5 Reasons Why Television Is Miles Better Than The Movies

These days, the chatter you hear about good, quality television overshadows the once golden screen of movies.  Breaking Bad, Walking Dead, Mad Men, Game of Thrones, Homeland, and more… arguably better quality than the movies in theaters right now.  Here are five reasons that television is better than movies:

1. Longer time to tell the story.

Movies these days, with rare exceptions, don’t last longer than three hours.  While you can certainly and easily tell a quality story in that amount of time, it is more challenging.  It’s easier to write stories and develop characters when you have a longer amount of time to do so.

2. Subscription premium cable channels.

As someone who is too poor to afford the premium cable or satellite packages, I used to be envious of people who were able to watch them.  But in a way, I have to be grateful for these channels.  Once just for movies, shows like The Sopranos became forerunners in the hour long serio-drama television trend.  Which brings us to our next reason that television is better…

3. Cable/satellite wars.

As our access to television has expanded, television channels are fighting for our attention.  Most of their audience has 500 or more channels to choose from, in addition to the entire internet.  Why should we choose their channel?  The spirit of competition brings quality to the forefront.  Because movies are so expensive to produce, there’s just not as much competition any more.

4. Cost!

In this economy, cheapness is everything.  Most of us have access to the internet or television at our disposal at all times.  A night at the movies for two people costs about $20, and that’s not including the cost of snacks or a babysitter.  It’s so much cheaper, or even free, to watch TV . And finally..

5. The hype.

More and more big name actors, directors, and writers are challenging themselves on the silver screen. TV is most certainly not where creative Hollywood goes to “settle” any longer.  Some people find themselves more drawn to the challenges of small screen writing.  So yes, this really IS the golden age of television!