From 'Ransom Canyon' to 'Little House on the Prairie,' Netflix Is Officially Riding a Wave of Comfort Entertainment [Exclusive]

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Published Aug 26, 2026, 12:00 PM EDT

Ryan O'Rourke is a Senior News Writer at Collider with a specific interest in all things adult animation, video game adaptations, and the work of Mike Flanagan. He is also an experienced baseball writer with over six years of articles between multiple outlets, most notably FanSided's CubbiesCrib. Whether it's taking in a baseball game, a new season of Futurama or Castlevania: Nocturne, or playing the latest From Software title, he is always finding ways to show his fandom. When it comes to gaming and anything that takes inspiration from it, he is deeply opinionated on what's going on. Outside of entertainment, he's a graduate of Eureka College with a Bachelor's in Communication where he honed his craft as a writer. Between The IV Leader at Illinois Valley Community College and The Pegasus at Eureka, he spent the majority of his college career publishing articles on everything from politics to campus happenings and, of course, entertainment for the student body. Those principles he learned covering the 2020 election, Palestine, and so much more are brought here to Collider, where he has gleefully written on everything from the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes to Nathan Lane baby-birding sewer boys.

The definition of comfort entertainment will always vary from person to person based on tastes. Comedy fans might embrace the large back catalogs of classic series like Seinfeld, Friends, or The Office, while those with a love of sci-fi could lean on everything from the wider Star Trek universe, and so on. Just about any film or series can be comforting for fans with a genuine connection to it and a willingness to revisit it time after time. However, in the streaming era, there's been a distinct rise in shows built to be the next great comfort watches. On that front, few platforms have nailed down the formula quite like the one that's been at it the longest — Netflix.

In a sense, comfort has always been Netflix's primary business model since its inception byMarc Randolph and Reed Hastings in 1997. During its days as a DVD rental service, the company profited by offering a wide selection of films through a subscription model that gave its customers more flexibility than the per-rental model with late fees utilized by chains like Blockbuster. When it shifted to streaming, well before original programming was even a glimmer in either of its bosses' eyes, the focus was on popular, beloved television shows that viewers would want to rewatch with ease, like Veronica Mars, The Office, and its biggest acquisition at the time, Breaking Bad. It's now the model other platforms have since followed, becoming a production giant capable of event series like Stranger Things and Wednesday and genuine Oscar contenders like Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein, yet it's only natural that it would strive to meet the ever-rising demand for more comfortable, easy-going Heartland-coded programming, too.

This isn't a recent development either. Back in 2019, Netflix debuted the first season of the romantic drama Virgin River based on the books by Robyn Carr, following Melinda "Mel" Monroe as she seeks a fresh start in the remote, tight-knit community of the titular California town. In 2020, that would be followed by Sweet Magnolias, based on Sheryl Woods' novels chronicling the complex lives, careers, and romantic entanglements of three lifelong friends in South Carolina. The streamer has also worked to sync up its acquisitions with its original shows, landing the streaming rights to another popular Carr adaptation, Sullivan's Crossing, from The CW, a network that has long thrived on these kinds of romantic comfort watches. It's been a long process to build out that selection, but the work has paid off, as those three and Netflix's other similar programming have combined to rack up over 1 billion views between 2023 and 2026.

Collider Exclusive · Taylor Sheridan Universe Quiz Which Taylor Sheridan
Show Do You Belong In? Yellowstone · Landman · Tulsa King · Mayor of Kingstown

Four worlds. All of them brutal, complicated, and built on power, loyalty, and the price of survival. Taylor Sheridan doesn't write heroes — he writes people who do what they have to do and live with the cost. Ten questions will reveal which one of his worlds you were made for.

🤠Yellowstone

🛢️Landman

👑Tulsa King

⚖️Mayor of Kingstown

FIND YOUR WORLD →

Where does your power come from? In Sheridan's world, everyone has leverage. The question is what kind.

ALand, legacy, and a name that's been feared and respected for generations. BKnowing the deal better than anyone else in the room — and being willing to walk away first. CReputation. I've earned it the hard way, and everyone in the room knows it. DBeing the only person both sides will talk to. That makes me indispensable — and dangerous.

