• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, June 24, 2024

They might not be a perfect match, but a list of upcoming Netflix shows has a familiar air.

They are all reminiscent of the kinds of TV shows we have seen for years on network TV and basic cable.

But now, Netflix is making so many of its own shows in so many categories that the goal seems to be to corner the market on all of them.

They represent Netflix’s philosophy that when it comes to content creation, it is quantity over quality (with some exceptions).

How many beach- or island-based reality dating shows have we all seen in our lives? Too many for any of us to count.

And yet, the second season of another one, “Perfect Match” (photo above), premiered earlier this month. Logline: Couples cavort in skimpy swimsuits in the search for love. 

Similar searchers do the same on a couple of dozen other shows. Currently, the foremost example is the crassly named “FBoy Island” on The CW. 

I was also going to cite “Temptation Island,” which was revived a couple of years ago on USA Network. But I learned on Friday that the show has moved, ironically, to Netflix. 

NBC is pulling out all the stops to promote this summer’s Olympics in Paris July 24 to August 11.

Perhaps the most anticipated athlete in the whole thing is Simone Biles, who is seeking to dominate women’s gymnastics.

Another Olympian drawing attention in advance of the Games is Italian sprinter Marcell Jacobs, gold medalist in the men’s 100 Meter in 2020, who may face stiff competition this summer from American up-and-comer Noah Lyles.

But Netflix will premiere documentaries about all of them before the Olympics on NBC. 

It’s all about timing. “Simone Biles: Rising” starts on Netflix July 17. “Sprint: The World’s Fastest Humans” premieres July 2.

In another sport, football, a docuseries with a retro feel started on Netflix last week -- “America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders.”

I’m not sure how the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders came to earn the title “America’s Sweethearts,” but their story has been told before in “Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders: Making the Team.”

That show was all about what it takes to join these Rockettes of the Lone Star State. It aired on CMT for something like 16 seasons until it ended in 2022.

Cut to the present day and Netflix is carrying the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader torch with a show bearing a new title, but covering the same subject.

In the upcoming drama “Supacell” on Netflix, five ordinary people suddenly develop superpowers. “Heroes,” anyone?

Coming up this Friday is the high-stakes real estate reality series “Owning Manhattan” starring superbroker Ryan Serhant.

Remember him? He gained fame as a swashbuckling Manhattan broker on Bravo’s “Million Dollar Listing.” Now he’s owning it on Netflix.

Season 2 of “That ’90s Show” comes to Netflix this Thursday. The show is a continuation of the old “That ’70s Show” seen on Fox in the 1990s.

“That ’90s Show” is a dyed-in-the-wool network TV show if I ever saw one. Netflix has long dabbled in the kinds of network-style, three-camera sitcoms that even the networks are not doing as much as they used to.

I was surprised to see a blast from the past on the Netflix list of upcoming shows -- “The Mole.”

Coming this Friday for its second season on Netflix, this reality competition show is so complicated that I will not even attempt to describe it here.

The original show aired on ABC from 2001 to 2008. It was the network’s entry into the new world of competition shows best exemplified by “Survivor,” which premiered a year earlier on CBS and became the TV show of the year.

“The Mole” was hosted by none other than Anderson Cooper. Incredibly, it didn’t ruin his career.

The new “Mole” has a journalist host as well, NPR’s Ari Shapiro. Perhaps he can investigate why on Earth Netflix brought back “The Mole” in the first place.