Watch your back, Netflix. With today's release of 10 new pilots, Amazon just raised the stakes in the furious creative race between the two companies. While Netflix has hogged most of the prestige thanks to critically acclaimed shows like House of Cards and Orange Is The New Black, Amazon is looking to gain an edge by helping users decide its programming.
In the same way it greenlit the political laugher Alpha House and the Silicon Valley comedy Beta, Amazon is once again allowing users to decide which of the 10 new pilots go to series. Since five of the pilots are for children, and our readers are comprised of sophisticated adults, let's run down the five new pilots aimed at you, the grown-ups.
There's The After, a sci-fi mystery from X-Files boss Chris Carter. Bosch is a twisty crime procedural based on the eponymous book series. Transparent is a comedy starring Jeffrey Tambor and Gaby Hoffmann as members of an L.A. family with boundary issues. The Rebels is the football drama we've all been waiting for since the departure of Friday Night Lights, and finally, Mozart In The Jungle is a comedy about "sex, drugs, and classical music," written by indie dream team Roman Coppola, Jason Schwartzman, and Alex Timbers.
While we haven't seen the pilots, early buzz suggests that the big winner here is Transparent, the one about three siblings and their parents navigating their way through L.A. ennui. As for the others, well, you'll just have to head on over to Amazon Prime to find out. Your move, Netflix. (Vulture)