NEXT QUESTION →

Who do you put first, no matter what? Loyalty in Sheridan's universe is always absolute — and always costly.

AFamily — blood or chosen. The ranch, the name, the people who carry it with me. BThe company — or whoever's signing the cheques. Loyalty follows the contract. CMy crew. The men who stood with me when it counted — I don't abandon them for anything. DMy community — even when my community is a powder keg and I'm the only thing stopping it from blowing.

NEXT QUESTION →

Someone crosses a line. How do you respond? Every Sheridan protagonist has a line. What matters is what happens after it's crossed.

AQuietly, decisively, and in a way that sends a message to everyone watching. BI outmanoeuvre them legally, financially, and politically before they even know I've moved. CDirectly. Old school. You cross me, you hear about it to your face — and then you deal with the consequences. DI absorb it, calculate the fallout, and find the move that keeps the whole system from collapsing.

NEXT QUESTION →

Where do you feel most in your element? Sheridan's worlds are as much about place as they are about people.

AWide open land — mountains, sky, silence. Somewhere you can see trouble coming from a mile away. BThe oil fields of West Texas — brutal, lucrative, and indifferent to whoever happens to be standing on top of them. CA mid-size city where the rules haven't quite caught up yet — fertile ground for someone with vision and nerve. DA rust-belt town built around a prison — where everyone's life is shaped by what's inside those walls.

NEXT QUESTION →

How do you feel about operating in the grey? Nobody in a Sheridan show has clean hands. The question is how they carry the dirt.

AI do what has to be done to protect what's mine. I'll answer for it eventually — but not today. BGrey is just business. The line moves depending on what's at stake, and I move with it. CI have a code — it's not the law's code, but it's mine, and I don't break it. DI've made peace with it. Keeping the peace requires compromises most people don't have the stomach for.

NEXT QUESTION →

What are you actually fighting to hold onto? Every Sheridan character is fighting a war. The real question is what they're defending.

AA way of life that the modern world is doing everything it can to erase. BMy position — and the leverage that comes with being the person everyone needs to close a deal. CRelevance. I've been away, I've been written off — and I'm proving that was a mistake. DWhatever fragile order I've managed to build — because without it, everything burns.

NEXT QUESTION →

How do you lead? Authority in Sheridan's world is never given — it's established, maintained, and constantly tested.

ABy example and force of will. People follow me because they believe in what I'm protecting — and because they know what happens if they don't. BThrough negotiation and leverage. I don't need people to like me — I need them to need me. CBy being the smartest, most experienced person in the room and making sure everyone quietly knows it. DBy being the calm centre of a situation that would spiral without me — and accepting that nobody thanks you for it.

NEXT QUESTION →

Someone new arrives and tries to change how things work. Your reaction? Every Sheridan show has an outsider disrupting an established order. Sometimes that outsider is you.

AThey'll learn. Or they won't. Either way, the land was here before them and it'll be here after. BI figure out what they want, what they're worth, and whether they're an asset or a problem — fast. CI was the outsider once. I give them a chance — one — to show they understand respect. DNew players destabilise everything I've built. I assess the threat and manage it before it manages me.

NEXT QUESTION →

What has your position cost you? Nobody gets to where these characters are without paying for it. The bill is always personal.

AMy family's peace — maybe their innocence. The ranch demands everything, and I've let it take too much. BRelationships, time, any version of a normal life. The job eats everything that isn't nailed down. CYears. Decades in some cases. Time I can't get back — but I'm not done yet. DMy conscience, mostly. And the ability to ever fully trust anyone on either side of the wall.

NEXT QUESTION →

When it's over, what do you want people to say? Sheridan's characters all know the ending is coming. The question is what they leave behind.

AThat I held the line. That the land is still ours and everything I did was worth it. BThat I was the best at what I did and that no deal ever got closed without me at the table. CThat I built something real, somewhere nobody expected it, and I did it on my own terms. DThat I kept the peace when nobody else could — and that the town is still standing because of it.

REVEAL MY SHOW →

Sheridan Has Spoken You Belong In…

The show that claimed the most of your answers is the world you were built for. If two tied, both are shown — you're complicated enough to straddle two Sheridan universes.

