Writer's Journey - Thoughts on Streaming and the Genre

“How has streaming changed the genre?” That was the question for the last panel I moderated at Balticon over Memorial Day Weekend.

On the panel were Ryan O’nan, who writes for Big Sky and recently published Winder, and Gwedolyn Clare, author of Ink, Iron, and Glass. Both authors agreed that streaming has changed the genre in fundamental ways. Ryan shared that writing for television has a style we’re familiar with—one that offers hooks to keep us from changing channels, particularly at the 30 minute mark. Streaming doesn’t. It doesn’t need to, we’re binging shows.

Gwedolyn explained this change in story telling on screen, the change from what we’re used to with television demands a different style in writing. There are often no commercials. Even how shows just appear without any fanfare is different than we’re used to.

Think about it. Did you know Lost in Space was about to appear on Netflix? How about the first season of Stranger Things? According to Ryan, Netflix as the first major streaming service gave greenlighted shows no supervision. The shows were given production money and if they wanted to spend more per episode, they just produced less episodes. Television shows typically had over twenty episodes. Streaming offers us often six or eight episodes.

It was suggested that short stories make the best movies and the six or eight episode arcs can make for better story telling.

That said, looking for free stories? This month my novella, Last Knight, prequel to Knight of the Broken Table, is featured in Imagination Unleashed: Fantasy & Science Fiction Giveaway, which offers a lot of great free reads. Knight of the Broken Table’s also featured in Free Fantasy & Sci Fi Ebooks, which offers you even more great free reads to check out.

Dare to Believe,

D.H.