Golden Age of Television (2000s–present)
In the United States, the Golden Age of Television (also known as Peak TV or Prestige TV)[1][2][3] is a period widely regarded for its high number of "high quality", internationally acclaimed television programs.[4][5][6][7]
Named in reference to the original Golden Age of Television of the 1950s,[8] the period has also been referred to as the "New", "Second", or "Third Golden Age of Television". The various names reflect disagreement over whether shows of the 1980s and early-mid 1990s belong to a since-concluded golden era or to the current one.[19] The contemporary period is generally identified as beginning in 1999 with The Sopranos,[20][21] with debate as to whether the age ended (or "peaked") in the mid-late 2010s[20][22][23][24] or early 2020s (to the point of calling its replacement "Trough TV"),[25][26][27][28] or remains ongoing.[29][8] Multichannel linear television, such as cable and digital satellite, reached its peak in 2014 and has declined in viewers, reach and new content rapidly since then;[30][31] overall new series creation peaked in the early 2020s, following a several years-long competitive period known as the streaming wars, cresting shortly before the 2023 Hollywood labor disputes.[32]
It is believed to have resulted from advances in media distribution technology,[9][13] digital TV technology (including HDTV, online video platforms, TV streaming, video-on-demand, and web TV),[33][9] and a large increase in the number of hours of available television, which has prompted a major wave of content creation.[34]
History
[edit]Origins and early era
[edit]History of television in the United States |
---|
![]() |
Eras |
|
Histories |
French scholar Alexis Pichard has argued that television enjoyed a Second Golden Age[35] starting in the 2000s which was a combination of three elements: first, an improvement in both visual aesthetics and storytelling; second, an overall homogeneity between cable series and networks series; and third, a tremendous popular success. Pichard contends that this Second Golden Age was the result of a revolution initiated by the traditional networks in the 1980s and carried on by the cable channels (especially HBO) in the 1990s.[36] Film director Francis Ford Coppola thinks that the second golden age of television comes from "kids" with their "little father's camcorder", who wanted to make films like he did in the 1970s but were not permitted to, so they did it for television.[37]
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/Firefly_cast_%287594521370%29.jpg/220px-Firefly_cast_%287594521370%29.jpg)
The new Golden Age brought creator-driven tragic anti-heroic dramas of the 2000s and 2010s,[38] including 1998's Sex and the City, 1999's The Sopranos (named the greatest TV show of all time by TV Guide[39] and Rolling Stone[40]) [41][42] and The West Wing; 2001's Six Feet Under and 24;[43][41] 2002's The Wire (voted as the greatest TV show of the 21st Century by BBC in 2021)[41][44] and The Shield;[41] 2004's Deadwood,[45][41] Lost[46] and Battlestar Galactica;[41] 2005's Grey's Anatomy and Avatar: The Last Airbender;[47] 2006's Friday Night Lights;[41] 2007's Mad Men;[41] 2008's Breaking Bad;[48][41] 2010's The Walking Dead;[49] 2011's Game of Thrones;[14][50][51] 2013's House of Cards[52] and Orange Is the New Black;[53] and 2015's Better Call Saul.[54] Others appear in the Writers Guild of America 2013 vote for 101 Best-Written TV Shows.[55] Production values got higher than ever before[56] on shows such as Band of Brothers,[57] Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and Homeland to the point of rivaling cinema, while anti-heroic series like The Sopranos and The Wire were cited as improving television content thus earning critical praise.[58]
Stephanie Zacharek of The Village Voice has argued that the current golden age began earlier with over-the-air broadcast shows like Babylon 5, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (both of which premiered in 1993), and Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997).[17] TV critic Alan Sepinwall cites shows such as Buffy and Oz (which both first aired in 1997) as ushering in the golden age.[41] Will Gompertz of the BBC believes that Friends, which debuted in 1994, might stake a claim as the opening bookend show of the period.[18] Matt Zoller Seitz argues that it began in the 1980s with Hill Street Blues (1981) and St. Elsewhere (1982).[15] Kirk Hamilton of Kotaku has said that Avatar: The Last Airbender (2005) should be considered a part of the golden age of television, and recommended "the sophisticated kids show" to others.[59] With the rise of instant access to content on Netflix, creator-driven television shows like Breaking Bad, The Shield (2002), Friday Night Lights (2006) and Mad Men gained loyal followings that grew to become widely popular. The success of instant access to television shows was presaged by the popularity of DVDs, and continues to increase with the rise of digital platforms and online companies.
