People are craving comfort. Amid what can feel like a state of constant crisis – a layering of traumatic societal events – it can sometimes seem like we’ve lost a sense of scale and cohesion. In the face of this, the desire to retreat into nostalgia is more seductive than ever.

The past decade has seen political polarisation – accelerated by social media’s filter bubbles and echo chambers – deepen and mutate. An ominous era of a polycrisis has shattered any remaining societal consensus. Meanwhile, powerful anti-establishment voices have stepped into the void.

With cinemas in India closed due to the pandemic, the world’s biggest movie industry, Bollywood, has embraced streaming platforms as a distribution option. With big-budget films premiering on the likes of Netflix and Disney+, more Indians are signing up for subscriptions to get their movie fix.

The Addams Family spin-off series Wednesday quickly broke viewership records for Netflix. Centered around Morticia and Gomez’s morose daughter as she heads off to boarding school, the show puts a modern twist on a cult classic and further demonstrates the appeal of nostalgia-inducing TV.

Coca-Cola is turning consumers to fans through Coke Studio, a global music marketing platform that spotlights emerging musicians. By merging its cultural clout and uniting people via sound, Coke is catering to the growing interest in experiences over things, and desires to discover artistic talent.

Language boundaries are breaking as content made in Indian languages, other than Hindi, is attracting more audiences with strong scripts and diverse stories. As streaming companies bump up their budgets, why is this move towards pan-Indian content so appealing to both native and foreign speakers?