Rewatch Favorite Shows Again for the First Time

Is rewatching old TV good for the soul?

With the corporeality of new shows to cull from reaching overwhelming levels, increasingly audiences are choosing to rewatch their favourite serial instead. David Renshaw explores why.

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Over the by yr, when staying at home has been authorities mandated in many parts of the world, information technology has fortunately never been easier to discover something new to sentinel on Tv. Whether information technology is a talking-point reality series, a dearest and twisty crime thriller, or whatever new comedy or drama Netflix and Amazon with their multi-billion dollar budgets have added to the content completeness, viewers are spoiled for option on the modest screen. There are unabridged websites to aid you navigate what's on all the unlike streaming platforms, while social media can often exist indecipherable to those who haven't defenseless the latest episode of their favourite show.

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Why, and so, with then much fresh content, is there a growing trend for people brushing aside the glowing reviews and friends' recommendations and deciding to hit "echo" on the shows they accept watched time and time once again? Certainly, the predilection for rewatching old series seems to have been spiking recently.

The most streamed programme in the US last year was the American version of The Function, which finished in 2013 after nine series (Credit: Alamy)

Concluding year a rewatch of The Sopranos, the original prestige TV series, became a lockdown cliche rivalled only by baking assistant bread, with the critically-adored mob drama dubbed "the hottest show of lockdown" past The Guardian and "the hottest show of 2020" by GQ.

The anecdotal evidence that 2020 was "the year of the rewatch" is backed upwards by the numbers. Nielsen data showed that the almost streamed programme in the U.s. last year was the American version of The Function, which finished in 2013 after nine serial and was after bought by Netflix; Americans cumulatively streamed a total of more than than 57 billion minutes of it, nigh 10 million more than its closest rival. Other shows to rank highly on Nielsen'south list include New Girl and Vampire Diaries, both of which concluded their runs more than ii years ago. Meanwhile, as the Guardian reported, United kingdom of great britain and northern ireland streaming service NOW TV reported a 122% increase in views of The Sopranos betwixt March and October 2020, while HBO in the US reported a 200% increase.

How classic series became the hottest properties

Streaming services  – understandably, given the data  – jostle at keen expense over the rights to add archetype hits to their libraries. In recent times, the rights holders to some of Goggle box'due south best-known shows have made large money every bit United states of america media companies bet staggering amounts on licensing their timeless works. NBCUniversal committed to paying $500 million (£360m) to bring The Part exclusively to its own streaming service Peacock from 1 January 2021 for five years. Meanwhile, WarnerMedia picked upwards Friends for $425 one thousand thousand (£306m), also for five years, for its new streaming service HBO Max – an conquering it is crowning with a hotly-anticipated cast reunion, i-off special in May. Both of those series were previously available on Netflix in the US. Looking to fill the gap, Netflix paid $500 one thousand thousand (£360m) for a five-year lease of Seinfeld due to begin subsequently in 2021. HBO Max continued the shopping spree when they committed effectually $600 million (£432m) for the rights to The Big Bang Theory and a further $500 million (£360m) for South Park.

At the same time, the fact that these classic series have become Tv land's hottest property has been reflected in the audio world too, with the rise of the "rewatch podcast". Proper name a TV hit and, chances are, there'due south an accompanying podcast taking a nostalgic trip downwardly memory lane. Often – as is the example with Office Ladies, featuring Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey, and Scrubs recap Fake Doctors, Real Friends, hosted by Zach Braff and Donald Faison – these series are helmed past former cast members of the show. If you dreamed of an alternative reality where Christopher Moltisanti escaped a life of organised law-breaking and went into the earth of in-depth recaps, the Michael Imperoli-hosted Talking Sopranos is your offset port of phone call.

