Topline
Two decade-old movies featuring some of Hollywood’s biggest stars are the latest films to enjoy a second life after they were added to Netflix’s lineup, with 2012 romance “The Vow” and Brad Pitt’s “Fury” sneaking into the streamer’s top 10 most-watched English movies last week.
Key Facts
“The Vow,” starring Rachel McAdams and Channing Tatum as a married couple whose lives are turned upside down by a traumatic brain injury, was viewed 3.8 million times on Netflix between Jan. 29 and Feb. 4 to become the streamer’s seventh most-watched movie of the week.
The film is joined in the top 10 by “Fury,” a 2014 World War II movie that sees Brad Pitt lead a five-man crew (Shia LaBeouf, Logan Lerman, Michael Peña and Jon Bernthal) behind enemy lines to strike Nazi forces.
“Fury” was viewed 3.3 million times, making it the ninth most-watched movie of last week.
Also among the top 10 films last week were “The Postcard Killings,” a 2020 crime thriller that was viewed 4.9 million times and “Minions,” a 2015 animated film that spent its third week in the most-watched category with 4 million views.
The top five most-watched English movies of last week were “The Greatest Night in Pop” (2024) “Orion and the Dark” (2024), “Lift” (2024), “Deep Fear” (2024) and “The Postcard Killings (2020).
Tangent
Aside from three outliers, last week’s most watched English TV shows were all new releases on Netflix. Sofía Vergara’s cartel drama “Griselda” topped the list for the second week in a row with 114.1 million viewing hours, followed by “Alexander: The Making of a God,” “American Nightmare,” “Fool Me Once” and the second season of “Love on the Spectrum.” Further down the list, the first season of “The Tourist,” which originally released in 2022, was the sixth most-watched show with 11.4 million viewing hours. The first season of “Yellowstone” and the sixth season of “Young Sheldon” both made the top-10 list as audiences await the release of new episodes. The seventh and final season of “Young Sheldon,” which was the most-viewed title across all of streaming in December, will premiere on CBS on Feb. 15 and the second part of “Yellowstone’s” final season will premiere later this year. Older episodes of the “Yellowstone” series were added to Netflix on Jan. 15.
Key Background
“The Vow” and “Fury” join “The Legend of Tarzan,” “Pretty Woman,” “Suits,” “The Big Bang Theory,” “Gilmore Girls” and other titles that have surged in popularity years after their release thanks to a second life on streaming. In 2023, not a single original series from a streamer broke into the top-10 most streamed shows of the year, Nielsen data shows. Instead, acquired series and “comfort shows” like “Friends” and “Grey’s Anatomy” racked up the highest number of streaming minutes. “Suits,” the most-streamed show of the year, was streamed for 57.7 billion minutes in 2023. By comparison, the most streamed original series of the year was Ted Lasso on AppleTV+, which was viewed for 16.9 billion minutes, according to Nielsen data. In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter this week, Nielsen executive Brian Fuhrer said the phenomenon can be partially credited to a slower production schedule for original streaming series, with fewer new releases.
Surprising Fact
Even when original scripted shows from streamers do manage to hit it big, they have a lesser chance of big-number success due to their relatively small catalogs. No scripted original series has ever crossed the 100-episode mark, and even the most successful shows usually end after a few dozen episodes (“Stranger Things” will end after season 5 with 42 total episodes, “Ted Lasso” ended after 34 and “Sex Education” had 32). The most popular acquired broadcast series, however, have much deeper wells from which to draw. “Suits” ended after 134 episodes; “The Big Bang Theory” ran for 279; and “Grey’s Anatomy” and “NCIS,” which are both still in production, have each aired over 400 episodes.
Section Title
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