Disney is leading the charge against Netflix by returning to weekly episode releases
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
When Netflix started Beyoncéing its TV shows (releasing entire seasons at once, often with little or no warning), the streaming service reinvented how people consume TV. As Netflix chief content officer Ted Sarandos explained it in 2016, TV viewers were already moving away from an “appointment TV” model and toward saving up DVR’d episodes for binge viewing, so the service tried to keep up with the ways its customers wanted to consume content.
In subsequent years, streaming subscribers became accustomed to binging shows. But powerhouses like Disney, Apple, and Hulu are looking to change the game again by taking the opposite strategy with their streaming services. If Netflix turned patience into a forgotten virtue, its competitors are...