I recently changed my T-Mobile plan, which gets Netflix free. I was excited, because it gives me another movie and show outlet, and I love watching movies. It’s the basic plan, which means only 720p, which I can live with. Only one stream at a time, I’m OK with that. No commercials. But, would it be worth $9.99 a month?
Not really.
I’m actually a bit underwhelmed by the amount of content. That could be due to me mostly watching horror, scifi/fantasy, and period pieces (mostly things from hundreds to thousands of years ago). And while there’s certainly some different stuff than on the other ones, it’s not that great. I thought there would be much, much more. And most is within this century, mostly from the last 10 years. A few that are older, but, not many.
One problem is that many of the shows and movies look fantastic, and then you realize they’re dubbed. The problem with dubbing is not so much that the words do not match lips, but, that the voices sound separate from what’s going on. It’s rather like someone doing karaoke: you know the voice and music are separate. Like listening to a 3.1 soundbar where the voice channel is overpowering the rest of the music and sound. Barbarians looked great, but, it’s in German.
Then there are the shows that are not complete. Cursed was exactly the type of show I would love. Except, there was no season 2 and will never be (partly due to COVID), and it ended in a cliffhanger. Nope.
Then there’s the interface, which is a pain to find things. It’s almost like you have to know what you’re looking for exactly and hope they have it. There is a good outside site, Just Watch, but, it shouldn’t be necessary to use it.
I had been, and still do, use Amazon Prime, Freevee, Tubi, and Pluto TV. They have massive libraries. Sure, a lot is crappola, but, you might find a gem that most do not like but you like. I’ve found a few of those. I find a ton of movies and shows (especially Freevee for those). I also pay for the basic Paramount Plus, which had been free for a year. It’s mostly about CBS shows, and I do love putting on Survivor and The Amazing Race, a lot of the time as background. They have a few good movies here and there, such as the new Dungeons and Dragons (good movie. Not great, but, a fun watch with zero woke, zero messages). Scream 6 (that was good). The Star Trek shows and Halo. I saw Top Gun: Maverick on it first. And Smile (it was Ok). It’s worth the money for me. Even with ads, which you get on Freevee, Tubi, and Pluto.
Then there’s Peacock. Is it worth $4.99, and deal with ads vs $9.99? It probably is, they come out with some movies from the theaters before others.
But, Netflix? If I had to pay $9.99 a month, I probably wouldn’t. I appreciate The Witcher, though a bit dark. Vikings Valhala, yes. Definitely going to watch The Last Kingdom movie, might even rewatch all 5 seasons. Some other stuff. I just expected more. Maybe it will surprise me in the future.
Netflix has a good many Korean shows. I highly recommend them. The actors actually act, the writing is good and the productions are very good. They also have a high moral content.
There are many that look interesting, but, you get to that whole dubbed thing.
One other thing I noticed is that you have to turn the volume way up.
We definitely don’t do dubbed. After a bit, caption reading gets very easy and you don’t need the volume. Besides, as you get older captions are necessary for even English. Try to find Train to Busan, Squid Game, Goblin, anything with actress Shin Min Na.
I may try that, usually not a fan of captions.
At least they are dubbed. BAck when I had Netflix, they had a bunch of cheap foreign content that were only subbed. I gave them up before it became popular to boycott them just because they ran out of content worth watching.
Not sure why they’re ignoring so much content, mostly older, that so many others have. Sure, the others have it, but, that means people go to those other services, and may then think “why pay for Netflix?”
When Netflix started streaming, they had licenses, or the straightforward ability to license nearly any video content in every production company’s libraries. Now with HBO+, Peacock, Amazon Prime, etc., They no longer have the ability to pay for whatever content they want to feature. The best advice I’ve seen is to get HBO+ for 2 months, then cancel it and get Peackock for two months, and continue to rotate through them so that you can watch what you want from each of the company’s libraries.