I think the Game of Thrones ending plays a significant part as well. It really disappointed everyone and it was the Television phenomenon of the decade. It has left people in a state of reluctance towards investing their time and emotion into a multiple seasons long show, since the risk of it falling flat or failing miserably will always loom on the horizon.
The problem with game of thrones was it was based on a book series that was still being written and George R. R. Martin couldn’t write the books fast enough so around season 6 the show was ahead of the books and they delays while George R. R. Martin got the books out was getting to much for production so they chose to move forward without a book to based the season on and it was a big deal at the time for the show
@@kevin10001 the problem was that the showrunners just stopped giving a shit. They made show only content that was good before, but instead of just leaving the show to someone else after season 3/4 they continued. Sure having more source material certainly helps if you can just lift a scene directly from the book. But it doesn't just make the show shit suddenly as can be seen with how good house of the dragon is with basically no source material.
@@bookwu5133It wasn't that they stopped caring at all. Netflix came along and offered them a shit ton of money, and I mean a lot, to make several TV shows, and Disney also wanted them to make a new Star Wars movie. So the writers of GoT, made the choice to quickly wrap things up, so they can move on. If you look back to Season 6, behind the scenes, D&D were determined not to have a LOST problem, where the ending caused too many questions. You could tell back then, that they were going to keep things going. Then all of these money offers came through. Now no one would refuse a $250mil deal with Netflix to make new shows. Anyone would wrap things up fast. HBO should have intervened and hired new writers while the original ones left the project.
@@bookwu5133I totally agree. Its obvious D&D just wanted to finish the show as quickly as possible. George provided them with a basic outline of how it would all end and I don't think Season 8 was hated so much for the ending but more for the fact that how we got to that ending felt very rushed and undercooked not to mention all the idiotic dialogue and nonsensical plot points. Game of Thrones easily could have been spread out to a 10 season show with 10 episodes for each season and we could have had a more satisfying end to the story because how we get to that ending will have been set up well enough beforehand.
Atlanta, Barry, Better Call Saul, Peaky Blinders & Succession all ending within a year of each other has hit me hard Gonna miss these amazing shows but hopefully we’ll be getting some more amazing shows soon
I mean The Bear, Severance, The White Lotus, Blue Lights, I'm A Virgo are all already on their way to being my new favorites. There's still no shortage of great television coming out to replace the shows you mentioned. I agree that am really gonna miss Succession and Atlanta though.🥲
Got an alternative take on this. The term 'content' killed the creative world. As soon as art in TV, film and games (etc) got reduced to this very basic term people stopped caring because why would you? Content doesn't have a positive connotation it heavily implies that it's mindless dribble to consume and move onto the next one. It has given an easy out to companies to not strive for quality and instead just shovel 'content' towards the viewer.
Yeah Streaming Services should be called "Scrolling Services", because I spend more time scrolling than watching. For example they have this New Releases section and it's 30 shows / movies that I have no interest in watching. It's like dumping random stuff into a landfill.
Look at all the bad shows that were produced. Looking back it seems the people must have had severe brain damage. AND the Entertainment Industry has always been a place thst attracted highly narcicisstic people that have no real ideas. It's just that our time let them have their way.
I feel like the sense of burnout is real too. The sheer volume of shows being pumped and dumped on these services is unfathomable and frankly quite hard to keep up with. Excellent video and I look forward to more in the future!
the problem is not the volume of shows it's the idea that you have to keep up with them that plus the fact that the rating system on sites like netflix is completely broken
@@Dexiray That's not something that can ever be solved. Before Streaming things were exactly the same on Tv. The reason streaming won't ever go away and why TV shows are likely here to stay is that you can just simply customize your watch list on Netflix and similar sites.
I often see that people say Sopranos was the beginning of the recent "Golden Age", but I would argue that The X-Files actually started it, with each episode being like a mini-movie, with a movie like production.
@@zxcytdfxy256actually I'd say Homicide: Life on the Streets deserves that honor. A lot of the people that went on to work on Oz, The Sopranos, The Wire etc. worked on that show.
My golden age of TV included 24, prison break, breaking bad, x files, Las Vegas, csi, sopranos, the shield, dexter . Current day I'd say Atlanta, GOT, stranger things
@joewas2225 great show and one of my all time favs. Had 3 seasons on DVD but lost them in moving. Have got all in SD format on hard drive and thankfully they in fhd on Disney plus
Personally I think the golden age began in the 90s and it started with twin peaks. Probably one of the first auteur driven, serialized, high concept TV shows. Babylon 5 would be another perfect example. At this time you had high quality shows like that but you also had episode counts of 20+ unlike modern shows which seem to always have 10 or less per season now. If I had to pick an end point it would be after better call Saul ended. The last of the TV greats. Yeah the golden age was already over for most but bcs was so good it carried on the golden age as long as it was on air.
The reason the 80’s is considered a golden age, as I heard it from a TV scholar Robert Thompson who I was an assistant for in college, the late 70’s and early 80’s not only produced higher quality visuals and storytelling than the previous decades, but TV was also becoming more willing to tackle real life topics and situations more directly. As he saw it, the two most influential shows not only of the second age but also the entire TV history were All in the Family and Hill Street Blues specifically because of how they pushed more relevant stories to the forefront. So yeah, I’d say the 80’s range was a second golden age.
Wow! Thanks for commenting, this is super interesting and informative. I wonder what the debate is all about then. This debate was a reason I didn't dive into it too much in the video. Didn't want to open that can of worms 😅
Well, then the second Golden Age would have started in the 70's if you're including All in The Family. AITF ushered in more urban setting for sitcoms - mostly created by Norman Lear. But maybe they would consider AITF an anomaly and not include it as part of a Golden Age.
Don't forget that HBO's OZ started all this. airing 2 years before Sopranos, it brought to the table amazing actors, a long form story instead of episodic/semi episodic format, and more sex and violence than we had ever seen on the small screen. The shows that directly followed it, all got a push because OZ tried something new and pulled it off. It may not be exactly a great show (it's quite dated and gets worse with each season), but it did get us to the golden age.
@@waverlyking6045 and yet Oz was the breakthrough that people remember. The big prison show with the ongoing story, sickening brutality and quality actors. It's unfair to credit sopranos as the start of the golden age of TV, when Oz got the modern ball rolling.
You could even go back further and argue that Babylon 5, Deep Space Nine, and Buffy were the genesis of modern serialized television. Oz gets a ton of credit for pushing the boundaries though.
See, I don't think the number of great shows has decreased. Rather, what's decreased are shows that our society has collectively AGREED are great. Not everyone enjoyed Mad Men or The Office or Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones, but if you asked someone to name great TV shows from the 2000's/early 2010's, they're likely to mention those shows, because there's a cultural consensus that those programs were captial-"G" Great. But now, there are just SO MANY shows coming out all the time, it's much harder for any show to become a cultural juggernaut that everyone (even people who haven't seen it themselves) recognizes as Great Television. That doesn't mean there aren't still loads of great shows, but without any consensus on what the great ones are, FINDING those great shows becomes a matter of trawling through the available content, guided by personal recommendations and research, till you find one that clicks with you.
This is a really good point, I think this ties into the fact that streaming has somewhat killed the “experience” of watching a good TV show. Before, you had the whole country collectively watching a show at the same time, waiting for new episodes at the same time, and talking about those same episodes at the same time. Now that streaming has taken over, everyone watches everything at different times. Couple that with the sheer amount of new shows that exist now and you quickly find that most people will just gravitate to many different shows. I remember being desperate to watch a new episode the night it came out because I knew if I missed it, I’d have a hard time avoiding spoilers until the next rerun. Nowadays, people might wait weeks before binging a bunch of episodes of a show they like. It somewhat ruins the grandness of a good show and hinders any buzz around them, which sucks because there are still so many good shows out there like The Bear or Changeling, but they are rarely talked about even though I believe they’d have massive fandoms if they aired just a decade or two prior. I honestly find myself missing the artfully curated TV schedules more and more, but that could just be nostalgia talking
I feel this is also true of other cultural things as well like music and video games. There's just so much content for every niche now. Or maybe I'm just getting old and I don't know what the hottest stuff is anymore
This is very true. There are so many great tv shows from recent years. From the top of my head- Succession, Better Call Saul, Fleabag, Mr. Robot, Barry, The White Lotus, The Boys, Ted Lasso, Bojack Horseman, Atlanta, Peaky Blinders, The Bear and many I cant think of right now
@@crazychase98that because it Netflix’s eyes of your not a hit right out of the gate your not worth keeping around which isn’t right cause it takes some shows a while to find its audience but with Netflix when people finally find it due to lack of promotion it’s already over
Last TV Golden age is 2000-2020. We are currently in an artistic dark age with almost everything: Film, Music, TV, etc. Most art today is recycled, low quality, and uninspired.. which is why so many people are returning to older music, movies, and TV lately. Right now, old music is outselling new music. I don't know if that has ever happened before in history.