Daniel D'Addario, Variety'southward principal Tv set critic, suggests that the trend for rewatching classic serial dates back farther than the pandemic. "This was already happening earlier the enforced isolation of Covid, and has simply become more of a big deal over the by 12 months," he says. "Part of it is [a thing of] technology having defenseless up to our interest and desires. You no longer have to look for TV reruns or invest in DVD boxsets – these things are waiting for you lot online. Then there is the comfort of familiarity. The things people are binging are not deeply experimental, you lot know the rhythms of these shows very well. Information technology's well-nigh knowing what you're getting and letting information technology wash over you lot."

This current rewatching miracle is the stuff of endless online discussion, as well as viral memes, with many framing it in like ways: time and fourth dimension over again, people say they are drawn back to their favourite shows because of their feeling that starting something new might be stressful. Why, defended rewatchers argue, would I start something new that might be nerve-racking, complicated, not what it seemed from the trailer, or simply unenjoyable, when I know I take a guaranteed treat waiting for me? By reducing the element of risk, contrastingly, a rewatch tin possess a restorative, zen-like power. One person who certainly believes in this is the pop star Billie Eilish, who has grown up endlessly rewatching the US version of The Function, and even sampled it on her breakout album When Nosotros All Autumn Asleep, Where Do We Go? "Information technology's my therapy, bro. It's like my footling escape," she explained in a 2019 Elle interview. "As stupid every bit that sounds, that bear witness has gotten me through my whole life."

Sopranos star Michael Imperioli is 1 of a number of bandage members of archetype shows at present hosting a 'rewatch podcast' (Credit: Alamy)

The therapeutic power of old and familiar Television set is something that Katie Antoniou, a writer based in San Francisco, also knows well. She spent Christmas 2017 in a psychiatric ward, after being admitted post-obit an anxiety attack. When she returned home to her family unit she found the just thing that helped her twenty-four hours to day was rewatching old episodes of Seinfeld she'd seen countless times earlier. "I remember Seinfeld worked for me considering zilch happens in it," she says of the 90s evidence with the famous "no hugging, no learning" mantra. "There are no feet-inducing moments in in that location. You ever know where it's going to be set, and yous get to know how the characters are going to react, so they almost experience like friends of your own." Antoniou rewatched all 170 episodes of the serial, so did then all over once again. "There's and so much of it that yous tin simply dip in [to] wherever you feel like and exist assured that information technology will make you lot express mirth and get those proficient chemicals going in your brain," she explains. "When I scout Seinfeld now I only remember recovering and the safety of home. I tin still experience the back up of existence comforted by this TV show."

What makes for a good rewatch

What makes for a good rewatch is an interesting thing to contemplate. What seems obvious from many of the shows mentioned to a higher place is that comedies are the perfect rewatching fabric. A good one-act works on multiple levels; laughter lowers stress and releases positive hormones including dopamine, while the individual episodes of a sitcom, in detail, are less reliant on plot for their consequence and don't lose so much when that is no longer a novelty: funny one-liners and comedic set-pieces seem to hold up to repeat viewing meliorate than dramas that hang on suspense, similar the question of a killer's identity in a whodunnit, or whether or non the couple in a romantic drama will finally become together. Sitcoms also provide a static world, be information technology a workplace or a fix of New York apartments, with characters who maintain a consistent personality that sees them acting to blazon regardless of the situations they find themselves in. Compare that with, say, the nervus-jangling Breaking Bad in which Walter White becomes increasingly erratic and unpredictable as the serial progresses, and you lot begin to sympathize the calming appeal of a sure sitcom bet.

The fact that comedy often places mood over plot also brings it into the sphere of "ambience TV", a term coined by New Yorker writer Kyle Chayka in a feature last year to describe the rise in our technologically-distracted age  of "soothing, deadening, and relatively monotonous" shows like Emily In Paris and Netflix's diverse forays into home-makeover shows. Essentially, these are things to put on while you lot scroll social media or Whatsapp your friends. If y'all zone out for 10 minutes then don't worry, you didn't miss anything of import.

