Do you remember most things between seasons?

Submitted by JustForQuestions321 t3_z733gg in television

I struggled with this for quite a long time, and I was wondering how other people deal with this, I can't remember most things that happened in a show after a while, for example, Dark, I remember that I liked it but when Season 2 dropped I didn't know anything that happened before, so I just didn't watch it, do you hope to get into it once you start it or do you watch a recap?

Man I don't even know if I'm just dumb at this point

How do you all do it?

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frstyle34 t1_iy4ffxn wrote

That’s why good producers create recaps to help those of us who don’t obsess over a show every second of every day in between seasons

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NoNefariousness2144 t1_iy4w2ka wrote

I love it when shows have recaps that are in-character. Like Ozark season 2 had Ruth describing everything that happened previously >!to her dad in prison!<.

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thisisntshakespeare t1_iy4fivz wrote

I think Dark would be impossible to watch without a refresher (or at least detailed notes). Most tv shows are not as intricate and mind-bending as Dark.

Shows like Bosch:Legacy, I can pick up where they left off with the main series without great issue. I really appreciate the shows that have re-caps before each show. We’re currently watching Alaska Daily and they do re-caps, so helpful.

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drogyn1701 t1_iy4gk8u wrote

If it's been a while since the previous season I don't mind doing a re-watch before a new season. I just did that with Warrior Nun and there was plenty I had forgotten.

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0451enjoyer t1_iy4uxpu wrote

I usually watch a recap video. I've found man of recaps on YouTube is the best at it, bit of an information dump but he goes over all the important parts. A lot of the official recaps netflix release aren't very good in my opinion as they miss a lot of details.

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Adrian_FCD t1_iy7pn9g wrote

Man of Recaps is tge GOAT, really lives up to his name.

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LiterallyKesha t1_iy71q76 wrote

I'm seeing a new trend of some recap youtubers mixing in their stupid opinions into the recap. They start referencing articles and outside sources as an opinion piece rather than just giving you the facts.

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Chilis1 t1_iy88di8 wrote

Dark is the extreme example where recaps just aren’t enough.

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AintNothinbutaGFring t1_iy8y2r3 wrote

Fucking love Man of Recaps. He should have his own show, he could do the recaps between seasons

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Thromkai t1_iy54vxa wrote

> Man I don't even know if I'm just dumb at this point

It's much easier to remember a season when it runs for 22-24 episodes between September - May than it is to remember a 10 episode season that you watched in less than a month.

It used to be that by the time a show had ended, there was pretty much just 4 more months until it kicked back up again, for the most part.

Now, you can binge an entire season and you might not get another one until another year and a half. This coupled with the fact that there are so many shows like that out there, that it's hard to remember anything but the most important details.

Even with the 22 episode shows, as time goes on, so does the memory fade (in general). I watched every episode of Smallville for 10 years and even sometimes I'll read recaps of some of their most insane episodes and still not remember there was an Egyptian curse episode or a vampire episode or that Amy Adams could unhinge her jaw like a snake in one episode.

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DoIrllyneeda_usrname t1_iy4ijvw wrote

I mostly just remember cliffhangers lol. Even then it's kind of hard to do. I vaguely remember how The Boys S3 or Stranger Things S4 ended. I think I'll just wait for a good chunk of a show to come out if it's a more complex show.

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Yserbius t1_iy4rjtm wrote

It's faces I have the hardest time with. Non-regular characters showing up mid-season and I'm supposed to know who this is.

Worst offender: Mr. Robot. One season ends with a dude dramatically walking out of a taxi as the camera slowly pans up and reveals him to be... uh.... (quickly googles) a guy who was the focus of three episodes two season ago.

Best one: The Witcher. One episode was going to do the whole "face obscured by camera to dramatically reveal who this was" and had to preface it by a long seemingly unrelated hallucination of a memory by a different character since the face of this person was only shown very briefly once in the previous season.

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Roook36 t1_iy4t2o6 wrote

The Witcher season 1 also had issues with it being non-linear. And the two main characters never change, age (over decades) or wear different clothes. Also it's all a fantasy setting so you can't be like "oh bellbottoms. This is the 70s"

They introduced a whole bunch of character in episode one. Dramatically killed them all (like who cares, I don't even know who they are). Then threw them back up on the screen several episodes later without telling you it's a flashback. So I'm like "this lady looks familiar, where did I see her before" but in my head the character is dead so I think it must be a different show.

And I know who you're talking about with the reveal and I absolutely needed that hallucination because I'd have had no idea who I was looking at lol

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bflaminio t1_iy6v5dv wrote

> Non-regular characters showing up mid-season and I'm supposed to know who this is.

