- All seasons of revered classics such as The Sopranos, The Wire, Deadwood, Rome and Six Feet Under, and of recent favorites such as Eastbound & Down, Enlightened and Flight of the Conchords
- Epic miniseries, including Angels in America, Band of Brothers, John Adams, The Pacific and Parade’s End
- Select seasons of current series such as Boardwalk Empire, Treme and True Blood
- Hit original movies like Game Change, Too Big To Fail and You Don’t Know
- Pedigreed documentaries including the Autopsy and Iceman series, Ghosts of Abu Ghraib and When the Levees Broke
- Hilarious original comedy specials from Lewis Black, Ellen DeGeneres, Louis CK and Bill Maher
Wednesday, April 23, 2014
GAME'S THE SAME; JUST GOT MORE FIERCE: Remember when we were playing with the widget to determine if Amazon Prime was right for you? Because this is going to be a tipping point for many others. Beginning May 21, Amazon Prime members will have unlimited streaming access to (and I'm just going to cut and paste here):
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You know, I'm really tempted by things like this, and then I remember the 80+ hours of TV I have stacked up on my DVR, and I wonder when I think I'm going to have time to watch all this glorious unlimited streaming. It would just be more to feel guilty about not getting to.
ReplyDeleteThe big thing here is that the rule seems to be "3 years old or cancelled/ended show." So no Game of Thrones, Girls, Silicon Valley, or Last Week Tonight (at least not yet).
ReplyDeleteAlso relevant? Because of their continued licensing to basic cable, three big shows are not included--Sex and the City, Entourage, and Curb Your Enthusiasm.
ReplyDeleteNot having Entourage available should encourage more people to sign up, right?
ReplyDeleteOne word: XIIIth!
ReplyDeleteBut will Amazon Prime offer a special "HBO of Your Youth" channel, on which they constantly play "Table For Five," "Gloria," and "Just You and Me, Kid"?
ReplyDeleteLook, it's probably a deal breaker for Michael Scott.
ReplyDeleteI have the Wire and Deadwood DVD/Blu sets and still relish the ease with which I can watch these, as well as series, like Rome, I never got to.
ReplyDeleteWhat was that thing, was it called "Brain Games"? that would sometimes run between programs? I loved those when I was a kid.
ReplyDeleteStill no monthly subscription rates? Oh well.
ReplyDeleteI get that Treme is a "current series", because Prime won't have all seasons of it, but I choose to read that as meaning that the current season of GoT is actually also season 5 of Treme, telling Sonny's story after his fishing boat gets lost at sea and he ends up as a mercenary in Essos.
ReplyDeleteI'm already subscribed to both Amazon Prime and HBO, and this doesn't compel me to cancel HBO because of all the new stuff, but it does further complicate streaming service box bingo. I have three boxes plugged into my TV: a Tivo, an Apple TV, and a Blu-Ray player. All three can stream Netflix (as can the TV itself!) The TV and Blu-Ray can stream Prime. Of these, only the Apple TV can play HBO GO. Too many boxes! Too many services! But so long as no one else outside of the cable bundle or Amazon/Netflix/HBO starts creating worthwhile original programming, I think I'm subscribing to almost everything worthwhile. Or at least there's far more good programming that I can watch than I have time to watch.
Can't fault HBO too much for not wanting to disrupt their billion-dollar business. This deal feel more like HBO realizing that everyone that was ever going to buy a Wire box set had already done so.
ReplyDeleteOh, I'm not faulting HBO on that. My ire is purely at Amazon and their inability to be flexible towards my stinginess and not wanting to plunk down $100 all at once.
ReplyDeleteSend me $11/month and your Amazon password. I'll set it up for you next January.
ReplyDeleteFlight of the Conchords?!? Dayenu. We're already enjoying the hell out of Prime via Roku (My 10-y.o. has now seen just about every Twilight Zone worth seeing, I finally caught up on all the Better Off Ted episodes I'd missed, and we're about halfway through modern-era Doctor Who, among many other things). This just adds to the embarrassment of riches it offers. Like Terri above, we're also up to our eyeballs in unwatched TiVoed programming, and we're woefully behind on movies, but summer is coming....
ReplyDeleteAre you and I still the only people who watched that show all the way through?