The part about old music outselling new music… are you just saying that because you kinda just feel like thats true or is there anything actually backing that up?
I disagree, there have been a lot of great shows since 2020 like The Lasso just to name one. Also there was more garbage shows. Also I can name lots of great films, shows, albums and games that have come out in the past 5 years
So why do some consider the Golden Age to have ended with Mad Men when GOT, Better Call Saul, and American Horror Story were still on while amazing shows like Succession, Barry and Atlanta hadn’t even started yet.
The golden age is usually associated with the age of the anti-hero, which became very popular following The Sopranos. It ended with Better Call Saul (Which i would argue is the next best series of this type after the Sopranos). We have not seen a great series of an anti-hero portrayed on the screen since then, and Sopranos initiated this narrative construction. Instead, we have moved to political TV, where minority oppression is explored, and white men are mocked (mostly the upper class). Atlanta is within the first dimension, while Succession fits within the latter.
With Barry, Succession, Snowfall, and Top Boy all ended this year, it kinda feels that way. But there will be new shows to take their place hopefully. I know The Bear has received a lot of praise, so I'm definitely gonna check that out
I would like to add Curb your enthusiasm too on the list of Great TV shows. Even though streaming was booming during the 2020 and 2021, Larry stil released only 10 episodes per season and season 10 was arguably the best CYE season. The show is always quality more than quantity
it’s hard to overstate how impact full 24 (playing out in real time) and Lost (a show wowing created on the fly with cliff hanger episode endings that changed the entire show) these 2 shows were. people complain about Lost because of the ending but the show was amazing at the time. without these 2, you wouldn’t have had things like Game of thrones and breaking bad
I don't see that connection; I would say Breaking Bad wouldn't exist without The Sopranos and Game of Thrones being a massive hit book series was going to eventually become a TV series or movie franchise and that has nothing to do with 24 or Lost.
What connection do you see between Lost and these other shows. Lost was an example of carny writing : create great premise and then don't worry if you can actually write any answers that aren't stupid. It was just a less intelligent version of X Files. Actual good shows require great writing which became apparent with the end of GOT.
There are always going to be shows and movies written by human beings with an artfulness that could never be replicated by technology. But for 90% of the crap that's churned out, if the studios were using AI to write it, could an audience even tell the difference?
Yeah, they could. AI is really noticeable and it just allows studios to take out every last kernel of creative talent. If we want films and shows to be better, we should advocate for writers and not try to help studios exploit them even more
@@officialmonarchmusic personally I think the whole argument is a load of nonsense in an age when anyone with talent can go direct to consumer. I could have busted my hump to get a job writing for Marvel Comics, but instead I made Spider-Man videos on RUclips and earned more money than any Marvel Comics writer has ever made in the same amount of time. As far as I'm concerned the studio's who wouldn't know creativity if it stung them in the butt, arguing with the same kinds of people who don't want to include Luke Skywalker in Star Wars because somehow that works as an ad campaign for what wonderful people they are, are like children bickering on a really really expensive playground. Either way, people seem to be less and less interested all the time in playing with their toys.
@@theseanwardshow Yeah, I mean, at least you are creating your work yourself. AI is being used by studios (who already are not creative) to hammer down on writers, which is why they went on strike in the first place
Just ask Chat GTP to write an episode of a show you like. Nope, short answer, it can't. There are several videos on RUclips that test Chat GPT's "writing skills". I have watched 70s tv shows. To me they are slow and boring and everything feels artificial. There is a thing called taste and Zeitgeist. And romantification bias, which every generation suffers from.
Streaming has ruined TV. Watching Lost an episode a week and everyone talkimh about it at work was the best thing about my jpb at the time. Now everyone watches media at a different pace and that kills the interactions you have with real people about your favorite shows
“Nostalgia hits hard when I think about the golden age of TV. Streaming platforms have changed the game, but the cultural phenomenon and residual impact of traditional cable TV are unmatched. Opting for cable was like diving into the heart of American culture. Who else found themselves captivated by the charm of cable TV back then?”
If you haven’t, I encourage all of you to watch the sopranos. Never thought with hour long episodes and basically 8 full seasons, I would ever have the commitment, but by God i had to see it all. It’s a great show and will leave you speechless at times. It wasn’t what it was without reason, but unfortunately my age group (I watched it freshman year, 2020) seems not to have picked it up like we have breaking bad.
The last golden age ended in the 2000's. The 90's - 00's was the best TV. For example, Star Trek the Next Generation, Deep Space 9, Warehouse 13, Fringe, Tin Man, Firefly, Babylon 5, Buffy, Eureka, Farscape, Legend of the Seeker, The West Wing, Battlestar Galactica, Sanctuary are all great shows I’ve watched many times. Very little of what's been made since is even tolerable.
I agree with you. Its the same in Animation. Im an illustrator myself in Singapore. One of my art mentor was the animator for 80-90s Amazing Spiderman and X-men. My mentor wasa Pinoy animator. In those days to animate spiderman to shot his web to swing from one building to another require 50-60 drawing and hours of clean up work. My mentor said.. animators and writer dont have enough time to generate quality artworks and scripts like in the 80-90s. Investors are too spolit by the speed of computers and now AI made things worse. Now Japan cant find an animator like Hayao Miyazaki. Japan anime nowadays have detailed background but flat illustrated character and lacks the fluidity like their predecussers like Hayao Miyazaki's. Hayao Miyazaki's animation so detailed to the exact the flow of the character's hair, movement of clothes fold and etc all animated AT ONCE while the character is speaking! He also said the spoilt on digital animation and AI kills the industry. Look at 40-60s looney tunes shorts by Chuck Jones that has the luxury of time to hand drawn paper by paper and those conveniently digitally animated ones thats of today. I agree with you.. as an scientific/ wildlife/ character artist myself. I always put traditional hand drawn style FIRST, digital as support. I never touch AI. Investors always hope to earn money fast just for one season of the series regardless its live action or animated. But the crude reality... Writers need time. Artists need time. Animators need time. Editors need time. Of course everything within a reasonable, understandable, do-able deadline. Its like you go to a high class restaurant and give a timer to the chef, expecting your meal to be out in GIVEN time. Then prepare to experience a SHITTY MEAL.
Really hoping we get a great resurgence soon after the strikes come to an agreeement since we’ve been getting little gems here and there (The Bear, Barry, Atlanta, The Boys). Would love to see more passion projects rather than cash grabs. Another great video from you!
I think there is a lot more competition with so many streaming services that it is hard to have a mega hit TV show that everyone is talking about. For example, I can't can't talk about the latest episode of Foundation with my family because none of them have Apple TV. This leads to a lot of shows that are formulaic to minimize the risk and get predictable results, just like the music industry. However, also just like the music industry, there is still some good stuff out there but you have to dig through a lot of trash to find it.
There's a plenty of amazing shows that just ended their run that either started in or started from influence of the same decade for the Golden age such as Better Call Saul and Barry. I think if the Golden age is truly over then it would be essentially now, the early 2020s, but I think it's too early to say. Disney+ is certainly muddying the waters with their series getting more and more mediocre.
The golden age ended when non creative productions started to dominate the industry. 2018 was the start of the decline and now we can all see the decline. Succession was probably the last great show. Billion started out amazingly but declined into nonsense.
The golden age is usually associated with the age of the anti-hero, which became very popular following The Sopranos. It ended with Better Call Saul (Which i would argue is the next best series of this type after the Sopranos). We have not seen a great series of an anti-hero portrayed on the screen since then, and Sopranos initiated this narrative construction. Instead, we have moved to political TV, where minority lives are explored, (whether it is women or non-whites) and white men are mocked (mostly the upper class). Atlanta is within the first dimension, while Succession fits within the latter.
@@Art-is-craft Disagree, there's been a lot of great shows since. Poker Face, The Last of us, Ted Lasso, Yellowjackets, You, The Legend of Vox Machina. The Bear. The Mandalorian. Swarm, Succession
@@cartoonfanatic I have not seen some of the shows you listed but of those that I have seen they are not on par with succession. Are they good shows yes but not great shows. Succession will be remembered in 15 years time whereas Yellow jacks will not.
I'd say we're in the golden age of retro TV. A time where people are rewatching their favorite shows and sharing with their kids and discovering new ones from the past few decades that eluded them. For me there are so many shows that I'm now finally getting around to watching. I was preoccupied watching Nickelodeon and the Disney channel. I missed out on watching along with the viewers shows like Malcolm in the middle, breaking bad, how I met your mother, the office, ugly Betty, psych, and Chuck.
