1. Documentaries are educational.
This may or may not come as a surprise, but documentaries are meant to teach the viewer about a subject. Even if it seems random or useless, learning something is better than learning nothing. On many occasions, knowledge gained from a documentary is not useless and can be applied to everyday life. Personally, I have been to relate history documentaries to college courses such as Shakespeare and Introduction to Archaeology. Many documentaries cover social ideas that people experience daily such as drug use and diet habits. So go improve your brain. Watch a documentary.
2. Documentaries cover a wide variety of topics.
Documentaries are not just for nerds and people who do their homework on Friday night. Netflix has documentaries for nearly every area of interest. I am an avid binger of history and nature documentaries. But simply searching “documentaries” in the Netflix search bar will bring up countless options ranging from conspiracy theories to house cats to Bitcoin. Yes, even bitcoin. There is a documentary for everyone.
3. Documentaries vary in length.
Sometimes you want to watch something short and sweet to pass some time. Sometimes you want to close yourself off and binge until the morning hours. Because of the vast quantity and types of documentaries on Netflix, they can satisfy all viewing length wants and needs. Many documentaries stretch across multiple episodes split into seasons, such as Planet Earth and Brain Games. Some run for about an hour such as the Lion in your Living Room and Inside Russia’s Toughest Prisons. And there are documentaries that fall everywhere in between.
4. No Guilt!
Okay, maybe a little guilt still spending time watching Netflix. But there is significantly less guilt knowing you are watching something productive. There is so much to take away from every documentary, even the strange ones, that it is a form of productivity. You can call it productive TV or “producTVe.” Spend some time on Netflix with something that will make you smarter and better than before. It is okay to indulge in some much needed Netflix documentary binging.
Personal Recommendations from a documentary frequenter:
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Secrets of Great British Castles
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Tales of Irish Castles
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Planet Earth
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Great Yellowstone Thaw
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The Lion in your Living Room
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Vikings Unearthed
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Egypt
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Minimalism: A Documentary About the Important Things