When I was a senior in college, I was scrolling through Hulu.com to find something new to watch when a show called “Dorm Life” jumped out at me. Upon further investigation, I came to learn that the episodes were only five min long and that an entire season was up. It turned out to be a web-based series created by a handful of UCLA students. I was immediately drawn in by the subtle humor, brilliant character development, and the shows uncanny ability to move the plot along steadily in such a short amount of time.

I immediately began telling my friends to watch it. However, I kept accidentally calling it a TV show. My vocabulary was so conditioned by the fact that television dominates episodic media. Plus, I hated using the term “webisode” because it sounded like a super nerdy term for an episode of the Spiderman cartoon show from the 90s. Other than “Dorm Life” and College Humor’s “Jake and Amir”, I have never really been very impressed with many web series, until now.

Hulu has recently launched their first original program. I assume the budget for this show has come out of their earnings from advertisements and Hulu Plus subscription fees. This series is a mockumentary style show titled: “Battleground” and centers on the small campaign staff of a Wisconsin senatorial candidate, produced by Marc Webb (500 Days of Summer) and written and directed by actor J.D. Walsh.

The cast of “Battleground” is relatively unknown and delivers a fresh new batch of characters. I don’t think a rookie cast this good has been assembled since Steve Carell’s supporting cast on The Office (although before 2005 he hadn’t had much of a starring presence, either).  The only actor on “Battleground” that I have seen anywhere else is Jack DeSena (Mind you: I had already drawn comparison’s in my mind between this show and “Dorm Life” before I realized they had an actor overlap).

There is a major overlap stylistically with The Office and Parks and Rec (my absolute favorite show on TV) because of it’s mockumentary style and office/government setting, although “Battleground” focuses even more on the fact that it is supposed to feel like a documentary and the camera team is referenced, shown, and spoken to more often than in most mockumentary shows. Additionally, all of the interviews are retrospective (happening after the campaign is over) and you get a nice bit of direct foreshadowing from these clips (for instance, one of the staff members is giving his interviews from prison, peaking my curiosity of what events led to his incarceration.

“Battleground” aired the same week as Netflix’s own original program “Lilyhammer.” These shows have opened up a door for a new platform of media. Previously, syndicated shows were financed by major networks (e.g. NBC, AMC, Showtime) or small media groups (e.g. “Dorm Life”’s Attention Span Media). Streaming websites like Netflix and Hulu fall squarely in the middle of these two types of platforms and have finally begun to venture into original programming. If these shows find success—which is even more easily measured than TV shows rely on estimated viewership as opposed to internet tracked viewing counters that streaming services can make use of—we might see a whole new batch of programs springing up on these sites.

It will be interesting to see if these “webisodes” (or whatever we should call them) develop further or fizzle out after this critical time. Check it out for yourself. A new episode of “Battleground” airs every Tuesday, but you should begin at the first episode. 

— Justin Rutzen, guest contributor and former IFC member. Follow him on Twitter.