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There's No Such Thing as Too Much TV

My Thoughts on TV

By Eli SanzaPublished 7 years ago 4 min read
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Kevin Spacey as Frank Underwood in House of Cards

I would like to address a common complaint within the TV world about there being too many good shows and not enough time to watch them.

Ever since the evolution of streaming sites like Netflix, the amount of television shows available to the public has grown vast and gotten varied. House of Cards was the first show to shine a spotlight on this new medium, especially when it got nominated for an Emmy, the first time a web series had ever gotten the honor.

This, of course, led to other websites like Hulu and Amazon getting in on the act with their own award-worthy shows like Transparent. The best thing about this historical development in the history of entertainment was that shows that would normally not find a home on broadcast television or cable were finding a home on streaming sites.

Without these websites, acclaimed shows like Orange is the New Black and Master of None may never have seen the light of day. Without Netflix, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt would have been just another NBC show that might have been, and without Hulu, The Mindy Project might have ended after FOX cancelled it (to underscore the questionable judgment of network television, FOX replaced The Mindy Project, their first comedy with an Indian lead, with two shows about white men, Grandfathered and The Grinder, which were both cancelled after one season).

This surge in new outlets for TV producers led to more and more good shows, which led to a unique criticism from the viewers of these shows: there are too many quality shows on television to realistically watch all of them.

Yes, I've read the articles that discuss this and I admit that it can feel overwhelming, but this isn't as big of a problem as people think it is.

Do you realize how many books and movies and video games there are in the world that you will never have time to read, watch or play? Millions.

You could go your entire life never discovering your true favorite author, or that you're a fan of Ingmar Bergman, or that that you're the best Mario Kart player on the planet.

Why is it that as soon as TV hits this milestone of endless choices we suddenly see it as a problem? You never hear people complain about there being too many good books (and there are a ton) because we've just accepted the fact that there is not enough time to read everything. So what do we do in the case of literature? We simply read whatever interests us in the moment, and this is the norm.

When it comes to the consumption of television, it should give us satisfaction that the medium has come this far. The more endless the choices, the less of a chance that you'll end up watching something you hate.

Some of you might be thinking, "Yeah, great article, except there are still way too many shows I want to see and not enough hours in the day to watch them all."

I am a TV addict and I have been in that situation as well, but if there are shows out there that you truly want to watch, I guarantee you will find time to watch them. If it takes you more than a year to start a show, you should question how much you really want to see it.

If I miss an episode of my favorite TV show, or an entire season of my favorite show, is finally available to binge on Netflix, I know I'm going to watch it, because if I don't, I'm not a very big fan of that show, am I? Trust me: if you can't find the time to watch it, you don't care about watching it.

So don't complain about there being too many shows. There's no such thing as too much TV. More importantly, and this should give you the most comfort, you're not under any obligation to watch anything, no matter how brilliant it is.

You're one human being and TV isn't everything. If someone tells me they've never watched House of Cards, Game of Thrones or Veep, I don't shame them. I envy them.

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About the Creator

Eli Sanza

Eli Sanza is a media critic and film historian from California. He posts film and TV news on Twitter and discusses Hollywood history on his podcast and his blog. He is also a Disney geek and currently stuck in the '90s.

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