On Binge-Watching (Guest Post)

(Ed. Note - I am currently getting reacquainted with a location known as "my home," a place I've been in for a total of 16 hours over the course of the last 2 days. In the interim, please enjoy this guest post from my good friend, former podcast co-host and the world's foremost expert on the oldest persons in the world, Keegan King I will return to my normal posting schedule tomorrow, with an additional makeup post coming tomorrow or Friday.)

Alas, as predicted by George R.R. Martin, winter has come.  As I joyfully gaze at the weather app on my phone (It's A Hot One), I quickly realize that I may never want to go outside again.  What can a sad, sad soul do after coming home from his/her sad, sad job?  Besides the obvious answer of descending into increasingly troubling alcoholism, of course?

Let me give some quick backstory by quickly revealing two pieces of information about myself.  I’m a big fan of Lost, and the first time in my life I had the fortitude to “binge-watch” a television show, it was so that I could catch the finale of Lost LIVE! and feel the glorious disappointment of Lost LIVE! 

But the more I thought about what I did, and heard my mom’s voice in my head criticizing my poor decision making and telling me she taught me better and that I’m a disappointment not just to her but to the whole family, etc., the more I decided that binge-watching is the only correct way to watch television.  In just a few short weeks, I caught up on, and finished a series that others were watching for six long years.

I made the choice that only in one rare circumstance would I try to follow along with a show, live, week-by-week and season-by-season.  This circumstance is, of course, the moment of public shaming when that guy says, in his highest-and-mightiest voice, “What do you MEAN you haven’t seen Mr. Robot!?”  So now I’m obviously going to be watching Mr. Robot like the rest of the dirty peasant TV masses. (Ed. note - I thought this was a joke title. Nope. This is a real show)

By making the honest choice to binge-watch during these cold, lonely winter nights, further research can be done into a show’s true credentials.  Better choices can be made when you are able to ask honest opinions about similar shows, and get reactions by folks who have already been pleased/disappointed.  Should I watch Rick and Morty? I heard it was a pretty weird show. “Hell yes!” yelled the masses back.  In five nights, I watched two seasons.

Some detractors might say that I’m devaluing the “pay-off,” or that they get to spend six years enjoying Breaking Bad when I get just three weeks.  But my response is that there’s just TOO much television programming.  I can binge-watch entire serii every three weeks for eternity, and will have only seen 10% of the quality television programs out there: quality original programming on some online video streaming thing like “The Netflix” or Amazon Prime TV; premium programming on HBO, Showtime or Starz; regular broadcasting stations, like NBC, FOX, CBS or ABC; or even cable stations, such as FX, AMC or USA.  

There’s just too much good TV not to binge-watch.  And it’s kind of becoming a cool tradition, at least for me, is to play binge-watch-catch-up so that you can see the last few episodes of a beloved series live.