Streaming Killed the Television Star

Has anyone else noticed that television has gotten… worse?

So many shows are released as miniseries. They’ll be one season and then years later there will finally be another. Well, if there’s ever another season. So many fantastic shows get canceled after a single season like Moon Knight, I Am Not Okay With This, and Julie and the Phantoms. I mourn these shows more than you’ll ever know (especially Moon Knight, there was so much that could have come from that show). 

These sorts of things happened in the past as well when TV was on TV and not whatever streaming service you decided to subscribe to for the month. But the television of old also had shows with several seasons that fit into a nice 30 to 45 minute block. Take Supernatural that started all the way back in 2005, or ER which ran from 1994 to 2009. You don’t see those sorts of long running shows made by companies like Netflix or HBO.

Long-running shows like these are some of the world’s favorites. Maybe there’s a bit of nostalgia, after all when I’m rewatching Supernatural I always go back to the first couple seasons. They’re the shows that have twenty episode long seasons, the ones with filler episodes, the kinds you can put on in the background while folding laundry or doing dishes and still understand what’s going on.

I couldn’t imagine doing those things with many of the shows that come out now!

Alright, so we’re in consensus that limit-series aren’t the best things in the world, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the issues with streaming.

Let me give you an example that really upset me last year.

I’m a Formula 1 fan, so I do almost everything I can to catch each race. Prior to the 2026 season, that wasn’t too difficult. Races were televised on ESPN, good old cable television. Sure the ad breaks during qualifying and free practice could be annoying, but it was better than having to pay for another streaming site to watch a couple of races a month.

And then it all came crashing down.

Formula 1 signed a very stupid contract with Apple TV so that in the US the races can only be streamed through Apple. Genuinely, I mean this in the kindest way possible, who has Apple TV? Now I have to pay $12.99 a month when all I’m trying to watch is 6 to 8 hours of content a month? That seems rather extreme. 

This happens with plenty of other media too. How many times have you gotten a streaming service for a specific show only for that show to leave barely a month later? How about when you learn you have to pay for some “pro” plan to actually access half the content on the site? 

Prior to streaming there were some channels that you had to pay for, that was always the case, but it certainly wasn’t to the same extent that it is now. In order to get the same access to television that you’d get on cable through streaming services it feels like you have to pay double, sometimes triple, the price. Then there’s all those movies that get sold to some streaming service after their theatrical release that you’ll be extremely lucky to get a physical copy of.

But how many people have a DVD player anymore? 

Sadly, I don’t think this is going to change anytime soon. Corporations are always going to be hungry for every single dollar they can get a hand of, but maybe change will happen slowly. I’ve seen plenty of people online return to cable television – even if it isn’t as great as it used to be. More and more people are trying to get physical versions of their media so they can truly say that they own it; even my 15-year-old sister is collecting DVDs of her favorite movies because half of them have been taken off of Netflix. 

We are stronger than corporate greed, you just have to believe that it’s true. Once that happens, once you realize that you can start making petitions, spreading the word, you learn that you have true power. Even if it’s just for something as silly as television, it’s important that we get our voice back.

After all, I don’t want to pay $10.99 to see the third season of The Pitt.