June 12, 2008 was a memorable day. That’s the day I watched my very first episode of the NBC hit show “Heroes”.
Nobody remembers Heroes - mainly because Seasons 2-5 were miserable. But I’ll stand by Season One. It was terrific, and as a somewhat (very) nerdy recent middle school graduate, it was everything I was looking for in TV.
On June 13, I saw three more episodes of Heroes. And, I’m embarrased to say, on the very next day I watched four more. For those of you keeping track, that’s eight episodes of the show Heroes, all in three days.
I will say that in this summer between eighth and ninth grade, I wasn’t a complete dud. I did have friends, and I did step outside every once in a while. Take June 15th, for instance. On June 15th, I watched a mere one episode of Heroes. That’s twenty-three hours unaccounted for in my day. I’m sure June 15th was nice. It was a Sunday. I don’t have a specific memory, but I’m sure I got lunch with a friend or threw a frisbee in a park or read a really riveting book.
On June 16th I watched seven episodes of Heroes. On June 17th I watched seven episodes of Heroes. On June 18th I watched seven episodes of Heroes.
Did you know Netflix tracked your viewing history?
I have discovered my Netflix Data
One of the most sobering feelings in the world is taking a long hard look into 10+ years of your Netflix viewing history. By my admittedly rough estimate, I have spent a terrifyingly large amount of time watching Netflix in the past decade. So terrifyingly large that I genuinely don’t want to admit it publicly.
…
oh god
…
(Over 1000 hours)
…
To be fair, I genuinely do believe I’m overestimating. Netflix reports data on an episode level - if I only watched the first five minutes of a movie, that’s being counted as the full movie. But either way, this is too much Netflix.
For anyone who is curious, here’s what I’ve been watching.
Lost takes the cake! I’ve watched more episodes of Lost than any other Netflix show.
That said, Lost was a high-school show! I actually haven’t seen an episode of Lost since 2010. In the chart below, you can (gulp) explore and compare my Netflix habits in high school vs. college vs. now.
(Click into the various areas of the below map to zoom in. Apologies for when the text doesn’t quite fit in the box! There are lots of small areas to fill)
You can track the expansion of Netflix’s streaming services through my viewing habits. In 2008 and 2009, Netflix had only just started to move beyond the “mail-a-DVD model” - and I was only watching a couple shows (the main ones being Friday Night Lights, Lost, and - of course - Heroes).
As Netflix began building out its library (and especially as it started to launch its own original content), I started to watch 10 or more distinct Netflix shows in a single year - see 2016 as an example. By the time we get to 2018, my Netflix lineup is packed.
The Bingeing
I’m ashamed to say that Heroes was only the beginning. Over the next ten years, there were over 50 days where I watched over 5 episodes of Netflix shows. My max? 12 episodes in a given day, which I hit on January 27, 2016. I watched 12 episodes of Archer.
But Archer is a 30-minute show. If you layer in episode lengths, my longest binge was a walloping seven-and-a-half hours about a year later (January 15, 2017). On that day, I watched a medley: Two episodes of Bojack Horseman, five episodes of Crazy Ex Girlfriend, one episode of Supergirl, and - to round it off - two episodes of Sherlock.
Other highlights? October 23, 2010, when I watched 8 episodes of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Last year on January 24th I watched 8 episodes of Marvel’s “The Punisher” (not sure that one was worth it). And of course, August 8, 2015.
I actually remember that August. I had recently discovered an old favorite and was binge-rewatching the first season. I quickly dove back into the world of Matt Parkman, and Sylar, and the foretold threat of an atom bomb that would go off in New York City if not for Peter Petrelli, Hiro Nakamura, and a girl who could not be harmed.
That’s right. On August 8, 2015, I watched 8 more episodes of Heroes.
How much TV can one mom watch?
Data privacy lesson for everyone! If you share a Netflix account with family members, they have access to your entire viewing history. Turns out I’m not the only binge-watcher in the family.
Everyone say hello to my mom.
Now everyone say hello to all the episodes of Madam Secretary that my mom has watched (only days with 1+ episodes are shown).
In the interest of journalistic integrity, I should acknowledge that any data regarding my mom’s Netflix viewing is disputed. My dad infiltrates my mom’s profile all the time, so there has been quite a bit of manual cleaning on my end to try to determine who watched which shows. Plus, Neflix didn’t even break out different viewer profiles for myself, my dad, and my mom before 2013. That led to exchanges like this one:
Also, I admittedly am not 100% certain for the protocol of how and when Netflix tags an episode as ‘watched’. My mom pointed this out too.
But here’s the thing … I know that recently, my mom has mentioned watching a Hallmark Channel drama called “When Calls the Heart”. I know I’m not watching it. I know my dad’s not watching it. This one is all her.
And has my mom been calmly watching one episode a week? One every couple of days?
I don’t think the “Netflix is just recording when I download episodes in bunches but I’m not ACTUALLY binge-watching” excuse works when you’ve “downloaded” 43 episodes in 30 days.
@ Mom: You are a binger too! Welcome to the club.
It runs in the family
One more fun discovery from the Netflix data: My cousin India used our Netflix account for a while when she was in high school.
I’ve looked into the data, and it seems as though there might be some data quality issues going on. For example, the 23 episodes span seasons 4 through 7, which is a bit weird. It’s possible that India just clicked into each of these episodes while ‘channel-surfing’. Maybe it’s not actually the case that she watched 15 hours of Buffy on a Tuesday.
But isn’t it fun to imagine otherwise?