Complex TV

While functioning as a sort of “transmedia lite”, I would add 2nd Screen applications for mobile and tablet devices to the list here. Not only can narrative elements be included in, elaborated on, or entirely added to 2nd screen viewing (see Psych‘s “#Hashtag Killer”), but they can also attach much of the paratext to the primary text, blurring the line that separates the two. (e.g., if a network/production company deliver content via the 2nd screen, why would said content be treated as less of the narrative than the content delivered through the 1st?)

You sort of speak to this in paragraph 21, and get to it a bit with fantasy here, but what is the value of spatial ambiguity to a series like Lost? And how is that value perceived by audiences? It seems like there’s a tension there, in that spatial ambiguity seems to give writers the license to change the story as they see fit, leading to some of the conflict between fans and creators over the notion of “master plans.”I think of Lost particularly because the spatial ambiguity gave the series the ability to randomly introduce both a Temple and a Lighthouse in its final season, but in both instances some fairly vocal fans rejected those locations based on their perception of the space of the island, or what we could consider an accumulated diegetic place-based authenticity. Paratexts played a big part in establishing this, but does the freedom of ambiguity undo some of that work through the primary narrative’s willingness to add new locations willy nilly?

For the most part, I would agree that place-based authenticity is largely observed by those who are natives of a given city.However, two points:1) Attempts to establish spatial realism as tied to specific places are often incredibly transparent – when a show moves to a new setting (like, for example, Glee setting Nationals in Chicago), viewers who are aware the show films in Los Angeles (which is an increasing number of viewers in an Internet age) might look to see what strategies they might undertake to establish place-based authenticity. In the case of Glee, the only effort I saw was a single bucket of Garrett popcorn, which I only identified as Chicagoan because it had appeared on the set of Happy Endings, which is equally faking Chicago. As a result, while we might not observe minute geographical incoherence (such as Homeland citing real D.C. locations while shooting in N.C. equivalents), we CAN observe signifiers of place designed to mask larger incoherences, which could lead viewers to be skeptical of the show’s spatial geography more generally.2) While I am aware that neither you nor I would be a “general” viewer in this sense, the reason I know about most of the above examples is because people made it known via Twitter – heck, that’s what has me here writing this comment at this particular point in time. Message boards, social media, and post-air analysis have all allowed for spatial realism to spread beyond those who actually live within a particular place, and as I look toward my own project specifically focused on space/place I find myself seeing more and more conversation on this subject. Granted, I’m looking for it, and run in circles where it would be more prominent, but I do think that the transition from “recognition” to “transmission” is becoming more common.

It’s unlikely to be ready by SCSMI, but you might want to look at my essay (which will be folded into the chapter) “Previously On,” about serial TV & memory (and originally presented at SCSMI). The blog version is online, or it’s in this book.

I am particularly interested in this chapter on Comprehension as I am presenting a paper at the upcoming SCSMI conference inquiring into an aspect of memory and serial TV. Is it likely to be available online soon? I would be very pleased to be able to reference it!

Just a thought, but I wonder if this definition of narrative complexity here has the potential to be a little misleading. I appreciate that the merging of serial and episodic forms has enabled much of the narrative complexity to which you refer; but, as you say in para 8, narrative complexity is not wholly dependent on the presence of serialisation, and you demonstrate this further within the chapter — in some of your discussion of narrative spectacle, for example. So might it be worth briefly defining (in para 5) this “broader mode of complexity” that you refer to in para 8?

Phrases like “methodological contextualization” and “associated paratexts” reduce the seriousness of your work here. If open scholarship is to be truly meaningful, the trappings of academic obfuscation can and should be dropped.

ps: and i don’t mean the game of wiki-interaction which seems (asfar as i know wikis) to be usually very aware of its own fluidity and malleability. what i mean is the fans’ assumption about their object of engagement: do the contributors mostly act in the roles of “onlookers” who assume that their various interactions (shared pleasures, quibbles, contestations) refer to a stable text – or is there also an understanding that they might actually be players/inter-actors with and within the larger moveable game that is the unfolding development of the series “lost”?

“but rather as opposing vectors of cultural engagement”: i guess i was talking about “spread” as an observational stance above, not as a form of engagment. if you phrase it like this, it makes sense to talk about “vectors” going into different directions.– as for “legitimacy”, i feel tempted to quote david simon’s word of wisdom with which you started: “just be.” — (and might there be a slight performative contradiction between “we need to” and “shift our normative stance”? or what do you mean by “shift”: find another, better normative stance or get rid of the question of normativity altogether. i’m all for the second option & think that, in that case, the best way to get rid of normativity is to not even pay it too much attention. same with questions of legitimacy    

i’m not sure if you want to establish “spreadable media” vs. “drillable media” as a difference in type – or perspective? the latter would make a lot of sense to me: die-hard fans, intensely focussing on their object of engagement, probably tend to regard the unfolding series as a standing & hopefully rewarding puzzle, a mystery to be solved (and a disappointment if it offers no such solution) — while, when we take a step back, observe the series in relation to other series, to its immediate media environment, its cultural conditions, and in interaction with its die-hard fans, we might be more drawn to descriptors that stress spread and sprawl? if so, “drillable” and “spreadable” media are not opposites (“rather than”) but, relating to the same phenomena, perspectives?