The dark pattern is series themselves.
1. They are massively produced and have replaced many other programs. There is always new content available, you can spend your life watching 3 new episodes an evening.
2. They are in fact not series any more, but serials. Each episode of a series has an independent storyline and comes to a conclusion; episodes can mostly be watched in random order, you can miss a broadcast, it doesn't matter, you can watch a later episodes without any problem. Serials are a single long storyline split in episodes: you can't miss one, let alone two episodes, otherwise you're lost; and they can use cliffhangers! and of course they do. The hooking is much much bigger for serials than for series, you always end up begging for more.
Even when it starts as a series, they quickly inject enough serials elements to turn it into a serial in disguise.
