₦airaland Forum

joseph1832:
OkaY You got me. I saw all the Steven King novels and voila, I saw Alex Ferguson. In my mind I was like, Steven King wrote a novel about Alex Ferguson. Lol.

😂😂...My library is sorted by most recent that's why..so it's the last book i read, and for the upmteenth time that is. It is such a good book, not just from a football perspective, but life in general. The chapter he described how dominant Pep's Barça were between 09-11, is my fave bit

IngeniousLeez:
70% of the populace suffering ke?? You no talk 90-95% being fvvked. The extra 5% is for those that can relatively adapt and manoeuvre easily.
These periods, I feel people in the entertainment spectrum are going to suffer the economic crunch, subscription VOD especially.



Damn, so Netflix has 200k subs in naija? It looks even very large to me bruh. Yeah, I hear majority of the subs come from SA alone, then Egypt and a couple North Africans. Which source put our subs at that? It's impressive for me cos I feel Netflix being popular here na audio for social media or Twitter.



I sometimes wonder if they even make money in Nigerian market with their low sub prices in comparison to the spending spree they've been on for the past 5 yrs.
Netflix being a very data analytics oriented streaming company would never invest in a project they deemed no potential net positive or leverage.

Like you said, our content would mostly be appealing to people across the globe and most definitely our fellow diasporans abroad who want a feel of home. We have a large Diasporan community in that regard. And for some weird reason Nigerian entertainment popularity is growing globally.
I always used to think its only our Afrobeats that portray Nigeria in good light and global recognition but lately I've been seeing many Africans growing up or fully entrenched in Nollywood on social media. We dey always yab our country people but it seems the African continent sees us in high regard and superiority in that aspect.

Netflix is very data driven, so they must have a solid reason backed by hard facts which they see potential in Nigerian local investment. Even investing or marketing less than their main market in SA. A major reason I feel investing in Nigeria is sensible is that Nigeria remains the de facto Hub and King of African filmmaking. Our production rates even rival Hollywood and Bollywood. When anyone think of the African filmmaking industry, Nollywood is the face of the continent.
The industry is still in early stages of reliable and advanced distribution market. So Netflix has a lot to gain in aiding that evolution.



Also, Netflix having a reputation for loss making to gain market foothold lends credence to their continued support. Most likely in hopes that when the market fully begins to develop and mature, they'll be rightly well positioned to reap the bounty. 200mn-strong populace ain't no joke. No matter how anyone looks at it. They have a growth mindset.
We have an army of 160mn mobile internet subscribers. If Netflix can capture just 10% of that subscriber base in the future, they're swimming in money. In fact, 1% of that number is 1.6mn strong subscribers. So our numbers is significant which SA can't replicate.
They understand the pioneer advantage; which Netflix holds to most of its present day success to cos they were the first in the streaming industry.

Subscription growth has been drying up in North America and lately Europe due to increased competition. So they're looking for alternative potential growth markets for the next era. So Africa is a big market being that it has limited to no competition in streaming. Ripe market for the plucking.


Other streamers ain't looking at the continent as a significant market and Netflix is showing its foresight once again in betting first in Africa. When the region starts seeing the huge push from cable to streaming which will come inevitably cos everyone is fed up of DSTV and cable in general, then their investments starts to pay off exponentially.

I always used to say DStv would suffer when Netflix and the rest looks our way. But it seems the company foresaw this and quickly adapted with SHOWMAX and funny enough its the top streaming service in Africa with NETFLIX being a close second.
This highlights the need for understanding the local market and establishing yourself first.

By the time other streamers has exhausted all growth frontiers and has no where to run to than the fledgling potential huge market in the African space, Netflix and Showmax would have entrenched themselves to the roots of the industry ans well positioned to fight off any competitor.

DSTV primary market is South Africa, yet they can't do without the profitability that Nigeria gives them. Netflix would be looking at this. The numbers far favours us. And the streaming business is good-or-bad a numbers game.