ReplyDeleteMay I also suggest a HBO Interstitials channel, where all they show are the classic HBO bumpers (da-da-da da-da da da-da-da da da DA, da da DA, da da DA, da da DAAAAAAAA) and the Making of the HBO Bumper Special.
ReplyDeleteSepinwall wrote specifically the Girls and Newsroom would have episodes added- presumably just from seasons 3+ years old. But Game of Thrones is conspicuously missing from the list.
ReplyDeleteMy assumption is that they want to try to sell GoT to basic cable/syndication. I think that's going to be a lot harder than it was for SATC or Sopranos given just how prevalent the premium cable violence and nudity is on the show. (For many other shows, it's primarily language, which can be eliminated with looping/bleeping, but here, that's harder to do.)
ReplyDeleteNo.
ReplyDeleteThey're also selling a _lot_ of DVD/Blu-Rays, I believe.
ReplyDeleteMine would include "The Hitchiker" and "First and 10" and the numerous "History of Burlesque" specials they seemed to show in the early '80s.
ReplyDeleteWe have Prime and netflix and hulu+, and I am thrilled to get this news. My parents' HBO Go availability isn't compatible with any of our streaming devices, but we have two roku players in the house that will be very happy to find these things on Prime, and I guess the laptop will have to suffice in my sewing room.
ReplyDeleteSomething called "Brain Games" is currently on regular TV, and it's really interesting. I recommend it.
ReplyDeleteHBO of My Youth would include The Competition, The Goodbye Girl, Only when I Laugh, and Just You and Me, Kid.
What's the easiest way to do Amazon Prime streaming on your TV? We used to hook up the laptop and that was such a pain to have to do each time that we don't bother, which means we're not making use of that aspect of Prime. We have Netflix too.
ReplyDeleteSome smart TVs have an app for Amazon prime. The Wii recently added an app as well that can be downloaded, which is what we've been using. You could also get a chromecast, which is a pretty cheap way to do if if you don't already have a device that is capable.
ReplyDeleteThe absolute easiest is probably through Amazon's own Fire TV. http://www.amazon.com/Fire-TV-streaming-media-player/dp/B00CX5P8FC If you order it through your Amazon Prime account, it should come automatically set up. It also supports Netflix (and will support HBO GO by the fall.)
ReplyDeleteThe Roku is probably the best overall media streamer -- it offers access to the most services and an easy interface. http://www.amazon.com/Roku-3-Streaming-Media-Player/dp/B00BGGDVOO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1398354708&sr=8-1&keywords=roku+box+3
You may already have something that can stream Prime to your TV -- many blu-ray and DVD players have Amazon streaming built in, and many new smart TV's themselves support it.
Here's the "Braingames" I was thinking of: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braingames
ReplyDeleteMy brother and I must've watched "Six Pack" 18 dozen times on HBO when we were kids.
We use our PS3 and Sony BluRay player- both work well.
ReplyDeleteSeconding on Roku, which gives you access to Prime, Netflix and most -- all? -- of the other major streaming services (plus some incredibly niche-y ones too). Easy setup, unobtrusive, and we've had no problems with it in the 4+ months we've had it. All you need is an outlet and a free input (RCA connection for older TVs, or else HDMI), and a WiFi connection. Roku also now has a stick, a la Google's Chromecast, that you can plug into a HDMI jack, but I'm pretty sure Chromecast doesn't yet officially support Prime (and may not get to, what with Fire TV). The Roku stick is around $50, the fastest Roku set-top box (Roku 3) is about $100. (We have the next model down, the Roku 2, and speed is no issue, so the 3 must be crazy fast.)
ReplyDeleteI have a smart tv with apps for Amazon Prime, Hulu, Netflix, and YouTube. It's fantastic.
ReplyDeleteI love my Roku! We now have two.
ReplyDeleteIt used to be the case, I believe, that Samsung had exclusive rights to the Amazon Video app. I believe that this is not longer true, and that (at least) LG televisions now have access, but I'm not sure.
ReplyDeleteI used to consider Emmett Otter's Jug Band Christmas and the movie "The Christmas That Almost Wasn't" two of my biggest holiday viewing traditions.
ReplyDeleteDefinitely not exclusive to Samsung -- I have a Panasonic TV that streams Amazon
ReplyDelete