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Prestige TV is one of the most influential terms in television. It describes the shows that have defined the medium this century, made with deep artistic intent, exemplary production values and resonant storytelling. We’re talking The Sopranos, Mad Men and Breaking Bad. Plus Succession, Chernobyl, Watchmen and The Last of Us. Lots of Emmys, even more discourse. This, for better or worse, is the modern television canon.
But, in recent years, something has shifted. Though plenty of series still aspire to the Prestige TV mantle, fewer seem to fully deliver. Sometimes when I’m watching a show that presents as Prestige, I realise that it is in fact the black sheep of the elevated genre. Say hello to Prestige Trash.
Here generally for a good time and not a long time, Prestige Trash is liable to cut some corners and indulge the audience’s needs, even while delivering the high-end traits. Forget the canon, this is pure cannon. These shows are all about the blast.
His & Hers is a good recent example. This Netflix hit, which starred Tessa Thompson and Jon Bernthal as an estranged couple each starting to suspect the other was involved in a high-profile murder, went to some crazy places while keeping a straight face. An older Prestige Trash totem is The Undoing, the 2020 HBO Max thriller starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Grant that quickly went off the rails and never found its way back.
Prestige Trash has been lurking on our streaming platforms for years now, but the concept gained traction in 2023 with a New Yorker profile of Bela Bajaria, the chief content officer at Netflix. As Bajaria laid out her programming philosophy for the streaming behemoth, she referenced a term one of her senior executives used: “gourmet cheeseburger”. This was an internal definition for the likes of Bridgerton – a high-end production focused on satisfying audiences while also leaving them hungry for more.
So how can you tell the difference? Whether you’re trying to avoid it or find it completely hits the spot (an equally valid take), here are six signs your Prestige TV show is actually Prestige Trash.
1. The cast is full of big names
Hollywood stars are the engine of Prestige Trash. They bring a veneer of class to the production and a level of talent that can try to finesse a show’s outré flourishes and structural failings. The super-sized example of this is Apple TV’s Morning Wars, which went bigger than big with a cast headlined by Jennifer Aniston, Reese Witherspoon and Steve Carell. It started with the fallout from a #MeToo scandal, but it’s become a paragon of Prestige Trash with its soapy plotting and recreations of momentous historical events such as the January 6 Capitol riot for ludicrous means.
2. A very haphazard use of trauma
These shows move fast and will make use of whatever the story requires, often in a cavalier manner. As His & Hers barrels towards its ending, the limited series sets up a character in teenage flashback and then reveals that they were the subject of sexual assault. Just to make it obvious, a home-made video recording of the crime, complete with terrified cries, is revealed and played. It’s a horrifying revelation, but one used solely as plot motivation, never to be mentioned again.
3. There’s a bonkers final twist
Go big or go home is a key Prestige Trash maxim – and that almost always means these shows double down for the finale. The Netflix psychological thriller Behind Her Eyes is an infamous example of this (two words: astral projection), but Amazon Prime’s recent drama The Girlfriend also delivered in bulk. The conflict, set up with some smart observations, between the mother (Robin Wright) and girlfriend (Olivia Cooke) of a young man ended with a fight to the death, secret recordings and a message from beyond the grave. It’s quite the wild ride.
4. It sets up contemporary issues, but then sidesteps them completely
Prestige Trash knows that it needs to be about something pertinent on a wider social scale, but there’s no rule saying it has to follow through or even resolve the situations it sets up. Netflix’s Sirens, which is a good show just not the one it initially suggests, digs into inequality and female insecurity as a haughty billionaire’s wife (Julianne Moore) takes on a working-class interloper (Meghann Fahey) for possession of an obsessively dedicated personal assistant (Milly Alcock). Somehow, the billionaire’s attention becomes the focus.
5. It cashes in on a famous franchise
This is otherwise known as the And Just Like That… gambit. It’s understandable that audiences yearn for more of their favourite shows, no matter the compromises involved, but it can quickly become a slippery path. Sex and the City was hugely influential and rightly beloved, so bringing most of the creatives and cast back – less Kim Cattrall’s Samantha Jones – appeared sound at first glance. But the HBO Max revival was poorly executed and at times started to feel like self-satire. It reached the Prestige Trash nadir of serving as a hate-watch.
6. Wish fulfilment for the main characters
If the leads of a show serve as surrogates for the audience, then it’s often tempting to just guarantee everyone a good time. When Stan’s Billions began, it was a twisty examination of New York power, most notably in the form of Damian Lewis’s Wall Street billionaire Bobby Axelrod. But within a few seasons, Bobby’s wife Lara (Malin Akerman) had disappeared, and his hedge-fund smarts earned him excessive pleasures that led to the show’s ultimate form: aka the ecstasy and models orgy era.
What are your favourite (or least favourite) examples of Prestige Trash? Let us know in the comments below.
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