Thinking before looking
May. 22nd, 2008 12:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethSo I've been thinking about episode length, exhibition context, and classic vs new Doctor Who.
... is exhibition the right word? It is with film. We studied film in Intro Moving Image, but not so much did we study Television. I have a Television Studies dictionary on a shelf but it's more than arms length away, so, onwards.
Classic series:
25 minute episodes on Saturday nights = awesome ratings of win
25 minute episodes twice a week where soaps used to be = less awesome ratings
45 minute episodes = everyone saying 45 minutes doesn't work
Trial of a Time Lord - 14 episodes in one story. How long were they? I confess to never having seen a one of them.
25 minutes opposite Coronation Street = ... oh dear. ratings of all gone.
TV movie:
... oh dear.
Made for US audiences, which is a charge I've heard levelled at the New Series (and the way it is framed, it is a charge). Length and time of broadcast?
It'll be in the About Time book. I'm only up to Ace joining. Shall read the rest soon.
New Series:
45ish minutes, 7ish pm Saturday nights, with multiple repeats on BBC3 or iPlayer
I don't actually have memorised when in the evening earlier DW was, but the 70s DW was 1730ish
possibly all Saturday evening DW was there?
... you'd think I'd know, but honestly, since I got grown enough to be conscious it was either on video or opposite soaps.
So... when asked why New Series is 45 minutes long and mostly single episode stories, no parts 1 or 2 or 14, was told, because that's how the USA does it.
But the USA does it that way to fit advertising in the rest of the hour. And they still have to slice and dice UK shows to fit their time slot. See: Life on Mars, or rather don't because I'm told they have to hack about 20 minutes per episode. My point is, if they were timed specifically for US markets, they'd probably be shorter.
They'd also have cliffhangers which clearly indicate where the advertising goes.
Watch any US made show. I've been reading books like 'Crafty TV writing' and the end of act cliffhanger is to US shows as the end of episode cliffhanger is to classic Doctor Who. It's the image you leave the audience with that makes them want to come back for more. Sure, US shows only need attention to reach the other side of the ad break, but there's a ton of competition.
The lack of multi part numbering, even for stories that are in fact two parters... that might be more helpful to look at. Classic DW relied on their audience coming back once or even twice a week, every week, until the story was done. There were info dump recaps - why didn't they use 'previouslies'? Bit less intrusive than 'as you know bob' to my mind. ANYway, DW story arcs could last 4 to 6 weeks, and still have an audience at the other end. Why? Well, honestly, I don't think 'cool stories' is adequate explanation. You have to look at the exhibition context. Few channels, little choice. Apparently early TVs took ages to warm up so it were easier leaving them on in the corner all the time. An evening of television was watched as one evening line up of television. Which... I haven't a clue what's on after any of the shows I watch. I only know what's on before because I'll watch them live if I happen to be awake. Mostly my recorder box catches my chosen lineup for me, and I'll watch it back when I get around to it.
So between these extremes of technology, it went from two channels and little choice through 4 and a VCR to 5 and some satellite up to who even knows and a box that can record a whole season at one button press.
Actually that last might bring back the conditions where 25 minute episodes and long serials actually work again. Especially if you combine it with downloads. You wouldn't need to get an audience to commit to watching every week, just to click through at the end of one episode, subscribe to an RSS feed announcing them maybe, that kind of thing.
... and that's sounding kinda familiar, yesno? Not for DW yet, but.
So, anyways, DW used to have a large slice of a stays where it's put audience.
Then the audience started breaking up and moving around and stuff. The remote control was king.
Then they started moving DW around to chase a different bit of audience.
And then they decided it didn't work done that way.
What was that bit in the middle where 45 minute episodes were deemed not to work?
... I'd have to actually watch them to find out.
Do I want to watch the 6th Doctor with my brain actually working?
I've been thinking about episode structure because I've been thinking about writing some.
US style advert cliffhangers can be godawful cheesy, lacking in tension, resolved by someone shouting 'wait!'... no, that's DW, isn't it? Er, anyway, they can be bad, but the effect once you take the ad breaks themselves out is...
... I over geek on the metaphor here but I can't think of a less geek one. oh dear...
It's like magnets in an accelerator.
You've got the plot whizzing along. You give it a kick at the start, usually with a pre-credits sequence. Then it hits these fixed points in sequence and each give it a boost. And timing is critical - too soon and it's more like a stumble than a boost, too late and you're lucky to maintain speed.
Alt metaphor - rollercoaster.
Then you've got the long slow climb at the start. Things build up and up and up until they just *whoosh* and then you've got like loops and tall bits and all that. Only if you haven't built up enough momentum you get half way up the tall bits and never hit the next big *whoosh* cause everyone's got off to push already. Sort of thing.
And that longlonglong bit at the start of Leisure Hive isn't right, cause it doesn't go up and up at all, it's just trundling along a beach. There's no whoosh. To even get to the whoosh you either have to dig a really big hole or start the build up process, late, and with all that long bit wasted. Unless boredom is actually the intended effect.
Running along corridors is not in fact *whoosh*, cause things neither improve nor deteriorate, go up or down, they're just going along. No build up, no boost. You can't do much of that before losing momentum.
No, really. Even if it is traditional. Even if the characters are running, the plot is not.