The only thing hindering or key to unlocking this huge market is access to cheap internet and reliable connectivity. Especially once unlimited data takes hold in Nigeria, mehn, streaming services are swimming in money. That's if they can stay in business when that time arrives.




Kaycee7, we dey await your masterpiece. When that time reach you fit contact me for collabo cos we gats change this industry by fire by force. Not by only online complaints. Our future Christopher Nolan. ✌🏽🙌🏽



I just remembered how I saw this article of Amazon Prime Video epic failure in Africa/Nigeria despite pumping millions of funds in local content. 👇🏽

Bro...I did extensive data analytics course during grad sch and i can boldly tell you that to use data metrics to predict the future accurately, you have to control like 90% of the factors and currently Netflix controls around 40% of said factors that would make them make any sort of meaningful take home profits in the nearest future.

Throwing money at making Nigerian content is less than half of the work. The key component that makes Netflix work ideally, is fast, uninterrupted, and cheap internet. This draws back to the economy been in shambles!, Internet is not cheap here, not to talk of unlimited internet. Infact there are very few truly unlimited internet here without FUP, and those are very very expensive still, far above the reach of the average internet user here. Even Starling that looked like truly giving us unlimited internet for cheap, has shot up there sub prices by almost 100%. With the current optics, i do not envision an immediate future where internet becomes cheap... it's not happening any time soon, I am sorry. Netflix can bypass this route tho, by partnering local ISP to have cheap Netflix based plans. That's one part of the hurdle, the second part is trying to convince majority of people in the poverty capital of the world, to regularly pay for content that they can routinely get on the open sea☠️


But then again, I strongly believe, Netflix aren't actually hinging get good profits margin from people subbing their services here. The love for Nigerian content, the world over, is at an all time high, so it's easily sellable in the diaspora, i believe that is where they are targeting to recoup their investments.

Dstv works here, because of a state backed strong arm monopoly, holding all the football rights and majority of thier service aren't hinge on internet service or stable power supply. That's why it's even difficult for them to even market Showmax, because it's basically still Dstv content with a little premium content from overseas that seriously isn't worth the hassle. "Say make i pay for Dstv sub, still come pay for Showmax, to watch Real housewives of Lekki"? 😩😩


lol Prime video was doomed to fail here from the start, they rushed in and was just approving just about any movie that people haven't even heard about. Between it and Netflix, They have the largest base of bottom barrel Nigerian content, like every gets through to thier platform 😂😩

Ishilove:
I have a whole bunch of them in Epub format. I can share them with you if you want

Thanks for the offer. As it turns out, his books are pretty easy to find, and my source returned the titles you suggested to me within minutes and they are safely in my library. Now as a book reader, you know getting the book most times, it's the easy part....the hardest part is actually reading them 😬, but i find the time 😅

Illusioneffect:
You're right. But I think it's growing fast. Let's see how it goes. Having Netflix here is like a necessity but in Nigeria some people see it as waste and some how it's true😂

Growing fast una 😩. I know my people, Netflix basic sub of 2.2k is still a luxury here, and again the people aren't really used to the idea of paying for these things even before the economic downturn...told someone something ago, that i pay for Apple Music , and he looked at me like i was crazy, and said "when Naijaloaded dey" 😩

Illusioneffect:
Nollywood in my opinion have two major problems - they're not willing to take risks esp risky stories and scripts and they're not creative enough to solve filmmaking problems. They'd rather recycle stories and add little bits to make it seem new when it's not. In this Hijack '93 - it's like that Apple 'Hijack' series with worst story telling

The industry is not set up for filmmakers to take risk, and do none conventional story telling. The few ones that have dared to make arthouse films here, have been appreciated by few of us who do care, but they failed to gained any critical or commercial traction in the industry.

And Again, actual creatives that know what they are doing are not been let into writers room, directors chair or film sets here. The hyper conservative stance here also contributes. Meaning you can't tell stories against the ills of major tribes, can't tell stories about the ills of religion, can't properly tell stories about the political decay, let me not even talk about stories about alphabet people (which they very much exist here!), the filmmaker doing that will be burnt at the stake!.

