Recently, the viewing trends have seen a certain change. Streaming releases are consistently breaking records even though their reviews are not so good. Every new release shares the update of having a large number of viewers worldwide. The pandemic gave rise to the popularity of the streaming platforms as the entire world went into a complete lockdown and even the theatres were shut.
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But even now only a few movies released in theatres match the amount of popularity of streaming releases. Does this mean it is a decline in the popularity of theatres?
Streaming releases breaking viewing records
A number of streaming releases recently are crossing the records of views. They have attained a growing number of views despite the critics sharing bad reviews on it. Let us, for example, take the movie, Red Notice which has received only a 37% score on Rotten Tomatoes and is still some of the top and most-watched movies on Netflix. Other movies like Man from Toronto and The Terminal List are also similar examples.
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The movies and series even have a star-studded cast as actors are now shifting to acting for projects that are exclusively for streaming platforms. Oscar-winning stars like Leonardo Di Caprio and Cate Blanchett have joined the movies too and have led to their popularity as well. These movies are also created using a higher budget and can avoid the expenditure of releasing the movies in theatres making them better in quality.
Does this mean the death of theatre is near?
Streaming platforms have a number of benefits compared to theatres. With the advent of more and more streaming platforms, entertaining content is being made easily available to viewers in the comfort of their homes. Also, the streaming platforms provide larger content options at a comparatively cheaper price. As a monthly subscription with a variety of content compared to a single movie ticket price, a monthly subscription seems like a cheaper deal.
But this cannot completely hint that the theatres would end. With celebrities like Tom Cruise backing up the theatres and also the unique movie viewing experience the theatres provide cannot be recreated at home. Though the popularity has decreased it does not mean the end of it. Many movies make a theatrical release and perform well at the box office like Spider-Man: No Way Home, Top Gun: Maverick, and The Batman among others.
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