Serial movies, why not?

A long time ago in a galaxy far away they used to make what were called serial films. These movies were serialized installments of some story, like Flash-Gordon, Tarzan etc. They would be presented in usually weekly basis. Maybe Prometheus might have been better as one of these, as it seems it needed more time for development of scenes. Lots of lost opportunities I feel, that might have been cut due to time constraints so ended up as afterthoughts it seems to me. Maybe Lindelof's style might be better suited to these kind of formats also (I like his style of storytelling BTW). I'm sure movie companies could find a model that would work for them. If successful, it could help the movie business I would imagine. For one, it would be very difficult to get a hold of leaks in weekly or biweekly or even monthly installments. Quality of cinematography might suffer a bit, but with proper planning, technology and vision it could be possible to provide a quality product in that format I think. Note that I don't work in the business so I might be just talking nonsense...