Hell no we have so many masterpieces still airing / in production: Invincible, Severance, Cobra Kai, House of the Dragon, Last of Us, Andor, The Boys, What We Do in the Shadows, Attack on Titan, Arcane, Always Sunny, Vinland Saga, Primal and I know I'm forgetting some
Quality of the writing has plummeted this is for sure, especially in the syfy and fantasy genres. Also PC and activism all too often reigns supreme. As for 1899, I really liked it but.. I think it was a good thing it ended after a single season, I fear a 2nd season would I guess ruin it for lack of a better term. Much like how I felt about Westworld and also Altered Carbon, AMAZING first seasons, but the 'sequels' spoiled the whole story, at least that's my opinion.
OZ and The Shield are two from a little while back were great. Boardwalk Empire, Rescue Me, Six Feet Under, and The Wire were other favorites from a few years ago too
Weren't people talking about how the golden age was the 50's for TV... then the 60's.. then the 70's... then the 80's... then the 90's... then the 00's.... ?
Spot on about the hesitancy to invest time in a show that you are pretty sure will be cancelled by the end of the first season. From a business model perspective it was never sustainable once you eliminated the long term contracts and let people drop in and out fairly easily. It appears we are headed towards a consolidation phase (HBOmax + discoveryplus, etc...) which may allow them to spread the costs for critically acclaimed but maybe not very profitable shows across more streaming viewers. It'll probably take a few years to shake it all out, but i've got a sneaky suspicion that the old model (cable channel packages) may become the new model (Freevee, Pluto, etc...) with ads back in the picture.
Yup, streaming studios have shifted priorities from making good art, taking the time to produce quality to rushing out content. People slam the writers for the drastic drop in quality but it’s not their fault. They don’t have time to write good quality material, or even us crew time to make it. It’s become all about quick turnaround of deliverables. How fast can we pump out the next thing? Remember when there were YEARS between seasons of GOT? They took their time? I’ve worked on Netflix shows that shot 3 seasons all within one year and released one year apart. It was an insane schedule and does not produce a quality show.
I’d say the future of TV shows highly depends on when and if the streaming bubble will burst. That will unavoidably have a devastating impact on budgets. But, from a creative point of view there is no reason to be afraid jet. Just look what came up the last 3-4 years: Mandalorian, Severence, House of Dragon, Loki, One Peace, The boys (and it’s offshoot Gen V), Mythic Quest… and don’t forget that many shows like the office, community, parks and rec or even Dexter to an extend, found a large audience many years after it’s release, so who knows what we are missing right now.
It ended. It's not the golden age anymore if every shows that I enjoyed keep getting cancelled just as I finished watching. This is like right before the video game crash, you got every studios pumping out low quality contents to fill their libraries
The 90’s were definitely another golden age of television that wasn’t mentioned here, at least for the comedy genre. That decade brought us the Simpsons, Seinfeld, Friends, Frasier, King of the Hill, South Park and Family Guy just to name a few. Shows that would reshape the industry and are still widely watched today.
i think the problem with tv right now is that this streaming/digital experiment (that started the moment. It was possible to torrent the TV show in a reasonable amount of time) has left us with the system that doesn’t have many answers on how to distribute high quality content and pay people fairly. this is why people are returning to the US cable model with a fee and adverts. And I think you’re right, we’re in for several years of cheap boring TV that can be broken up into lots of different bits so plenty of adverts can be packed around it; cheap trash basically
If you're looking for something relatively recent and refreshing, I highly recommend the Australian dark comedy crime drama, Mr. Inbetween. You won't be disappointed.
Blaming streaming for churning out content seems a bit disingenuous since that’s exactly how network tv operates. Literally have pilot season and whatever sticks with focus groups etc gets picked up and run with. Also writers ‘having less time to write’ and having pressure to produce when now most shows are 10ish episodes and previously were 20+ per season doesn’t seem to track
I was pissed when Netflix canceled Archive 81. Also pissed when HBO didn’t renew “Lovecraft country.” Neither got a second season…this is getting out of hand.
The golden age is over, the future may be an opportunity for more import films and shows. Squid game and even the One Piece live action got people talking maybe it’s the East’s time to shine ✨
I would love it if there is more focus on animated, non-comedic cartoons in the mainstream consciousness. Arcane and Invincible are great examples of this, and I feel that shows like those deserve more time in the spotlight.
I would have to call it a "dark age of mass media" overall. there are some good things on, but ultimately, the market for high-budget entertainment is completely disrupted by social media content and the like. the change from quality to quantity has a hidden benefit - with such a high volume of personal youtube content, there is a greater likelihood of you being able to find a freelance creator who can make something that is really interesting
Excellent commentary. I would say that we are in the Iron Age of Television. I know that's now the official designation, but I would say the early day of tv are the golden age, the late sixties to 1980 is the silver age, 1980's to 99' is the bronze. And we are in the waning moments of the Iron age, just like in civilization, they say we are still in the Iron age after the start of the industrial era. Technology brought on this in television as it did in the greater civilization.
Quantity over Quality of course! There's way too much content, scripted content, for us to catch up, but most is just OK or plain bad. Still, in a flood of streaming shows there are plenty of good quality TV shows, especially on HBO: "Succesion" and "House of the dragon" amazing TV shows. And others like "Westworld', "The Guilded Age" or "The White Lotus" are pretty damn good. HBO has ruled the Golden Age of TV either on cable or now on streaming. Hope the Warner/HBO executives keep priorizing quality TV. One thing I miss much is the thrill of having to wait a week to see the follow up to a cliffhanger episode end. Binge-watching killed that excitement
If we could somehow shift to a society that looks at not just direct profit, but also social and environmental impact I think that would be the ticket. Even then people may still disagree about what is a good social or environmental impact, of course
The boys and it’s spin off Gen V firmly belong in the golden age of TV, incredible writing, great acting and a level of graphic scenes which sometimes make GOT look tame 🤯
If found myself watching tv more often in the past months because I literally spend ages looking for something to watch on a streaming service, then you have the problem of not giving shows a chance because you can change it to anything you literally want. With the tv channels, it’s different, it’s like this show is on now do you want to watch it or not, not later now…..
I cannot agree with the title question. Some of the shows you mention in 5:29 are 15, 20 years apart. However, "Chernobyl", "The last of us", "House of the Dragon", "Severance", "The Mandalorian", "Dopesick", "Ted Lasso" are all TV shows that only came within 4 years of each other, and are all stellar. And all that despite the fact that we had a once in a lifetime extreme situation: A pandemic that forced airplanes to stay on the ground for more than a whole year, and no filming on set (or none at all) for a long time. And right now we have a strike going on. All those problems have never existed on the same scale between the early 2000s and now (or ever). And for ALL those of you that this list still is not long enough, I have ONE show for you from the golden age that I'm sure most of you never watched, and you'll ABSOLUTELY love it: "The Shield"! If I was running a RUclips channel I would counter this video by stating that this is proof that many THINK the golden age is over because there is so MUCH more trash being released today. It takes longer to find the gems. But they're still there, and they're plenty.
If HBO doesn’t keep things going I see Apple TV taking over the mantle. With shows like Severance, Silo, Ted Lasso, and the Morning Show they’re on a great path.
My Top 5 TV shows of ALL TIME: (No particular order) 24 Breaking Bad Squid Game The Munsters (far before my time) Hotel Del Luna Honerable Mention: The Sopranos (have seen the majority but not all) The only good shows nowadays are foreign TV shows. So to answer your question. Yes. The Golden Age is gone.
Your points are great counters to Patrick H Willem's "Who Killed Cinema?" video. The reason films like Rain Man or Kramer versus Kramer are not dominating the box office is that TV has become those films. If Forest Gump, City of Angels, or Scarface were made nowadays, they would be TV.
RUclips videos like these have to stop, of course we still have fantastic innovative television that are critically acclaimed, with die-hard fan bases. There are just so many. Guaranteed without watching I know less than half the author is gonna even mention. Atlanta, Queens Gambit, Bojack Horseman, Arcane, Invincible, Squid Game, Stranger Things, Pantheon, Wednesday, Beef, Ted Lasso, Severence, The Good Place, The Crown, The Mandalorian, Russian doll, I May Destroy You, What We Do in the Shadows, Mare of Easttown. All of these have tons of breakdowns of why they are considered some of the best. Here is why it's a golden age, I can tell you a majority of the great shows he has on there without watching, we all can. Definitely Sopranos, the Office, Breaking Bad, and Seinfeld guaranteed. Maybe community, freaks, and geeks, always sunny, arrested development for nerd credit. Why am I so sure? because it was literally that's everyone's list, everyone watched them. Compared to now, where I guarantee I'm probably missing your current favorite show, there are just way too many great shows for two people to have even similar favorite lists. There are two things that the internet believes at large that are just wrong. One Insightful criticism isn't saying everything in the past is better than it is now. Literally saw a video the other day of why people in the past were more attractive and intelligent than people today. You'll always get clicks and likes. But anyone who isn't easily manipulated is going to be insulted... we know what you're doing politics always do it. Second, the internet is convinced If they don't like it, regardless of other people's opinion, it's bad and they like it because they are stupid, if they do like it, it's because of its perceived brilliance, and higher quality. If you don't like something that you know is bad, that's just a lack of self-awareness. So the opposite is true too, you don't have to like a show for it to still be good. So when you make a video like this, you have to at least try to make it objectively with facts and figures, what people are saying about their past favorite shows, compared to todays, based on critical reception, popularity, and any number of criteria.
