Amazon’s Prime Video is utilizing generative AI to make it easier for viewers to catch up on their latest TV show, no matter where in the episode or series they last watched, with up-to-the-minute textual recaps.
Amazon is looking to cater to viewers when they may have only caught part of an episode, took a series break or might be sitting down for the start of a new season but can’t quite remember the key plot highlights of earlier ones. Prime Video’s new X-Ray Recaps feature, still in beta, promises easy-to-digest summaries “personalized down to the exact minute” of where viewers were last watching, regardless of when they’re jumping in, be it halfway through an episode or in need of a refresher on earlier seasons. For example, the feature could give a recap for the start of an episode, half of a season, all episodes of a current season or recaps for full prior seasons of a series.
Amazon touts the feature as easier and more seamless than other methods viewers might turn to, like rewinding or searching online for summaries that may or may not be available – while also promising to avoid the risk of spoilers or the need to rewatch already-viewed scenes. The textual recap snippets deliver “key cliffhangers, character-driven plot points, and other details that can be accessed at any point in your viewing experience,” according to Amazon’s blog.
Still in beta, at launch it’s currently only available on Amazon Fire TV devices in the U.S., with plans to roll out to additional devices by year-end. The X-Ray Recaps also initially are only available for original series created by Amazon MGM Studios, including Daisy Jones and the Six, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, The Wheel of Time, and The Boys.
The context-based summaries are powered by Amazon’s Bedrock, which it describes as a managed AWS service for building and scaling genAI applications with foundational models. According to the company, X-Ray Recaps utilize Amazon Bedrock models along with custom AI models trained on Amazon SageMaker to analyze various video segments, together with subtitles or dialogue to generate detailed snippets of key events, places, times and conversations in series. Amazon also noted it applies guardrails to make sure the recaps are concise and free from spoilers.
The feature can be launched from series detail pages on Prime Video or during playback with the X-Ray experience. It expands capabilities of Prime Video’s existing X-Ray feature that provides additional scene information, such as cast, soundtrack and production details.
“Prime Video product and technology teams work relentlessly behind the scenes to enhance customers’ viewing experience, and with the creation of X-Ray Recaps, we’re directly addressing a common problem customers face when streaming content: forgetting where they left off,” said Adam Gray, VP of product at Prime Video, in a statement. “With this context-aware functionality, Prime Video will deliver summaries of memorable moments and important plot points so our customers can quickly jump back into what they were watching or rediscover why they fell in love with a series in the first place.”
X-Ray Recaps are one of the latest updates for Prime Video, which is also pulling in more commerce elements for its own series. Last week the streaming service debuted the premiere of Buy It Now a Shark Tank-style reality-competition TV show where entrepreneurs have the chance to pitch their products to a panel of Amazon exec and celebrity judges and live studio audience. Finalists then get to sell their products through the e-commerce giant in a new Buy It Now store front – accessible via a QR code in each episode, by searching on the e-commerce platform, and through links in the series page within the Prime Video app. In addition to selling their goods via Amazon, one contestant from each episode wins $20,000.
Before the premiere, Bernstein analyst Mark Shmulik told the Wall Street Journal that Amazon has a better chance of getting viewers to shop, particularly younger audiences, by creating shows that feature the online retailers’ sellers and their products, categorizing the Prime Video competition show as “more elegant than QR codes.”
Also new to Prime Video today, Tuesday November 5, is Amazon’s first live news coverage foray with Election Night, a one-night special delivering U.S. election results and analysis with host Brian Williams.
The continued build up of Prime Video content and features comes as Amazon last week reported Q3 results including a 19% year over year bump in advertising sales to reach $14.3 billion in the period. In early 2024 Amazon introduced ads on its Prime Video subscription plan in the U.S., Canada and several other markets automatically as the default across users, with the option to upgrade to ad-free for $2.99 more per month. Next year, ads on Prime Video will expand to additional international markets including Brazil, India, Japan, the Netherlands and New Zealand.