The company said that its monthly subscribers will able to indulge in binge viewing and will have immediate access to the entire series. Viewers who use the site in free-of-charge, ad-supported mode will be able to watch two episodes per week.
Chinese video sites are competing to acquire killer content that will attract viewers, but especially the event shows that can help drive subscriptions. iQIYI recently surprised the market when it announced that it had amassed 5 million paying subscribers. It pointed to its home-grown “Tomb” series as a key factor that allowed it to convert free users into paying subscribers.
Their efforts to buy foreign series, however, has been hampered by recent regulation which effectively imposed nationality restrictions. The State Administration of Press Publication Radio Film and Television has also started to require that foreign series obtain censorship approval for an entire season before broadcasting. That reduces the platforms’ ability to play series in a day-and-date fashion closely co-ordinated with first broadcast in the country of origin.
The Josh Duhammel- and Dean Winters-starring detective series started playing on CBS in the U.S. from March 1. It was cancelled by CBS in May.