Big companies now do AI assisted market research into what sells next year. That's just one example - the philosophy is making rules for what works and what doesn't and much less people recognizing quality and taking a bet on people recognizing it as well. Issue is, they then end up with the lowest common denominator. Someone taking a chance as well as the long tail of offbeat stuff that nobody watched for a while until it turned into a classic - you won't get that passed the people making decisions
Also doesn’t help that with reduced episode counts and smaller writer’s rooms, newer writers don’t have the opportunity to pick up necessary showrunning skills-whether by spending down time on set or by shadowing experienced showrunners
1899 should have been a Titanic with time traveling. Instead, it was a video game. Tension and conflict was flat because it was just a video game rather than a real world. Season 1 should have started with the space traveling scene.
Hell where at rock bottom right now tbh for every one good show we get 10 bad shows but I think that due to how bad we are doing it can only get better from here and in the next ten years maybe we’ll start getting quality tv back on the screens
IMO no we arent. There are still some quality shows being made but the problem with on the demand/streaming model is that providers need an endless supply of new content to keep people subscribed. There is a noticeable shift to quantity over quality and most content now is filler at best. I also think that instant access kills interest/hype around shows. The “water cooler” chat about shows and waiting a week to see the next episode played a huge part in building hype and maintaining interest. If you watch an entire series on the day of launch there is not time to digest it its straight on to next content without ever appreciating it. My 2cents anyway
If you take the 3 golden ages into account TV might as well always been peak or golden. There's like what, 20 years where it wasn't if you take the 50s, 80s/90s, 2000s as golden ages
The answer is yes, since the previous five golden ages of television are now officially over, we are about to enter the next golden age of television, since apparently almost every age of television is a golden one, e.g., the 50s, 80s, 90s, 00s, 10s, etc.
You are right, there was not a hard end date, it fizzled out, somewhere between 2010 and 2015 I would say. I would say movies went bad somewhere between 2005 and 2007. It was then that I switched my movie obsession to TV series.
You didn't mention my favorite shows (other than Rick and Morty): The Boys, Umbrella Academy, South Park, Curb your enthusiasm, Wilfred and underappreciated Futureman.
I genuinely find creator made content on places RUclips far more compelling these days. Network stuff tends to feel designed by committee and pandering. A lot of creators produce very high quality (in some cases like true crime, documentaries, comedy etc. I'd argue a superior product). But even a person with a laptop spudcam can often produce good stuff if it's genuine. I don't really feel the need to watch not very good actors reading a not very good script.
The 80s and 90s had a golden age but putting that aside, it's over and you can see a pretty big decline. There're great shows out there but there's even more sh@t.
For me, the Golden Age of Television we recently experienced began with the first episode of The Sopranos and ended with the final episode of Better Call Saul. Imagine that…it all began in a psychiatrist’s office…and ended in a prison.
The future of TV is the past, I think. More modestly-budgeted series with more episodes per year. You have to remember shows like The Twilight Zone was doing an average of 31 episodes a *year* for five years. With more than half the episodes being written by showrunner Rod Serling. Never a hit, the show famously got cancelled at the end of every season and then getting last-minute reprieves at some point over the summer. The same is true of Star Trek, which did 26 episodes a year, and got cancelled at the end of every season. And then you’ve got “Cheers,” a huge hit that didn’t really find its audience until around the end of its second season (25 episodes a year, BTW), but the network believed in it and was willing to give it time for people to discover it. And in fact at the outset Neflix used to sign shows for two 13-episode seasons up front, with an option of a more if the ratings are good because they understood it took a while to find an audience, too. Now they don’t care. A lot of zoomers call that level of production ‘filler’ and, yeah, some of it is, but even filler episodes usually have something good in them somewhere. And that many episodes mean you get to know the characters much better, and get much more attached to them, than you do with a 6 or 7 episode streaming season every 18 months or so. So I think what’s gonna have to happen is that things will go back to 13-20 episode seasons as per the 2010s on cable, with a somewhat more modest budget spaced out to allow for 3 blowout episodes a year. I feel like that’s the minimum sustainable level for a show. Less than that, and there’s too few episodes to really make a connection with, more than that and people will just lose patience as per the last few years of the CW shows.
hey man cool video. I think AI is the result of writers doing the same thing over and over for the last few years. generic to the bone, well the word generic basically implies AI. writers like Charlie Kaufman could never be copied by AI, because he is forward thinking, and I think we might see a comeback of the auteur, when generic shows separate themselves more clearly from WTF!?-shows since originality becomes a big value again.
Thanks! Yeah creativity is what’s holding AI back. And I don’t see it improving in this aspect anytime time in the near future. AI helping writers will be huge, but the actual writer will need to drive AI to achieve something original
I think the Game of Thrones ending plays a significant part as well. It really disappointed everyone and it was the Television phenomenon of the decade. It has left people in a state of reluctance towards investing their time and emotion into a multiple seasons long show, since the risk of it falling flat or failing miserably will always loom on the horizon.
The problem with game of thrones was it was based on a book series that was still being written and George R. R. Martin couldn’t write the books fast enough so around season 6 the show was ahead of the books and they delays while George R. R. Martin got the books out was getting to much for production so they chose to move forward without a book to based the season on and it was a big deal at the time for the show
@@kevin10001 the problem was that the showrunners just stopped giving a shit. They made show only content that was good before, but instead of just leaving the show to someone else after season 3/4 they continued. Sure having more source material certainly helps if you can just lift a scene directly from the book. But it doesn't just make the show shit suddenly as can be seen with how good house of the dragon is with basically no source material.
@@bookwu5133It wasn't that they stopped caring at all. Netflix came along and offered them a shit ton of money, and I mean a lot, to make several TV shows, and Disney also wanted them to make a new Star Wars movie. So the writers of GoT, made the choice to quickly wrap things up, so they can move on.
If you look back to Season 6, behind the scenes, D&D were determined not to have a LOST problem, where the ending caused too many questions. You could tell back then, that they were going to keep things going. Then all of these money offers came through. Now no one would refuse a $250mil deal with Netflix to make new shows. Anyone would wrap things up fast. HBO should have intervened and hired new writers while the original ones left the project.
Mr robots ending was amazing though and it came out the aame year
@@bookwu5133I totally agree. Its obvious D&D just wanted to finish the show as quickly as possible. George provided them with a basic outline of how it would all end and I don't think Season 8 was hated so much for the ending but more for the fact that how we got to that ending felt very rushed and undercooked not to mention all the idiotic dialogue and nonsensical plot points. Game of Thrones easily could have been spread out to a 10 season show with 10 episodes for each season and we could have had a more satisfying end to the story because how we get to that ending will have been set up well enough beforehand.
Atlanta, Barry, Better Call Saul, Peaky Blinders & Succession all ending within a year of each other has hit me hard
Gonna miss these amazing shows but hopefully we’ll be getting some more amazing shows soon
Fingers crossed! 🤞
I mean The Bear, Severance, The White Lotus, Blue Lights, I'm A Virgo are all already on their way to being my new favorites. There's still no shortage of great television coming out to replace the shows you mentioned.
I agree that am really gonna miss Succession and Atlanta though.🥲
@@graysonmcguire3510All of those are ass, comparatively
The Bear my brother, that’s IT.
The current industry is dominated by non creative people. The industry is now in decline and may take 15 years to recover.
Got an alternative take on this. The term 'content' killed the creative world. As soon as art in TV, film and games (etc) got reduced to this very basic term people stopped caring because why would you? Content doesn't have a positive connotation it heavily implies that it's mindless dribble to consume and move onto the next one. It has given an easy out to companies to not strive for quality and instead just shovel 'content' towards the viewer.
Seems like, at one point, it was about ideas. Now, yeah, just content. Even for the purpose of hate-watching.
perfect explanation
Yeah Streaming Services should be called "Scrolling Services", because I spend more time scrolling than watching. For example they have this New Releases section and it's 30 shows / movies that I have no interest in watching. It's like dumping random stuff into a landfill.
