by Inge Hansen (@mecnotabene) Set in the fictional and often-violent land of Westeros, the TV series Game of Thrones has captured the imagination of TV viewers around the globe and in South Africa, after just a short time on our screens. Although Season Five has recently concluded, viewers are becoming increasingly voracious for new episodes and fresh content from the franchise, created by HBO from the novels of George RR Martin.
As a testament to this, in 2014, Game of Thrones topped the list of the most-pirated TV series during the year at 48.3m torrent downloads (up from 4.3m in 2012), with zombie thriller the Walking Dead coming in second. In the US, the show is regularly the top-watched series, with the final episode of season five drawing the highest viewership from the coveted adult age group of 18-49.
Huge plot twists
Little wonder that, in previous years, SA fans bemoaned that, due to the delay in the episodes being broadcast on our TV screens, they often knew about huge plot twists long before they were able to access the latest episode.
To improve the viewer experience, in early 2015 it was announced that M-Net would be bringing Game of Thrones to fans at the same time as the latest episode was airing in America. Although Express from the US had been running for some time with popular shows, this was to be the first time that viewers would essentially be watching the episode live with their US counterparts.
By doing this, South Africans had the opportunity to join 170 countries worldwide in a live TV event, which was orchestrated by HBO and exponentially increased conversation around the show on social media. This first was celebrated by M-Net Edge through airing the first episode of Season Five on 13 April 2015 at 3am at selected Nu Metro cinemas.
Although initially this novelty was appealing to SA viewers, as the series progressed, we could see a change in viewing habits, with viewership in the Express from the US slot dropping slightly in subsequent episodes from its high at the end of April of 14 000+ LSM 7-10 adult viewers (DStvi data).
Growing trend
Speaking to the growing trend of binge-watching and consumers barely containing their excitement for new episodes was the news in early 2015 that the new season of House of Cards would all be released at once, by Netflix. Although the reaction to this was somewhat mixed, according to social media, most fans relished the chance to watch their show in high quality and consume it as quickly as possible.
This method of releasing content could be a possible way forward to further reducing the piracy levels we see today.
What with Twitter having become a closely watched barometer for success and talkability, Game of Thrones fans again lead the way, with over 2.6m users following the official account. This excludes the deluge of hashtags associated with defining moments in the show as the drama is recounted in the social media space. By means of comparison, Grey’s Anatomy, which is in its 11th season, has 1.5m followers, and newly popular The Blacklist at 183 000 followers.
As more A-list movie stars are joining top-quality TV series and viewers continue to invest time in the outcome of the plot, as well as pay TV licences, the trend of binge-watching is certainly set to increase. It will be interesting to see how pay TV continues to innovate in this space and if local free-to-air channels can afford to adapt this new demand.
Catch up on sleep
In the meantime, with season six of Game Thrones being released in early 2016, fans may catch up on some sleep for now.
Sources:
Following two years at Media24 scrubbing for insights within the magazine division, Inge Hansen joined Nota Bene as an A&I analyst in March 2013. Working across multiple clients, including FMCG, alcohol and petroleum, she has the luxury of working with teams to develop robust insights that drive strategy while keeping abreast of media trends the world over. Inge loves having her pulse on the media landscape but far prefers raising her pulse mountain-biking on weekends. She contributes Thinking TV, a monthly analysis of South African TV viewership figures, to MarkLives. Follow @mecnotabene for regular media updates.
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