The Golden Age of television is believed to have resulted from advances in media distribution technology,[9][13] digital TV technology (including HDTV, online video platforms, TV streaming, video-on-demand, and web TV),[33][9] and a large increase in the number of hours of available television, which has prompted a major wave of content creation.[34] The increase in the number of shows is also cited as evidence of a Golden Age, or "peak TV". In the five years between 2011 and 2016, the number of scripted television shows, on broadcast, cable and digital platforms increased by 71%. In 2002, 182 television shows aired, while 2016 had 455 original scripted television shows and 495 in 2018. The number of shows are rising largely due to companies like Netflix, Amazon Video and Hulu investing heavily in original content. The number of shows aired by online service increased from only one in 2009 to over 93 in 2016.[60][61][62][63][64][65]
Late era and potential end
[edit]![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/97/Paley_Center_for_Media_-_Babylon_5%2C_Supernatural%2C_The_Vampire_Diaries_%286926333642%29.jpg/220px-Paley_Center_for_Media_-_Babylon_5%2C_Supernatural%2C_The_Vampire_Diaries_%286926333642%29.jpg)
An increasing reliance on rebooting and reviving existing franchises led to widespread belief that the Golden Age of Television was ending in the late 2010s,[22] with the caveat that some of these reboots (such as DuckTales,[66] Girl Meets World,[67] One Day at a Time[68][69] and X-Men '97[70]) share the positive reception and mature character development of original shows of the era. To address burnout from binge watching and concerns that the practice makes television more disposable and forgettable, streaming providers reduced their reliance on the practice in the early 2020s by returning to a more traditional model of releasing one new episode a week. A showrunner for an unnamed series on Netflix, a platform that has been especially aggressive toward releasing full seasons at once as a company policy, commented that the volume of existing content has made it more difficult to devote the time to binge watching.[23] By 2024, Netflix had also begun splitting its seasons of new content to limit binge-watching, fearing that it was contributing to a phenomenon where viewers would subscribe for a short period to binge-watch their favorite show only to cancel their subscription when finished.[71]
Quantity over quality
[edit]In the Watchmen writers' room, we would play this game called Is It a Show? Somebody would name a title, logline, and one of the actors, and we'd have to guess whether it was real. But the joke was it was always a show. Some were in their second or third seasons, and none of us—supposedly television professionals—had ever heard of them.
Ed Power of the Irish Examiner opined that "the sun began to set" on the golden age between 2013 and 2015, with the finales of Breaking Bad and Mad Men, and "Since then, television has reverted to its older tradition of quantity over quality."[20] Siobhan Lyons of The Conversation believes the 2022 finale of Better Call Saul marks the end of "the last of those defining, golden age shows," in a time increasingly oversaturated with streaming content and viewing options.[26] NPR noted in May 2022 that although television executives had predicted a peak in television series since the mid-2010s, the number of series continued to grow into the early 2020s, from 400 original productions across broadcast, cable and major streaming outlets in 2015 to 559 in 2021. The network noted that the major streamers, with the exception of Disney+ (which NPR attributed to the company's strong brand recognition), were seeing diminishing quality and, particularly in the case of Netflix, declining popularity.[73] A May 2023 essay in Harper's Bazaar declared the era of the time to be the "Age of Mid Television," noting that mediocre programs were gaining popularity due to the escapism they provide in an age where the real world brings greater anxiety.[74] Vulture expressed similar views in June 2023, speaking of Peak TV in the past tense and noting that the more artistic shows that marked the Golden Age of highbrow programming were also expensive and not particularly profitable, even if they drew new subscribers.[72] The New Yorker concurred in November of the same year, declaring the Golden Age to be over after a regression toward the mean; based upon several books on the topic, the article essentially argued that the same dynamics that drove the death of earlier Golden Ages in media (such as television's first Golden Age and the New Hollywood of the early 1970s) were also affecting the early 21st-century Golden Age of Television, namely that the technology innovations that had allowed highbrow programs to flourish were being capitalized upon by more profitable franchise products able to crowd out riskier projects for attention from financial backers.[75]
