Now That Riverdale's Over, Which Teen Drama is the Next Big Thing?
No other show can boast such influence and level of recognition.
A key advantage of television is the availability of niche channels that offer diverse audiences exactly the kind of content they want. For instance, The CW has always been a popular destination for teenagers, having produced top teen dramas over the years, including The Vampire Diaries and a Sex in the City prequel for adolescents titled The Carrie Diaries. However, Riverdale has always been the channel's most renowned teen drama.
Premiering in 2017, this anthology-like show quickly gained popularity among viewers thanks to its unexpected twists, diverse plots, and the range of genres it explored. Over its seven-year run, Riverdale has spanned seven seasons, each consisting of approximately twenty episodes. Now, more than a month since the show's last episode aired, people are on the lookout for a new teen drama to binge on.
On-Demand TV
We've recently seen a shift as audiences abandon traditional TV and subscribe to streaming platforms. Giants such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and Max dominate the field, relegating TV to a secondary role. As a result, most new titles originate on these platforms, and teen dramas are no exception.
For those seeking another teen drama to watch, there are shows such as Sex Education, Heartstopper, and Young Royals on Netflix or The Summer I Turned Pretty on Amazon Prime. However, it's too early to say whether these series will have as big an impact on pop culture as Riverdale has.
Meanwhile, traditional TV has seen the premiere of Cruel Summer's second season this year. This show has failed to get traction or generate any meaningful buzz, however.
Too Much Content to Choose From
The proliferation of streaming platforms and the rise in the popularity of the on-demand format mean that whenever there is a promising target audience, multiple players immediately start producing lots of content for it, inundating even relatively small niche markets with offers. As a result, none of these offers individually can ever hope to achieve the status of a nationwide, let alone global, cultural phenomenon on par with Riverdale. These days, there are just too many teen series to choose from for any one of them to really make that big of an impact.
No Such Thing As The Next Big Thing
It would appear that we have moved past the next-big-thing paradigm. Nowadays, instead of one huge show that everybody's watching, we've got numerous small shows, each with its own dedicated fanbase. Things have changed, so instead of waiting for the next big thing, people just choose their own poison.