https://doi.org/10.1177/15274764221093602 Television & New Media 1–17 © The Author(s) 2022 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/15274764221093602 journals.sagepub.com/home/tvn Article “Shudder” and the Aesthetics and Platform Logics of Genre-Specific SVOD services Jessica Balanzategui 1 and Andrew Lynch 1 Abstract Major subscription-video-on-demand (SVOD) services including Netflix and Apple TV+ target a wide range of consumers through catalogs that house a diverse variety of genres. However, as the SVOD ecology has evolved, services have emerged that focus on particular genres, and thus target enthusiasts of specific content types. This article examines the horror-focused SVOD service “Shudder” to highlight how these genre-specific SVOD services curate content in ways that differ from major services like Netflix. Unlike the top-tier generalist SVODs, niche services like Shudder do not appeal to users via personalized algorithmic recommendation of titles from a seemingly limitless catalog: instead, these services are branded around the affective pleasures of and fan cultures surrounding specific genres. Our analysis of Shudder combines interface and genre analysis to illuminate how the platform offers a “phenomenal experience” of generic immersion in ways that reflect on new intersections between SVOD platforms, genre, nostalgia, and cinephilic subcultures. Keywords SVOD, horror, genre, fandom, Shudder, streaming platform Major subscription-video-on-demand (SVOD) services including Netflix, Apple TV+, and Disney+ target a wide range of consumers through “conglomerated niche” (Lotz 2017) catalogs that include a diverse range of genres. These very successful, top tier SVODs have attracted the most attention in popular and scholarly commen- tary about the rise of the SVOD ecology (Hallinan and Striphas 2016; Jenner 2018; 1 Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn, VIC, Australia Corresponding Author: Jessica Balanzategui, Swinburne University of Technology, John Street, Hawthorn, VIC 3122, Australia. Email: jbalanzategui@swin.edu.au 1093602TVN XX X 10.1177/15274764221093602Television & New MediaBalanzategui and Lynch research-article 2022