Streaming wars and aftermath
[edit]Around 2019, a period of intense competition began for market share among streaming services, a period known as the streaming wars. This competition increased during the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic as more people stayed home and watched television.[76] Many services attempted to compete on quality. The streaming wars, combined with the decline of the popularity of mainstream films (along with said films increasingly relying on franchises that are less likely to garner awards), and the rise of independent films winning major film awards within the last six years, resulted in a historical first—the first film from a streaming service to produce an Academy Award winner for Best Picture: Apple TV's CODA over Netflix's The Power of the Dog at the 94th Academy Awards.[77]
The streaming wars were largely recognized to have ended in 2022, as the major streaming services lost subscribers and shifted their focus to profit over market share by raising subscription fees, cutting production budgets, cracking down on password sharing, and introducing ad-supported tiers.[78] HBO Max made a substantial cut to its library in August 2022, mostly to its children's television series, out of concerns that the quantity of content on the service (especially with its pending merger with Discovery+) was becoming overwhelming and difficult to find, and that the children's programming was not driving subscriptions or views on the service.[79] By the summer of 2023, other major streaming providers had begun to remove short-lived series from their catalogues and make them unavailable afterwards, something that had previously been a rare occurrence; this was particularly true of Disney+ (Disney had historically followed a similar model with physical media, known as the Disney Vault, which it had initially suspended in the early months of Disney+[80]) and Paramount+.[81] This also coincided with an increased emphasis on business models that draw revenue from both advertising and subscriptions, prompting streaming providers to focus on productions that have mass appeal while also reducing investment in high-risk projects targeting niche audiences.[82]
The COVID-19 pandemic and its aftermath saw major reductions in the workforce and cancellations of multiple productions to save money on basic residuals and music licensing costs, which led to a worsening condition for writers and actors, setting the stage for the 2023 Hollywood labor disputes.[83] This led to fewer shows ordered by studios and streamers as the WGA strike ended[25] and fewer spec scripts being offered by writers to the studios, anticipating the cutbacks.[84] The Hollywood Reporter said in January 2024 that "Peak TV Is Over". It reported that the number of United States TV series in 2023 decreased to 481 from 633 in 2022 and 2021, and that the number would not likely increase in 2024.[32]
Rerun boom
[edit]Viewership patterns during the pandemic shifted rapidly toward reruns,[76] a trend that continued into 2023 as the streaming providers shifted away from original content and became open to non-exclusive licensing deals allowing popular archive shows to appear on multiple platforms.[85] A 2021 interview of social media influencers noted that the teen sitcoms and teen dramas from the early Golden Age, driven by continued presence in reruns and video-on-demand platforms, have stronger followings among Generation Z than contemporary shows; they feel that the latter are more geared toward pre-teens or adults instead of teenagers, try too hard to appeal to current trends, and lack a sense of familiarity compared to shows that have been around since they were born. This is attributed as a cause for the increasing number of reboots and revivals of shows from early in the era.[24] Suits was the most-streamed TV show of 2023, and especially popular with Gen Z, despite new episodes ending in 2019 and being neither, Slate wrote, "a cult classic or a critical darling". The magazine stated that the show and similar "glossy, lightweight procedurals" were ideal second screen content:[86]
They're just about extremely attractive people doing their jobs exceptionally well, then blowing off steam by having extremely attractive sex. In other words, they're what, for the vast majority of the medium's life span, was known simply as "TV."
