Not there yet

[threemonkeys]

I want to like Sanctuary. I like the idea of a "TV" series made available entirely by download. It appeals as it gets the idiots at the networks out of the loop. The question is whether a subscription service download can be financially viable yet without the revenue from the broadcast side. That remains to be seen. Based on what I have seen so far, I'm going to to take some convincing.

They are doing the viral marketing thing by making the first episode available on youtube and the like. You can watch it on what purports to be a fan site too. I say "purports" because it does not feel like a site set up by fans - rather it given the impression of having been set up by the production company as part of that viral marketing (and yes I know I'm contributing to it). Going on over to the official site is another thing altogether. The bloody thing is a Flash site only - no html alternative. I hate Flash. It means the site design has been driven by marketing people who are more interested in "look" than content. Then there is the question of offering it through "The Sanctuary Media Player" not as a more flexible file format. This is going to frustrate many people. I guess they do it for commercial reasons to protect their product but you know that isn't going to work. Already you can download avi versions of the first episode from the torrent sites.

Having said all that, this venture will probably succeed or fail based on the quality of the show. For me, it is a mixed start. It appears to be about some sort of "immortal" (they don't use that word) who goes around protecting people from supernatural evil. Fans of Angel will be nodding about now. It stars Amanda Tapping of SG1 fame and in fact there is a big overlap with Stargate production people and guest stars.

I've only seen the first 15 minute episode and that does not give enough time to get a real impression, but why should that stop me. The dialogue has quite a lot of one-liners but still managed to seem stilted and wooden. It is all shot in front of a green screen and that gives the creators a lot of flexibility but they don't need to show it off with big swooping zooms. We know about that already - "been there, done that". But it does have an effective dark look about it and some good editing. The story has an interesting setup and therefore some promise. Enough to keep me watching for now anyway.

Comments

[cricketk.livejournal.com]

The YouTube episode is so dark it's impossible to actually see it.

I think I may torrent the episodes so I can watch them through the TV, and give the project money if they're any good.

[threemonkeys.livejournal.com]

That is my strategy too - I just didn't want to encourage people down that route. It is still quite dark in places.

How is your David Hewlett squee factor these days? Keep your eye out...

[darthsappho.livejournal.com]

I thoroughly approve of the idea in principle, but the price seems a little on the high side for 15 minute episodes. Per minute, that's three times the cost of, say, the Firefly box set. The trailer looked visually impressive, but didn't give me any hint of a reason to care about the story or characters. Nothing obvious on the official site tells me who or what it's about, beyond "there are monsters which need to be fought".

[threemonkeys.livejournal.com]

Good point about the price - its the old "nickel & dime" approach where each bit is supposed to be so small that you don't notice how high the overall price is - not that small in $NZ. I can't help feeling that they might make more money and get to a lot more people if they adopt the 99 cents approach that iTunes uses.

[darthsappho.livejournal.com]

Or sold it in longer chunks; my aversion is more at being asked to pay for such a short installment than at how much they're charging, and 99 cent payments are probably impractical from a bank fee perspective (I assume people tend to buy more than one track at a time from iTunes, and even if not they have they have much greater economies of scale).

The fake fan site is annoying, too; a show this new obviously doesn't _have_ serious fans yet.

[threemonkeys.livejournal.com]

There aren't any fees on credit card transactions, but I do agree about the length of episode. You can't do much character development and story in such a short time.

[darthsappho.livejournal.com]

There are fees for the merchant. Or if you know of a service that _doesn't_ charge fees, I'd very much like to know about it 8)

[threemonkeys.livejournal.com]

True, but it is a fixed percentage - about 3% for a large merchant. When the percentage does vary, it is not dependent on the size of the individual transactions but the total monthly turnover. Therefore it does not matter if they take 1,000,000 x $1.00 transactions or 400,000 x $2.50 transactions. Either way they end up paying the same in merchant service fees ($30,000).