Commentary: Binge viewing can spoil a good season of TV viewing

Recently, Netflix made available to the public the complete first season of the new TV series “House of Cards.”

This meant that a viewer could watch all 13 hours of the show, one after another. And people did.

This is known as binge viewing — sitting in front of the television for hours on end, consuming an entire season of shows. I’m sure there are people out there who used up an entire weekend watching an entire TV show’s episodes.

Can you imaging watching all nine seasons of “Everybody Loves Raymond”? At about 22 episodes a year, 22 minutes in length, that amounts to 72 hours. So, if you started watching Friday night on President’s Day weekend, you could be done by Monday night. Of course, that would mean not sleeping, going to the bathroom, or living your life.

My wife and I did tune in to “House of Cards,” mainly due to the positive reviews we read. We were pleasantly surprised at the high quality of writing and acting in the show, especially Kevin Spacey. And because it was well-done, we didn’t want to watch all the episodes in one sitting. A couple of times we watch two episodes in a row, but that was sufficient.

It’s been nearly three weeks since the show premiered and we still haven’t finished all 13 episodes, which is fine. Something this good evidently took time to write, produce and edit. So why should we be TV gluttons and gorge ourselves on it? It’s definitely not of the “Honey Boo Boo” caliber.

Since so few excellent TV shows exist, viewers should savor a “House of Cards” and make it last. Too often, people overdo things they like. There is nothing wrong with waiting for the next good meal, the next good vacation or the next good TV show. Remember the old saying, “too much of a good thing”?

BRIAN CROSBY writes a regular column for Times Community News North. He is the author of “Smart Kids, Bad Schools and The $100,000 Teacher” and can be reached at brian-crosby.com.