Even as the pandemic waned, cable television in particular—which suffered a 30% decline in viewer reach in the period between its peak and 2023—increasingly relied upon reruns and other archival programming. Compared to a peak of 214 original cable series in 2014, The New York Times noted that number had fallen 39% by 2022, and further in 2023. The Times dubbed this phenomenon "zombie TV," in that the channels retained a shell of an established cable brand, but without any of the original programming that had defined the channel's identity, as an undead zombie continues to function but without the soul or personality of its host body. The Times also commented that general-interest cable networks such as TNT, USA Network and TBS were particularly hard-hit, with TNT and TBS's combined original series output dropping from 17 series to 3. USA suffered a near-complete loss of its original scripted programming, though this was also partially due to the network absorbing more sports programming from the closure of sister network NBCSN, which helped keep USA's ratings among the highest on cable. Such cable networks have increasingly relied upon all-day marathons of acquired rerun programming to fill their schedules.[31] This has coincided with an even more dramatic decline in viewership, with general-interest cable networks and several of the more established niche networks losing over half of their viewing audiences in the same period; David Bauder of the Associated Press noted that the corresponding declines in viewership and original programming were triggering a vicious cycle, and that by the mid-2020s, cable television had lost its ability to create "appointment television" events, instead relying on "ghost" programming such as low-quality, low-cost reality fare and reruns.[30]
The streaming wars were also a factor in a shift toward free advertising supported television initiatives (FAST) in the early 2020s. FAST services typically rely on archival programming for the majority of their content, allowing the services to operate for free to the end user while splitting advertising revenue with the program owners (or profiting directly if the program and FAST service are owned by the same company). Tubi, the advertising-supported video on demand service owned by Fox Corporation, acquired the streaming rights to much of the content that HBO Max had jettisoned in 2023. Pluto TV relies on the extensive archival libraries of Paramount and its numerous acquisitions.[87]
Characteristics and criticism
[edit]Characteristics of this golden age are complicated characters who may be morally ambiguous or antiheroes, questionable behavior, complex plots, hyper-serialized storytelling, diverse points of view, playful explorations of modern-day issues and would-be R-rated material.[88][89][90][91]
Genres of television associated with this golden age include dramas (especially ones originating on cable and digital platforms; some being called "peak bleak" due to the extremely pessimistic nature of shows like Succession and Game of Thrones[92]); sitcoms (especially ones that use comedy-drama which some critics would call "sadcoms"),[93] single-camera setup, or adult animation; sketch comedy (especially series linked to alternative comedy); and late-night talk shows (especially ones that emphasize news satire). Such were the shows' popularity and buzzworthiness that aftershows—talk shows specifically created to discuss a specific television program—were created and scheduled in the lead-out slot following Golden Age shows on linear networks.[94]
A key characteristic of the golden age is serialization, where a continuous story arc stretches over multiple episodes or seasons. Traditional American television had an episodic format, with each episode typically consisting of a self-contained story. During the golden age, there has been a transition to a serialization format. John R. Ziegler and Leah Richards note that the serialization format was previously already a key defining characteristic of Japanese anime shows, notably the popular Dragon Ball Z (1989), which distinguished them from American television shows at the time. Serialization later also became a key defining characteristic of American live-action television shows during the golden age.[95]
The era is not without criticism; the limited audience appeal of shows featuring unlikeable characters and too many showrunners embracing the "12-hour movie" structure of stories.[96][97] Shawn Ryan said "You're seeing ideas that should've been movies being elongated into eight episodes, and they don't have the narrative engines to sustain them for that long". New York said that "the expensive signifiers of prestige TV — the movie stars, the set pieces, the cinematography — became so familiar and easy to appropriate that it could take viewers six or seven hours to realize the show they were watching was a fugazi".[72] The number of original shows being produced has some, like FX CEO John Landgraf[98][99][100] and Time's TV critic Judy Berman,[1] worried about overwhelming the viewing audience to the point of what the latter called "peak redundancy".[1][101] Author Daniel Kelley said that this was also the Golden Age of bad TV with shows such as Zoo, Under the Dome, and The I-Land.[102]
Derek Thompson of The Atlantic stated that TV replaced movies as "elite entertainment",[103] but the focus on prestige TV prevented more broadly appealing programs from airing. Damon Lindelof said "TV has become very artisanal", using Swarm as an example of a show that "everybody I know is watching" but his relatives have never heard of. New York quoted a "top agent" as decrying the contempt TV people had for mainstream audiences' tastes; "People seem to really like Two and a Half Men, and none of my writers want to write that. They all want to write Barry. And you know who watches Barry? Nobody".[72] The Ankler stated that Shōgun was, by contrast, "prestige TV at its best: great television that people actually watched".[104]
Newton Minow, whose landmark 1961 speech "Television and the Public Interest" had highlighted the end of the original golden age of the 1950s, commented that the state of television in 2011, in the midst of the modern golden age and 50 years after the speech, had lost the sense of shared community that the live linear television dominated by a small number of networks had provided.[105][106][107]
Mary McNamara of The Los Angeles Times cited the golden age of TV as one of the reasons behind the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike, which, along with the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike and the studios' use of artificial intelligence, effectively halted most scripted television production in the United States.[108]
See also
[edit]- List of shows considered as Peak TV
- Multichannel television in the United States
- Streaming television
- 1990s in television
- 2000s in television
- 2010s in television
- 2020s in television
- Quality television
- Adult animation
- Binge-watching
- Documentary film
- Hate-watching
- Miniseries
- Telenovela
- New Hollywood
- American independent cinema
- Cinephilia
- Soap opera
- Television film
- Art film
- Nerd culture
- Marvel and DC Comics
- Postmodern television
- Game shows
- True crime
- Pop culture fiction
References
[edit]- ^ a b c Berman, Judy (November 19, 2021). "Peak TV Is Over. Welcome to the Era of Streaming Redundancy". Time.
