Netflix sacks content boss Bela Bajaria in big move to reset the narrative

It’s a bloodbath at Netflix headquarters with content boss Bela Bajaria shown the door alongside an estimated 1000 employees in a brutal round of job cuts.

Bajaria’s ouster had been rumoured as inevitable for days as the streamer started to cull workers with the overall sackings amounting to six per cent of its global workforce.

Netflix has been under immense pressure this year as its stock price slid 40 per cent in the past 12 months, beginning with its unsuccessful attempt to acquire Warner Bros.

It has also failed to produce a new zeitgeist-penetrating hit since Adolescence, which was released more than 18 months ago.

As chief content officer who oversaw a $US20 billion budget, Bajaria was the second most visible Netflix executive after co-chief executive Ted Sarandos, responsible for overseeing the company’s whole output, ranging from scripted and unscripted series to its push into podcasts, gaming and live sports.

Bajaria will be replaced by Peter Rice, an experienced creative executive who previously held top jobs at Disney and Fox and has worked across TV and film. He has produced and shepherded projects including The Bear, Modern Family, Slumdog Millionaire and Sideways.

One of the first decisions Rice is expected to make is the future of the head of film role. Dan Lin is currently in the chair but Puck reported that he is likely to be sacked too, but the decision will be Rice’s to make.

If Lin is also soon-to-be out, then these moves, which also included the sackings of a raft of next level down TV and film executives yesterday, represents a significant reset in Netflix’s content strategy and priorities.

In the first half of 2026, Netflix viewership grew 2 per cent, well below the benchmarks set by Wall Street. The company also said it would cease releasing twice-yearly engagement reports, a sign that it didn’t want to draw attention to the lacklustre data.

Two weeks ago, Sarandos admitted at a Bloomberg event, “Overall, we’re not growing as fast as I want us to, and we’re working on making that move faster”.

For months, industry commentators and even the financial markets have been making noise about Netflix’s lack of buzzy titles beyond new seasons of existing shows such as Stranger Things (which has now ended), The Diplomat and Bridgerton.

Among the highest rated shows of the year so far are I Will Find You and His & Hers, two middling (at best) crime thrillers that clocked decent numbers but were quickly forgotten.

Its expansion into podcasts, live events and gaming have also paid underwhelming dividends. The podcast videos push is still early days but Netflix notably left off the viewership numbers from its engagement report.

While it’s had some successes in live programming including partnerships with the US football league and wrestling, the expensive investment hasn’t yet paid back with returns. Live programming costs five per cent of Netflix’s content spend but only accounts for one per cent of viewership.

If Netflix wanted to rejuvenate its brand as must-see TV that had enduring cultural appeal instead of looking as if it was just frantically chasing YouTube, it was going to have to make some big moves.

Parting with Bajaria and potentially Lin is a reset move.

The Bajaria era at Netflix has been a defining one. By most accounts, she was easy to work with, dramatically expanded international commissions, and she led a slate with genuinely great shows including Beef, Squid Game and KPop Demon Hunters, but it was also marked by populism over quality control.

So, even though there are still legitimate critical hits – East of Eden and Long Story Short are recent examples – they’re harder to find in the miasma of mediocrity that encompasses most of its offerings. Which gives the overall impression of “there’s nothing to watch on Netflix”.

In Sarandos’s company-wide email announcing the leadership changes, he was gracious about Bajaria’s contribution over her 10 years in the business. He name-checked a number of projects under the umbrella of “so much of what you see on Netflix today can be traced back to a Bela initiative”.

What’s interesting is the first show he listed was Insatiable, which was a point of divergence between the first wave of Netflix originals under former content boss Cindy Holland and Bajaria.

A year after Bajaria joined Netflix, originally to oversee unscripted content such as reality TV programming, there was a consequential moment when Bajaria’s team greenlit a show called Insatiable, which Holland’s team had already passed on.

Insatiable was a supposed dark comedy about a 17-year-old girl who loses a lot of weight after a violent assault and then becomes a beauty pageant queen. It was critically smashed for being fatphobic and also just bad TV (its Rotten Tomatoes score is 12 per cent). It’s why Holland’s team rejected it.

But Bajaria had different sensibilities and a background in network TV, and saw something in it that might appeal to a non-tastemaker audience. The series was watched enough that it was renewed for a second season.

According to a 2022 Hollywood Reporter feature, the Insatiable episode pointed to a significant shift within Netflix that was both organisational (giving different teams the ability to override someone else’s pass) and cultural (prioritising quantity over quality).

One source told THR in that piece that Insatiable was “the beginning of the Walmart-isation” of Netflix.

Sarandos then shifted the business to a broad appeal strategy with the remit for more rather than better. In 2020, Sarandos sacked Holland and elevated Bajaria into the all TV role. She later consolidated her power when she was promoted to chief content officer.

Bajaria was famously the subject of a New Yorker profile at the start of 2023 in which she refused to name any favourite shows (“I mean, I’m a fan of TV.”), and said that the strategy was about scaling up, and “recognising that people like having more”.

In that same piece, she coined the term “gourmet cheeseburgers” as her objective. Netflix was trying to be an elevated version of something crowd-pleasing that everyone likes, and not filet mignon or steak tartare.

That worked for a time and it produced successes such as Wednesday although two of its most lauded, watched and buzziest titles in recent years, British miniseries Adolescence and Baby Reindeer, are both much more challenging fare than a gourmet cheeseburger.

It might be hyperbolic to suggest that Netflix is at a crossroads, because there are not clearly defined paths to choose from.

The entertainment business overall is in upheaval and Netflix is not the only company making swathes of job cuts. The newly merged Paramount and Warner Bros is expected to sack thousands of people now that the deal is closed.

The once-threat now reality of tech companies has changed the business dramatically, and YouTube is the dominant force in time spent watching. Netflix’s recent moves to diversify is clearly trying to keep up with YouTube.

Bajaria’s replacement, Rice, is a veteran, an old, steady hand who has worked across traditional entertainment and has previously helped 20th Century Fox transition into Disney when the House of Mouse bought the former.

Rice is seen as a capable executive but his specialty is not streaming and online, nor is it disruptive strategies. So, it’s possible he’s the “right now” guy to get Netflix back on even footing, to get to a place where it’s not constantly chasing and is instead in a position to forge.

For audiences, any significant changes won’t be immediate. Perhaps that’ll mean fewer gourmet cheeseburgers, or fewer of everything in general. Perhaps the era of more, more, more is over.

When you’ve tried to be everything to everyone and it doesn’t work, then the only thing that’s left is to try to be better at some things. Like making good TV.