Response for 11/16

Today’s readings focus on television serials, especially concerning the dual forms of daytime soap operas and contemporary primetime series. How do you see the similarities and differences between these two forms? Are they slight variations of each other, or might they be two distinct modes of serial narratives?

9 thoughts on “Response for 11/16

  1. Matthew Yaggy

    I think they are slight variations on each other. Many prime time serials exhibit the same qualities of daytime soap operas. In the serial Lost, we have a large ensemble cast and a series of overlapping mini closures characteristic of soap operas which focus on character relationships. In Lost, there is certainly more movement towards an eventual end but the narrative never made it explicitly clear what the ending was going to be. Also, as in soap operas, the show devotes a fair amount of screen time to character’s reactions to events that have occurred in the shows fabula. These reactions add to the level of redundancy in both forms. Finally, there is a great focus on the emotional relationships between the show’s characters in both forms. Whether it be the love triangle between Sawyer, Kate, and Jack on Lost or the various relationships on As The World Turns and other Soaps.

    Of course, there are always exceptions with serials taking place in different genres or settings. However, the element of reverberating effects is almost always present.

    1. Matthew Yaggy

      Of course, Mittell’s article (which I’m reading now) says there isn’t redundancy in serials. Especially in Lost there are a lot of confusing details from previous episodes that are referenced and not elaborated on, but I feel that character names and relationships are fairly redundant. For example, Sawyer always making fun of Hurley or the characters always addressing each other by their first names.

      1. James Landenberger

        I think soaps just exhibit various features of primetime series in the extreme. Allen talks about the ‘closed’ text and the ‘open’ text. The open text allows for a plurality of meaning, it allows inroads to new plotlines, and it creates open ended causal chains that may or may not be picked up in the future, whereas the closed text emphasizes narrative closure, causal determinacy. The soap exhibits characteristics of the open text in the extreme. But the primetime series also exhibits openness to a lesser extent. Texts must be open-ended enough to allow for a next season, in case the series is to be continued, and as Mittell notes there must be (in the serial, at least) a balance between open-endedness (to create curiosity, intrigue) and narrative closure (satisfaction) in the contemporary series.
        Allen also talks about redundancy, another characteristic that the soap form takes to an extreme but is also present in the contemporary series. In his article about constructive memory Mittell talks about ‘previously on’ sequences, allusions to previous episodes, etc. In the contemporary series the past is alluded to only when it is necessary for the plot at hand. This is also true of the soap but because of the shear breadth of plot history and variety (extensive character relationships, character histories) more redundancy is needed to accomodate the casual viewer.

        so what is present in the soap (openness, redundancy) is also present in the contemporary series, but it is exhibited to a greater degree.

      2. Patricia

        That is less redundancy and more “motifs” or established relationships, I think. If you call that redundancy you might as well say that calling someone by their name every time you speak to them is redundancy. It’s simply a form of address. Jack always saves people–that is not necessarily redundancy, but a character trait that he exhibits when the time calls for it. It would be redundancy, if every time he saved someone he referenced the other time that he saved that particular person.

  2. Andrew Silver

    From my personal experience watching prime-time serials like Dexter and Deadwood and hearing my mom discuss her soaps (All my children?) the two forms of television were similar but separate entities in terms of audience interaction with them. However, as pointed out in professor Mittell’s essay, the sale of shows in dvd box sets, which can be watched at the viewer’s leisure rather than on a planned basis, has brought soap opera’s and prime-time television into the same realm. Before the sale of box sets, most of the fan talk revolved around mysteries;what’s going to happen next? While there was always some talk of which character was the best and if the show was consistent or not, my friends and I were much more likely to discuss if the Pinkerton’s will ever come to Deadwood or if Deb will find out Dexter’s true identity. With Soap operas, amazingly being on every day of the year, there is no time for such future discussion before another problem arises in the next episode. While there still is some talk of will a character get married or will one character murder the other most of the talk, as Robyn Warhol points out in her America online chatroom study, revolves around if the show’s characters act consistently or filling in new viewers on previous occurrences. Discussion is never about the future.

    However, with consumers now able to consume their selected shows season all in one sitting if they so please ( as I did with Californication) talking about the future in prime-time shows is becoming obsolete as discussion now shifts more towards that of soap-operas, evaluating the show as a whole rather than wondering what will happen next.

  3. Patricia

    I think there is also a generational divide here… soap operas were around long before these new shows that we watch and fan engagement with it was less of an online thing and more of a “over a cup of coffee with the neighbor” or on the phone with a fellow viewer type of deal. Our generation is definitely more of the online blog/iChat/forum posting with strangers type of group.

  4. Dustin Schwartz

    I’ve been watching some Lost clips this break, and have randomly stumbled on some connections for this post.

    *SPOILER ALERT*

    Lost is a fascinating case regarding what it shares with soap operas as a serial. Allen and Warhol mention how theme music play is used throughout soap operas as a way to signal something, like an emotion and a memory, from past episodes, like a returning character or event. The deaths of Jin and Sun in Season 6 had a similar score to that heard during Charlie’s death in Season 3. I remember going on YouTube right after the submarine perished and the episode ended to watch Charlie’s death and make the connection.

    The finale, for example, had a certain score (which I think should have been awarded an Emmy) that was played during flashbacks when some of the characters “remembered” and reunited in the alternate universe/the afterlife. I might have heard it in previous episodes, but, regardless, it was similar to previous scores (like the one used in the death sequences), and it was used more than once during the finale–both in the flashbacks and in the “moving on” church scene. It triggered the same emotional effect, for me at least, in responding to the characters and their relationships in a cathartic sense, especially as the flashbacks showed montages of their long-term relationships that developed over the whole series. These flashbacks were also redundant, as they repeated images from past episodes of the serial, another attribute of soap operas.

    1. Dustin Schwartz

      In addition, the music, for me, had this thematic love/spiritual meaning that connected the characters and interpreted the show’s significance–or at least how I interpreted the show’s meaning.

  5. James Stepney

    The largest difference between soap opera serials and primetime serials are the ways narrative is presented within the story-world and toward the audience. Many soap operas use familiar narratives that rarely exceed the natural world, where many primetime narratives can create a world that is both fictional in content, as well as in setting. Again, as a loyal fan of the HBO series, True Blood, I find it very comforting that the intrinsic norms developed early in the series allows for not only a highly dramatic context, but also takes the idea that vampires and other supernatural entities co-exist with humans. Other than a short plot where a soul was reincarnated within a doll in the NBC series, Passions, much of the story takes place in a world very similar to our own. Primarily, I find that the context of the narrative is much broader within primetime narratives than soap operas, because the audience being targeted does not fall in the traditional category as those who either stay home or come home early to watch very dramatic characters infinitely extend dramatic situations.

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