- ^ Stahl, Michael (June 23, 2022). "Is "Prestige TV" Over?". InsideHook.
- ^ 13 Rules for Creating Prestige TV Dramas – Vulture
- ^ Leopold, Todd (May 6, 2013). "The new, new TV golden age". CNN.
- ^ Plunkett, John; Deans, Jason (August 22, 2013). "Kevin Spacey: television has entered a new golden age". The Guardian. Retrieved January 24, 2015.
- ^ "Stephen McGinty: A golden age of television?". The Scotsman.
- ^ REVIEW: Shogun Premiere Resurrects the Golden Age of Television - CBR.com
- ^ a b When The Golden Age Of Television Was (& Which Shows) – Screen Rant
- ^ a b c d e Carr, David (March 9, 2014). "Barely Keeping Up in TV's New Golden Age". The New York Times. Retrieved January 24, 2015.
- ^ "The CB Guide to the New Golden Age of Television". Canadian Business. Archived from the original on September 27, 2021. Retrieved January 24, 2015.
- ^ Weisenthal, Joe; Robinson, Melia. "16 Things You Never Knew About The New Golden Age Of TV". Business Insider. Retrieved January 24, 2015.
- ^ Pichard, Alexis. Le nouvel âge d'or des séries américaines. Editions Le Manuscrit. Archived from the original on February 26, 2021. Retrieved August 14, 2015.
- ^ a b c "Welcome to TV's second "Golden Age"". www.cbsnews.com. October 2013.
- ^ a b Reese, Hope (July 11, 2013). "Why Is the Golden Age of TV So Dark?". The Atlantic. Retrieved January 24, 2015.
- ^ a b Zoller Seitz, Matt (October 25, 2016). "Why the Golden Age of TV Was Really Born in the 1980s". Vulture.com.
- ^ Murray, Noel (September 14, 2016). "Making A Case For The '90s, Television's 'Other' Golden Age". Uproxx.
- ^ a b Zacharek, Stephanie (2015). "Why Avengers: Age of Ultron Fills this Buffy Fan with Despair". The Village Voice. Archived May 18, 2015, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ a b Gompertz, Will (November 2, 2019). "The Morning Show: Will Gompertz reviews Aniston and Witherspoon's Apple TV drama". BBC.com. Retrieved November 2, 2019.
- ^ [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18]
- ^ a b c "Is the golden age of TV over?". Irish Examiner. October 24, 2019. Retrieved September 12, 2022.
- ^ "The golden age of TV is dead; long live the golden age of TV". The A.V. Club. September 20, 2013.
- ^ a b Adalian, Josef (February 1, 2018). "Why Network TV's Obsession With Reboots Isn't a Bad Thing". Vulture.com. Retrieved April 17, 2019.
My former Variety colleague Michael Schneider, executive editor of IndieWire, captured perfectly the jaded response many had to last month's reboot news: "Anyone else getting the sense that broadcast TV is embarking on its Farewell Tour by playing all the hits one last time?" he tweeted.