For all its faults, She-Hulk subverted this beautifully. A character showed up that we were supposed to remember, and Jennifer calls it out to the audience and forces a "previously on..." segment.

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jagz27 t1_iy4xz1g wrote

Binging also makes it really hard to remember many details, I find. If you watch a whole season/show in a day or 2, it's not a lot of time for any of it to really stick.

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mickeyflinn t1_iy4rila wrote

I don't remember everything that happened in last season of most shows. I will remember most of the main points but there will always be details that I have forgotten.

> How do you all do it?

I will do a re-watch leading up to the release of the new season. I am not one of these people who are on their phone or have the show on in the back ground. If I watch a show I watch it.

For example for the last season of Stranger Things I did a complete re-watch leading up to the release of the first half of S4. Prior to the release of the second half of S4 I completely re-watched the first half.

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Roook36 t1_iy4shk3 wrote

Yeah. I used to be better about it. But I've lately been watching a recap of a show before a new season starts.

We also have more shows now that have much larger gaps between the season finale and a season premiere.

I forgot most of what happened in previous seasons of Stranger Things. I went back and watched them after I watched season 4 and I'd forgotten tons of stuff.

With Dark I always had that website up which gave you everyone's history without spoilers so that helped. I'd need to use that website between episodes at times. And it just got more complicated as it went.

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AgentElman t1_iy4ukgr wrote

I usually remember most of what happened in the last season except for how it ended. There was so much time spent on the characters and such over the course of the season that is easy to remember.

But I don't remember all of the sudden things that happened in the last 10 minutes of the season. So I'll be like "oh right, he got shot".

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Midwest__Misanthrope t1_iyav7ht wrote

Depends on the show. Better Call Saul, The Americans, and Game Of Thrones were shows I binged watched until I caught up, but I had no issues remembering things. I have retwached all those shows again and my memory has held up. There wasn’t plots or characters I completely forgot about.

Ozark on the other hand….for the life of me I can’t recall what has happened in that show besides some vague overarching plots and some character beats. I did a rewatch in preparation for the last season and I couldn’t believe how many major characters or plots I just completely forgot about

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jtsa5 t1_iy4pmu8 wrote

Depends on the show, how long I've been watching it and if it's a complicated storyline. I like when they recap or sometimes I'll go back and watch the last ep of the previous season just to re-cap.

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Tradman86 t1_iy4xbcd wrote

Usually, but that's also why I don't skip the recaps.

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CptTurnersOpticNerve t1_iy543bf wrote

Usually I can't even remember if I watched the last season of a show or not.

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ThisIsCreation t1_iy547lf wrote

I wish I could say I don't but the shows I'm into, I'm really into them.

When breaking bad was airing, I would rewatch the episode maybe twice before the next episode aired.

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fdjadjgowjoejow t1_iy65y4p wrote

Nope. Hell sometimes if I skip a week or two I don't recall parts from the previous episode let alone between seasons. I have to resort to episode summaries (print only) to get my bearings.

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stalkythefish t1_iy6q0m0 wrote

I did that with Dark as well! Season 2->3. The gap was so long that even with the recap, I was like, "huh?"

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[deleted] t1_iy7905h wrote

I don't remember what I had for lunch.

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ooouroboros t1_iy7ceo3 wrote

Sometimes but not usually

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Nacknack26 t1_iy7xkzr wrote

I agree it's a problem. Especially with a lot Netflix shows, since it takes forever to drop a new season. I binge watched dark when it was already over, but I would have gotten lost definitely. With some tv shows with a easier plot to follow and you can jump back right in.

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MercilessShadow t1_iy83pw8 wrote

It depends on if the episodes are released weekly or not. And how llng its been between seasons.

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theyusedthelamppost t1_iy8wudb wrote

>and I was wondering how other people deal with this

I remember things because my engagement with a show is not limited to just watching each episode. I am often on reddit discussing/theorizing after each episode. And these hours are what really embeds the details into my memory.

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AintNothinbutaGFring t1_iy8xxul wrote

I love watching Man of Recaps, so if he has a video for the previous seasons, I'll usually watch those before starting the new one

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sweetpeapickle t1_iy9hsiq wrote

As long as it doesn't take several years between seasons. Funny thing is, I have issues of walking into a room, & not remembering wth I walked in there for. But several months between seasons of a tv series-no problem.

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homogenic- t1_iyb5neq wrote

Most of the time but when I don’t remember some things I watch man on recaps on YouTube.

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phyneas t1_iyfavt8 wrote

Not so much these days with the "year or three" breaks between each 8-episode season that are becoming the norm. Usually I'll find a summary of at least the last couple episodes of the prior season to read somewhere, which will usually jog my memory enough that I'm not completely lost when starting the new one.

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