Netflix users are allowed to place 500 DVDs in their movie queue. The goal: Fill up the queue and watch all 500 in one year.
My name is Bucky Sinister, and I’m a DVD Binger. In February of 2002, I ended fifteen years of drug and alcohol abuse, declared bankruptcy, and was left with no idea of what to do after 8pm.
I tried to remember what I did before I started drinking. My mind crawled way back to the ’80s. What came up were three things: church, my Commodore 64, and movies. I wasn’t going back to church unless it was for a recovery meeting in the basement. I had no idea where to find a C64. But there were a lot of great films I had missed, especially in the last three years.
Thanks to Community Thrift, I was able to afford a used TV and VCR. All I had to do was get the movies. I patronized my local video store, but was subjected to such harsh renter’s shame (common among fanatical film geeks) that I was forced to find other venues. About this time, DVD players suddenly became very cheap, and I joined the Netflix Generation.
Right away, I was a loyal customer. Netflix never rolled its eyes at me upon searching for a film, nor did it berate me when seeing my selection. In no time at all, I had over a hundred movies in my queue. I never got to watch them all, as I added three in the time it took me to watch two. After a year, I had over two hundred movies in my queue, and it was growing quickly.