So the stories that are left to tell, are the crass, razz and cringe stories like this one.

Illusioneffect:
That's why I trust Hollywood adapting a Nigerian fictional story? They'd put more effort telling the story more than our incompetent movie producers

Yes, I thought i yielded to this fact last week?. My only issue was that, I didn't want it 100% Hollywood, and they should do it in a way that doesn't take away the authenticity of the book. Of course I don't trust these Nigerian filmmakers to do a good job.

IngeniousLeez:
Lmao.... Nollywood never cease to amaze me.
Props as you said is so damn important for a period piece.

I wanted to also complain of the sniper rifle they used but just decided to keep quiet on that cos I'm not too good with identifying gun$.
But that rifle ehn, I still dey doubt e existence for 93’.

I just dey shake head. And like you said na NETFLIX I blame. They don't really care about the quality or authenticity. Their own na just to approve money and slap Netflix on it so they can keep growing in the market and competing with SHOWMAX. So anything goes.

Imagine with Netflix blood money and they can't get ordinary props right. At least, the uniforms and probably rifles shouldn't even be a problem if they encounter challenges with the vehicles.

You go just dey shake head and imagine whether this industry is even redeemable at all.

lol Netflix thinks, spamming Nigerian content, will get more people to subscribe here 😃. I can't even begin to count the reasons why this is counter productive, chief among them being, the damn economy dealing squarely with like 70% of the populace. Can't be thinking of Netflix sub when belly dey empty and other more important bills dey pile up fa 😩. Infact, active Netflix subscribers here is below 200k!. South Africa has like 70% of the total subscribers in sub Saharan africa, so I don't know why Netflix is not throwing their money there.

Well, i have longed clocked that, "The Idea of being Nigerian" has a far more appealing allure, than "being Nigerian and actually living here".... people around the world love our content for some reason and it is very easy for Netflix to sell it.

Kaycee7 say make we wait, say 2035, say him go change the industry....so fingers crossed 🤞🏿 and Inshallah 🙏🏿😁

Kaycee7:
Nah! I'll start taking this industry out of the trenches from 2035

I'll be rooting for you harmano 👌🏿

IngeniousLeez:
Hmm, interesting premise.....
But the costumes, set, location and feel of the movie ain't it. Toyota Hilux vehicles for the military in 1993? See the camo worn by the soldiers sef, it looks very modern. Even that helicopter transport Mi-17 desert camo looks like something as recent as 2015.
At least they seem to have had some sort of collabo with the military.

Is this another vibes and insha'Allah project from Netflix Nollywood ??
Oyaskii come see your people. 😂



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNJzWqKUlwM?si=KOI6bBKCtruhIYBU

Bruhhh... Nollywood stresses me out fr 😩.

It's even Netflix i blame because, it's like they don't care about their rep here. How are they giving 100% creative keys to Nigerian Filmmakers who have shown gross incompetence in times past?

If you are adapting a movie from an historical event, common sense should tell you that the props is the absolute thing you get right even if all other part is wrong.

Well, you'd just know it's the most obvious 4/10 flick 🕊️🕊️😩...but i will still show up... pretty clear that this industry might never leave the trenches.

Chibudollar:
I get your points bro, all valid reasons, but look at a show like severance it's been almost 3 years since we got season 1 and its been a long wait since then. Not like it needed fancy locations and high effects it was mostly done in one room. I don't know if they intentionally delay these shows

The official word is there were creative differences and the writers strike of last year also contributed but i ain't buying the excuse. FBI suppose pack people go jail if they investigate the production flow of that show 😩😩.

It has no business taking that long to make.

Chibudollar:
bro... I just finished season 4 few days ago. Premium series. 22 episodes and it was very good. These days you'd beg them for 10 episodes and it takes 2 to 3 years before you'll even get 1 season

The quality and scale of production has increased over time. Back in the day, they didn't need any fancy locations or 4K footage, so easier to produce 22 episodes capped most times at 720p Res at most, meant for primetime tvs weekly releases.


