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Why someone saying ‘just make it through the first few episodes’ is often the best indicator of a great TV show.

It’s all about the first act — setting up the hero in the known world, so that we can see, and more importantly feel, how they change.

Chris Ashby
5 min readApr 29, 2021

We’ve all heard it before. A common phrase uttered to us Netflix series doubters by eager viewers, keen to share the latest series they’ve been binging and why it’s unequivocally the best.

“Just get through the first few episodes. After that I promise you, it gets really good!”

You might hear that and think, well, if I need to watch 3 hours of something before it actually gets good, then that’s just wasted time. Why wouldn’t I watch something that was good right from the very beginning? Surely I should be spending my time watching something that’s going to get to the action right off the bat, instead of trudging through filler just to get to the good stuff.

Well, that often uttered phrase of ‘just get through the first few episodes,’ might be a better way of judging a good series from a bad one than you think.

The art of the first act

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Chris Ashby
Chris Ashby

Written by Chris Ashby

Founder of Telescope.design writing about how startups can use design to grow. Get weekly startup design insight and more @ thestartupdesignsystem.com

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