What is Post-Series Depression?
Also known as PSD, is the sadness felt after reading or watching a really interesting series or story, especially one that you followed intently and in the case of others, even went as far as being attached to characters.
The bitter feeling when you know this intriguing journey has come to an end, but you don’t want it to end.
It is the longing for the scenes on the last episode to flow for you like they did the first time you watched it.
When you didn’t know what the next scene held and the world in which the characters found themselves was entire without limit or prediction.
Because any time you watch the story, you know that they aren’t free to roam anywhere like they were before.
They are stuck in a cart on a track and all you can hope for is to notice something about the scene you didn’t before and just to go back and try to re-feel those feelings you had felt the first time around.
But it will never be quite the same.
This can be true for any series; be it book-based, TV-based, anime, comic, or even movie.
The effects can also be felt after completing a stand-alone piece that is not necessarily part of a series, although this isn’t as common as PSD derives from the attachment one has to the story’s characters.
Effects may include, but are not limited to:
- A state of depression or sadness
- The inability to start another story
- The need to re-watch/reread
- Excessively projecting felt love towards the internet
- Creating fan fiction
Projecting the felt emotions from the series to real-life situations
However, it is projected, that the effects of Post-Series Depression can affect how you generally interact with the people around you, from being gloomy and sulky to being inexplicably affectionate towards unsuspecting people around you.
In any case, there is a dire need to recover from this post-series depression because your actions during this episode of this psychological breakdown may be inspired by rather fictitious emotions based on a scripted end to a series you got so intimately attached to.
So before you injure yourself or the people around you, here are some of the ways that can help you recover from this somewhat self-inflicted sorrow; I Recommend you to check out how deal with binge watching depression by clicking here
1. Laughter!
Binge a Comedy Series. (I did this after Nairobi died in Money Heist and I was inconsolable):
The fact that I become so attached to her character and at some point, it became my sole reason for watching the series, my heart was torn to tiny pieces when that bullet hit her and I saw her lying helplessly in her blood.
I became so inconsolable that I had to halt my binge for days. I could not even watch anything else at the time, not until this one time I walked in on my wife while she was re-watching some episodes of The Big Bang Theory.
I joined her just for the sake of it but little did I know that Sheldon Cooper would literally be my saving grace. I mean who watches Cooper and still keep a gloomy face.
At first it was just a smile, then a few chuckles and before I knew it I was laughing on top of my voice. And at that point I knew I found my remedy,
I knew Post-Series Depression was just a few big bangs of laughter away from moonwalking its sorrowful self out of my system. So laughter works, it really really works.
2. Complete Immersion
Step 1: Go home, get on TikTok and search it. Search it like there’s no tomorrow. Laugh over it, cry over it. Stay up way too late. You don’t even care; your body is numb with pain.
Step 2: I bet this TV show/movie has a soundtrack or a score. Download it. Listen to it on repeat. Listen to it until it doesn’t hurt anymore.
Step 3: Go do some physical activity. But make sure you are also still listening to the music. Exercise increases your endorphins which will start to make this sad music seem happy(er).
Step 4: Watch the actors in other things. Realize that they have other interesting projects. If their life can go on, so can yours!
Step 5: Are you still listening to the music?
Step 6: If you like making videos or gifs, painting or drawing, etc I recommend you starting with Tiktok or Youtube.
Step 7: You’re in your car driving to work and that song comes on. All of a sudden you realize you’re not sad anymore. The complete immersion into the topic allowed for a healthy, cathartic release.
3. Queue Up More Series To Watch In Advance
Don’t wait until the end of a series to search for your next TV show to binge. Make it a habit of finding series you want to watch in advance and adding them to a queue.
Post-Series Depression can hit during a period of idlesness, when you don’t have anything else to watch.
This might help you to get excited about the next series on your list rather than feeling that you’ve got nothing left to watch.
The likes of Netflix allow you to add series to a list, however you can’t decide which order to watch them. As a result, you may prefer to simply keep a list on your phone in your notes.
This could include series from all different platforms.
Not sure what to watch next? You can find a list of series to suit every interest here. Try to make each new series different to the last rather than trying to look for a similar series to the one you’re already watching (if a series is too similar, it may just end up paling in comparison).
4. Watch The Finale With Someone Can Remedy The Effects Of Post-Series Depression.
Sorrow and loneliness have this impeccable bond that usually creates a destructive force if allowed to merge.
Now you may not necessarily be lonely as per say, but the fact that you are alone at such an emotional time renders you bare on sorrow’s platter and might be fertile breeding grounds for Post-Series Depression.
