This post was republished on 7/16.
Well, it lasted a just over a week, but The Lincoln Lawyer Season 2, Part 1, has just been unseated by a new show in Netflix’s top 10 list. While Part 2 is arriving on August 3, thanks to Netflix’s “fun” new habit of splitting seasons of every successful show in half, the first half people seem to be done with at this point, so it’s sliding down the list.
What’s replaced it? A rare non-fiction program. It’s a new series called Quarterbacks, which goes inside the life of various famous quarterbacks, Patrick Mahomes, Kirk Cousins and Marcus Mariota, detailing their lives both in and out of the NFL. I am pretty sure this is another attempt to replicate the “F1: Drive to Survive” formula of doing quasi-reality series of individual sports, given the ongoing success of that series. We already did this with Golf, and now we’re turning to the NFL. So far, it seems to be working.
The rest of the list is interesting. There’s a new show with the certainly eye-catching title of Survival of the Thickest, which is not a reality show about thick people competing against one another, it’s about a woman “finding happiness on her own terms.” People seem to be liking it. Every episode title ends with the word “bitch.”
New episodes of Sonic Prime land in the #4 spot, as that seems to be popular among kids. The rest of the list is a bunch of old list-toppers. Suits has hung on as The Witcher and Tom Segura have slipped below it. The Witcher is dropping pretty fast for what is supposed to be one of Netflix’s bigger shows, but everyone is pretty mad about it right now.
A new series called Hack my Home is at #9, a home makeover show that uses engineering to solve problems with space inside houses. It’s not about hacking SmartHomes like I thought it was. Finally, new episodes of the anime Record of Ragnarok are at #10.
As for the top series, I am guessing when The Lincoln Lawyer returns in August it will top the charts again, which is the whole point of why Netflix is doing this. I’ve said before that I still think this is worth than either a full binge model or a weekly release model, but they just keep doing it.
Quarterbacks feels like it’s something they’ll keep printing seasons of after this. It’s also now important to consider how much reality series are going to surge now that both writers and actors are on strike in Hollywood. We’ll see how that plays out on Netflix, where the list may eventually be nothing but reality series and old seasons of shows.
Update (7/15): The list has shifted once again, albeit not with a new #1 series, as Quarterbacks is still on top. Now, Survival of the Thickest has passed up The Lincoln Lawyer which is falling pretty quick now, #3 and dropping. There’s also a new season of Too Hot to Handle which just came out, which I’m going to say is at the bottom end of Netflix’s top 10 reality series.
Suits is holding strong at #5. The thing about getting a licensed show that’s pretty good with eight seasons is that people are going to spend a very, very long time watching it. So here we are. I’m not sure any Netflix shows even have eight seasons?
I will briefly veer into the movie territory to recommend something that has debuted in the #2 slot there, Bird Box Barcelona, which is indeed a sequel to one of Netflix’s most popular movies ever. It does not, however, star Sandra Bullock this time, and takes place in Spain and mostly in Spanish. Gotta hit those target markets. But believe it or not, it’s actually very good, and I say this knowing it flies in the face of critic and audience scores. I really liked what they did with the concept which I found much more interesting than the original version. So give it a shot.
Follow me on Twitter, Threads, YouTube, and Instagram. Subscribe to my free weekly content round-up newsletter, God Rolls.
Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.
Read the full article here
