Streaming bags itself another TV Goliath

Amazon Prime Video and Netflix are already providing competition to traditional TV, and now it seems they are also stealing yet more top talent away from television networks.

One of US television's biggest showrunners - David E Kelley - was promoting his latest offering, Goliath for Amazon at the TCA, and waxing lyrical about the joys of a binge watching audience and the lack of commercial breaks when he was asked if he could go back to networks.

"I don't think so!" he replied. "You're trusting that your audience is going to sit down and maybe watch the whole series in a week. You don't have to remind them what they saw an hour and a half ago. You can be more efficient in your storytelling and you can just go deeper."

"Even if you're fast-forwarding through it, it's very onerous," he added, about commercials. "In this, we're doing one hours and we don't have to take those breaks and we don't have to craft episodes with those obstacles and it's a much freer and richer way to tell stories."

Pilot season

Goliath is an anomaly for Amazon in that it was picked up straight to series rather than going through the streaming giant's hugely popular 'Pilot season' where the audience votes help make the decision on what is picked up.

However, Kelley would have been okay with going through this popularity contest, telling the conference that "you shouldn't be doing it in the first place" if the audience wasn't interested in your wares.

"At the end of the day you've got to bet on yourself," he concluded, ahead of Goliath's release in its totality and ready for your binge-watching pleasure in October.

Amazon also showed off another of its standout hits, with Man in the High Castle arriving back for its second season this year.

• Goliath will be hoping to make it into our best shows for Amazon Prime Instant Video

HT Deadline & Hollywood Reporter