- ^ a b Press, Joy (May 14, 2021). "One Episode at a Time, Please: Is a Binge Backlash Brewing?". Vanity Fair.
- ^ a b Schwartz, Deanna (July 14, 2021). "Meet the teens running fan pages for 2000s TV shows that aired when they were babies". Insider. Retrieved July 17, 2021.
- ^ a b Amol Sharma, Joe Flint (September 30, 2023). "Peak TV Is Over. A Different Hollywood Is Coming". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved October 2, 2023.
- ^ a b "Better Call Saul's final episode is the end of the golden age of TV as we know it". The Conversation. August 15, 2022. Retrieved September 12, 2022.
- ^ Adams, Sam (March 5, 2023). "Peak TV Is Over. Welcome to Trough TV". Slate.
- ^ Hollywood Made 14% Fewer Shows in 2023, Marking the End of Peak TV - The New York Times
- ^ The End of Peak TV? Not So FAST – Variety
- ^ a b Bauder, David (February 29, 2024). "They are TV's ghosts — networks that somehow survive with little reason to watch them anymore". Associated Press. Retrieved March 5, 2024.
- ^ a b Koblin, John (December 8, 2023). "Zombie TV Has Come for Cable". The New York Times via Yahoo! News. Retrieved December 9, 2023.
- ^ a b Roxborough, Scott (January 19, 2024). "Peak TV Is Over as 2023 Scripted Series Releases 'Crash'". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved January 19, 2024.
- ^ a b Lipsett, Joe (2018). "Defining Success in the Era of Peak TV: A Case Study". In Newman, Emily L.; Witsell, Emily (eds.). ABC Family to Freeform TV: Essays on the Millennial-Focused Network and Its Programs. McFarland & Company. pp. 15–32. ISBN 978-1-4766-6735-5.
- ^ a b Simon, Jeff (March 31, 2015). "Who put these shows on the air and why?". The Buffalo News. Retrieved March 31, 2015.
- ^ "TV's golden age is real". The Economist. November 24, 2018.
- ^ Pichard, 2011, p.11
- ^ "Francis Ford Coppola: 'Apocalypse Now is not an anti-war film'". the Guardian. August 9, 2019.
- ^ Pandora's Box: A Conversation with Peter Biskind about Peak TV|Chronogram Magazine
- ^ Fretts, Bruce; Roush, Matt (December 23, 2013). "TV Guide Magazine's 60 Best Series of All Time". TV Guide. Archived from the original on December 24, 2013. Retrieved December 23, 2013.
- ^ Sheffield, Rob (September 21, 2016). "100 Greatest TV Shows of All Time". Rolling Stone. Archived from the original on September 23, 2016. Retrieved September 22, 2016.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j "The Revolution Was Televised, by Alan Sepinwall".
- ^ Netflix's Mystery Science Theater 3000 revival is as funny (and necessary) as the original – The Verge
- ^ Young, Alex (September 21, 2016). "Rolling Stone's list of the 100 Greatest TV Shows proves we're really in the Golden Age of Television | Consequence of Sound". Consequence of Sound.
- ^ Why The Wire is the greatest TV series of the 21st Century – BBC Culture
- ^ Saraiya, Sonia (May 30, 2019). "Review: The Deadwood Movie Gives the Golden Age Series What it Deserves: a Fitting, Emotional Sendoff". Vanity Fair. Retrieved May 31, 2019.
- ^ Keveney, Bill. "'Lost' 15th anniversary: Here's to polar bears, brainy sci-fi, Sawyer and Kate". USA TODAY.
- ^ Sholars, Mike (February 21, 2014). "It's All Geek To Me: The Golden Age Of Animated Television | HuffPost Canada". The Huffington Post Canada.
- ^ Lawson, Mark (May 23, 2013). "Are we really in a 'second golden age for television'? | Television & radio | The Guardian". Guardian News & Media.
- ^ How The Walking Dead changed the course of the TV revolution|Stuff.co.nz
- ^ Kakutani, Michiko (June 24, 2013). "Brett Martin's 'Difficult Men' Sees a New Golden Age for TV". The New York Times. Retrieved October 1, 2015.
