I thought Wednesday season 2 was quite good, especially by the time it reached the end, which was full of genuinely unpredictable twists and reveals. But audiences? While scores are still solid, viewership numbers are very much bad, at least in context.
Right now, according to Netflix’s own metrics, Wednesday season 2 only has 40% of the views of season 1. Wednesday season 1 had 252 million views, season 2 has 102 million That’s an enormous drop.
There are some caveats here. Namely that we are not quite two months into the three-month window in which those numbers are counted, and the season was divided into two parts, and the second was only out a month ago. However, Wednesday only did 7.2 million views last week, so being generous, if it adds 35,000, that’s still going to end up being 54% of the views of season 1.
In the context of Netflix releases, this is extremely bad. What you want to see with a popular show is holding onto or even growing its audience, not one that loses half its viewers. For instance, season 4 of Stranger Things has the most views of the series. Or at least you want it to be close. Bridgerton season 1 has 113 million views while season 3 still has 106 million. Squid Game season 2 had 192 million views to season 1’s 265 million. The bad news came with the release of season 3 at 145 million, but that was a bit of a bizarre experiment given that season 3 was more or less the second half of season 2, just released six months later.
What happened with Wednesday here? A few things:
- It was nearly three years between seasons, not even for some big blockbuster production, but mainly kids hanging around a school. That’s a gap that will bleed an audience badly.
- Wednesday season 2 was split into two parts. Netflix does this in order to ensure people subscribe for two months rather than just do one, binge, and quit, but it means a significant drop-off between parts, as it’s a lot easier to ditch the show when it’s gone for a month as opposed to watching all of it within a week or so.
- The virality is gone. Wednesday was a global, word-of-mouth phenomenon, but when it returned with a very similar-looking second season, the same kind of hype just wasn’t there. You might also argue that star Jenna Ortega has been simultaneously overexposed in the interim, but unfortunately making almost exclusively bad movies.
Still, I’m not sure this all adds up to a full explanation for a drop this big. Even if it crosses 50%, this is not what Netflix wants to see with what is supposed to be a flagship franchise going forward. It was renewed for season 3 long ago, but Netflix has to find a way to respark interest again.
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Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.