‘Seinfeld’ Fans Think It’s A Shame That Netflix Is Airing The Show In The Wrong Aspect Ratio

Once upon a time — for over five decades — televisions were in a different shape than they are now. TV sets used to be box-shaped. The shows that aired on them, of course, were, too. Widescreen TVs became popular in the aughts, and now any show made in the before-time runs into a problem: They’re often re-shaped for modern TVs. That means cropping and removing chunks of the image. And it means incurring the wrath of those who notice, such as the Simpsons fans who successfully pressured Disney+ into making sure there was an option to watch older episodes of the show in their original form.

Now it’s happening to Seinfeld. All 180 episodes of the ‘90s landmark debuted on Netflix over the weekend. But fans of the show quickly noticed a problem: The show had been reformatted to fit modern screens. That meant jokes had been ruined, like one involving a pothole.

— Brandon (spooky version) (@Thatoneguy64) October 1, 2021

Another eagle-eyed viewer seemed to figure it out: The image was not only cropped but also ever-so-slightly stretched out.

— Wes (@alifefilmodic) October 1, 2021

People wondered why Netflix spent a princely sum to show a censored Seinfeld. (Incidentally, HBO Max did the same with Friends, which streams in a similarly cropped form.)