🤠 Yellowstone

🛢️ Landman

👑 Tulsa King

⚖️ Mayor of Kingstown

You are a Dutton — or you might as well be. You understand that some things are worth protecting at any cost, and that the modern world's indifference to history, to land, to legacy, is not something you're willing to accept quietly. You lead from the front, you carry your family's weight without complaint, and when someone threatens what's yours, you don't escalate — you finish it. You're not cruel. But you are absolute. In Yellowstone's world, that combination of ferocity and loyalty doesn't make you a villain. It makes you the only thing standing between everything that matters and everyone who wants to take it.

You thrive in the chaos of high-stakes negotiation, where the money is enormous, the margins are thin, and the wrong word in the wrong room can cost everyone everything. You're a fixer — the person called when a situation is already on fire and needs someone with the nerve to walk into it. West Texas oil country rewards exactly what you are: sharp, adaptable, unsentimental, and absolutely clear-eyed about what people want and what they'll do to get it. You're not naive enough to think this world is fair. You're smart enough to be the one deciding who it's fair to.

You are a Dwight Manfredi — someone who has served their time, paid their dues, and arrived somewhere unexpected with nothing but their reputation and their wits. You adapt without losing yourself. You build loyalty through respect rather than fear, though you're not above reminding people that the two aren't mutually exclusive. Tulsa King is for people who are still standing when everyone assumed they'd be finished — who find, in an unfamiliar place, that they're more capable than the world gave them credit for. You don't need a throne. You build one, wherever you happen to land.

You carry the weight of a system that is broken by design, and you do it anyway — because someone has to, and because you're the only one positioned to do it without the whole thing collapsing. Mike McLusky's world is for people who are comfortable operating where there are no good options, only less catastrophic ones. You speak every language: law enforcement, criminal, political, human. That fluency makes you invaluable and it makes you a target. You've made your peace with both. Mayor of Kingstown belongs to people who understand that keeping the peace is not the same as being at peace — and who do the job regardless.

↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ

The Heartland Continues to Expand Its Influence on Netflix

Josh Duhamel and Minka Kelly in an episode of Ransom Canyon

Nikki Rodriguez as Jackie and Naveen Paddock a Eliot in Season 3 of 'My Life with the Walter Boys.'

The success of more optimistic, escapist Heartland drama doesn't stop there. All three of Virgin River, Sweet Magnolias, and Sullivan's Crossing are still going strong with new seasons launched this year. Combined with the cozy new film adaptation of Shelby van Pelt's Remarkably Bright Creatures, which spent four weeks in Netflix's global top ten, these titles accounted for a staggering 150 million views in the first quarter of the year alone. Their success is just a small indicator of a much wider demand for heartland/comfort content that hits those same sweet, romantic, down-home vibes. This year has seen 20 titles of that variety ride onto the platform's weekly global top-ten lists, with six of them even reaching the very top.

Around the world, people are connecting to the characters and relationships of these projects, as 93 different countries have seen at least one show or film from this Heartland-comfort genre land on their top-ten in viewership. What makes Netflix's catalog so formidable is that each comfort program is reaching that level of escapism and entertainment in different ways. As there's no direct definition of comfort entertainment, there's no exact recipe to follow to deliver an addictive hit, whether it leans into romance, teen drama, friendships, small town life, something else, or a combination of it all.

This summer, the torch has been picked up by a few of the platform's other heavy hitters, including My Life With the Walter Boys. Season 3 of the coming-of-age teen drama adaptation of Ali Novak's novel premiered on August 6 and has wasted no time drawing viewers back in to see what's next for the titular Walter family and Jackie Howard (Nikki Rodriguez), the teenage girl they welcomed into their home back in 2023. It returned to #1 on Netflix's global television chart once more after its first two seasons combined to spend 15 weeks on the list themselves while raking in over 130 million views. Speaking to Collider's Samantha Coley, showrunner Melanie Halsall agreed with the comparison to the golden age of CW dramas like One Tree Hill and Gossip Girl and stressed the importance of giving audiences in that current demographic something of high quality that won't just appeal to them now, but provide a nice escape in the present and future.

