MOST STRANGE THINGS. (from left to right) Finn Wolfhard as Mike Wheeler, Millie Bobby Brown as Eleven and Noah … [+] Schnapp as Will Byers in STRANGER THINGS. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix © 2022
We knew it would happen sooner or later, and it took Stranger Things about two weeks to lose its No. 1 spot on Netflix’s top 10 list for a new show. Now we’ve been through this twice, since season 4 of Stranger Things was split into releases a month apart with part 1 and part 2, so what did you win this time around?
Although Stranger Things Part 1 topped the list of the top 10 for about three weeks, it was eventually ousted by the return of The Umbrella Academy for season 3. It wasn’t a big surprise considering that The Umbrella Academy has been a huge success for a while. now, but this time? It’s a new thing.
Resident Evil is currently Netflix’s No. 1 show, which creates a weird situation considering most people seem to … hate it. I just finished writing an article about how while Resident Evil season 1 not only doesn’t have a good score with the critics, with 55% on Rotten Tomatoes, it’s even worse with the audience and has an audience score of the 22% that is among the worst I have. I’ve never seen any Netflix series.
And yet, it’s clear that people are looking at it. Resident Evil debuted as the number two show when it arrived a few days ago, and has now risen to number 1, shattering the most popular season of the most popular English-language show in Netflix history. Of course, the second part of Stranger Things requires only four hours of viewing time for people to move on, so it’s not a big shock that it lasted “only” two weeks at number 1 instead of three as did the part 1.
Season 4 of Stranger Things is trying to make its way to Squid Game’s 28-day total viewing record for the two parts combined. It needs 1.6 billion views in 28 days and, although it has already surpassed the billion mark, it has two more weeks for the second part to arrive. It can fall short by a few hundred million, unless fans decide to watch the last two episodes repeated a lot of times.
As for Resident Evil, all that really matters to Netflix is the audience. So the show may have a low score with critics and even audiences, but whenever people watch it for some reason, it may have a season 2. However, Netflix has cut back on much cheaper shows than they’ve worked better, so it doesn’t seem like a safe thing until we see long-term performance. Resident Evil itself has the feeling that it will have a season 2, as it feels comfortable ending with a bunch of cliffhangers demanding at least another season to settle.
We’ll see how long Resident Evil can stay in the lead here. The more time passes, the more likely we are to see a season 2, but I would be surprised if we heard something specific soon. More will come, stay tuned.
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