Netflix’s ‘Bridgerton’ renewed for season 2

Netflix sees strong subscriber growth as the streaming platform continues to push out more content in 2021, including a new season of Netflix's original show 'Bridgerton'. Yahoo Finance’s Alexandra Canal shares the details.

Video transcript

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ZACK GUZMAN: Well, in this week's Fame and Fortune, we are spotlighting the increased competition in the streaming space. Right now, Netflix shares are in the red, though still up by about 15% on the week after their impressive earnings report. For more on how they're bracing for the competition, I want to bring on Yahoo Finance's Alexandra Canal, who joins us now. And Ali, I mean, it was an impressive quarter for Netflix, but looking ahead, still a lot of competition. So what do they have planned?

ALEXANDRA CANAL: Well, Zack, they have "Bridgerton," and if you haven't watched "Bridgerton," you have to check it out. I've binged this entire season in just a few short days. And yesterday, Netflix announced that "Bridgerton" Season 2 will be officially coming to the platform. They made the announcement yesterday, said that they will be resuming filming this spring in the UK.

And one of the biggest challenges here is going to be how they film amid the coronavirus pandemic. Because if you watch "Bridgerton," you know that there are some very hot and heavy, steamy scenes. We've spoken to some industry leaders that said because of coronavirus restrictions, those more intimate scenes might decrease in the future. Hopefully, that's not the case for "Bridgerton" because I really think that's the identity of this show.

Besides that, they also have a lot of extras to film those extravagant party and ball scenes. So I'm going to be closely monitoring that, and I'm curious to see how they tackle it. But overall, this comes at a great time for Netflix. As you mentioned, they had a really impressive quarter. They crushed those subscriber growth estimates, bringing in 8.5 million users versus the 6 million that were expected. Overall, they said that they will be pushing out even more content in 2021, releasing a new movie every single week.

And if we take a look specifically at "Bridgerton," it is Netflix's most successful series to date. It is projected to have brought in 63 million households. And just for comparison purposes, "The Queen's Gambit," which we've spoken a lot about the success of that show, that brought in 62 million users within the first four weeks of that premiere. "Bridgerton" bringing in 63 within the first four weeks of that December 25th premiere. So already, it's outperforming some of those Netflix heavy-hitters.

And of course, this shows that Netflix always willing to put their money where their mouth is. They signed Shonda Rhimes to that multi-year $100 million deal. And with "Bridgerton," it's certainly paying off.

ZACK GUZMAN: All right, Ali, closely monitoring "Bridgerton's" steamy scenes apparently. I'll check it out.

ALEXANDRA CANAL: You have to.

ZACK GUZMAN: I mean, if it's as good as "Queen's Gambit," I'll give it a go. I haven't watched it yet. But also, obviously, as successful as that series is off to a hot start for Netflix, they're also losing. They lost to "The Office" this year. That was one of the biggest shows for the platform. How is that maybe impacting the future that Netflix has?

ALEXANDRA CANAL: Right, "The Office" left Netflix on January 1st, headed to Peacock. And as you mentioned, it was hugely successful on Netflix. It was the number one show on that platform throughout 2020, according to Nielsen streaming list. Between December 7th and December 14th, "The Office" was the number one show across every single platform, with 1.3 billion in just viewing minutes alone across all 192 episodes.

So people have been curious to see how "The Office" has been performing on Peacock, especially since Netflix is the leader in this space. And according to new data compiled by Reelgood, which is a streaming hub that hosts all the different platforms on one site, it seems like "The Office" is actually getting more viewership on Peacock versus Netflix. So let's break down the data here. Among 2 million Reelgood users, the share of streams for "The Office" rose to 9.2% from January 1st to January 7th, topping both "Bridgerton" and "The Mandalorian" for that week.

Now beyond that, the number of Reelgood users with a Peacock free subscription grew by 17% during the week of January 8th versus the week of December 25th, while those who had Peacock premium account grew by 5%, which within that same time frame. So the rise in subscriptions could certainly be attributed to "The Office." "The Office" Seasons 1 and 2 are on Peacock free, while seasons 3 through 9 are on that Peacock premium account.

And if I know anything about "Office" fans, I know that they're willing to watch the series anywhere. And especially during this time of the pandemic, we're seeing shows like "The Office," like "Grey's Anatomy," those comfort series really rise as people look for a sense of normalcy during this time. So I might just have to download Peacock to watch "The Office." I got "Bridgerton" on Netflix. This is good for the consumer here.

ZACK GUZMAN: Clearly a busy weekend for you ahead. I appreciate that in this week's Fame and Fortune, Ali Canal.