Looking at modern art:
It's nothing more than money laundring for rich people.
Look at all the bad shows that were produced.
Looking back it seems the people must have had severe brain damage.
AND the Entertainment Industry has always been a place thst attracted highly narcicisstic people that have no real ideas.
It's just that our time let them have their way.
I feel like the sense of burnout is real too. The sheer volume of shows being pumped and dumped on these services is unfathomable and frankly quite hard to keep up with. Excellent video and I look forward to more in the future!
Lol you don’t remember this happening on tv as well? Guess your cable box must’ve been broken
This. The amount of new shows is outstanding but the amount of shows I'm interested in is close to none in those new shows.
@@mcgritty8842I was too young to really experience that. Seems like hell though
the problem is not the volume of shows
it's the idea that you have to keep up with them
that plus the fact that the rating system on sites like netflix is completely broken
@@Dexiray That's not something that can ever be solved. Before Streaming things were exactly the same on Tv. The reason streaming won't ever go away and why TV shows are likely here to stay is that you can just simply customize your watch list on Netflix and similar sites.
I often see that people say Sopranos was the beginning of the recent "Golden Age", but I would argue that The X-Files actually started it, with each episode being like a mini-movie, with a movie like production.
It also knocked down the doors on ideas when network TV timidly rang the doorbell.
If we are talking about dramas, I would say ER and NYPD Blue started it.
I'd argue that twin peaks was the beginning
no, OZ did
@@zxcytdfxy256actually I'd say Homicide: Life on the Streets deserves that honor. A lot of the people that went on to work on Oz, The Sopranos, The Wire etc. worked on that show.
My golden age of TV included 24, prison break, breaking bad, x files, Las Vegas, csi, sopranos, the shield, dexter . Current day I'd say Atlanta, GOT, stranger things
Another 24 fan 😁👍 I love that show. Have all the seasons on DVD.
@joewas2225 great show and one of my all time favs. Had 3 seasons on DVD but lost them in moving. Have got all in SD format on hard drive and thankfully they in fhd on Disney plus
Personally I think the golden age began in the 90s and it started with twin peaks. Probably one of the first auteur driven, serialized, high concept TV shows. Babylon 5 would be another perfect example. At this time you had high quality shows like that but you also had episode counts of 20+ unlike modern shows which seem to always have 10 or less per season now.
If I had to pick an end point it would be after better call Saul ended. The last of the TV greats. Yeah the golden age was already over for most but bcs was so good it carried on the golden age as long as it was on air.
Frasier is coming back
It started in the 1990s but it was a renaissance of the first golden era of 1960s to mid 1970s.
I say it ended with Succession
@@agi238 you might be right
@@agi238
I think the decline started earlier and succession was the last great show.
The reason the 80’s is considered a golden age, as I heard it from a TV scholar Robert Thompson who I was an assistant for in college, the late 70’s and early 80’s not only produced higher quality visuals and storytelling than the previous decades, but TV was also becoming more willing to tackle real life topics and situations more directly. As he saw it, the two most influential shows not only of the second age but also the entire TV history were All in the Family and Hill Street Blues specifically because of how they pushed more relevant stories to the forefront. So yeah, I’d say the 80’s range was a second golden age.
Wow! Thanks for commenting, this is super interesting and informative. I wonder what the debate is all about then. This debate was a reason I didn't dive into it too much in the video. Didn't want to open that can of worms 😅
@JustinZarian thank you! I'll check the book out for sure. Thank you for the offer as well, maybe we'll take you up on if some day 😊
@@FilmStack Sounds good! My wife and I have enjoyed your channel’s output so far, so keep up the great work!
@JustinZarian Thank you! That means a lot 😊
Well, then the second Golden Age would have started in the 70's if you're including All in The Family. AITF ushered in more urban setting for sitcoms - mostly created by Norman Lear. But maybe they would consider AITF an anomaly and not include it as part of a Golden Age.
Don't forget that HBO's OZ started all this. airing 2 years before Sopranos, it brought to the table amazing actors, a long form story instead of episodic/semi episodic format, and more sex and violence than we had ever seen on the small screen. The shows that directly followed it, all got a push because OZ tried something new and pulled it off. It may not be exactly a great show (it's quite dated and gets worse with each season), but it did get us to the golden age.
hehe no
Before then, HBO had lots of shows that walked so Oz could run . Shows like Tales from the Crypt, 1st and Ten, Dream On, The Hitchhiker, etc.
@@waverlyking6045 and yet Oz was the breakthrough that people remember. The big prison show with the ongoing story, sickening brutality and quality actors. It's unfair to credit sopranos as the start of the golden age of TV, when Oz got the modern ball rolling.
I won’t argue anyone who says Sopranos was the better show but Oz was an absolute game changer.
You could even go back further and argue that Babylon 5, Deep Space Nine, and Buffy were the genesis of modern serialized television. Oz gets a ton of credit for pushing the boundaries though.
See, I don't think the number of great shows has decreased. Rather, what's decreased are shows that our society has collectively AGREED are great.
Not everyone enjoyed Mad Men or The Office or Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones, but if you asked someone to name great TV shows from the 2000's/early 2010's, they're likely to mention those shows, because there's a cultural consensus that those programs were captial-"G" Great.
But now, there are just SO MANY shows coming out all the time, it's much harder for any show to become a cultural juggernaut that everyone (even people who haven't seen it themselves) recognizes as Great Television.
That doesn't mean there aren't still loads of great shows, but without any consensus on what the great ones are, FINDING those great shows becomes a matter of trawling through the available content, guided by personal recommendations and research, till you find one that clicks with you.
@conor5148facts
This is a really good point, I think this ties into the fact that streaming has somewhat killed the “experience” of watching a good TV show. Before, you had the whole country collectively watching a show at the same time, waiting for new episodes at the same time, and talking about those same episodes at the same time. Now that streaming has taken over, everyone watches everything at different times. Couple that with the sheer amount of new shows that exist now and you quickly find that most people will just gravitate to many different shows.
I remember being desperate to watch a new episode the night it came out because I knew if I missed it, I’d have a hard time avoiding spoilers until the next rerun. Nowadays, people might wait weeks before binging a bunch of episodes of a show they like. It somewhat ruins the grandness of a good show and hinders any buzz around them, which sucks because there are still so many good shows out there like The Bear or Changeling, but they are rarely talked about even though I believe they’d have massive fandoms if they aired just a decade or two prior.
I honestly find myself missing the artfully curated TV schedules more and more, but that could just be nostalgia talking
I feel this is also true of other cultural things as well like music and video games. There's just so much content for every niche now. Or maybe I'm just getting old and I don't know what the hottest stuff is anymore
@conor5148true detective is coming again
This is very true. There are so many great tv shows from recent years. From the top of my head- Succession, Better Call Saul, Fleabag, Mr. Robot, Barry, The White Lotus, The Boys, Ted Lasso, Bojack Horseman, Atlanta, Peaky Blinders, The Bear and many I cant think of right now
More bad shows does not mean less good shows, just less viewers which means less cultural impact
Bad shows suck the money from good ones look at any good Netflix show that started in 2017 or later no more then one or 2 seasons due to money issues
@@crazychase98that because it Netflix’s eyes of your not a hit right out of the gate your not worth keeping around which isn’t right cause it takes some shows a while to find its audience but with Netflix when people finally find it due to lack of promotion it’s already over
Last TV Golden age is 2000-2020. We are currently in an artistic dark age with almost everything: Film, Music, TV, etc. Most art today is recycled, low quality, and uninspired.. which is why so many people are returning to older music, movies, and TV lately. Right now, old music is outselling new music. I don't know if that has ever happened before in history.
So true. Almost everything with big money behind it is un-creative uninspired trash. And endless unnecessary remakes and sequels
The part about old music outselling new music… are you just saying that because you kinda just feel like thats true or is there anything actually backing that up?
@@Zezezeze69 In the time it took to ask me, you could have Googled it yourself.
I disagree, there have been a lot of great shows since 2020 like The Lasso just to name one. Also there was more garbage shows. Also I can name lots of great films, shows, albums and games that have come out in the past 5 years
@@bradysmith4405 That's been the case for the last 15-20 years and even then there's been lots of great stuff in the past 5 years
So why do some consider the Golden Age to have ended with Mad Men when GOT, Better Call Saul, and American Horror Story were still on while amazing shows like Succession, Barry and Atlanta hadn’t even started yet.
And season 5 of fargo starts next month
The golden age is usually associated with the age of the anti-hero, which became very popular following The Sopranos. It ended with Better Call Saul (Which i would argue is the next best series of this type after the Sopranos). We have not seen a great series of an anti-hero portrayed on the screen since then, and Sopranos initiated this narrative construction. Instead, we have moved to political TV, where minority oppression is explored, and white men are mocked (mostly the upper class). Atlanta is within the first dimension, while Succession fits within the latter.
