Every few weeks or months, I find myself consumed with feelings of extreme inadequacy and self-doubt thanks to the internet. Am I a loser? Do I have really bad taste? Am I stupid? Am I an imposter? What set off the spiral this time was the Netflix show Stranger Things . And the fact that I don’t watch it.
The internet is a cruel place that demands homogeneity. You don’t really have to literally watch the exact same thing at the exact same time — because the web is based on these loose, shifting principles of egalitarianism where everyone sort of has an equal voice — but it helps if you do. That’s how you get with the cool crowd, the backbenchers, the theorists and analysts.
TV shows especially provoke a kind of frenzy. You spend a lot of time with the characters, you internalise elements of a show, you read about it everywhere. The discussion on social media — the kind that’s replaced ‘watercooler talk’ — tends to revolve around the flavour of the week, which is bestowed with platitudes of eternal greatness.
TV shows, in the internet age, become cultural phenomena. Long-drawn hypotheses on the symbolism are written, earnest think-pieces followed by rebuttals and re-rebuttals. Memes are created. References and links between real life and the show are thrown up. And the ones not watching are left out.
‘Binge-watching’ mode
We’re in what’s been called the Golden Age of TV, and with binge-watching redefining the experience, creators are exploring the medium in previously unimaginable ways. And TV, like all art, especially when done well, is bound to incite some pretty passionate feelings among fans and critics — you do a 12-hour marathon of any work of fiction, and the characters become your friends and enemies. That, added to the fact that anyone has the right to state their opinion now, and not just a snooty few, means there’s just a lot of talk. It’s one of the more fun parts of being a fan.
Mass consumption
Stranger Things is set in the ’80s with a bunch of kids in it. It has supernatural elements and it is, by all accounts, really well made. I haven’t watched it yet. But I can tell you the response to the first season was unanimously positive while the second one has gotten mixed reviews. People online seem to have developed an attachment to the child actors on it, and are hoping they go on to have long, successful careers.
Which is all great, but the show’s premise really doesn’t interest me. So now I have all this unnecessary information clogging my brain, about a show I don’t really plan to watch anytime soon.
What do I do with this? Remember how a few months ago everyone was going bats about Game Of Thrones , overrated fantasy slasher fiction sh*tshow that it is? Every time a hyped new show comes out, all talk is literally around that one thing and nothing else.
That’s really the issue with the community consumption of art online. Everyone talks about the exact same thing, especially TV shows. It happened with Breaking Bad , it happened with Sherlock , Game Of Thrones... with just about any popular show. The ones who aren’t up to date get FOMO, so they try and watch it just to fit in.
This makes me wonder about the under-the-radar shows that never quite get the internet traction they deserve. People, now more than ever, can seek out different works based on their unique preferences, but instead get caught in the hype and FOMO machine.
Of course, there’s nothing wrong in liking popular shows. Often, they do well simply because they are good (Occam’s razor). It’s really a problem of plenty. This is something the music world is affected by too. With so much music out there, it becomes that much harder to discover something off-beat that’ll work for you. But the process of discovery has changed; TV shows were, when I was growing up, an accidental discovery at best. You were surfing channels and saw something fun. Now you can Google the entire pilot script before making a commitment to a show, and yet so often we tend to play it safe.
Now, we pick up something only when it’s pre-approved, when it has both critical and popular consensus. Surely, there’s a better way. Underground blogs? Trusted tastemakers? Given TV’s massy appeal, I really don’t know the answer. Maybe I’ll just watch Stranger Things.
The author is a freelance culture writer from New Delhi who wishes he’d studied engineering instead.