"I loved the CW shows! I feel that the shows that you watch as a young person tend to be the shows that you fall in love with and remember your whole life. These are the shows that help us learn who we are and who we want to be and how to understand the world — and they can also be an escape from the pressures of this time in life. Our core audience is at a time in their lives that shapes their entire futures, and it’s a privilege to be telling stories that appeal to that audience."

It means "the world," then, for Halsall and everyone involved to see that audience power the Walter Boys back to the top yet again. In an ever-competitive streaming age, it's hard for any series to make it past two seasons, let alone three at times. "We all feel so blessed and lucky that the show has resonated this way with the audience, and we never take the show's success or our audience for granted," she continued. In her eyes, while there's a lot of shared DNA with the tragedy, romance, and drama of Jackie's story with the Walters and other YA titles, "the appeal of this series and this genre goes far beyond the core YA audience, and I believe that this is because everyone knows what it is like to be, to have been or to aspire to be a teenager, with all the drama and emotions that time in life entails. And so I don’t see this as a 'YA show,' I see it as a drama about young people, but the stories and emotions involved speak to a much wider, cross-generational audience. And I am incredibly pleased about and proud of that."

The success of Walter Boys is such that Netflix didn't have to think twice about giving it an early Season 4 order. Halsall confirmed that the team is keeping the train moving quickly to ensure this series can be as regular a presence as possible and to prevent fans from waiting too long after an impactful finale. "We are in production right now, and all I can really say is that the events of last season will have far-reaching, emotional and dramatic consequences for all our characters, as, of course, you'd expect from our show!" In the meantime, Netflix has other summer success stories, including the return of Ransom Canyon for Season 2, which now gives the steamy neo-Western eight total weeks in the top ten, and the debut of its long-anticipated take on Little House on the Prairie.

'Little House on the Prairie' Leans on Legacy for Ideal Escapism

The Ingalls family in Netflix's Little House on the Prairie

When it was announced, the latest rendition of Laura Ingalls Wilder's beloved children's books based in the American Midwest was met with a mix of excitement and raised eyebrows. The series, under Archive 81's Rebecca Sonnenshine, was touted as a new interpretation of the Ingalls family's life for the modern day, which was a bold undertaking considering the widespread love of the 1970s series starring and steered by Michael Landon. Yet, any skepticism was mostly overcome as viewers flocked to Independence to meet the new Ingalls family, played by Alice Halsey, Luke Bracey, Crosby Fitzgerald, and Skywalker Hughes. The series soared onto not just Netflix's charts, but also Nielsen's, reaching #1 on the former and #2 on the latter.

Little House undoubtedly has benefited from the long legacy of both the books and its television predecessor, but it also thrives on that feeling of Western escapism to a simpler life with characters worth rooting for and a community that's welcoming. It's exactly why Netflix trusted Sonnenshine with a second season back in March, well before anyone had seen an episode. The showrunner confirmed that production is well underway, detailing what's coming next with the family's move to Walnut Grove and how the books are informing the direction.

"We're hard at work shooting Season 2. As you probably know from the end of Season 1, the Ingalls family is headed to Walnut Grove, Minnesota — and Nellie Oleson! We're trying to capture all the magic and fun and iconic moments of On The Banks of Plum Creek, the 4th book in the Little House series. Laura and Mary are finally able to attend a real school, while Charles and Caroline settle into new roles in a bustling railroad town. New friends, new enemies, new challenges!"

Part of the challenge for Sonnenshine and the team has been crafting Little House into a series that still matches that comfort television feeling that its predecessor and other Heartland dramas have while not taking away the sense of realism. The goal was not to take the edge away from the prairie and the realities of growing up in the late 1800s, nor was it to make the drama too intense that the sense of positivity faded. Her North Star in finding that balance was the Ingallses themselves. "It comes back to the family," she explained, before digging deeper into how the series drives home that connection amid a very complicated existence.

"The prairie is both dangerous and beautiful. Life can be complicated and scary. People can disappoint you. Mother Nature is a cruel mistress. But we always try to find a moment for our characters to connect at the end of each episode — to find comfort in the fact that they are together, no matter what. That unconditional love is a beacon in the darkness. It's something we come back to over and over again."