Fr and mr robot
With Barry, Succession, Snowfall, and Top Boy all ended this year, it kinda feels that way. But there will be new shows to take their place hopefully. I know The Bear has received a lot of praise, so I'm definitely gonna check that out
It's the only show I know of that is really that golden age quality. It's fantastic.
I would like to add Curb your enthusiasm too on the list of Great TV shows. Even though streaming was booming during the 2020 and 2021, Larry stil released only 10 episodes per season and season 10 was arguably the best CYE season. The show is always quality more than quantity
Every Netflix show has 9 episodes max in one season
FTX Larry's latest Curb season featured one of the most atrocious and wooden cameos I've ever witnessed on television.
it’s hard to overstate how impact full 24 (playing out in real time) and Lost (a show wowing created on the fly with cliff hanger episode endings that changed the entire show) these 2 shows were. people complain about Lost because of the ending but the show was amazing at the time. without these 2, you wouldn’t have had things like Game of thrones and breaking bad
the people i lived with and i watched Lost season 2 in a single sitting. i think it was 16+ hours (before streaming in like 2005)
I don't see that connection; I would say Breaking Bad wouldn't exist without The Sopranos and Game of Thrones being a massive hit book series was going to eventually become a TV series or movie franchise and that has nothing to do with 24 or Lost.
What connection do you see between Lost and these other shows. Lost was an example of carny writing : create great premise and then don't worry if you can actually write any answers that aren't stupid. It was just a less intelligent version of X Files. Actual good shows require great writing which became apparent with the end of GOT.
24 was crap TV
I never bought into the hype of either of these shows, but especially not Lost. Fuckin trash writing and characters
There are always going to be shows and movies written by human beings with an artfulness that could never be replicated by technology. But for 90% of the crap that's churned out, if the studios were using AI to write it, could an audience even tell the difference?
In the 1970s the industry was dominated by creative talent.
Yeah, they could. AI is really noticeable and it just allows studios to take out every last kernel of creative talent. If we want films and shows to be better, we should advocate for writers and not try to help studios exploit them even more
@@officialmonarchmusic personally I think the whole argument is a load of nonsense in an age when anyone with talent can go direct to consumer. I could have busted my hump to get a job writing for Marvel Comics, but instead I made Spider-Man videos on RUclips and earned more money than any Marvel Comics writer has ever made in the same amount of time. As far as I'm concerned the studio's who wouldn't know creativity if it stung them in the butt, arguing with the same kinds of people who don't want to include Luke Skywalker in Star Wars because somehow that works as an ad campaign for what wonderful people they are, are like children bickering on a really really expensive playground. Either way, people seem to be less and less interested all the time in playing with their toys.
@@theseanwardshow Yeah, I mean, at least you are creating your work yourself. AI is being used by studios (who already are not creative) to hammer down on writers, which is why they went on strike in the first place
Just ask Chat GTP to write an episode of a show you like.
Nope, short answer, it can't.
There are several videos on RUclips that test Chat GPT's "writing skills".
I have watched 70s tv shows.
To me they are slow and boring and everything feels artificial. There is a thing called taste and Zeitgeist.
And romantification bias, which every generation suffers from.
Streaming has ruined TV. Watching Lost an episode a week and everyone talkimh about it at work was the best thing about my jpb at the time. Now everyone watches media at a different pace and that kills the interactions you have with real people about your favorite shows
“Nostalgia hits hard when I think about the golden age of TV. Streaming platforms have changed the game, but the cultural phenomenon and residual impact of traditional cable TV are unmatched. Opting for cable was like diving into the heart of American culture. Who else found themselves captivated by the charm of cable TV back then?”
If you haven’t, I encourage all of you to watch the sopranos. Never thought with hour long episodes and basically 8 full seasons, I would ever have the commitment, but by God i had to see it all. It’s a great show and will leave you speechless at times. It wasn’t what it was without reason, but unfortunately my age group (I watched it freshman year, 2020) seems not to have picked it up like we have breaking bad.
The sopranos has six seasons im pretty sure
Your generation didn't pick up Breaking Bad neither though because they were in elementary school when it came out lol.
The last golden age ended in the 2000's. The 90's - 00's was the best TV. For example, Star Trek the Next Generation, Deep Space 9, Warehouse 13, Fringe, Tin Man, Firefly, Babylon 5, Buffy, Eureka, Farscape, Legend of the Seeker, The West Wing, Battlestar Galactica, Sanctuary are all great shows I’ve watched many times. Very little of what's been made since is even tolerable.
I agree with you. Its the same in Animation. Im an illustrator myself in Singapore. One of my art mentor was the animator for 80-90s Amazing Spiderman and X-men. My mentor wasa Pinoy animator. In those days to animate spiderman to shot his web to swing from one building to another require 50-60 drawing and hours of clean up work. My mentor said.. animators and writer dont have enough time to generate quality artworks and scripts like in the 80-90s. Investors are too spolit by the speed of computers and now AI made things worse.
Now Japan cant find an animator like Hayao Miyazaki. Japan anime nowadays have detailed background but flat illustrated character and lacks the fluidity like their predecussers like Hayao Miyazaki's. Hayao Miyazaki's animation so detailed to the exact the flow of the character's hair, movement of clothes fold and etc all animated AT ONCE while the character is speaking!
He also said the spoilt on digital animation and AI kills the industry.
Look at 40-60s looney tunes shorts by Chuck Jones that has the luxury of time to hand drawn paper by paper and those conveniently digitally animated ones thats of today.
I agree with you.. as an scientific/ wildlife/ character artist myself. I always put traditional hand drawn style FIRST, digital as support. I never touch AI.
Investors always hope to earn money fast just for one season of the series regardless its live action or animated.
But the crude reality...
Writers need time.
Artists need time.
Animators need time.
Editors need time.
Of course everything within a reasonable, understandable, do-able deadline.
Its like you go to a high class restaurant and give a timer to the chef, expecting your meal to be out in GIVEN time.
Then prepare to experience a SHITTY MEAL.
Wow thanks for this comment. Really interesting!
House of the dragon was the only recent show that actually made me excited for the next episode. I think it may be one of the best right now
Really hoping we get a great resurgence soon after the strikes come to an agreeement since we’ve been getting little gems here and there (The Bear, Barry, Atlanta, The Boys). Would love to see more passion projects rather than cash grabs. Another great video from you!
I think there is a lot more competition with so many streaming services that it is hard to have a mega hit TV show that everyone is talking about. For example, I can't can't talk about the latest episode of Foundation with my family because none of them have Apple TV. This leads to a lot of shows that are formulaic to minimize the risk and get predictable results, just like the music industry. However, also just like the music industry, there is still some good stuff out there but you have to dig through a lot of trash to find it.
I think the problem with mega hit tv shows is that it kind of ruins the credit other less popular shows deserve but are just as equally great imo.
Fortunately, even if we stopped making content right now. There are so many great tv shows and films in the vault that we just haven't seen yet.
Simple answer: YES. Despite the rare few gems we've received in this current age, the best years are long gone.
Let's hope we get another resurgence! Fingers crossed but I'm not optimistic 😢
There's a plenty of amazing shows that just ended their run that either started in or started from influence of the same decade for the Golden age such as Better Call Saul and Barry. I think if the Golden age is truly over then it would be essentially now, the early 2020s, but I think it's too early to say. Disney+ is certainly muddying the waters with their series getting more and more mediocre.
The golden age ended when non creative productions started to dominate the industry. 2018 was the start of the decline and now we can all see the decline. Succession was probably the last great show. Billion started out amazingly but declined into nonsense.
The golden age is usually associated with the age of the anti-hero, which became very popular following The Sopranos. It ended with Better Call Saul (Which i would argue is the next best series of this type after the Sopranos). We have not seen a great series of an anti-hero portrayed on the screen since then, and Sopranos initiated this narrative construction. Instead, we have moved to political TV, where minority lives are explored, (whether it is women or non-whites) and white men are mocked (mostly the upper class). Atlanta is within the first dimension, while Succession fits within the latter.
Yeah Disney is really bad... And really popular
@@Art-is-craft Disagree, there's been a lot of great shows since. Poker Face, The Last of us, Ted Lasso, Yellowjackets, You, The Legend of Vox Machina. The Bear. The Mandalorian. Swarm, Succession
@@cartoonfanatic
I have not seen some of the shows you listed but of those that I have seen they are not on par with succession. Are they good shows yes but not great shows. Succession will be remembered in 15 years time whereas Yellow jacks will not.
