After a successful Chris Rock live special in March, Netflix completely fumbled Sunday’s Love is Blind reunion. Delays led the company to film it for on-demand streaming instead.
Netflix ran into significant issues with its second-ever live event on Sunday evening. Love is Blind: The Live Reunion failed to start streaming at its planned 8PM showtime, leading to major consternation from the show’s fans across social media. Netflix acknowledged the problem on Twitter soon after and promised to kick off the presentation within 15 minutes.
That didn’t happen, either. More than an hour later, subscribers were still encountering error screens when trying to watch the event. Netflix followed up by saying it’d be “worth the wait.” As the delay stretched on, hosts Vanessa and Nick Lachey posted to Instagram thanking fans (and a live studio audience) for their extended patience.
Finally, at around 9:30PM ET, Netflix shared a public apology and said the special would be filmed and made available on the service “as soon as humanly possible.” But it wouldn’t be live anymore due to whatever technical mishap caused all of this. Fans got to enjoy the season four reunion a short time later, though Netflix has yet to provide any explanation for what happened.
For unknown reasons, the Love is Blind reunion proved far more challenging for Netflix than a Chris Rock live comedy special that streamed in early March without any snags. With tonight’s delay extending into the 9PM ET hour, Netflix risked losing many viewers to HBO’s smash hit Succession. As expected, the company faced an avalanche of complaints and mockery on social media due to the unexpected postponement. Even Blockbuster — whatever incarnation of “Blockbuster” this Twitter account is — couldn’t help but take a shot.
The embarrassing delay just two events in is a setback for Netflix, which has said it intends to regularly deliver live programming — including comedy specials and awards shows like the 2024 Screen Actors Guild Awards — as a way to entice subscribers and fend off streaming rivals. The company hasn’t announced what’s next on its live event calendar, but there will be major pressure on Netflix to come through and make tonight’s debacle an anomaly.
