The final episode of Phi reached 3 million viewers within 72 hours on Puhu TV, pushing total viewing numbers for the series to over 70 million. These numbers put Ay Yapim’s groundbreaking series among the most watched Turkish series anywhere during this spring, despite being exclusive to Puhu’s online platform and benefiting from no traditional linear broadcast.
The first original content produced for Puhu TV, Phi has also contributed to a surge in the channel’s success. Since the launch of the series Puhu has scored a number of new landmarks, with use of the platform more than doubling following Phi’s initial release, and since then more than 20% of Turkey’s entire internet-connected population tuning in to the series.
The series is based on a trilogy of novels called Phi, Pi, Chi by Akilah Azra Kohan which have sold over a million copies in Turkey. Award-winning actress Serenay Sarıkaya, who most recently played the lead role in the worldwide hit series Medcezir, stars in this series. The first novel Phi is the basis for the first series of the same title with 26 episodes x 60 minutes, to be followed by two more seasons of the same length based on the novels Pi and Chi, respectively.
The story offers an intelligent insight in to the true meaning of life through the five character’s life changing journeys. Manay is a rich, ruthless and famous psychologist who has his own TV show known for its unique style. A chance encounter sees him falling instantly for Duru but she already has a boyfriend, Deniz. Deniz is a charismatic man and talented musician but a slave to cannabis. Özge, a journalist and a real fighter, is always asking things everyone else is afraid to ask and to Manay’s dismay, he realizes that he is no match for her questions. Bilge is a brilliant psychology student and the wisest of them all, who grew up with an autistic brother and no mother. The encounters between these different people force them to re-evaluate life and to come to the awareness that to experience true love, you must first have the courage to lose yourself.
