By Steven Zeitchik Steven Zeitchik Reporter covering the business of entertainment in the U.S. and beyond Email Bio Follow March 21 at 7:00 AM There’s the show in which the protagonist throws a rock at the head of a young woman, follows her to a beach house and shoots her dead. The true story about the brutal sexual assault and murder of a woman in Wisconsin. The recordings of the notorious 1970s man who confessed to killing dozens of women, sometimes having sex with their decomposing corpses.
“I’m concerned about the trajectory we’re on,” said Glenn Sparks, a professor at Purdue University who has studied the effects of media violence, and is one of a number of critics who come not from the more traditional ranks of conservative family groups but are instead academics, journalists and mental-health experts.
Then there’s newcomer “You,” about a creepy stalker, which the company touted on a recent earnings call has been viewed by at least 40 million households. And one of the most-watched Netflix movies ever, “Bird Box,” released in December, is a dark exercise in which victims are moved to commit suicide after encountering a lethal supernatural being. The film was viewed by 80 million accounts in its first month of availability, Netflix executives said.
And no broadcast network in 2017-2018 had more than one show in its top five that primarily trafficked in violence, even of the more benign broadcast-network kind. The top scripted series on the biggest networks in 2017-2018 in the adult 18-49 demographic -- NBC’s “This Is Us,” CBS’ “The Big Bang Theory” and ABC’s “Roseanne” -- are all preoccupied with other themes.
Robert Thompson, a professor of media and culture at Syracuse University, says the reason for this focus may have to do with the fact that viewers often watch Netflix in more private ways and settings than they do traditional television. That can help the service achieve for shows about killers what e-book readers did for “50 Shades of Grey,” plain-brown packaging by way of the company of the red envelope.“If you look at television history, there’s often a mirror effect,” Thompson said.
The service’s interest in violence began early. Netflix’s first original scripted series was “House of Cards,” with its linchpin moment of Frank pushing Zoe in front of a train. Shortly after came"Hemlock Grove,” which opens with two teenage girls violently murdered. And even before the recent “Velvet Buzzsaw,” a dark horror-comedy that featured admirers of art gorily hanged and burned, and “Polar,” a hit-man thriller with multiple gruesome murders, Netflix was debuting films like “The Babysitter” and “Clinical,” which feature plenty of explicit violence.
Give me a break. Apparently never heard of Dateline NB fucking C. At least Netflix isn't network television.
Blockbuster thought Netflix had a shitty business model too. Doubt at your own peril.
How many original scripted shows does Netflix air every year? Do three shows really prove that it has a problem with violent and gory content? And with their obsession with algorithms couldn't it be argued that they are merely giving subscribers what they want?
To bad there isn't a way to watch what you want on netflix. I tried watching the dragon prince but it kept bringing up a ted bundy show. Tried watching some old episodes of star trek and mindhunter came on. oh well.
Isn’t Netflix a Millennial thingie? Hollywood idiocy? Then who cares.
Netflix is pandering to the liberal base.
Not only Netflix - you can hardly que up any of the offered movie channels and movies and not get inundated with gratuitous : Blood, horror, zombies, vampires, serial killing, gun vilolence, gangs, gangland, drugs, drug lords -- WHERE IS THE COMEDY?
Yes ! atleast i think so😅
Who cares? I canceled my subscription the day they hired Susan Rice.
Get a grip.
yep, which is why I quit watching it. just do Amazon Prime now
Yes. I don't want to waste my precious day off from work on the likes of Ted Bundy or Richard Ramirez. They don't deserve the attention - let them fade off into obscurity.
If that's what people want to watch what's the problem? Do we want to go back to Tipper Gore and her ilk telling us what's good and bad, what we should and should not be watching?
I have been wondering the same thing. It seems that every time I log into Netflix, there’s one more show profiling killers.
HA HA 😂 no 😂
OH NO! We have to get rid of this content because millions of people will watch it, but one person might decide to re-create it...
Is it a problem if you live by “Harry’s code”?
Society does. Netflix, like all successful businesses, creates products that people want.
It has many problems
We should ask tomsegura. Isn’t that right ChristinaP
The liberal garbage they shovel out is a much bigger problem than the serial killer content people obviously like to watch.