The fifth and final season of Stranger Things kicks off in November, and we’ve now learned the running times for the first four episodes: the shortest is nearly an hour long at 54 minutes, and the longest well over an hour at 83. If the show sticks to tradition, later episodes will be even longer. It’s no wonder this show can sustain fans through long waits between seasons: when new episodes do come, they’re huge.
It’s become increasingly common for episodes of TV shows to rival movies for length. What are some of the longest in history, and how did we get to the point where that’s normal?
5 of the longest episodes in TV history
Game of Thrones: “The Long Night,” 82 minutes (2019)
For seven seasons, Game of Thrones fans waited to see the monstrous White Walkers to invade Westeros. They finally did in season 8, and the final battle between the living and the dead took place at Winterfell. Fitting for such an occasion, the episode was the longest of the show’s run.
M*A*S*H: “Goodbye, Farewell and Amen,” 119 minutes (1983)
The series finale of M*A*S*H*, a sitcom set during the Korean War, is the most-watched single episode of TV in history. Anticipation was so feverish that commercial time during this episode, which came at the end of the show’s eleventh season, sold for more than time at the Super Bowl that year.
Stranger Things: “Chapter Nine: The Piggyback,” 144 minutes (2022)
When I say to expect longer episodes later in Stranger Things season 5, this is why. The season 4 finale ran for well over two hours, and featured the Hawkins kids taking a stand against the otherworldly Vecna.
Sense8: “Amor Vincit Omnia,” 152 minutes (2018)
The series finale of Sense8, Netflix’s show about strangers from all over the world connected by a psychic link, ran for over 2-1/2 hours. Netflix first sold this episode as a movie, but on the service it’s listed as an episode like any other, highlighting how TV shows and movies have started to collapse into each other in the age of streaming.
The Third Day, “Autumn,” 12 hours (2020)
The Third Day is an HBO-Sky Atlantic series that follows a man played by Jude Law who is drawn to a mysterious island. The second part, “Autumn,” was aired as a 12-hour event on HBO’s Facebook page. The episode, if we want to call it that, revolves around a coming-of-age ritual practiced on the island.
Even among the kinds of long TV episodes we’re taking about, “Autumn” is an obvious outlier, but I had to mention it because it’s so ludicrous. Can you imagine sitting down for a 12-hour episode of TV?
Why it’s okay to make super-sized TV episodes now
Thank you, streaming
Looking at these episodes, a few patterns emerge. First up, a lot of these extra-long episodes only come at the end of a show’s run, after they’ve amassed enough popularity to pull off a stunt like this. “The Long Night” came towards the end of Game of Thrones’ historic run, when people were out of their minds with excitement to see how it all ended. M*A*S*H* was so popular that CBS let the series finale run for 2-1/2 hours, with commercials bringing in dump trucks full of cash. You have to earn this kind of length.
The other pattern is that most of these episodes ran after the advent of streaming, when TV wasn’t as constrained by things like timeslots and commercial breaks. In that context, why not do a crazy experiment like “Autumn,” even if The Third Day isn’t a popular show? Sense8 was never a huge hit for Netflix, but the streamer allowed the producers to make a giant-sized series finale anyway, because what’s stopping them? They were flush with cash and on the cutting edge of TV, so they might as well push boundaries.
The world of streaming was like this not too long ago: no one was quite sure what they could get away with so they tried to get away with everything. Shows like Stranger Things are still big enough to do this, but a lot of others have had to cut back.
Episodes are getting short again, even on streaming
The return of brevity
Once upon a time, episodes of TV dramas clocked in around 45 minutes per episode, whether they were on network or cable. In the streaming age, creators could make episodes basically as long as they wanted. But the age when streamers were throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks is coming to an end. Increasingly, companies like Netflix and HBO want things regimented and sustainable. That means getting costs under control, and that means shortened seasons and shortened episode lengths. In fact, a lot of dramas are now going in the opposite direction and turning out episodes that are shorter than they used to be.
For example, a lot of Marvel TV shows that air on Disney+ have episodes of around 30 minutes. The second season of the DC superhero show Peacemaker, which just aired on HBO Max, followed suit; only the season finale popped up to approach an hour. Game of Thrones was one of the shows that helped explode episode runtimes, but the first season of upcoming prequel show A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms will run for only six episodes at around 30 minutes apiece. Runtimes are collapsing.
This doesn’t mean that these shows are bad; Peacemaker was a triumph in a lot of ways and A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms looks like it could save the Game of Thrones universe. But it does mean that networks are no longer giving us movie-length episodes on a whim.
Disappointment and novelty
I’m of the opinion that a good show is a good show and that an episode should be as long or short as it needs to be, but I understand why some fans are understandably disappointed that some of these prestige streaming shows seem to be getting shorter. They’ll have to ride it out until they get used to it or another industry shift comes along to sway things one direction of another.
And look at this way: even if episodes are getting shorter, it could make extra-long episodes seem special again, when they were starting to feel ordinary. They’ll have to be reserved for huge turning points, or for shows that have become so popular the creators can push for a major event episode.
And if you still like your episodes as long as possible, there’s always Stranger Things, which is the exception to every rule.
- Release Date
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2016 – 2025
- Network
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Netflix
- Showrunner
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Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer
- Directors
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Matt Duffer, Andrew Stanton, Frank Darabont, Nimród Antal, Uta Briesewitz
- Writers
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Kate Trefry, Jessica Mecklenburg, Alison Tatlock
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Finn Wolfhard
Mike Wheeler
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Gaten Matarazzo
Dustin Henderson
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Caleb McLaughlin
Lucas Sinclair
