Netflix's woes continue. Hulu just announced it will become the only place in the U.S. for streaming Schitt's Creek (one of the best shows on Netflix. Well, formerly).
Joe Earley, the president of Hulu, is quoted in the press release announcement as saying "Based on the number of Schitt’s Creek GIFs we Slack every day, it’s no surprise that we are absolutely thrilled to welcome Johnny, Moira, Alexis, ‘Daviiid’ and the wonderfully unique residents of Schitt’s Creek to Hulu."
The beloved sitcom, which follows a once-rich family up to the lower-class town of Schitt's Creek, arrives on Hulu on October 3, 2022. This gives Netflix subscribers who don't have Hulu (or don't want to see the show with ads) approximately five months to watch all six seasons of the series.
Netflix, which has recently had bad news over canceled subscriptions, may be looking at its bottom line a little more closely. News recently broke that Stranger Things 4 cost $30 million per episode.
Analysis: Why is Schitt's Creek leaving Netflix?
The departure of Schitt's Creek from Netflix may be surprising to fans, but this has been a long time coming. Schitt's Creek comes from the Canadian broadcasting company, and CBC and Netflix have long held a tenuous relationship. Per the Financial Post, CBC's CEO Catherine Tait has said on the Content Canada podcast that "We’re not going to do deals that hurt the long-term viability of our domestic industry."
She elaborated, stating "A number of countries have done deals, as we did, with Netflix … and over time we start to see that we’re feeding the growth of Netflix, or we’re feeding the growth of Amazon, rather than feeding our own domestic business and industry."
Netflix is thought of as helping Schitt's Creek find a larger audience and popularity, as it originally aired on Pop TV in the U.S., a channel that many aren't aware of, and is hard to find. Yours truly only found out about Pop when the Impact pro wrestling program left Destination America in 2015 for Pop in 2016.
Right now, Netflix is taking its punches, but this move is just as important for Hulu, which could always stand to improve its offerings in the "beloved sitcom" category. Netflix took Seinfeld from Hulu on October 1, 2021, and while Schitt's isn't the institution Seinfeld is, it's one of the more recently released sitcoms that people love and will want to rewatch.Hopefully, Netflix will use the budget space left by Schitt's Creek's departure for something that could make amends to fans upset about canceled Netflix shows. We recommend Glow season 4.