Neither ambient nor overtly comic, though undeniably very funny in parts, The Sopranos is one of a small number of outliers here. Its success as a rewatch virtually likely stems from its prestigious position as being widely considered the greatest Boob tube serial of all time; the fact it aired ii decades ago, pregnant many viewers volition exist watching for a second time just perhaps with little retention of what happens; and the snowball effect of virality – once information technology's established a lot of people are rewatching, it tin can be hard to resist joining in. Meanwhile another drama from the same era which has been an anecdotally popular choice for rewatching over the past year is Aaron Sorkin's political soap The Due west Wing. That'due south probable considering, with its idealised vision of a Democratic White House, it offered escapism of a very particular kind for liberals riding out the terminal days of the Trump era.

Genre aside, the anecdotal evidence that one-time Tv is good for the soul is supported by a 2013 research newspaper by Jaye L Derrick, associate professor of social psychology at the University of Houston, in which she investigated the ways familiar fictional worlds help to restore self-control in individuals. In that paper she described the restorative nature of repeats as creating a sense of "social surrogacy", ie the kind of friends-by-proxy relationship Antoniou felt with Seinfeld's Jerry, George, Elaine, and Kramer. "In some of the enquiry that I have done we have discovered that simply thinking about favourite TV shows was sufficient to make people feel better subsequently a rejection outcome such as a fight or a menstruation of loneliness," she tells BBC Civilisation. "There is an association between favourite narratives and feeling meliorate which doesn't occur if we're watching something new."

With their static worlds, sitcoms like Seinfeld have a especially calming entreatment when it comes to rewatching (Credit: Alamy)

Through her studies, Derrick has come to the decision that self-control – or the energy needed to manage your impulses, emotions and behaviours in the face up of new events – is key to what drives and then many people back to old stories. "If we use up a large corporeality of self-control in the day, at work or in relationships, and so we're less able to command ourselves by the end of the solar day when information technology comes to watching TV," she says. "Rewatching an old evidence doesn't require any cocky-control because yous know how it's going to play out but yous can nonetheless get all of the interest and feeling of connection from watching it." Essentially, many of us, when we sit down down after a peculiarly stressful mean solar day, are looking forrard to no more surprises.

Notwithstanding Iain Hashemite kingdom of jordan, a consultant in psychological medicine at Oxford University Hospitals, is more measured when it comes to discussing the benefits that rewatching Television set can bring to the audience. Certainly, he says, don't become dislocated into thinking that some other night binging old episodes of the Sopranos on the sofa is the same as dealing with your mental wellness. "What's the reason y'all're watching Television receiver?" he asks. "If patients come to me and say, 'My chief pastime is watching TV' I'thou inclined to inquire 'Are you doing that to avoid the world?'. Too much volition ultimately lead to stagnation. It's physically sedentary, and exercise is maybe the most effective single treatment for depression. Mentally, TV watching is also sedentary. It's OK to rest your listen but yous should also be engaging your encephalon in something more active."

Looking forward, information technology'southward easy to imagine a scenario in which streaming bosses seeking more than guaranteed hits move budgets away from developing new series and invest further in satisfying the viewers' need for comfort and nostalgia. Is the era of Pinnacle TV – with its endless amount of new shows – over, if viewers are happier to relax in the by? D'Addario is confident this won't come to pass. "The body of water-change I'thousand really expecting is that at that place will come up a signal where we're so far by Friends and The Office that future generations cannot relate to them," he says, pointing to I Beloved Lucy as an example of a classic TV evidence that no longer chimes with mod audiences. "The impulse [for rewatching] will remain but it volition shift on to a different thing." With streaming putting such a premium on rewatchable content, the ultimate mission for programme-makers today is to create the adjacent era of shows that volition have currency in x years, and 20 years' time too. The future of TV lies not just in what we want to watch this evening, but what we'll want to sentinel over and over and over.

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Source: https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20210427-is-rewatching-old-tv-good-for-the-soul

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