In Brief: "Ancient Apocalypse" Fails to Recapture the Magic

10/23/2024

It isn't your imagination: Fewer people are talking about Ancient Apocalypse in its second season, nearly two years after the show's first season smashed viewership records for a streaming archaeology series. According to viewership statistics released by Netflix this week, viewership for the series is down more than two-thirds from the show's debut season. According to Netflix's Global Top Ten list for the week of October 14 to 20, just 2.2 million people watched the second season in its debut week. The 8.9 million hours viewed last week were about one-third of the 27.7 million hours viewed in the first season's first week in 2022. (Netflix did not estimate viewership in the figures it released in 2022, but using a similar conversion formula would estimate between 6 and 7 million viewers in 2022.) Similarly, with the media focused on the U.S. election and the Middle East, the number of news stories this past week discussing Ancient Apocalypse pales in comparison to 2022 stories about the first season.

This season's viewership collapse might be due to the timing of the release, in the heart of the busy season for new TV (Netflix viewers flocked to the streamer's Outer Banks instead of Ancient Apocalypse), or competition from world events ahead of the U.S. election. It may also be due to a lack of compelling narrative this season--there was nothing new, just a rehash of season one. (Of course, that never hurt Ancient Aliens.) But more likely, Netflix simply waited too long between seasons. Two years is an eternity when it comes to a flash in the pan, and the failure to capitalize on momentum led to viewers drifting away and forgetting why they cared. There were a lot of missed opportunities. I would have thought with all the time they had, Hancock, Netflix, and show producer ITN would have put together a tie-in book, for example, to build excitement. Instead, Hancock spent his promotional time on grievance tour complaining about Flint Dibble, and the whining likely did little to attract viewers to the show.

11 Comments

Kent

10/23/2024 12:54:45 pm

One more thing: Election year. Old people watch AA and old people follow politics. Each is a case of sameold sameold, perhaps with election year ahead by a nose.

Good Point

10/23/2024 06:28:26 pm

"Two years is an eternity when it comes to a flash in the pan, and the failure to capitalize on momentum led to viewers drifting away and forgetting why they cared."

How much of this could be blamed on the writer's strike? There are numerous shows and programs falling into this category. So long in between seasons, I simply don't care anymore. "Ghosts" has really gone down the crapper. There are numerous interesting ideas they've just left hanging. Does anyone remember what was happening on any of the Yellowstone related series??? Does anyone really care?

Jim

10/23/2024 07:32:18 pm

Maybe it is too confusing for people.
If Native Americans were the Atlantians, who were the white guys who came and taught them stuff ?
Were they a pre pre Ice age civilization ?

Grammy's Old Hat

10/24/2024 01:11:42 am

One only needs to look at an older work of Hancock, "The Mars Mystery" for the answer to your query. The Albino Master race came from Mars. I don't recall how the Gingers took over the role.

Cheyenne Chaco

10/24/2024 10:09:21 am

Unlike network or cable, a show on streaming will always be there for when people have time.

Graham has been on a number of major podcasts in the past week. What Graham should have done is started his media tour a little earlier. So the returns will be delayed, but two of his books have already returned to the #1 spot, so he's already headed in that direction.

Jason jumped the gun and wasted his day analyzing Netflix. Plus using "estimates" for numbers as if Netflix viewers are governed by a formula is a sign you might want to go back and focus on David Hatcher Childress, the world famous Ignorant-at-large.

Luke

10/24/2024 11:10:45 am

Thank you Flint Dibble

An Over-Educated Grunt

10/24/2024 07:19:36 pm

Part of it could just be that the second season just wasn't as good. Even with the addition of Keanu Reeves and the inclusion of recent work like the footprints at White Sands and terra preta, it just wasn't as consistently interesting. It becomes more and note obvious that discovery doesn't happen at the pace of a TV show and his ability to cherry-pick from new evidence is even slower. Result - he has to stretch the argument thinner, and it becomes less interesting with each new stretch.

Paul

10/30/2024 03:44:03 pm

I have for the most part, paid Hancock little to no attention, have not watched, or for that matter, care to watch his 2 series.
For some reason, I got sucked into a video that he posted October 11th, and that is 20 minutes that I won’t get back. (could only stomach about 20 minutes of the 56 minutes, or whatever it is)
What I find crazy is that the video has about 267k views to date.
My impression of Hancock is that he is a pathetic, old man. Steeped in his delusions of grandeur. He, nor his cronies, likely never actually studied a stitch of science, but make all these grandiose claims, with zero evidence, or imagined evidence, to back their craziness up.
I don’t know which is worse, that the man is so delusional or that so many have taken the time to listen.
Essentially, he is accusing folks of trying to chip away his armor, but he doesn’t realize that he really doesn’t have any armor.
Maybe if the fool had studied a little more science in prior years instead of doing dope….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PEe72Nj-AW0

Carnival barker

10/30/2024 05:44:57 pm

Is he really delusional or just a gifted con artist? When you engage with those who consume his work you get a good idea of which peasants were giving their life savings to the man selling slivers from the One True Cross a thousand years ago. He has a gift for feigned outrage that some critics may confuse with the delusion of a true believer. The dipshits on the other hand confuse his act with sincerity.

nick

11/27/2024 06:32:55 pm

Wasn't it Dibble who first did a lot of whining (and outright slander) against Hancock?

Nathan thurm

12/3/2024 01:20:50 pm

I'm sure everyone would be delighted to see a specific quote where Dibble outright slandered Hancock.

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In Brief: "Ancient Apocalypse" Fails to Recapture the Magic

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