Parrot Analytics Justifies Amazon Canceling 'Good Girls Revolt'

11 Jan, 2017 By: John Latchem

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Amazon in December canceled its original series “Good Girls Revolt” after just one season despite it receiving generally positive reviews upon its release Oct. 28. The show details efforts by female journalists in the late 1960s to gain equal status to their male counterparts at a New York magazine.

Sony Pictures Television, which produced the show, claimed viewership was particularly strong, citing data from streaming monitor Symphony Advanced Media indicating “Good Girls Revolt” had twice as many viewers as Amazon’s best-known show, “Transparent.”

However, , which tracks consumer demand for a title through many metrics, including social media, indicates viewer interest in the series was actually rather low, justifying the cancellation, though no official explanation was given by Amazon. Parrot’s data demonstrates the new breadth of information available to networks and video services when making programming decisions, allowing them to buck trends when a renewal or cancellation would have seemed otherwise straightforward according to traditional metrics.

Parrot compared the popularity of “Good Girls Revolt” in the five Amazon Video markets available in October and November — the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Austria and Japan — and found it was outranked by several other Amazon series available in the same time frame, including “Transparent,” which was 153% more in demand.

Another new Amazon show, the Golden Globe-winning “Goliath,” had 404% more demand. “The Man in the High Castle” and “Ripper Street” were also cited as more popular, 439% and 129%, respectively.

According to Parrot, this indicates that the high viewership touted by the show’s producers didn’t actually translate into as loyal a following as shows such as Emmy winner “Transparent” or “High Castle.”

“Amazon may value a less-watched but buzzier show over a low-key but solid performer if the buzzier show attracts more new subscribers to its platform,” the report reads, pointing out that “Transparent” has this advantage even in its third season. According to Parrot, demand for “Good Girls Revolt” sharply declined in the weeks after its release, indicating subsequent seasons were not likely to maintain viewers. In contrast, demand for “Goliath” grew by 70% from the first to fifth week after its release.

Parrot’s data suggests two other freshman Amazon shows displaying similar trends with lower demand than “Good Girls Revolt” — fashion-themed “The Collection” and Woody Allen’s “Crisis in Six Scenes” — are similarly likely to be canceled (though reports have already surfaced that Allen is not interested in another season).

On the other hand, according to the Parrot report, “Good Girls Revolt” did find an audience in other countries not covered by Amazon Video. This global appeal likely inspired Sony Pictures Television’s ultimately unsuccessful effort to shop the show to another programmer.

“While ‘Good Girls Revolt’ did not do well in Amazon’s markets, it had more popularity in a variety of countries in Asia and Europe, indicating that it could still be a successful show in the right market,” the Parrot report reads. “From Amazon’s point of view, though, its cancellation was almost inevitable.”

According to The Hollywood Reporter, plans for a second season were well underway as a result of the seemingly positive viewership numbers, so the cancellation came as something of a shock to the show’s producers. The show’s creator on Jan. 11 confirmed the show would not continue.

 

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