- ^ Plunkett, John; Deans, Jason (August 22, 2013). "Kevin Spacey: television has entered a new golden age". The Guardian. Retrieved January 2, 2016.
- ^ Thompson, Derek (February 7, 2013). "Netflix, 'House of Cards,' and the Golden Age of Television". The Atlantic.
- ^ "How Orange Is the New Black set the blueprint for a Breaking Bad and Mad Men-free TV landscape". The Independent. July 26, 2019.
- ^ Jurgenson, John (August 8, 2022). "How 'Better Call Saul' Refined the Art of Television". The Wall Street Journal.
- ^ "101 Best Written TV Series List". Writers Guild of America West. Retrieved January 31, 2020.
- ^ Films and Television Are Merging - The Royal Ocean Film Society on YouTube
- ^ 'Band of Brothers' sequel series will follow the US Air Force in World War II - Entertainment.ie
- ^ "Telephilia: Has Television Become a More Relevant American Medium Than Art Film?". IndieWire. May 17, 2013.
- ^ "Avatar: The Last Airbender Is One Of The Greatest TV Shows Of All Time". Kotaku. September 18, 2018.
- ^ Sepinwall, Alan (August 18, 2015). "'Peak TV in America': Is there really too much good scripted television?". HitFix. Retrieved January 2, 2016.
- ^ James, Meg (December 16, 2015). "2015: Year of 'peak TV' hits record with 409 original series". LA Times. Retrieved January 2, 2016.
- ^ Littleton, Cynthia (December 16, 2015). "Peak TV: Surge From Streaming Services, Cable Pushes 2015 Scripted Series Tally to 409". Variety. Retrieved January 2, 2016.
- ^ Leslie, Ian (April 13, 2017). "Watch it while it lasts: our golden age of television". Financial Times. Retrieved August 13, 2017.
- ^ Flint, Joe (December 21, 2016). "Peak TV Still Going Strong With 455 Scripted Shows in 2016". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved August 13, 2017.
- ^ Koblin, John (April 12, 2019). "Hollywood Upended as Unions Tell Writers to Fire Agents". The New York Times. p. B1. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved April 13, 2019.
- ^ "DuckTales: Season 1 (2018)". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango. Archived from the original on December 2, 2017. Retrieved February 23, 2018.
- ^ Bowman, Sabienna (January 7, 2017). "Girl Meets World Has Become a Landmark Show for a New Generation of Fans". Bustle. Retrieved January 8, 2017.
- ^ "Best of 2017: Television Critic Top Ten Lists". Metacritic. Archived from the original on January 2, 2018. Retrieved March 15, 2019.
- ^ "Best of 2018: Television Critic Top Ten Lists". Metacritic. Archived from the original on December 4, 2018. Retrieved March 15, 2019.
- ^ "X-Men '97 First Reviews: "Marvel's Best Release in Years," Critics Say". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved March 21, 2024.
- ^ Romano, Aja (June 3, 2024). "Why does TV feel so underwhelming yet so overwhelming?". Vox. Retrieved June 15, 2024.
- ^ a b c d Adalian, Josef; Brown, Lane (June 6, 2023). "The Binge Purge". New York.
- ^ Holmes, Linda (May 3, 2022). "There's too much TV to keep up. Have we hit the limit?". NPR. Retrieved May 6, 2022.
- ^ Greenidge, Kaitlyn (May 5, 2023). "It's Time to Embrace the Era of Mid Entertainment". Harper's Bazaar. Retrieved May 7, 2023.
- ^ Schulman, Michael (November 6, 2023). "Boxed Out: The Twilight of Prestige Television". The New Yorker. ISSN 0028-792X. Retrieved November 6, 2023.
- ^ a b Renshaw, David (April 27, 2021). "Is rewatching old TV good for the soul?". bbc.com. Retrieved April 30, 2021.
- ^ Apple TV+ Beats Netflix to Streaming History With 'CODA' Best Picture Win – Decider
- ^ Pallotta, Frank (August 11, 2022). "The streaming wars are over". CNN.
- ^ Sherman, Alex (August 19, 2022). "Here's why HBO Max is pulling dozens of films and TV series from the streaming platform". CNBC. Retrieved August 21, 2022.
