The Media Blog: The Maverick is (really) good – but no one is watching (yet)

Has anyone seen any of the episodes of Accelerate TV’s The Maverick?

We bet it’s a no.

The YouTube views are poor; for a show that has run for almost 2 months. A paltry 1,481 views for all four episodes is enough to send any producer to Yaba, and never back.

Why isn’t The Maverick getting clicks compared to the other shows, even on the online channel?

The show presents “mavericks” who broke into the market when there was barely a market and set the pace for the young people making waves today. As a premise, that’s a damn good one. More complex and nuanced than plenty of what we continue to see on Nigerian TV.

The first episode featured celebrated photographer Kelechi Amadi-Obi and in subsequent episodes, we’ve seen record label owner Obi Asika, event production designer Funmi Victor-Okigbo and beauty entrepreneur, Tara Fela-Durotoye.

Premise, solid. Guest lists, as they say, on point.

The Maverick is hip, it’s colourful, it’s absolutely not boring – which is a very high score in a country where boring is something of a pre-requisite for TV content. Thee producers make sure not to go beyond 10 minutes per episode, it’s not all talk – and when it is, it’s riveting conversation.

No one’s talking about such a good show. And that’s sad.

So. It might be worth it for the producers to introduce a host, for very obvious reasons. Nigeria’s youth are not attracted to watching someone sitting in an office and speaking to a camera.

We would prefer nothing is added or removed, because there is absolutely nothing wrong with the show as is. Sadly, the Nigerian audience wants what it wants. And the business of the media is a business of attracting audiences.

A host with a huge following will pull the necessary crowd to the show (they’ll come to see their favourite celebs dress – maybe you can even make it Eku Edewor, complete with her baby bump). Or something else. Anything else. Find a way to get people to watch this damn good show.

Now that we’ve given out this unsolicited advice, we’ll be here waiting to see improvements. Or not. Maybe you win if you stick with what you have.

PS: See anything worth talking about on the ins and outs of the media business in Nigeria on TV, radio, print and online (could be news, tweets, photos, opeds etc) send us a mail on [email protected] titled TMB. Let’s share the insight together!

One comment

  1. Seen two: reserve some of my comment, the quality is great. The ethos is … … I’m picky.

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