Sunday, December 3, 2017

Streaming Video Power Rankings #90:

1) Acorn TV: I am loving Acorn this month. I may have shed a few manly tears while watching 800 Words, and my decision now is: stick to my plan to only get Acorn for a month or plow on to the second season, which has 16 episodes? I am also laughing out loud at Men Behaving Badly, so I have plenty to enjoy, and the service is easier to use than ever. However, I may not renew because...

2) Amazon Prime Video: Shiny New Toy Syndrome: I just got Prime for a month for the holidays, and I am enjoying an exploration of the weird stuff on there, like the Pat Paulsen Comedy Half-Hour, an  vintage Don Knotts comedy special, and something else that really deserves its own post, even if it's a brief one.

Why should I watch award-winning excusive movies and original TV series when I can see Popeye and Son?

3) Netflix: Man, GLOW is really entertaining. Why did I not watch that when it premiered? The real story lately, though, is my daughter's addiction to Canadian teen drama Backstage. It's an engrossing show thankfully lacking in the "social relevance" of Degrassi.

4) Hulu: Got a bunch of new movies for December, many of them the same old, same old. Why do they even bother cycling those Bond movies and Rocky flicks so many times? For me, though, the big story was me finally beginning the current season of Brooklyn Nine-Nine.

5) Shout! Factory TV: I watched a few more episodes of Starcade, and two remarkable things happened: 1) No commercials! It was glorious, I tells ya. 2) After asking a young contestant what his hobbies were, host Geoff Edwards replied, "Girls and Dungeons and Dragons? Sounds pretty kinky to me."

6) The CW: I failed in my attempt to catch up on "my stories" before the Crisis on Earth-X crossover, but I like that the CW app has everything assembled in one place.

7) Walter Presents: I just love the stones of some guy "in the industry" who creates a SVOD service devoted to curated international TV and names it AFTER HIMSELF. I don't know anyone who even knows this exists, but Walter adds a few shows each month, so give him some credit.

8) BritBox: Mainly here because of their "Britmas" thing in which they are gonna roll out a ton of holiday programming this month. I'm a sucker for timely content adds like that.

9) YouTube: A slow week, but I can't drop it out of the top 10 after being able to come home and watch 4 different versions of "Underneath the Tree" by Kelly Clarkson after the kids and I heard it on the radio.

10) CBS All Access: No, I still don't have it, but it is doing well, it had a free month promotion for Black Friday, and a friend of mine told me the new Trek show was pretty good. I don't think the comedy No Activity is gaining any traction, but all that counts for something. Does anyone else think that Victoria's Secret show was probably the single most streamed item on there all year?

2 comments:

J Hall said...

Also shocked to see Amazon Prime add THE OKLAHOMA KID (1939) from Warner Brothers and WHO DONE IT? (1942), one of my favorite Abbott & Costello Universals. Plus, some additional PRC westerns featuring Buster Crabbe and Eddie Dean. Still miss the Republic "B"- westerns but these are fun to watch as well.

Rick Brooks said...

I think I stumbled on KID but not WHO DONE IT? Nice find! That's the problem with Prime, I think--too hard to find stuff like that. I also noticed the Fox noir Fallen Angel just appeared. It's like they license a handful of classic titles from everyone instead of getting a big deal with any major library.