Non-Shocker: Most Streaming Viewers Are Watching Theatrical Movies And Network TV

As long theorized, streaming consumers treat the platforms as video stores and basic cable networks, catching up on theatrical films and older television shows

Universal and Illumination’s ‘The Super Mario Bros. Movie’

Nielsen just dropped their annual top-list list for what folks who watch stuff on streaming platforms actually consumed. As expected, at least in terms of the consumers and audiences measured by the third-party ratings service, the top streaming shows were all third-party accuisitions (which is why I’m not including both the “most watched aqquisitions” and the “most-watched overall streaming shows” charts). Even less surprisingly, theatrical films dominated the most-watched movies list.

USA’s Suits towering over the competition with 57.7 billion minutes viewed since arriving on Netflix (and Peacock) mid-summer. Pundits spent the back half of the summer trying to “explain” the sudden popularity, but maybe it was just a very easy/casual watch featuring ridiculously good-looking people (including a future literal princess or duchess, natch) fighting the good fight against overbearing government lawyers and less-scrupulous rival companies for nine long seasons.

Once again, audiences want to watch television on streaming platforms, not neccessarily (or at least not always) some newfangled “streaming show.” The tenth-biggest third-party show, Supernatural, had more total minutes viewed (22 million) than last year’s top original streaming show, AppleTV+’s Ted Lasso (17 million). This again shows the chasm between what the industry says folks want to watch on streaming platforms versus what they actually consume.

Even with the increased publicity (and very increased episode lengths) for the third and final season, that the Apple actually topped the original show charts last year is a sign that A) folks really did use Apple on occasion and B) the fandom around the Jason Sudeikis-starring, Bill Lawrence-created football sitcom isn’t just contained within an online bubble of high-information entertainment junkies and the perpetually online. It may be a little ironic that the year’s top original streamer show was on a platform that has almost all original, non-IP shows and movies.

Yes, the episode count is a factor, as (for example) there were just ten episodes of Netflix’s (terrific) The Night Agent compared to 443 episodes of NCIS. However, that’s perhaps a good reason to let streaming originals actually run past two-to-three seasons. Moreover, you’ll notice in the original shows chart that most of the biggies are comparatively old-school television shows like The Night Agent and The Lincoln Lawyer, shows that are closer to network or basic cable dramas like Fox’s 24 or ABC’s The Practice than a paced-for-the-binge “eight hour movie.” Likewise, I don’t have its annual ranking, but Nielsen noted that Keri Russell’s very old-school (and quite entertaining) The Diplomat nabbed 2.7 billion hours in the first two weeks on Netflix. Its lightning-fast renewal seems to imply it was likely in the top twenty.

Oh, and if Disney thought having Star Wars shows and Marvel shows was going to boost Disney+, well, The Mandalorian is the only such item in the top ten last year. Even that show is, especially in the first two seasons, closer to an “episode of the week” structure in terms of the Fugitive/Incredible Hulk formula. And, yeah, She-Hulk would have benefited (budget notwithstanding) from being closer to a 20-epsiode case-of-the-week legal comedy. Alas. Good thing they didn’t dilute their two biggest live-action IPs to chase illusionary streaming glory, right?

To be fair, Disney did dominate among the year’s most-streamed movies. The top movie of the year was not a buzzy Netflix original like The Mother or Rebel Moon part I, but rather Walt Disney Animation’s Moana. The 2016 animated musical has long been a popular Disney+ title (in terms of being near the front of the trending titles list on any given day), and it was followed by Disney’s briefly theatrical Encanto from late 2021. As you can see, the majority of the top-streamed films last year were A) animated theatricals and B) all-quadrant blockbuster/franchise titles that were first huge box office hits before they arrived on streaming.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie was Netflix’s most-watched movie *after* earning $1.4 billion worldwide in theaters along with a robust VOD/DVD run. Avatar: The Way of Water earned $2.3 billion globally before becoming last year’s second-most streamed live-action title (I guess nobody likes Avatar after all…?) behind the $855 million-grossing Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. The only “original” title in the top ten, right at #10 (just behind Avatar 2 and Black Panther 2 as the only three live-action films to make the cut), was Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery.

That movie only exists because the Lionsgate-distributed Knives Out was a theatrical smash ($312 million in 2019). It is only on Netflix because they forked over $450 million in “f**k you money” to Rian Johnson and Ram Bergman (to be fair, I wouldn’t have said no either) for two sequels. Like the momentary popularity of Hocus Pocus 2 on Disney+ in late 2022, many of the biggest streaming flicks are either sequels to previously theatrical IP or (think something like Red Notice or The Grey Man) a streaming approximation of what used to be a big-deal theatrical tentpole.

Yes, I’d love to know the 11-20 top movies to see if last year’s Sony titles (65, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, The Woman King, etc.) held their own among live-action titles in their post-theatrical Netflix window, and if any other live-action theatricals playing on Max or Paramount+ did likewise. The $1.496 billion-grossing Top Gun: Maverick pulled around 1.46 billion minutes in its first month at Paramount+ (thank you, Entertainment Strategy Guy), which again shows that — in terms of movies and television — sometimes being on the popular streamer is more important than the movie or the show. The Office and Suits on Netflix is a big deal, while The Office and Suits on Peacock is not.

However, whether it’s Netflix or Tubi, audiences are more likely to gravitate toward a film they saw or meant to see, or a show they liked or meant to catch up with, then whatever the must-see streaming original happens to be. For all the money and effort put into a streaming arms race since 2019, to the point where it helped contribute to a WGA and SAG-AFTRA strike last year, Netflix’s most popular show was Suits, Disney+’s top show was Bluey and the most-watched show on Max was Friends.

Not unlike the lesson that wasn’t learned with Quibi, audiences like watching what they want to watch on streaming platforms. That doesn’t mean the idea of watching a show or movie that is only available on a platform (or, with Quibi, in bite-sized episodes which can only be watched on a smartphone) is inherantly appealing. Likewise, audiences flocked to The Avengers and the MCU movies in the 2010s because they liked those characters and those movies, not because they wanted cinematic universes and superhero melodramas in the abstract.

This time next year, don’t be surprised if 2024’s most watched show is, I dunno, USA’s Leverage popping up on Netflix while the most-watched movie is Frozen on Disney+, or a Universal theatrical animated smash (Kung Fu Panda 4, Despicable Me 4, etc.) on Netflix. Hollywood, pushed by Wall Street, spent the last few years building up their own streaming platforms and frankly undercutting theatrical and post-theatrical revenue streams in the hopes of challenging Netflix and being treated like a tech company. However, as evidenced by the last few years of Nielsen “most watched” charts, audiences mostly use streaming platforms as a skewed variation on basic cable or the video store. And right now, Netflix is the biggest video store and most popular cable network in town.