I am a very impatient person sometimes. I hate waiting for things to happen, and I do not like surprises. I also hate, I repeat HATE, cliffhangers. I watch a lot of different TV shows, and it is torture waiting for the next episode to come out a week later. I'm constantly looking up spoilers, if there are any, and I'm constantly looking at the actors' Twitter and Instagram pages for any clue as to what might happen in the next episode. And what's even worse than waiting a week between episodes, is waiting during a mid-season break or waiting during seasons. Those months between episodes are complete torture to me, and then there's no guarantee that at the end of a season that the show will come back for another season. That's another thing I hate--when things end or are short lived.
When I get invested into a TV show, I sometimes become an obsessed fan, and all I want to do is find out every little detail I can about the show and where it is going. With new shows, that's a little hard to do because sometimes the writers don't know what they are going to do with the show yet, so that's why sometimes finding a TV show that has a few seasons done already is the best thing for me.
I'm sure Netflix is not a new term to you, and that is where I go when I find a new TV show that I potentially want to invest my time and emotions into. I've recently found this show, Heartland, and fell completely in love with it in the little clips I've seen on YouTube, so I went to Netflix and was so happy that it was actually on there. I started binge watching the show about a week ago, and I'm already on season four. Yet, for every positive thing about binge watching a show, there is a negative thing to counteract it. I've come up with a pros and cons list of binge watching TV shows.
The Pros:
For one, you don't have to wait weeks between episodes. You don't even have to wait a minute between episodes when you binge watch. One episode follows the other, and that is the perfect thing for me. I just have to find the time to do it.
Second, cliffhangers really don't exist, at least not for a long time. You'll have a moment of not knowing what's going to happen, but then, a moment later, your questions start to get answered.
Third, there are less surprises, which is extremely important to me. With Heartland, I've looked up the summaries to most of the season and episode so I know where the show is kind of going. This is something that I like because of the fact that I hate surprises, and if I know where the show is headed, all of the little details make a lot more sense at the time.
The Cons:
The number one con to binge watching a TV show is finding the time to do so. Considering that binge watching does involve watching multiple episodes in a row, it does require a significant amount of time. Sometimes I don't have all the time that I wish I did.
Another con is when I catch up to the current season that is showing on TV at the moment, I then have to go to waiting a week between episodes again. You know, the one thing I did not want to do, hence the binge watching to begin with, but I guess that's why they call it binge watching for a reason.
The last major con is when I come to the end of a show, and I have nothing else to look forward to. It's like coming to the end of a chapter in your life, especially if you've invested so much time in the show to begin with.
I'm sure others have come into the same issues I have with binge watching a show, but I guess the main point to look at when it comes to binge watching something is the fact that you've found something you can totally let yourself fall into. I chose the TV shows that I binge watch very carefully. I mean if you're going to invest time into something, you better have some kind of connection to it. I'm so happy that I've found Heartland. It has been a show that has grown on me and has turned into something I have come to have a strong connection to, and I couldn't love it any more.