Been for long, killed by netflix originals
You mean Disney+ formulaic garbage for the average manchild?
I'd say we're in the golden age of retro TV. A time where people are rewatching their favorite shows and sharing with their kids and discovering new ones from the past few decades that eluded them.
For me there are so many shows that I'm now finally getting around to watching. I was preoccupied watching Nickelodeon and the Disney channel.
I missed out on watching along with the viewers shows like Malcolm in the middle, breaking bad, how I met your mother, the office, ugly Betty, psych, and Chuck.
Nobody ever mentions the TV series prison break that was a groundbreaking show 📽️
Now we have "content" where content takes up space in streaming services and your time.
Hell no we have so many masterpieces still airing / in production: Invincible, Severance, Cobra Kai, House of the Dragon, Last of Us, Andor, The Boys, What We Do in the Shadows, Attack on Titan, Arcane, Always Sunny, Vinland Saga, Primal and I know I'm forgetting some
Quality of the writing has plummeted this is for sure, especially in the syfy and fantasy genres. Also PC and activism all too often reigns supreme.
As for 1899, I really liked it but.. I think it was a good thing it ended after a single season, I fear a 2nd season would I guess ruin it for lack of a better term. Much like how I felt about Westworld and also Altered Carbon, AMAZING first seasons, but the 'sequels' spoiled the whole story, at least that's my opinion.
OZ and The Shield are two from a little while back were great. Boardwalk Empire, Rescue Me, Six Feet Under, and The Wire were other favorites from a few years ago too
Weren't people talking about how the golden age was the 50's for TV... then the 60's.. then the 70's... then the 80's... then the 90's... then the 00's.... ?
Great video, kept me watching the whole way through even with my short attention span 😅
Spot on about the hesitancy to invest time in a show that you are pretty sure will be cancelled by the end of the first season. From a business model perspective it was never sustainable once you eliminated the long term contracts and let people drop in and out fairly easily. It appears we are headed towards a consolidation phase (HBOmax + discoveryplus, etc...) which may allow them to spread the costs for critically acclaimed but maybe not very profitable shows across more streaming viewers. It'll probably take a few years to shake it all out, but i've got a sneaky suspicion that the old model (cable channel packages) may become the new model (Freevee, Pluto, etc...) with ads back in the picture.
Yup, streaming studios have shifted priorities from making good art, taking the time to produce quality to rushing out content. People slam the writers for the drastic drop in quality but it’s not their fault. They don’t have time to write good quality material, or even us crew time to make it. It’s become all about quick turnaround of deliverables. How fast can we pump out the next thing? Remember when there were YEARS between seasons of GOT? They took their time? I’ve worked on Netflix shows that shot 3 seasons all within one year and released one year apart. It was an insane schedule and does not produce a quality show.
All the shows listed around 5 minutes in were cable shows, not streamers. Now, everything is streaming, for all practical purposes.
The golden age of everything is over.
I’d say the future of TV shows highly depends on when and if the streaming bubble will burst. That will unavoidably have a devastating impact on budgets.
But, from a creative point of view there is no reason to be afraid jet. Just look what came up the last 3-4 years: Mandalorian, Severence, House of Dragon, Loki, One Peace, The boys (and it’s offshoot Gen V), Mythic Quest… and don’t forget that many shows like the office, community, parks and rec or even Dexter to an extend, found a large audience many years after it’s release, so who knows what we are missing right now.
Yeh I agree. I hope these services let the shows find their footing at least 🤞
It ended. It's not the golden age anymore if every shows that I enjoyed keep getting cancelled just as I finished watching. This is like right before the video game crash, you got every studios pumping out low quality contents to fill their libraries
How bro could bring up D&D and not completely slander them is astounding.
Game of Thrones is NOT golden age tv. 5 good seasons out of 8 with the worst last season of any major show ever.
We’re definitely still in it. Whether you’re into movies, tv, anime, cartoons, etc. 2023 had something for everyone.
The 90’s were definitely another golden age of television that wasn’t mentioned here, at least for the comedy genre. That decade brought us the Simpsons, Seinfeld, Friends, Frasier, King of the Hill, South Park and Family Guy just to name a few. Shows that would reshape the industry and are still widely watched today.
i think the problem with tv right now is that this streaming/digital experiment (that started the moment. It was possible to torrent the TV show in a reasonable amount of time) has left us with the system that doesn’t have many answers on how to distribute high quality content and pay people fairly. this is why people are returning to the US cable model with a fee and adverts. And I think you’re right, we’re in for several years of cheap boring TV that can be broken up into lots of different bits so plenty of adverts can be packed around it; cheap trash basically
This is the second video I saw today on this topic. However, the previous video briefly mentioned this while focusing more on a different subject.
If you're looking for something relatively recent and refreshing, I highly recommend the Australian dark comedy crime drama, Mr. Inbetween.
You won't be disappointed.
Yeah, I'm definitely still bitter about 1899 as well!
Blaming streaming for churning out content seems a bit disingenuous since that’s exactly how network tv operates. Literally have pilot season and whatever sticks with focus groups etc gets picked up and run with. Also writers ‘having less time to write’ and having pressure to produce when now most shows are 10ish episodes and previously were 20+ per season doesn’t seem to track
I was pissed when Netflix canceled Archive 81. Also pissed when HBO didn’t renew “Lovecraft country.” Neither got a second season…this is getting out of hand.
The golden age is over, the future may be an opportunity for more import films and shows. Squid game and even the One Piece live action got people talking maybe it’s the East’s time to shine ✨
I would love it if there is more focus on animated, non-comedic cartoons in the mainstream consciousness. Arcane and Invincible are great examples of this, and I feel that shows like those deserve more time in the spotlight.
Arcane was absolutely stunning! I've watched it twice now and cannot get enough of it.
Agreed. I really enjoy animation but wish there was more stuff like Invincible and Primal out there.
I would have to call it a "dark age of mass media" overall. there are some good things on, but ultimately, the market for high-budget entertainment is completely disrupted by social media content and the like. the change from quality to quantity has a hidden benefit - with such a high volume of personal youtube content, there is a greater likelihood of you being able to find a freelance creator who can make something that is really interesting
It's a shame that you didn't put Buffy,Friends,The X-Files,Angel,Charmed,Roswell,The Vampire Diaries,Pretty Little Liars,Gossip Girl....
Excellent commentary. I would say that we are in the Iron Age of Television. I know that's now the official designation, but I would say the early day of tv are the golden age, the late sixties to 1980 is the silver age, 1980's to 99' is the bronze. And we are in the waning moments of the Iron age, just like in civilization, they say we are still in the Iron age after the start of the industrial era. Technology brought on this in television as it did in the greater civilization.
Yes it is along with the Golden Age of literally everything.
Quantity over Quality of course! There's way too much content, scripted content, for us to catch up, but most is just OK or plain bad. Still, in a flood of streaming shows there are plenty of good quality TV shows, especially on HBO: "Succesion" and "House of the dragon" amazing TV shows. And others like "Westworld', "The Guilded Age" or "The White Lotus" are pretty damn good. HBO has ruled the Golden Age of TV either on cable or now on streaming. Hope the Warner/HBO executives keep priorizing quality TV. One thing I miss much is the thrill of having to wait a week to see the follow up to a cliffhanger episode end. Binge-watching killed that excitement
If we could somehow shift to a society that looks at not just direct profit, but also social and environmental impact I think that would be the ticket. Even then people may still disagree about what is a good social or environmental impact, of course
Give some love to Amazon’s The Boys, it’s the best thing on TV since Better Caul Saul!
The boys and it’s spin off Gen V firmly belong in the golden age of TV, incredible writing, great acting and a level of graphic scenes which sometimes make GOT look tame 🤯
If found myself watching tv more often in the past months because I literally spend ages looking for something to watch on a streaming service, then you have the problem of not giving shows a chance because you can change it to anything you literally want. With the tv channels, it’s different, it’s like this show is on now do you want to watch it or not, not later now…..
I cannot agree with the title question. Some of the shows you mention in 5:29 are 15, 20 years apart. However, "Chernobyl", "The last of us", "House of the Dragon", "Severance", "The Mandalorian", "Dopesick", "Ted Lasso" are all TV shows that only came within 4 years of each other, and are all stellar. And all that despite the fact that we had a once in a lifetime extreme situation: A pandemic that forced airplanes to stay on the ground for more than a whole year, and no filming on set (or none at all) for a long time. And right now we have a strike going on. All those problems have never existed on the same scale between the early 2000s and now (or ever). And for ALL those of you that this list still is not long enough, I have ONE show for you from the golden age that I'm sure most of you never watched, and you'll ABSOLUTELY love it: "The Shield"! If I was running a RUclips channel I would counter this video by stating that this is proof that many THINK the golden age is over because there is so MUCH more trash being released today. It takes longer to find the gems. But they're still there, and they're plenty.
