NHL Getting Its Own ‘Drive To Survive’ Series, But We're All Kind Of Over Those, Right?

It seems like everyone and their mother wants a Drive To Survive-style behind-the-scenes docuseries, and now it's the NHL's turn to get in front of the camera.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Box To Box Films, which produced the extremely popular Drive to Survive Netflix series is behind this NHL series. DTS is often credited with kickstarting F1's rise in popularity in the United States.

The NHL seems to want that same thing, and so the as-yet-unnamed series will stream on Amazon Prime later this year.

It will follow a laundry list of big names including Edmonton Oilers Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl; Boston Bruins David Pastrnak and Jeremy Swayman, New York Ranger Jacob Trouba, Vancouver Canuck Quinn Hughes, Florida Panther Matthew Tkachuk; Vegas Golden Knights Jack Eichel, and Toronto Maple Leafs forward William Nylander.

Camera crews are also reportedly on hand to snag some offstage of the Stanley Cup Final, which should be cool.

The NHL has done its share of behind-the-scenes documentaries over the years, but the Box To Box folks have sort of mastered this style of show.

However, is the NHL late to the party on this sort of thing?

Camera crews follow Visa Cash App RB Formula 1 driver Yuki Tsunoda during testing in Bahrain earlier this year. (Photo by Kym Illman/Getty Images)

We Were All Docuseries-ed Out Before The NHL Got In On The Craze

From the PGA Tour to Tennis to NASCAR to IndyCar to the NFL and now the NHL, pretty much every sport or league has given this kind of series a shot in hopes of capturing the unprecedented surge in popularity that Formula 1 saw with Drive To Survive.

None of them have.

The shows might be great, but the DTS level of success hasn't been seen elsewhere.

I think part of it is that F1 lends itself to that kind of show with only ten teams and twenty drivers, meaning it's easy to get up to speed on who's who and how they relate to everyone else.

That's tough with other sports, but I think the bigger issues are the oversaturation and the fact that it's not always clear who these shows are for.

It's no longer a novel idea so people are less likely to check a show out just based on the concept alone. So, how do you get new fans in the door? If I knew the answer, I'd have my own production company and would be rolling in cash right now.

So, then they must rely on current fans, right?

Well, that's a problem too. A lot of the time, these shows feature over-dramatized versions of events fans have already seen in real time.

The dramatic end of a race on Drive To Survive is significantly less dramatic if you are already well aware of who won.

Still, these shows offer some interesting off-the-field/ice/track/course insights, which makes them worth a watch, but you've got to wonder how many more series like this will we see before the powers that be realize audiences have kind of gotten tired of them.