It's in the moments where Netflix's adaptation goes a bit further than the books that it especially stands out. When Coley asked about the scene she's most proud of from Season 1 of Little House, Sonnenshine highlighted the particularly tricky depiction of the Osage entering the family's house in Episode 3. "It's a chapter from the book that was told from a very narrow point of view," she shared. "We had such wonderful actors in our Osage roles, and they took such care to learn the language. I truly think that scene communicates that this is both the Little House you read as a child and the Little House you are watching today that gives you a new, more complicated perspective on a well-worn story." On the more emotional side that spoke more to the actors, the final moments of Episode 8 where everyone convenes to bid farewell were also a highlight for Sonnenshine, as she believes it "tells you that this is a story of resilience and moving on in way you might not expect from a television show — and it highlighted just how special all of our incredible cast members make this telling of Little House on the Prairie."

The Upcoming 'Crew Girl' Fully Embraces the CW Drama Comparisons

Kyle Clark and Sam Braun standing beside Miku Martineau at a dance as she grabs their faces in Crew Girl

The titles mentioned above may be among the most popular, but they're merely scratching the surface of a slate of comfort programming that ranges from comedy like Leanne, which has Season 2 on the way this week on August 27, Champagne Problems, or The Wrong Paris to even reality television and docuseries like Love Is Blind: Ohio and America's Sweethearts. On the horizon, Netflix has a pair of new titles ready to make viewers swoon, too. Collider can exclusively confirm that Guarding Stars, the new holiday romance feature starring two comfort/Heartland favorites in Gossip Girl's Leighton Meester and Supernatural's Jared Padalecki, will debut on the platform on November 18. On top of that, we can also share an exclusive new look at Crew Girl above, focusing on series star Miku Martineau alongside her two love interests, Kyle Clark and Sam Braun.

Crew Girl will premiere first on September 10 and follows the 16-year-old Teagan Tao (Martineau), once a single sculls rowing star on the rise until a family scandal sunk any future she had in the sport. Things go from bad to worse when her mom takes her to the East Coast for a fresh start at the prestigious Easton Prep, where there is no girls' rowing team. With no friends and no easy way to the water, she embraced her only option left as the coxswain for a dysfunctional boys' team that absolutely does not want her. She faces the immense challenge of bringing the mess of a team together in a competition full of cutthroat old money types willing to play dirty, all while pursuing her own ambitions, navigating her family's turmoil, and finding herself caught between the team's fiercest rivals — the arrogant team captain Josh Regis (Braun) and driven underdog Cam Dillinger (Clark).

If there's one person especially happy to see the surging popularity of comfort dramas like Crew Girl, it's the series' showrunner, Vivian Lin. She made a bold statement when talking with Collider — "The CW is as important to TV and culture as the Golden Age of HBO – that’s my hot take, and I stand by it!" That's certainly reflected in the number of shows, like the aforementioned Virgin River or Walter Boys, that share the DNA of the network's dramas, but she's not just pleased because it makes a show like hers possible. Like the creators above, she, too, finds these comfort stories important because they often explore ordinary people and connections in extraordinary ways that still reflect the real experiences of many viewers of all ages.

"It’s lovely to see this resurgence because these comfort-watch shows speak to something for this audience: fish-out-of-water stories, love triangles, finding unexpected friendships. These stories are meaningful because they’re about everyday people redefining who they are, exploring what love is, and figuring out new ways to connect to people. They’re reflections of our experiences and you can rewatch these shows at different stages in life and take something different from it."

As our image teases, Crew Girl falls into the bountiful, complicated, and often addictive category of teen romance and, specifically, love triangles. "I love messy romances, and this triangle gets messy." Lin teased, while also hinting at some twists and turns along the way to its endgame. "One rule for the writers was that we had to always surprise ourselves, so surprises are in store…" One thing that can make or break a good comfort show is its stars, but the showrunner assured that Martineau was everything she wanted and more for the lead role. It's not just about being charming and conveying the wide range of emotions her former rowing star goes through, but also the chemistry with her co-stars and the veritable boot camp of training she went through to be believable as Teagan.

