Image via Complex Original
It starts out so innocently. Someone suggests a poppin' show. Or you're cruising the Internet stream waves looking for a new series to surf for yourself. "What's this, five-star, highly recommended show?" you whisper to yourself, intrigued. The first episode starts. One hour later, that wasn't so bad. It's getting late, but one more episode won't hurt, right? The next thing you know, your tear-off day calendar is three sheets behind and you're balls deep in House of Cards season 2 with no knowledge of how you got there, let alone an ability to discern this episode's Frank Underwood Power Play™ from the one in season 1, episode 8. You have become another victim of the epidemic that's been sweeping the nation for the better part of this decade: bingewatching. It's a dangerous addiction affecting even the most casual of TV viewers, and it's only going to get worse. This quarter, TV stream giant Netflix is clipping up with more original TV, a campaign that starts this weekend with a new season of House of Cards and includes a promising Daredevil series, the Tina Fey-helmed Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, and the intriguing Bloodlines. Binge season is in full swing. These are the five stages you and every pop culturally cool gal or guy you know will be suffering from in the months weeks days (the whole point of binging is speed bruh) to come.
Stage 1: The "Just One" Gateway Episode
Just one can't hurt, right? You think you're making a lightweight commitment to 55 or so minutes of your night before going on with life. But what you've really done by mainlining that season premiere of House of Cards straight into the Netflix bloodSTREAM is set yourself up for a thirteen-hour binge, maybe less if the series is like, super progressive and aims to spin a good story in ten to eight episodes. You don't even know what you've just done to your social life, breh.
Stage 2: Aggressive Hibernation
Now you're on episode three, changing your autoplay settings to load up the next one without question and trying not to break the seal as if the pause button is broken. Maybe you're watching dolo, but more likely, bae is there with you. Is she down for the cause, just as sucked into the serialized storytelling vortex as you are? Or is she feeling neglected? Who has time to care, though?
Stage 3: Vegging
God forbid whatever fire you fired up on the insta-stream has more than one season, because if so then the couch has officially become your headquarters. There are micro-stages within this stage itself. First, the unbridled, shameleess glee of bunkering down in a stasis of neverending plot twists, cliffhangers, and a stoner-approved pile of sweets. Where's your girl? Buried under the empty wrappers, cartons and tangle of blankets. Probably(?)
By mid-season two, you've got a whole system established so you never have to take your eyes off the screen.
By mid-series, you've morphed into the sloth from Se7en. When's the last time you bathed? Pissed? Ate? Who cares, fam, season four is on deck.
Stage 4: Finale Despair
And just like that, IT'S OVER. All seven seasons are in the can. You can't even remember what happened when, but all that really matters is you have no reason to live anymore. The days of pretending to be a productive human, calling in sick from work and ignoring your girlfriend (seriously, she's definitely not under the blanket anymore) are finished. The mystery's been solved, the middle-aged Caucasian antihero had his reckoning, the sitcom cast is finally moving on with their lives. But you cannot.
Stage 5: Acceptance (Of a New Suggestion)
It's hard to move on. It's hard to buy into the obvious lie that there's another perfect show worthy of your precious free time. But Netflix (or the streaming service of your choice but let's be honest it's Netflix lmao) only has your best interests in mind. The Suggestions tab is basically an intervention, there to sit you down and prove that there is indeed a way forward. There's a companion series out there with twice the amount of episodes so addictive your girlfriend will just give in and break up with you once you start it. Get the Seamless ready, it's back on.