If HBO doesn’t keep things going I see Apple TV taking over the mantle. With shows like Severance, Silo, Ted Lasso, and the Morning Show they’re on a great path.
There are also other things going on, like writers and producers being unable to put an already complete story to screen. The Witcher, anyone?
We’ve also had Chernobyl, House of the Dragon, Andor and better call Saul as solid standouts lately
"Golden age" refers to the peak years of its infancy. Television has existed for 70 years.
Yeah man 1899, still don't understand why was it cancelled!
Wild how those three on the thumbnail are on my top 10.
My Top 5 TV shows of ALL TIME:
(No particular order)
24
Breaking Bad
Squid Game
The Munsters (far before my time)
Hotel Del Luna
Honerable Mention:
The Sopranos
(have seen the majority but not all)
The only good shows nowadays are foreign TV shows.
So to answer your question. Yes.
The Golden Age is gone.
Your points are great counters to Patrick H Willem's "Who Killed Cinema?" video. The reason films like Rain Man or Kramer versus Kramer are not dominating the box office is that TV has become those films. If Forest Gump, City of Angels, or Scarface were made nowadays, they would be TV.
RUclips videos like these have to stop, of course we still have fantastic innovative television that are critically acclaimed, with die-hard fan bases. There are just so many. Guaranteed without watching I know less than half the author is gonna even mention. Atlanta, Queens Gambit, Bojack Horseman, Arcane, Invincible, Squid Game, Stranger Things, Pantheon, Wednesday, Beef, Ted Lasso, Severence, The Good Place, The Crown, The Mandalorian, Russian doll, I May Destroy You, What We Do in the Shadows, Mare of Easttown. All of these have tons of breakdowns of why they are considered some of the best. Here is why it's a golden age, I can tell you a majority of the great shows he has on there without watching, we all can. Definitely Sopranos, the Office, Breaking Bad, and Seinfeld guaranteed. Maybe community, freaks, and geeks, always sunny, arrested development for nerd credit. Why am I so sure? because it was literally that's everyone's list, everyone watched them. Compared to now, where I guarantee I'm probably missing your current favorite show, there are just way too many great shows for two people to have even similar favorite lists. There are two things that the internet believes at large that are just wrong. One Insightful criticism isn't saying everything in the past is better than it is now. Literally saw a video the other day of why people in the past were more attractive and intelligent than people today. You'll always get clicks and likes. But anyone who isn't easily manipulated is going to be insulted... we know what you're doing politics always do it. Second, the internet is convinced If they don't like it, regardless of other people's opinion, it's bad and they like it because they are stupid, if they do like it, it's because of its perceived brilliance, and higher quality. If you don't like something that you know is bad, that's just a lack of self-awareness. So the opposite is true too, you don't have to like a show for it to still be good. So when you make a video like this, you have to at least try to make it objectively with facts and figures, what people are saying about their past favorite shows, compared to todays, based on critical reception, popularity, and any number of criteria.
You forgot to mention the influence of RUclips. I spend as much or more time here than anywhere else.
Tv is over... when those over 40 pass away noone will ever watch. Its dying a slow death
Big companies now do AI assisted market research into what sells next year. That's just one example - the philosophy is making rules for what works and what doesn't and much less people recognizing quality and taking a bet on people recognizing it as well. Issue is, they then end up with the lowest common denominator. Someone taking a chance as well as the long tail of offbeat stuff that nobody watched for a while until it turned into a classic - you won't get that passed the people making decisions
I can’t keep up with. So just disconnected . I will still watch major ones from time to time
Also doesn’t help that with reduced episode counts and smaller writer’s rooms, newer writers don’t have the opportunity to pick up necessary showrunning skills-whether by spending down time on set or by shadowing experienced showrunners
It's been over, it was over in 1999
Seinfeld is a 90’s show. The greatest decade in my lifetime. Well, the 2000’s as well. God, I miss fun. 😢
It hurts my soul that you never mentioned The Shield once in your vid. More people need to watch it.
1899 should have been a Titanic with time traveling. Instead, it was a video game. Tension and conflict was flat because it was just a video game rather than a real world. Season 1 should have started with the space traveling scene.
Price are going up and up for streaming
Hell where at rock bottom right now tbh for every one good show we get 10 bad shows but I think that due to how bad we are doing it can only get better from here and in the next ten years maybe we’ll start getting quality tv back on the screens
Now that Attack on Titan is finally over , yes . Yes it is .
IMO no we arent. There are still some quality shows being made but the problem with on the demand/streaming model is that providers need an endless supply of new content to keep people subscribed. There is a noticeable shift to quantity over quality and most content now is filler at best.
I also think that instant access kills interest/hype around shows. The “water cooler” chat about shows and waiting a week to see the next episode played a huge part in building hype and maintaining interest. If you watch an entire series on the day of launch there is not time to digest it its straight on to next content without ever appreciating it. My 2cents anyway
If you take the 3 golden ages into account TV might as well always been peak or golden. There's like what, 20 years where it wasn't if you take the 50s, 80s/90s, 2000s as golden ages
Game of thrones season 6 was the end of the golden age. We still have great shows like Stranger things and Hill House, but they are quite less now.
The answer is yes, since the previous five golden ages of television are now officially over, we are about to enter the next golden age of television, since apparently almost every age of television is a golden one, e.g., the 50s, 80s, 90s, 00s, 10s, etc.
What are you talking about?
@@danculbert6349I’m answering the question posed in the title of the video
It’s been over for a while
You are right, there was not a hard end date, it fizzled out, somewhere between 2010 and 2015 I would say. I would say movies went bad somewhere between 2005 and 2007. It was then that I switched my movie obsession to TV series.
If the actor's and studio's don't end this strike soon then there won't be any kind of golden age, dark age, or even bronze age of television.
You didn't mention my favorite shows (other than Rick and Morty): The Boys, Umbrella Academy, South Park, Curb your enthusiasm, Wilfred and underappreciated Futureman.
I genuinely find creator made content on places RUclips far more compelling these days. Network stuff tends to feel designed by committee and pandering. A lot of creators produce very high quality (in some cases like true crime, documentaries, comedy etc. I'd argue a superior product). But even a person with a laptop spudcam can often produce good stuff if it's genuine. I don't really feel the need to watch not very good actors reading a not very good script.
I'd say the twilight zone was the beginning.
The 80s and 90s had a golden age but putting that aside, it's over and you can see a pretty big decline. There're great shows out there but there's even more sh@t.
Fraserburgh is coming back
For me, the Golden Age of Television we recently experienced began with the first episode of The Sopranos and ended with the final episode of Better Call Saul. Imagine that…it all began in a psychiatrist’s office…and ended in a prison.
@@tGGgGg-sp9yx There have always been garbage shows, heck there were more garbage during the 60s to 00s than now
The future of TV is the past, I think. More modestly-budgeted series with more episodes per year. You have to remember shows like The Twilight Zone was doing an average of 31 episodes a *year* for five years. With more than half the episodes being written by showrunner Rod Serling. Never a hit, the show famously got cancelled at the end of every season and then getting last-minute reprieves at some point over the summer. The same is true of Star Trek, which did 26 episodes a year, and got cancelled at the end of every season. And then you’ve got “Cheers,” a huge hit that didn’t really find its audience until around the end of its second season (25 episodes a year, BTW), but the network believed in it and was willing to give it time for people to discover it. And in fact at the outset Neflix used to sign shows for two 13-episode seasons up front, with an option of a more if the ratings are good because they understood it took a while to find an audience, too. Now they don’t care.
A lot of zoomers call that level of production ‘filler’ and, yeah, some of it is, but even filler episodes usually have something good in them somewhere. And that many episodes mean you get to know the characters much better, and get much more attached to them, than you do with a 6 or 7 episode streaming season every 18 months or so.
So I think what’s gonna have to happen is that things will go back to 13-20 episode seasons as per the 2010s on cable, with a somewhat more modest budget spaced out to allow for 3 blowout episodes a year.
I feel like that’s the minimum sustainable level for a show. Less than that, and there’s too few episodes to really make a connection with, more than that and people will just lose patience as per the last few years of the CW shows.
hey man cool video. I think AI is the result of writers doing the same thing over and over for the last few years. generic to the bone, well the word generic basically implies AI. writers like Charlie Kaufman could never be copied by AI, because he is forward thinking, and I think we might see a comeback of the auteur, when generic shows separate themselves more clearly from WTF!?-shows since originality becomes a big value again.
Thanks! Yeah creativity is what’s holding AI back. And I don’t see it improving in this aspect anytime time in the near future. AI helping writers will be huge, but the actual writer will need to drive AI to achieve something original