"What can’t Miku do? For the role of Teagan, she learned to row, crawled through mud, climbed a wall, drove a sports car, got soaking wet on a cold dusky evening, ERG-ed (rowing machine) forever, found chemistry not only in a love triangle, but with all the characters. She can play so many facets in a scene – switching from competitive to vulnerable, empathetic to cheeky, all so effortlessly. And as a #1, she works hard, is game to take chances, and always has her charisma set to stun. She's a force to be reckoned with."

Netflix Continues Challenging Hallmark With Holiday Romance 'Guarding Stars'

Guarding Stars, meanwhile, represents Netflix's latest foray into holiday romance. For years now, the streamer has been encroaching on Hallmark's grounds of cozy Christmas flicks with its own comfort watches, from My Secret Santa to A Castle for Christmas and The Merry Gentlemen, starring Sullivan's Crossing's Chad Michael Murray. This outing will mark Padalecki's first feature effort in over ten years, and it's inspired by Katherine Center's acclaimed novel, The Bodyguard. Meester plays the role of the no-nonsense bodyguard whose firm assigns her to the unusual job of protecting Hollywood's current action star heartthrob, played by Padalecki, over the holidays. The magical time of year has sparks flying between the two, as they unravel each other's secrets and complicate their respective plans.

Purple Hearts director Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum returned to Netflix to helm the film from a screenplay courtesy of writing duos Erin Cardillo & Richard Keith (Virgin River) and Gina Matthews & Grant Scharbo. She told Collider that it only made sense to reunite with the platform in part because Guarding Stars has much of the same heart as their last collaboration, even if it takes a different approach to achieving the fantasy.

"Because movie romances are partly fantasy, the fantasy I keep coming back to in today’s world is that people can get past their judgments and actually see and appreciate each other. Maybe that’s overly optimistic, but it was at the core of my last Netflix movie Purple Hearts, and it’s at the heart of Guarding Stars. I’m drawn to characters who think they have each other figured out, then get thrown together long enough to discover how wrong they were. Guarding Stars gets there through humor, romance… and plenty of action, so hopefully audiences have a great time for two hours and come away feeling a little more optimistic about our ability to connect with people who see the world differently. Netflix reaches across so many borders and brings people together, so it’s a particularly good home for projects like these."

There are other aspects that Rosenbaum's two projects share besides a similar spirit and the comfort-watch status. Guarding Stars, like Purple Hearts, will center on two very different people whose romance turns from something for show into a completely real connection. What she loved about the idea most, though, was "a bodyguard you never see coming. Female bodyguards are still underrepresented on screen, but in real life, their ability to blend in can be a real asset in protecting high-profile people — it’s sometimes called 'ghost coverage.' They’re trained to assess risk, anticipate threats and spot trouble before it arrives, all while being invisible!" She thought it would be an especially fun way to explore such an under-represented dynamic by reversing the roles expected for the man of action Padalecki and romance-inclined Meester.

Meester took being a grizzled protector with a military background very seriously, too. "And Leighton, as a former MP turned bodyguard, takes no prisoners," Rosenbaum continued. "She threw herself completely into the strength, physicality, and demeanor of the character. Then, because protecting 'Jack' isn’t complicated enough, Hannah has to pretend she’s in love with him, too. What could possibly go wrong?" Yet, even with the two stars embracing different parts, the film still bills itself as a comfort watch by leaning into two stars who are so synonymous with comfort television. Part of the appeal for the director was putting "Blair Waldorf in combat boots" and seeing what happened, and it only helped that the two played their respective roles with excellent chemistry.

"Jared and Leighton both have that rare quality where audiences feel like they already know them, but they can still completely surprise you. I directed Gossip Girl, so there was something particularly fun for me about putting 'Blair Waldorf' in combat boots! And Jared and Leighton have fantastic chemistry together. There’s also a built-in clash in the way their characters see the world: a bodyguard’s job is to anticipate the worst possible outcome, while a movie star’s job is basically to sell you the best possible one. That difference in worldview creates great relatable friction — and, luckily for us, great chemistry."

Even as the summer months fade, and the weather grows colder, Netflix will keep aiming to warm hearts with its comfort television slate throughout the rest of the year and beyond. Crew Girl will debut its first season on September 10, while Guarding Stars will premiere on November 18. Stay tuned here at Collider for more on the future of the streamer's most addictive programming.