You will have nobody but yourself to sob with, to feel miserable with and you will be vulnerable to the after effects of a terrible ending to a dope series.
It is always good to keep company as it is known to absorb some of the shock that would make after effect to an emotional end a really good series.
So do you know someone else who has also been watching the series and is up to speed? You could plan to watch the finale together.
You’ll have both shared the journey to its completion, giving you someone to share the pain with when it ends.
In fact, the sense of emptiness may not feel so great afterwards because you can immediately start talking about what you’ve just watched.
If the series had an ambiguous ending or seemingly had a few loose ends, you may be able to attempt to answer some of the questions left unanswered together.
This could help you to develop a greater sense of resolution. If you’ve got a few friends who are fellow nerds of the show, you could even plan a post-series party
(this is something that many people did with shows like Breaking Bad and Game of Thrones).
5. Join The Conversation Online
Don’t have any friends or family members to discuss the series with? You may be able to overcome your Post-Series Depression by joining the conversation online.
Some people find that the best way to fill the emptiness is to immerse themselves into the fandom.
You could check out some of the wild fan theories and memes on Reddit, read reactions and debates surrounding the series on Twitter, look at professional reviews by publications and check YouTube for some of your favorite clips from the series to see what people have commented. You can then add your own insights if you have any.
This doesn’t only cushion how you feel, but can also broaden your perception of the series itself. It is common to have a certain view of certain scenes or characters in the series but joining the conversation can actually do more than just put the post-series depression of the leash, but also open you up to divergent perspectives.
This could be a strange but effective way of keeping the series alive after it is over. After a few hours (or a few days) of dissecting the movie, you may eventually get bored of it. At the same time, you may feel more content that you’ve got everything you can out of that series.
6. Go Behind The Scenes
You may have watched all the episodes, but there may still be extra content left to consume. Many popular series come with ‘behind the scenes’ episodes which delve into the film-making as well as discussions with actors.
Deconstructing the fantasy world of the series could actually help you to escape it. By realizing that everything you just watched is props and actors, you may be able to return more easily to reality.
You can also look up bloopers. These deleted clips that shows some insight of what happened during the making of the series will show you that there was actually cameras and directors that were present to make sure the actor does the right thing to get you to feel exactly how you felt.
Even if you can’t find behind the scenes video clips, you may be able to find written content online delving into how the show was made.
Even dissecting the series’ Wikipedia page and looking into the actors on IMDB could help you to move on.
If you can help it, don’t watch the finale at the beginning of a working week
If it’s a series that you’ve been avidly watching for months or years, consider watching the series finale at the end of the working week. For instance, if you work Monday to Friday, plan to watch it on Friday evening – not on Monday evening.
This could allow you to plan some fun activities for the weekend so that you have something more to look forward to after.
By doing this, returning to reality after the series has ended might not feel so bad. What you don’t want to do is exit the fantastical world of your favorite series only to settle back into the depressing routine of everyday life.
Some people use the same strategy when planning a vacation – they may plan to have a day off after they get back so that they’re not immediately hurling themselves back into the daily grind. Give yourself time to mourn the series while easing yourself back to reality so that it’s not such a sharp contrast.
If everyday life feels empty and TV series are the only thing that brighten it up, then there’s probably something more serious than post-series depression going on.
This is just a silly list of ways to stop yourself feeling slightly sad after a series ends. If you feel genuinely depressed, make sure to get help (binging another series is not the solution).
7. Follow The Characters Of Their Socials
Sometimes you can get so consumed into the series that you start to feel like the story is real and the characters are real too. At this point it’s easy to be affected by the events of the series and you start to catch real emotions as a result.
For such series, when the characters that you are really fond of die or when it comes to an end, you become depressed, you feel like something dear to you has been taken away from you.
One thing that can scoop you out of this misery is following the following the actors that play out the characters of the series on their socials.
This will give you an insight into their lives, even after the series is over.
Then you will realize that inasmuch as the series is over, their lives have continued, those who may have died during the series are actually live in the real world ad that it was all just acting.
So Post-Series Depression (PSD) is actually a thing. Some people experience it after watching a great movie, some after reaching the end of a novel or even completing a video game.
You could even compare it to the feeling you get after coming home from a vacation or completing a goal you’ve been working towards for so long.
It should feel like a happy moment, but because the journey is over, you end up feeling slightly hollow instead.
The more series you watch, the more frequently you’re likely to experience this feeling. You may even start to dread series finales knowing that the end is coming, instead of being excited by them. But, you don’t have to feel that way, especially after reading this article upto this point.
