Peak TV Continues With a Whopping 455 Original Scripted Shows in 2016

Have you seen every single one of the 455 original scripted shows that made 2016 so damn good for TV? Don't lie.

Atlanta
Image via FX
Atlanta

Forget, just for a moment, all the inarguable nonsense 2016 managed to give us. For TV, the past 12 months have been very generous with the top-shelf originals. From Donald Glover's masterful Atlanta to the unexpected Sugar Ray cameo in Maria Bamford's Lady Dynamite, this year has shown that the era of so-called "peak TV" just might have peaked yet again. According to a breakdown from FX and Entertainment Weekly, that's exactly what went down.

The final count of original scripted shows across streaming, cable, and broadcast platforms? A massive 455, EWreported Wednesday. That's enough to mark an eight percent increase since 2015 and a 71 percent increase when compared with 2011 numbers. That total, FX research chief Julie Piepenkotter noted, doesn't even include unscripted entries such as reality shows.

But before we start tossing all the praise at broadcast and cable bosses, consider this: Their total share of shows actually declined in 2016. Streaming outlets such as Amazon and Netflix are "solely responsible for the gains" by doubling their haul from the previous year.

Speaking of services such as Netflix absolutely squashing cable, the end of 2016 is expected to bring about the crowning of the streaming giant as the biggest player in the game. As of October, Netflix was roughly a million subscribers shy of topping cable. As data visualizer Samuel Bennett explained in an Uproxx-spotted Reddit post, Netflix should make up that difference by the time 2017 rolls in.

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Then again, we're getting more Curb Your Enthusiasm next year too. So who really knows?

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