Good. I will tell. I miss Fall.
He main video The TV adaptation of Bethesda’s monumentally huge video game franchise premiered literally a month ago, on April 10, and I’m already feeling its absence from my life. Like many others, I fell hard and fast for the show’s madcap vision of a post-nuclear hell, Ella Purnell’s plucky heroine Lucy MacLean, Aaron Moten’s lovably bumbling would-be knight Maximus, and, of course, the wickedly sexy bounty hunter Ghoul. by Walton Goggin. Yes, like many others, I found the decomposing corpse man with a penchant for violence and a hole where his nose should be. hot.
I really, really loved seeing Fall! I enjoyed the series’ mix of violence and absurdity. I found myself immersed in the fate of its original characters. I binged all eight episodes that Amazon unleashed on the world at once. And now… I miss him. Fall It was dominating the streaming charts and conversation just a month ago and now… nothing. Okay, maybe I saw a miserable meme on a friend’s Instagram stories this week, but other than that, the culture has moved on to things like baby reindeer, roasted Tom Brady jokes, hip hop rivalries, and how much we hate the new iPad commercial. Whereas another of my favorite shows of 2024, Shogunremained in the zeitgeist for months and is still generating a plethora of “The Anjin Says” memes.
Fallout’s debut was huge. It is the second most viewed program in the history of Prime Video, just after its lavish Lord of the Rings series. but it could Fall would have been even higher if Amazon had chosen to release the series on a weekly schedule, as FX did for Shogun or HBO does it for Dragon House? Or was it the secret to FallIs the success of that delicious compulsive model?
In an April 30 article for Puckstreaming analytics expert Julia Alexander compared the strategies behind Netflix’s surprise success baby reindeer and Prime Video Fall. Both were launched as a compulsive model, but Alexander wrote that he believed Amazon had fallen short by abandoning all of its products. Fall in one go: “Amazon’s post-apocalyptic dramaFall“It ticks all the boxes for a show that would have thrived as a weekly release but was destroyed all at once.”
While Alejandro admitted that Fall It was still a success – “Fallracked up over 65 million views in its first two weeks across all episodes and enjoyed the second-largest debut ever on Prime Video.,sitting right behindThe rings of power” -but that “[b]Final pitches will always look better at first.” The long tail of interest in Fall It has since plateaued and Amazon could have amassed more viewership and cultural cache if they had released episodes weekly. The only strategic reason Alexander could see for the compulsive drop was to create “a big show to highlight and support their newly instituted level of publicity ahead of their first Upfront bonanza in May.”
So from a business perspective, Prime Video may have simply launched Fall Season 1 at once to improve its initial numbers before an Upfront presentation. They chose the short-term big bang – no pun intended – over broader, longer, more sustained growth.
But is there a creative argument as to why Prime Video might have decided to give away all Fall to the fans at once? The decision maker himself Fall Recapper Sean T. Collins opined in his episodic reviews that the series worked well as a binge watch:
FallIt may be the first show I’ve seen that really benefits from the standard streaming model of a full-season simultaneous release. Watching this show, going from level to level and world to world, following Lucy, Maximus, Ghoul and Norm on their side missions and seeing those flashbacks to Cooper Howard scenes:FallIt’s like spending the weekend trying to beat a video game.
And you are right! One of the reasons I enjoyed Fall Such was the way it was structured episodically to raise the stakes, introduce new lore, incorporate new wrinkles, introduce new “missions” that seemed to progress through a video game. Each new installment was like entering a new level of the game. Binge-watching increased my enjoyment of the series.
So is it possible that Amazon got it right by launching Fall suddenly? Was it an aesthetic choice, designed to present the narrative in the best possible light? Or was it a ploy to improve metrics ahead of a big boost in ad sales?
Either way, I know one thing. I wish I had a new episode of Fall to watch right now, just a month since the show’s debut.
