Man Baffled as Everything He Watches on Netflix Turns Blue: 'Smurf Mode'

A Netflix subscriber was left scratching his head after logging into the streaming service, only to find everything he watched was a decidedly dark shade of blue.

America is a binge-watching nation. A YouGovAmerica poll of 1,000 U.S. adults saw 42 percent of respondents admit to binge-watching at least half the time when they watch TV, while 45 percent said they binge sometimes, and just 14 percent said they never binge-watch ever.

Hunkering down for a few hours of your favorite show is a much-loved pastime for many, and anything that gets in the way of that is likely to draw some considerable ire. Maybe that's why so many online reacted with such consternation to the plight of Anthony Dzioba.

The man from Melbourne, Australia, told Newsweek that he encountered an unusual problem when he went to watch something on Netflix while sitting at his desk at work. "I just logged into the computer like I usually do, loaded up Chrome and started watching an episode of Black Mirror, and it was blue," Dzioba said.

He initially assumed that the color change was deliberate. "I just thought it was the theme of the episode," he said. "But once the episode finished and I went to skip ahead, I noticed the color was normal on the search bar and then the next episode was blue as well."

Dzioba was at a loss to explain the new blue look to his Netflix. He had watched shows on his work computer before without the same issue.

"I've no idea what caused it, but it's only Netflix, not Disney," Dzioba said. "My work computer is a pretty old system, so I assumed it had something to do with it. But this did just randomly occur. I don't know if there were any updates between shifts that caused it."

Eager for answers, Dzioba turned to the internet, posting about his blue Netflix dilemma on Reddit under the handle u/Radalict. The post went viral, earning over 1,100 upvotes.

Some commenting on Reddit were quick to poke fun at the situation. "Try watching Orange Is the New Black," one Reddit user wrote, with another adding: "You just have to go into the settings and disable 'Smurf Mode.'"

Among all the jokes, Dzioba is pleased to report that at least one fellow Reddit user was able to offer him some advice that fixed the issue. "As per some advice in that thread I made, I found a setting in Chrome to disable hardware acceleration," he said.

Hardware acceleration is a setting that helps optimize the way a PC works, by prioritizing more important applications over others. Unfortunately, it has been known to hinder running video on programs such as Google Chrome.

While it's useful to turn it off while watching something during a breaktime, hardware acceleration should then be turned back on to help your computer run at optimal speed. Dzioba is just thankful his Netflix blues are over and hopes his experience might be of use to someone out there should they end up in a similar position.