I'm curious what people's thoughts on monoculture are, monoculture being pop culture that doesn't really change and is shared among a wide group of people. This OP will contain some examples of what i consider to be monoculture or cultural stagnation or whatever you term it as, but by no means are these hard and fast examples.
Streaming services and television seem to have had the most significant impact, in a few ways. First, critically popular TV shows don't become universally popular as quickly, especially as things become split across the six or so viable streaming services. Additionally Netflix, the largest producer of internet streamed original content, keeps almost all of its shows on a short leash, with GLOWs cancellation being more the norm than something as long as Grace and Frankie or Orange is the New Black. If the soft cap is 2-4 seasons, that leaves a lot less room and time for a show to develop and make an impact. Especially with the trend towards smaller seasons, new 120+ episode juggernauts seems to be a thing of the past. Breaking Bad and GOT succeeded despite that, but that seems to be the outlier. Second point regarding TV shows is that older shows are pillars on streaming sites. The Office, Friends and Seinfeld aren't breaking ground, but they're among the most popular shows on streaming platforms. The Office went off the air seven years ago, and seems it seems even more popular than ever.
Movies show a similar trend. The biggest movie releases all come from the same franchises, Fast & Furious, Marvel, Star Wars, Mission Impossible, Harry Potter, etc. There are some new entrants but most of them come from the Disney machine. Occasionally there's something like John Wick that's actually new? Marvel being mainstream is new to an extent, but Iron Man 1 is 12 years old and Avengers is 8 years old and the IP behind it is old as hell. Marvel's dominance almost certainly plays a part in this, likely suffocating anything that doesn't already have name recognition.
Finally, there's video games. Nintendo still relies on their big three, Mario Zelda and Pokemon, as well as franchises like Animal Crossing, Kirby, and Donkey Kong. Occasionally some newcomer like ARMS gets pushed by nintendo, but nothing really achieves that breakout status. There are some runaway hits like fortnite, minecraft and splatoon, there's no denying that. But on the other hand, the biggest PS5 launch game is a remake of a 10-year old game, the biggest Xbox Series X "launch" game is basically Halo 6, and one of the most anticipated games in a long time was a remake, Final Fantasy 7R. Some of this can be attributed to changing revenue streams, see the change from GTA releasing a game every few years to being on year 7 of GTAV, probably thanks in some part to GTAV Online. Elder Scrolls is similar - we're on year 9 or skyrim, and before that installments got released every 4-5 years iirc. I'm excited for some of the stuff MS is pushing to develop in house for this reason, something like Avowed or Ori is new blood at least. And even then one of the big ones in dev is a Fable remake.
I'm not saying that this is anything bad, just kind of interesting. It feels like for the past 10-12 years there tends to be a lot of remasters, reboots, sequels/prequels, and spinoffs rather than original new ideas.
Streaming services and television seem to have had the most significant impact, in a few ways. First, critically popular TV shows don't become universally popular as quickly, especially as things become split across the six or so viable streaming services. Additionally Netflix, the largest producer of internet streamed original content, keeps almost all of its shows on a short leash, with GLOWs cancellation being more the norm than something as long as Grace and Frankie or Orange is the New Black. If the soft cap is 2-4 seasons, that leaves a lot less room and time for a show to develop and make an impact. Especially with the trend towards smaller seasons, new 120+ episode juggernauts seems to be a thing of the past. Breaking Bad and GOT succeeded despite that, but that seems to be the outlier. Second point regarding TV shows is that older shows are pillars on streaming sites. The Office, Friends and Seinfeld aren't breaking ground, but they're among the most popular shows on streaming platforms. The Office went off the air seven years ago, and seems it seems even more popular than ever.
Movies show a similar trend. The biggest movie releases all come from the same franchises, Fast & Furious, Marvel, Star Wars, Mission Impossible, Harry Potter, etc. There are some new entrants but most of them come from the Disney machine. Occasionally there's something like John Wick that's actually new? Marvel being mainstream is new to an extent, but Iron Man 1 is 12 years old and Avengers is 8 years old and the IP behind it is old as hell. Marvel's dominance almost certainly plays a part in this, likely suffocating anything that doesn't already have name recognition.
Finally, there's video games. Nintendo still relies on their big three, Mario Zelda and Pokemon, as well as franchises like Animal Crossing, Kirby, and Donkey Kong. Occasionally some newcomer like ARMS gets pushed by nintendo, but nothing really achieves that breakout status. There are some runaway hits like fortnite, minecraft and splatoon, there's no denying that. But on the other hand, the biggest PS5 launch game is a remake of a 10-year old game, the biggest Xbox Series X "launch" game is basically Halo 6, and one of the most anticipated games in a long time was a remake, Final Fantasy 7R. Some of this can be attributed to changing revenue streams, see the change from GTA releasing a game every few years to being on year 7 of GTAV, probably thanks in some part to GTAV Online. Elder Scrolls is similar - we're on year 9 or skyrim, and before that installments got released every 4-5 years iirc. I'm excited for some of the stuff MS is pushing to develop in house for this reason, something like Avowed or Ori is new blood at least. And even then one of the big ones in dev is a Fable remake.
I'm not saying that this is anything bad, just kind of interesting. It feels like for the past 10-12 years there tends to be a lot of remasters, reboots, sequels/prequels, and spinoffs rather than original new ideas.
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