Now we have VOD services that go up to 4K and offering Dolby Atmos audio plus advanced VFX exists now for Sci shows and the likes. so these factors would mean longer production time between pre and post production.

And because of the preceding paragraph, the budget of shows now, are at an astronomical high. To put things in perspective, "Prison Break S1" cost about 2m American greens per episode to make, arriving at about 24m for the entire session, in contrast, HOTD S1 cost roughly about 20m per episode, reaching around 200m for the entire season of just 9 episodes!. So it is commercially not feasible to make many episodes per season of tv shows now.

The attention span of the average populace has been ruined by the rise of short form videos made popular by Tiktok, and you can see most social media platforms are incorporating short forms reels into their eco system, meaning people actually need you to get to the point as soon as possible, and most people lack the attention span to sit through 23 episodes of a single show! especially late millennials and Gen Z.

All that been said, i think these networks can really put in more efforts to reduce the wait time between seasons of shows.

samistry:
Film wey no even show for cinema for Yankee Na straight to video release.
Funny thing is the creator of hell boy didn't like Guillemo movies adaptation. He co-wrote this crooked man screenplay touting it will be more faithful to his vision.

Cinemas down here dey ment sometimes bruh. This movie was an archetype straight to VOD release, them go carry put for primetime slot dey charge exorbitant fee fa.

I have been done with anything "Hellboy" since the end of "The Golden Army". The last one in 2019, tanked critically and commercially so I don't know what strain of loud they were on, coming up with this.

Ishilove:
Hmmmm, Oyaskii, where do we start from oooo??

Tommyknockers (The 'super cunt' line is forever etched in my memory 😂)
Thinner
Misery
Cell
Bag of Bones
Needful Things
The Stand (MAD)
Christine (this one made gan)
Dreamcatcher
The Shining


Stephen King is one of the best writers of his generation, no cap.

Thanks for the list. I am completely weaned off hardcopy of books now, I will find the time to chase them down in Epub.

🙏🏾

abduleez1:
Lol, how person go use money go wan watch Hellboy wey be like low budget streaming product for this Tinubu regime? 😂😂😅

lol shey you see am. It was independence day, and unfortunately it was the biggest title playing that day! Just to tell you how starved we are for actual quality blockbusters worth seeing on a big screen.

The biggest title playing as of today is "Joker" which from all indications was actually a joke, so braah make cinema just dey avoid me dey go from now on 😩

pu7pl3:
😩😂😂😂😩😩😩
Omo, bro

😂😂🤣🤣🤣🤣

My bossman lament for 3 days straight...me wey don remove hand for cinema matter for months now, him think say i no know wentin i dey do 😂😂😂

https://thumbs2.imgbox.com/c9/4d/9AWVK6cF_t.gif

Ishilove:
He and King are my all time faves. I have been reading the Odd Thomas series and have finally gotten to the last book in the series.

For some uncanny reason i can't seem hack King's book. I think the only one i have read was a collection of short novellas titled "Full Dark, No Stars" , or maybe i can't just pick them...so please, can you run me list of S.King's books you think i should totally get into? 🙏🏾

abduleez1:
Lmao.... Wetin dem do you?? 😂😂

My guy go Genesis go see am last week, e waka comot around 15 minutes in, make money kukuma waste than for him eyes to complete that rubbish, he said😩😂😂.

Hellboy in 2024 is nasty work fgs.... a franchise that should have been retired since.

Ishilove:
Okay, thanks. I don't think it has been adapted though.

It was adapted albeit loosely and low budget, way way back. It tanked critically and commercially that's why you probably didn't hear of it. Funny thing, the filmmaker just kept making more sequels of it without Dean Koontz's input lol

Not many of his books have been adapted because he always greater creative control of his work. I don't blame him, though. The work of an artist is his baby and not many will want their babies butchered the way Hollywood butchers a lot of these books. A case in point is what is happening to J.R.R Tolkein's Lord of the Rings.

