In the past few years, television has seen a huge shift in the entertainment hierarchy. Big stars have entered the small screen arena and others, barely famous at first, have become superstars. With streaming giants like Netflix and, more recently, Amazon Prime Video, we’ve got access to a world of content at the touch of a screen.
Multi-starrers
This year will again see a number of stars on the small screen.
Tom Hardy teams up with Ridley Scott for Taboo , a period drama about a man setting up a shipping empire in the 1800s.
Meanwhile, Paolo Sorrentino's upcoming series The Young Pope has Jude Law playing Pope Pius XIII, the first American Pope in history. Diane Keaton co-stars. Reviews are mixed, but you should decide for yourself.
Big Little Lies , a dark comedy based on Liane Moriarty’s best-selling book, is hotly anticipated. Its all-star cast includes Nicole Kidman, Reese Witherspoon, Shailene Woodley and Alexander Skarsgard.
Shots Fired , a ten-part drama based on a racially charged shooting in a fictional town in North Carolina, is headlined by Helen Hunt and Robert Dreyfus.
A shift in production priorities has also helped movie actors enter television. Many of the shows are self-contained miniseries or anthologies that do not need commitment over multiple seasons. For instance, Taboo runs for eight episodes, Big Little Lies for seven.
Netflix vs Amazon Prime Video
The two heavyweights will continue their battle for streaming supremacy in 2017. Unsurprisingly, both services have announced ambitious plans this year. Netflix will reportedly spend nearly $6 billion on content. Amazon’s streaming service, which is Netflix’s closest competitor, spent an estimated $ 3.2 billion in 2016. According to Forbes , it is likely to double its spending on video content and triple its commitment to originals in the second half of 2017.
For now, however, it seems Netflix is ahead, especially in original content. Netflix currently has 30 original scripted series in various stages of development or release. In 2017, it’s going to double the number of original series and go big on unscripted shows, according to Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos. The service plans to debut 20 unscripted shows, including global competition series Ultimate Beastmaster , produced by Sylvester Stallone and The Biggest Loser executive producer Dave Broome.
Amazon’s original line-up appears to have a couple of new shows for now. Sneaky Pete has been created by Bryan Cranston and revolves around a conman who assumes the identity of his cellmate after being released from prison. Z: The Beginning of Everything is a period drama that stars Christina Ricci as Zelda Fitzgerald. It follows her life as she meets the then unpublished writer F. Scott Fitzgerald, and moves through their love affair and marriage.
Netflix’s multiple new shows include One Day at a Time , a multi-generational comedy based on the 1975 show of the same name that’s already raked in rave reviews. Neil Patrick Harris stars in A Series of Unfortunate Events , based on the popular children’s book by Lemony Snicket.
Selena Gomez produces 13 Reasons Why alongside Spotlight director Tom McCarthy, who is also set to helm the show’s first two episodes. It is based on the 2007 novel of the same name about a girl who commits suicide, but first sends a shoebox of cassette tapes to a boy saying why she did it.
Dear White People , an upcoming comedy, is based on the 2014 indie film of the same name, and is created by the original screenwriter and director, Justin Simien. Like the film, the show will follow a diverse group of students of colour as they attempt to navigate life at a predominantly white Ivy League college that often overlooks racial tensions.
The Marvel cinematic universe, which has now expanded magnificently to television as well, is likely to continue its strong run with Iron Fist and The Defenders . The latter will include all four of its marquee television characters: Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, and the forthcoming Iron Fist. They are billed to appear in the forthcoming film Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 as well; excitement among Marvel fans is understandably sky-high.
Indian originals
Despite the fanfare, naysayers have been sceptical of the potential of subscription-based content delivery model in India. And not without reason. Numbers vary, but it is widely accepted that India’s broadband penetration is appallingly poor, and that a vast majority of its population has no access to the internet. Coupled with the wide prevalence and unsaid acceptance of content piracy, it stands to reason that subscription-based streaming services are likely to stutter and fail.
After both Netflix and Amazon Prime Video entered the Indian market last year, 2017 is arguably when the streaming services will either find a firm footing or have to re-invent themselves for the Indian market.
Indian viewers, however, will be most keen to see how Netflix and Amazon Prime Video’s India-based originals turn out.
While Netflix is the global leader in producing original content, Amazon has gone all out in trying to capture the Indian market. Although it launched almost a year after Netflix, it announced at the outset that it had 18 Indian originals in various stages of development, its biggest launch in a market outside the US. Moreover, most of these shows are associated with big-ticket names.
Recently, it was announced that Amazon has partnered with 14 Indian comedians, including Sapan Varma, Biswa Kalyan Rath, Naveen Richard and Kanan Gill. According to a report in Mint , the first Amazon India original is likely to go live in the April-June quarter. All new shows will be of a standard with Bollywood productions, both in terms of scale and budgets.
Netflix, in comparison, has only announced an adaptation of Vikram Chandra’s Sacred Games , which is being produced in partnership with Phantom Films.