Why “Breaking Bad” is better than the movies

TV is now better than the movies.  And most software developers could tell you why.

Acclaimed series such as Lost, Breaking Bad and Game of Thrones dominate social media and water-cooler discussions week after week. Critics write stories gleefully explaining “the main reason TV is now better than movies” while Hollywood actors feel they can find better roles on television.

To those of us in technology, this all makes sense because much like our software — and unlike movies — TV development takes the same iterative approach which we advocate and prefer for any project.

Here are a few surprising similarities between modern TV production and software development:

Television can be broken down into manageable parts.

Television has the advantage of being episodic. This week’s show might not be the greatest, but one dud doesn’t sink the whole series. The Sopranos annoyed many fans with episodes made up almost entirely of Tony Soprano dream sequences. But the series is still considered one of the greatest of all time – and has been credited with ushering in the current “golden age” of televised drama.

With software development, we approach a big project in “episodes,” as well. Features and functionality are coded, tested and reviewed a piece at a time.  Any mistakes are caught early, and do not endanger the entire effort.

Movies, of course, do not have this luxury. Producing a blockbuster movie is the ultimate in “waterfall” development – an approach that many smart development teams have abandoned. Everything has to fall into place correctly when the final product ships, or an error made in writing, casting, directing or special effects could result in a box-office bomb.

Television receives frequent feedback and can change course relatively easily.

Every week a television series is on the air, its creators and producers get nearly-instant feedback: posts on social media, reviews and recaps from critics and fans, and Nielsen ratings.

The creative team has the opportunity to adapt future episodes accordingly, perhaps by giving a popular secondary character more screen time in future episodes or de-emphasizing an unpopular subplot.

The iterative, consultative style of development a company such as Axiaware uses furnishes every project with a wealth of useful feedback. With every client update we assess the status of the project and can make adjustments as needed.

This approach – in television and development – allows for change and provides for nimble reactions to feedback.

In the motion picture industry, the closest analog to these forms of frequent feedback are the “dailies” which are reviewed by a small, internal group – offering much less perspective than television producers get.

Television is less afraid to fail.

This may be the most important difference of all.

The film industry has become fixated on blockbusters, which cost a lot of money to produce and market. A box-office bust can be very expensive. In a piece that compared television’s quality to films last year on New York magazine’s Vulture blog, a movie studio executive said that the “fear of advocating a potential loser makes department heads ‘conservative in their projections.’”

Television producers take more risks, in part because the competitive landscape requires it. The Vulture piece also says:

There are too many networks now competing for attention and they don’t have the luxury of spending the huge sums movie studios can to cut through the marketing clutter and get the consideration of the potential viewer. So, they have no choice but to make shows that stand out from everything else based on their quality and distinctiveness.

That’s an approach a technology company can appreciate – leaner, focused on quality and, as I have written before, willing to fail.

Of course, there are major differences between software development and TV production. But this key similarity may help explain why many people decide against heading to the local multiplex on Friday night, instead staying home to binge-watch Season 3 of “Mad Men.”