Exactly, He takes meticulously care in fleshing out his characters and tie them to unique stories, but the few they have adapted to movies actually do remove major elements of the books, and most just settle for a "loose adaptions" that usually doesn't hit like the books.

He is literally my fave author, and he is like the most consistent author presently amongst "the old heads", he had a book out in January and he has another planned next month, and another for 2025 already lol, unlike someone like Dan Brown, and drops one book per decade and just disappears 😩

I said i should just "spy" "Prison Break S1" at the wee hours, and this shii kept me up, i consumed 5 episodes with minimal fuss, like wtf!! 😩.

The improved Web HD re release added to the spice, mainly the writing quality holds up so well... absolutely nothing was left to chance!.

It makes me wonder, where did all the good screen writers go? We used to get regular "22 episodes" banger shows during that era, consistently. Now some networks can't even hold common "10 episodes" without a cancellation axe hanging over the show...smh 😞

Ishilove:
The same book written by Dean Koontz?

Nope. This one is "The Watchers" and it was written by an irish writer.

Dean Koontz's own is simply "Watchers" and it was adapted i think, long long ago. Good book tho.

abduleez1:
Solid watchlist.

I've been hearing much talk about The Substance but I'm still undecided about it.

omoo...I am fully decided on it!. They said it's like Cronenberg's body horror regen and it's only good things i have been hearing about it.

But my guy, with the way Hollywood is set up now, you can't fully vouch for any movie , till you see it o 😩😂

Kaycee7:
The average viewer isn't dropping a trending show no matter how bad they claim to find it. The FOMO won't let them. They'd rather watch and rant than actually seek out a show they might like. Most of them don't even know what kind of shows they like.

The few who checked out S2 because folks said that it was better than S1 dropped it barely halfway. It's the folks who made it all the way to the finale that'll still be back to watch season 3 and rage and rant.

At the end of the day, everyone will choose what they want to do with their God-given time.

Mannnn...seeing a show in this Big 2024, and not getting some sort of reward value and enjoyment must be some form of self torture...No?.

Too many unserious media coming out in the last couple of years for one to still be allowing FOMO hold them to ransom. Just cut ties with any media that you simply do not enjoy...You own your time and effort, and you get to decide how you spend it!.

This might be an exceptional case tho, because of the allure of how good LOTR was, they think somehow this TROP will replicate this further than the line, and 2 seasons gone, and they are nowhere close according to these rants.... it's time to simply cut ties with it.

Well like you said, when people actually begin to know the shows they actually like, they will stop torturing themselves and make better decisions to see shows they actually would enjoy.

OhBritannia:
Lol but all jokes aside, penguin is a good show.

Yeah...The Penguin is dope and I am currently on to it too...i was just speaking in general, how highly you seem to rate every show you post about lol...your average rating should be around 8/10 this year alone.

Though when it comes to ratings, i recently rated Deadpool and wolverine a 2 and it's because i feel like both the writers and the casts weren't serious.
Maybe they used the movie as a front for money laundering. Lol

Really? 😮...I probably missed that, then Deadpool and Wolverine must be really really bad to fail your high standards

It's all bants from me by the way....Peace and light bro ✌🏾.

OhBritannia:
The penguin episode 3 is a solid 9/10 for me.

Personally this is the best episodes so far solely because of the character development and then telling the storyline in a deep manner so that the audience can finally connect and relate to what's going on.

I like the final transition of Victor from being innocent and now fully in the game and what he had to give up in order to fully transcend into the game.
I like the deep dialogues in this episode 3, dialogues of character developments.

Now the game has began fully, i can't wait for episode 4.

We might have to declare a public holiday the day a show rates below 5 in your books 😩.

