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Netflix: Sci-fi still needs to appeal to women

While many women may feel "space" shows are not for them, Netflix is keen to strike a balance.

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(L to R: Chris Regina, Jason Taylor, Mike Jones)

Sci-fi shows need to appeal to both male and female viewers if they want to be successful, according to Chris Regina Director, Original Series at Netflix.

Speaking last week at Screen Forever, Regina explained how Netflix is still looking to story over data for its programming and commissioning, but sci-fi has its own challenges.

“We are ultimately not programming to demographics. We are looking at make viewing patterns of fans that are out there and group them together,” he said.

“We care more about what you’re watching and how we can make suggestions that will fit your potential interest, than we do about whether you’re a certain age, location or gender.

“Space shows can be very tecchy and very ‘not for me’ response from women. So if you really want to make a show work it needs to be gender balanced, and bring in male & female audiences. Otherwise you have a pretty small cross-cut.

“We designed Another Life to take its cues from Arrival and First Contact which is more female-skewing. it’s a soap opera which is more lean-back and escapist.

“We’re playing with what I’d call ‘reimagined familiarity.’ It has these touch points from a variety of different shows and movies, but doing it in a different way.”

Regina found that conversations with female audiences still result in women responding to sci-fi and fantasy genres, if with a different approach to males.

“(They say) ‘My favourite show is Sabrina, I love Vampire Diaries, all the Harry Potter films!’ So you realise very quickly their entry point into the genre is through character. It’s not through high concept sci-fi conceit.”

6 Responses

  1. SF has always been genre stuff, Star Trek was created as a Space Western, that appeals to a niche audience. Networks’ relationship with it has been problematical, (bold promises followed by obscure late night slots and premature cancellation) so it’s ended up on specialist cable and now streaming services. It’s no coincidence that All Access launched with a Star Trek series and Disney with a Star Wars series.

    Netflix, up until yesterday, was making and buying up low budget SF to keep geeks paying their subscriptions because the data told them that was effective. Now they are competing against Disney+, they have suddenly changed their spin.

  2. “(They say) ‘My favourite show is Sabrina, I love Vampire Diaries, all the Harry Potter films!”. All the shows Regina mentions there are fantasy shows, not Sci-Fi, so I hope Regina and Netflix aren’t planning on mixing the two genres, but instead just developing characters that might appeal to women, while retaining a pure Sci-Fi show sense.

  4. Devising a foolproof concept for producing sci-fi is always going to be hit or miss, it’s not always up to viewers to make a show successful it is sometimes up to showrunners and studio heads to take a gamble as they did with the original Star Trek which is a classic example of a short run space opera series that became iconic in the sci-fi genre and has been revived many times and improved with new production techniques. Defining a show by male or female preferences is inventing issues that don’t necessarily exist as the story is what any TV show should be all about, fans find their own attractions that make them want to watch a show again, not gender preferences.

    1. Star Trek was a failure. It was due to be cancelled after after the initial S1 order, but got an additional order of 10 eps and renewed for the S2 based on the new theory that advertisers were flocking younger viewers rather than older viewers during the pop culture revolution. However, the programmers bumped it to Fridays and killed it off. A massive letter writing campaign lead to CBS deciding to give if 3rd season, to avoid pissing people off, then cancelled it again.

      Star Trek became a cult show and influential because generations watched it in reruns.

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