Why You Shouldn't Binge Watch Sacred Games 2 Or Any Other Show, As It's Bad For Your Brain

The second season of Sacred Games launched on Netflix this week, and a lot of people are probably already done with the show.

Unfortunately, not everyone is happy with how it turned out. But what's interesting to look at though is how everyone is consuming the show.

Back in the day, catching the latest episode of your favourite show meant waiting all week to watch it during its cable slot. Thanks to streaming services like Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Hotstar, we now have the ability to watch an entire season at once. But that's not always a good thing.

For one thing, previous studies have indicated that when you binge watch a show, you're likely to harm your own enjoyment of it.

For the most part, it's FOMO (the fear of missing out) that drives binge watching. Nothing is really stopping you from rationing out your content in manageable time slices. Sometimes, you might just be too excited to wait. Most often though, it's just that you don't want a new show spoiled for you by other people discussing it around you. That or you want to be able to join in the discussions. So you knuckle down to watch it all as soon as it comes out.

One study in particular from the University of Mebourne looked at the watching habits of studied 51 graduate and undergraduate students at the university. One group of 17 students watched an hour-long episode of BBC Cold War-era drama 'The Game' once a week, another watched them on a daily basis , while the last group watched the entire first season in a six-hour-long sitting.

The researchers found that the way each participant watched the show affected how well they remembered it. The binge-watchers had the strongest memories of it the next day, but also forgot the most after 140 days. Weekly viewers, meanwhile, started off remembering the least just a day later, but forgot fewer details as more time passed.

More importantly though, the binge-watchers also appeared to enjoy the show less than those who watched it daily or weekly. Those that watched an episode each day seemed to be the ones that had the most fun.

Which is strange, considering that binge watching is almost the preferred method right now. Perhaps it's more of a peer pressure thing and an attempt to avoid spoilers from, well, pretty much everywhere.

Still, if you really want to have the best shot at enjoying a show, try an episode a day. Though given the public response to Sacred Games 2, that may not make much of a difference.