I envy your exceptional high taste bossman, you have a clairvoyant knack of only picking the best shows to see..👍🏾

Has a show even become dramatically better after a bad season in recent times? 🤔...it rarely happens. For it to happen, the preceding season has to have some form of discernable quality.

I have no business continuing a show, that contextually had a bad season in my view...i need to be this ruthless considering how precious the time and effort, I am vesting into it, is 😩

Heart3030:
also those that hate it won't stop watching it....they keep on watching it just to tell us it's nonsense.

The people supposedly hate watching it, are doing so in the hope that it will eventually come good because of how good the movies were and I can't fault them.

They should probably follow my mantra. For awhile now, I don't see shows with the hope that it will eventually come good, despite a start or season, i didn't like. I have neither the time, patience or attention span to afford such luxury. It took me just 3 episodes of S1 to know this show wasn't for me, and i didn't even complete S1.
I am perfectly fine on missing out on it, even if it eventually comes good. It is already a closed chapter in my books as I'm perfectly fine on missing out on it, just to many good media around to be bothered.

It is better than hanging on to it, getting disappointed each week, ranting and even throwing squabbles with folks on here, that are supposedly having a good time with it. No show is currently worth all that stress.

Calibrator:
I will be rewatching the entire six movies in the LOTR franchise to purge my memory of the hogwash TROP made me watch.

Can't have my last memory of the franchise stained for all of eternity

I have never seen a show this polarised in reviews. There is basically no middle ground. Those that love it, think it's the best thing since slice bread whilst those that hate it, do so with so much fury and both sides can't be wrong, speaks volume to how differently we perceive media quality sometimes...so so uncanny 😩

abduleez1:
It was darn too good. Didn't know it was Irish produced.
Exhuma is also amongst my horror list.

This is probably the best year ever for horror genre in a long time. And has good variety too.

Have you watched "The Watchers"? How's it like?

That wasn't an original irish production lol. It was WB and was written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan's young daughter, so it reeked of nepotism, and it was even a problem during the film's promotional presser, as people where so sure she was never gonna get in that directors chair, if not for the calibre of her dad in the industry.

Anyways, the movie it's self is just there, good build up and all but fails to properly capitalize on it. It is nothing close to how good the book was.

Wait o. Horror flicks constitute about 70% of the total films i have logged this year 💀😅. I am not even joking, the genre totally ate this year and left no crumbs. I need to see "The Substance" to complete this list, shame it ain't playing around me, and with "Slow Mubi" handling the distribution, it might not arrived on VOD till next year 😩

abduleez1:
Oddity......8/10

Really good horror flick. Top tier writing and storytelling.
People say it's probably the scariest horror flick of the year, but I didn't see that. Just got the adequate doom and gloom and pristine suspense right from the start. Good jumpscares here and there.
Solid plot without an over reliance on the supernatural to explain away plot points. Instead, the supernatural themes perfectly complements and adds a sense of mystery to a well grounded storyline.

The strength lies in the acting, eerie atmosphere and chilling score.
Good return to form for the horror genre. Got the basics right without relying on over-the-top jump scares and overly loud sound effects.



Time to check Longlegs for another "scariest" title of 2024.

The simplicity was the charm. It was extremely well done..no dilly dally....just straight to the business of the day 👍🏾. This and "Exhuma" (2024)" are probably my best horror flick from this year.

The horror genre had quite a run this year, each month for like the last 3 or 4 months or so, has had a major horror release.


And back to "Oddity", Them Irish really do know how to make movies and shows, so if you see any Irish production, don't think, don't fuss, just pick it up and watch ✌🏾

armadeo:
2/10.

It begs the question why was this movie even made.

The most obvious cash grab ever. There was absolutely no need for a sequel. The idea for part one was "fresh" and ended well, this stood no chance of been good.

This is proper nasty work 😩. WB were probably high from the euphoria of the first one, and probably thought this would hit, with minimal fuss.

"El bomba" 💣 is imminent and at this rate, they might just cut their losses, nip the theatrical run and allow this stream on HMAX much earlier than expected.