Bland, easy to follow, for fans of everything: what has the Netflix algorithm done to our films?

平淡无奇,易于跟随,适合所有粉丝:Netflix的算法究竟对我们电影做了什么?

The Audio Long Read

2025-09-26

40 分钟
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When the streaming giant began making films guided by data that aimed to please a vast audience, the results were often generic, forgettable, artless affairs. But is there a happy ending? By Phil Hoad. Read by Adam Sims. Help support our independent journalism at theguardian.com/longreadpod
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单集文稿 ...

  • This is The Guardian.

  • What is the Netflix algorithm done to our films?

  • By Phil Hode.

  • Read by Adam Sims.

  • When the annals of 2025 at the movies are written, no one will remember the electric state.

  • The film, a sci-fi comic book adaptation,

  • is set in a world in which sentient robots have lost a war with humans.

  • Netflix blew a reported $320 million on it, making it the 14th most expensive film ever made.

  • But it tanked.

  • Though the electric state initially claimed the number one spot on the streamer,

  • viewers quickly lost interest.

  • Today, it doesn't even feature in the company's top 20 most viewed films,

  • a shocking performance for its most expensive production to date.

  • It became just another anonymous mockbuster,

  • crammed with the over-familiar flashy signifiers of big-screen filmmaking.

  • A Spielbergian childhood quest, a Mad Max post-apocalyptic wasteland,

  • fallout-style retrofuturistic trimmings.

  • Another way of classifying the electric state is as an example of the algorithm movie.

  • the kind of generic product that clogs up streaming platforms and seems designed to appeal to the broadest audience possible.

  • Directors Anthony and Joe Russo,