Hardon Williams
Member
Tubi has launched Terror on Tubi, a permanent hub for horror rather than the usual October pop-up. Their numbers: over 13,000 hours of horror in the catalogue and more than 53 million hours of horror streamed on the platform every month. They're also feeding it originals this autumn, including Buzzkill and an R.L. Stine Pumpkinhead sequel with Jem Garrard writing and directing, plus creator-led shows like Carter's Haunted House and Creepers.
The 53 million hours figure is the one that explains the decision. That's not a seasonal spike, that's a habit, and building a permanent front door for it costs Tubi almost nothing because the films are already licensed and sitting there. What it really fixes is a problem they created themselves: a catalogue that wide is unnavigable, and a hub is a UI patch for bad search.
13,000 hours is less impressive than it sounds. Free ad-supported catalogues run deep on titles that nobody has to pay much for, which in horror means an enormous tail of direct-to-video sequels and regional oddities. Some of that is genuinely fun and unavailable anywhere else, which is the real argument for Tubi. But the encodes on the older stuff can be rough, and a 1980s film that already had a soft transfer does not survive an aggressive bitrate on a 77-inch screen.
That's the trade. Free and enormous, at a picture quality you'd never accept for a film you cared about. For anyone who uses Tubi seriously for horror, has the presentation on the older catalogue titles improved at all, or is it the same masters that have been floating around for years?
The 53 million hours figure is the one that explains the decision. That's not a seasonal spike, that's a habit, and building a permanent front door for it costs Tubi almost nothing because the films are already licensed and sitting there. What it really fixes is a problem they created themselves: a catalogue that wide is unnavigable, and a hub is a UI patch for bad search.
13,000 hours is less impressive than it sounds. Free ad-supported catalogues run deep on titles that nobody has to pay much for, which in horror means an enormous tail of direct-to-video sequels and regional oddities. Some of that is genuinely fun and unavailable anywhere else, which is the real argument for Tubi. But the encodes on the older stuff can be rough, and a 1980s film that already had a soft transfer does not survive an aggressive bitrate on a 77-inch screen.
That's the trade. Free and enormous, at a picture quality you'd never accept for a film you cared about. For anyone who uses Tubi seriously for horror, has the presentation on the older catalogue titles improved at all, or is it the same masters that have been floating around for years?
