Netflix is an interesting beast. Its rise to power is a fascinating one. It is partly responsible for the death of one of the most beloved franchises in America, Blockbuster, thanks to its eye on innovation and embracing digital trends. Since it became a streaming service, it has delivered some of the most talked about television in modern history including shows like Stranger Things, Black Mirror, House of Cards, The Crown, Squid Game, and Castlevania to name a few.
However, Netflix wasn’t immune from the cultural blitzkrieg of social justice advocacy, and it began producing shows that left a horrible taste in the mouths of subscribers. Its adherence to leftist “art” encouraged it to produce some of the worst stinkers in modern television history such as The Cowboy Bebop live-action remake, Dear White People, and Vikings: Vallhalla. Of course, there was also the most damning show of them all, Cuties, which hyper-sexualized minors in order to make a point about hyper-sexualizing minors.
When you have as large a production house and product library as Netflix does, you’re going to release some bombs, but Netflix’s wokification and its mistreatment of various properties people love were always going to cause subscribers to fling their hands into the air and walk away. Moreover, with so many other streaming services to choose from, the competition was always going to get more fierce.
As of now, the Daily Wire is reporting that Netflix has lost nearly one million subscribers, and pretty quickly to boot:
The report shows approximately 970,000 subscribers canceled their membership during the last three months. The number comes after the service took a massive hit in the first quarter when it lost 200,000 subscribers between January and March.
While Reed Hastings, the company’s CEO, praised shows like “Ozark” and “Stranger Things” for keeping the results lower than the anticipated forecast, the company still saw its biggest loss in customers since its foundation 25 years ago.
A well-deserved loss given its less than stellar output and it allows itself to be a platform for scolding to the American people from the social justice obsessed. Even now, I’m seeing that its recent treatment of Resident Evil is about on par with that of Cowboy Bebop, in that it’s so infected with modern requirements that it’s hardly watchable.
At this rate, it would seem that Netflix has set its course. It will continue to produce bottom-of-the-barrel content that appeals to only the wokest of the woke, and only release something worth watching once in a blue moon. Go ahead and unsubscribe and come back whenever those brave enough to watch something on the channel say it’s safe to resub for a short period.
Or I would have thought that’s the case if it wasn’t for recent developments.
It’s clear Resident Evil was conceived, written, and filmed before it really hit Netflix that they were beginning to go broke because they were going woke. Something tells me that it might be one of the last few shows that actually go down this road of modernity adherence for Netflix.
And I think this is all thanks to Dave Chappelle.
By now you know Chappelle’s history with Netflix. He launched a salvo directly against woke culture with his stand-up special “Sticks and Stones” which took the nation by storm. Despite incessant calls for Netflix to take the special down and denounce Chappelle, Netflix was watching its numbers skyrocket. The sound of ringing cash registers drowned out the left’s rage. Despite this, the lesson wouldn’t catch on for some time.
It took Chappelle’s second Netflix comedy special “The Closer” for it to truly sink in. Once again, audiences raved about Chappelle’s stand-up routine where he directly challenged the woke left, especially the LGBT outrage brigades, while the left attempted to launch an entire movement to have him canceled. Trans employees marched in front of Netflix’s office and attempted to get a rally going. To be sure, people came to support them, but they were also met by Chappelle supporters. Soon, the LGBT walkout at Netflix died to sputter, and the nail in the coffin for them came from Hastings himself.
“If you’d find it hard to support our content breadth, Netflix may not be the best place for you,” said Hastings in a company-wide memo.
It was one of the first times in ages that a corporate CEO told the left “no.”
The plot thickened when I was perusing through Netflix’s offerings on Tuesday night and noticed something interesting. Netflix had featured another Dave Chappelle entry, but it wasn’t a comedy special. It was a speech he gave at his alma mater, the Duke Ellington School of Arts. The school had renovated its theater and they wanted to name it after him.
The speech is around 30 minutes long. Netflix didn’t give it much pomp and circumstance in the editing department. It could have been a YouTube video. Yet despite the lack of wowing visuals and flash, I couldn’t help but think the inclusion of this simple speech into its library was purposeful.
Within it, Chappelle gave some fun stories about his time at the school and his career, but he put some focus on recent events with his run-in with woke culture. At one point, he was addressing his alma mater’s current students about his special “The Closer” and how offended and angry they were. He commented that it “sincerely hurt me” to hear these talking points come out of “children’s faces” because he knew these kids didn’t come up with those words.
But something else bothered him more.
“These kids said everything about gender and this and that and the other, but they didn’t say anything about art,” Chappelle said.
The speech ends with Chappelle doing something extraordinary. He declined to have the theater named after him, not out of spite, but because he wanted it replaced with a message to the culture that wanted him canceled. He unveiled the new name of the theater to be the “Theater for Artistic Freedom and Expression.”
Keep in mind this is footage of a speech released by Netflix after it not only released Chappelle’s specials but also specials by Ricky Gervais and Bill Burr, both of whom challenge woke culture as well.
Is Netflix trying to turn a corner and distance itself from the wokeness that has given them such a sad reputation? Probably. It offering up Chappelle’s speech is seems less like more Chappelle content and more like a statement. In fact, that statement seems to be a bit more concrete since it’s canceled some of its more woke shows as well.
(READ: Netflix Cancels Some of Its Woke Shows, Signaling Its Backpedal From Leftism Is Well Underway)
If it is a company slowly prying off the grip of radical leftism, then I’m going to give it all the credit it deserves for doing so. If Netflix, the streaming giant that it is, can produce good content that appeals to the masses instead of appeasing one small group of political radicals then I sincerely hope they reattract subscribers at an alarmingly fast rate. I hope they set a bar. I hope they teach other streaming platforms that they don’t have to be beholden to leftist messaging.
Perhaps Netflix can be the flagship that leads the mainstream entertainment industry out of this socio-political dark age.
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