- ^ Perez, Sarah (March 8, 2019). "Disney's forthcoming streaming service will kill the Disney Vault". Tech Crunch. Retrieved March 9, 2019.
- ^ Blair, Elizabeth (July 24, 2023). "The streaming model is cratering — here's how that's hurting actors, writers and fans". All Things Considered. Retrieved July 28, 2023.
- ^ Watercutter, Angela. "The Anticlimactic Death of the Streaming Wars". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved August 30, 2023.
- ^ Jennifer Maas (July 11, 2023). "Peak TV Has Peaked: From Exhausted Talent to Massive Losses, the Writers Strike Magnifies an Industry in Freefall". Variety. Retrieved August 31, 2023.
- ^ Goldberg, Lesley; Rose, Lacey; Goldberg, Lesley (December 7, 2023). "It's Quiet, Too Quiet, in Hollywood: Where Are the Deals?". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved December 9, 2023.
- ^ Porter, Rick (February 6, 2024). "How Comfort Shows Conquered Streaming TV". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved February 10, 2024.
- ^ Adams, Sam (January 30, 2024). "Why Suits Was the Most Streamed Show of 2023". Slate. Retrieved June 8, 2024.
- ^ Morrison, Sara (May 24, 2023). "The Wild West of streaming TV is here and it's free". Vox. Retrieved November 4, 2023.
- ^ Reese, Hope (July 11, 2013). "Why Is the Golden Age of TV So Dark?". The Atlantic.
- ^ Kilkenny, Katie (February 27, 2018). "New Book Challenges Myth That TV's New Golden Age Is Just a Boy's Club". The Hollywood Reporter.
- ^ Ventura, Elbert (April 5, 2013). "Tired of TV's Golden Age?". The American Prospect.
- ^ Szalai, Georg (February 21, 2024). ""Peak Caution" Instead of "Peak TV"? BBC Drama Boss Promises "True Boldness and Braveness"". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved February 25, 2024.
- ^ The Secretive, Extravagant, Bighearted World of The Rings of Power, the Most Expensive Show Ever Made – Time
- ^ Aroesti, Rachel (October 11, 2016). "No laughing matter: the rise of the TV 'sadcom'". The Guardian.
- ^ Yahr, Emily (August 9, 2013). "After the show is the after-show — TV networks look to capitalize on biggest hits". Washington Post. Archived from the original on March 3, 2014.
- ^ Ziegler, John R.; Richards, Leah (January 9, 2020). Representation in Steven Universe. Springer Nature. p. 10. ISBN 978-3-030-31881-9.
- ^ "Streamers Need To Learn Love Nonfiction Too".
- ^ The best TV episodes of 2022|EW.com
- ^ Ming, Christopher (November 3, 2021). "The End of The Golden Age of Television and Why Content is No Longer King". Christopher Ming Blog.
- ^ There has never been a better time to be a bad actor|The Week
- ^ Streaming's Golden Age Is Suddenly Dimming – The New York Times
- ^ Jeffery, Morgan (June 12, 2018). "Here's why the so-called Golden Age of TV might be coming to an end". Digital Spy.
- ^ The Golden Age of Bad TV: Ludicrous Shows You Can't Stop Watching | Observer
- ^ Netflix, 'House of Cards,' and the Golden Age of Television – The Atlantic
- ^ Rich, Katie (May 20, 2024). "'Shogun' Starts Some Drama". Los Angeles.
- ^ Newton Minow's Vast Wasteland Speech: How It Changed TV|Time
- ^ Does Minow Still Think TV Is a 'Vast Wasteland'?|Ad Age (subscription required)
- ^ How TV's 'Vast Wasteland' Became a Vast Garden|WIRED
- ^ Why is there a writers' strike? Blame the Golden Age of TV – Los Angeles Times
External links
[edit]- 1990s in American television
- 2000s in American television
- 2010s in American television
- 2020s in American television
- Golden ages (metaphor)
- History of television in the United States
- 1990s in television
- 2000s in television
- 2010s in television
- 2020s in television
- 1990s in animation
- 2000s in animation
- 2010s in animation
- 2020s in animation
- 1999 establishments in the United States
- 1999 in animation
- Postmodern art