Why would I want to spend my leisure time experiencing that? How is that entertaining?
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/games/2020/dec/23/the-15-best-vi...
As another commenter above noted, it's a form of wish fulfillment and imaginary transgression, which is particularly appealing to teenage boys, since virtually all forms of actual aggression are off limits. Sports are the only arena where boys are allowed to be physically aggressive in real. Other than that, we have an entire group of young people who once would have been learning to hunt and kill and defend their clan but who now have to sit around and do very little besides read, write, and stare at computers. Arguably it's a positive thing to have less violence, but it leads many young men to wonder why the hell their bodies are strong and powerful. In video games, they at least get to pretend that there is some utility to being able to be forceful.
In the case of video games, there are some that are mindless violence, but The Last of Us Part II is an example of a game that reflects on those and show the real outcome of what people can do to each other and how evil and pointless it can be.
Why do people enjoy spending their leisure time experiencing that? It's not a rhetorical question.
I don't think anyone's watching the show specifically for the unpleasant scenes, it's just that the unpleasant scenes enhances story/drama aspect.
> [...] How is that entertaining?
I know what you mean. I have the same feelings, but restricted to depictions in my native language of people hurting each other in psychologically realistic ways.
I'm not bothered with any physical violence especially voiced with English dialogues. They somehow seem cartoonish to me.
But I pretty much have to avoid all Polish movies because they often use those really unpleasant themes.
They are made because they have audience. I have friends who love those movies and themes.
I tried to find out, what exactly appeals to them in those themes and best I could get out of them was that those brutal themes are somehow more 'real', that they expose how people 'truly' are. And that somehow has a value for them.
Probably morbid fascination pays a part in this too.