SO... I have a theory about what I'll find if I watch the old 45 minute eps - they'll be structured like the 25 minute ones, with a kick at the end to get you into next week. And then they wouldn't work.
Since I haven't looked yet, I could well be wrong.
Now the modern eps - the good ones anyway, there's always a Random Shoes lurking in potentia - they take the US model lessons to heart. And I don't think it's so they can sell. It's because we all watched Buffy for 7 years, on BBC2, with the ad breaks taken out - *and the structure still works*. Because all that energy meant to get you past a boring bit of people trying to sell you stuff instead gets you into the next ten minutes without actually losing momentum through commmercials. They build up with more energy in the UK exhibition context. Really fast roller coaster.
There's potential to go off the rails some if a particular development really needs time to sink in... but they still save the big ones for the end of the episode, so that should work fine.
Less well on DVD when you can just watch them all in one gulp. Or the turn around in mood between Torchwood 1-12 and 1-13, where I couldn't really react to both at once cause they needed different mood muscles. Showing eps as doubles that were only made as one at a times has different effects.
Now some of the complaining I've heard/read - and it is definitely complaining - blames US television, MTV, and the tartrazine generation, all for a lack of attention span and tendency to chop story into 5 minute chunks and be forever moving on. And... well, I haven't the psych study to back me up here, but here's an alternative possibility: Modern readers 'get' the language of TV much quicker, so they don't need to stay with something so long to know what's going on.
It's not a negative no-attention-span thing, it's a positive grasps-quickly thing.
I mean, how often do you watch ye ancient reruns and wish they'd get moving cause you get it already?
There was a bit in one of the early About Time volumes about how there was a phase of thinking young kids want flashy choppy images and short attention span stuff, whereas all the research says they want a sort of tension between known and not-yet-known, suspense building up to predictable. Hmmm, did it say that? Book is in library. But... which age kids, when the research, and is both sets of idea missing how modern readers work?
If someone has to watch a whole minute of empty beach before getting the idea that this beach is indeed empty... no, can't really imagine that. Anyway. If someone can watch a montage of shots, say like when the light sweeps across the room and the people move but not significantly, like was used in two different sections of TW 2-12, then you can get empty-boring-beach without empty-boring-shot and it doesn't even take as long. Bore the characters, not the audience!
If readers are better at TV language then they don't have to pay attention for so long, is what I'm saying.
And we can pay attention to other things at once.
I mean, it's all very well talking about The Good Old Days where the whole family sat together and ate and watched Doctor Who, but really that means getting a running commentary from every family member, which is multi tasking, of a sort.
The classic thing to say about the difference between cinema and television is exactly that, the way cinema gets full attention in a dark room where television happens in a context of a whole bunch of other people, or other tasks, or other data sources.
I watch most things while sat at my computer. Not DW and TW, but most other things. I'll be checking email, LJ, my newspapers page, all that.
DW is way more interesting than news.
With so much competition for attention - other channels, other data sources, other media - then TV has to have an attention getter *often*, or you lose people for five minutes while you wander around corridors and they blog about it. People will, in effect, go to commercials on their own, unless you keep giving them fresh reasons not to.
And *that's* why the structure of New Series Doctor Who is different.
We're not slavishly imitating the USA for the money.
We're reacting to shared changes in exhibition context, not just in the multi channel TV environment, but in the changed family life and media reading habits of the viewing audience.
... now if I can 'prove' that with some close reading and theory quotes, I have me an essay.
Except I'm not sure I want to essay on that one.
... actually to be honest it's more like I'm not sure I want to hand in that essay. I wants to write an essay for all those questions.
:eyeroll:
... is exhibition the right word? It is with film. We studied film in Intro Moving Image, but not so much did we study Television. I have a Television Studies dictionary on a shelf but it's more than arms length away, so, onwards.
Classic series:
25 minute episodes on Saturday nights = awesome ratings of win
25 minute episodes twice a week where soaps used to be = less awesome ratings
45 minute episodes = everyone saying 45 minutes doesn't work
Trial of a Time Lord - 14 episodes in one story. How long were they? I confess to never having seen a one of them.
25 minutes opposite Coronation Street = ... oh dear. ratings of all gone.
TV movie:
... oh dear.
Made for US audiences, which is a charge I've heard levelled at the New Series (and the way it is framed, it is a charge). Length and time of broadcast?
It'll be in the About Time book. I'm only up to Ace joining. Shall read the rest soon.
New Series:
45ish minutes, 7ish pm Saturday nights, with multiple repeats on BBC3 or iPlayer
I don't actually have memorised when in the evening earlier DW was, but the 70s DW was 1730ish
possibly all Saturday evening DW was there?
... you'd think I'd know, but honestly, since I got grown enough to be conscious it was either on video or opposite soaps.
So... when asked why New Series is 45 minutes long and mostly single episode stories, no parts 1 or 2 or 14, was told, because that's how the USA does it.
But the USA does it that way to fit advertising in the rest of the hour. And they still have to slice and dice UK shows to fit their time slot. See: Life on Mars, or rather don't because I'm told they have to hack about 20 minutes per episode. My point is, if they were timed specifically for US markets, they'd probably be shorter.
They'd also have cliffhangers which clearly indicate where the advertising goes.
Watch any US made show. I've been reading books like 'Crafty TV writing' and the end of act cliffhanger is to US shows as the end of episode cliffhanger is to classic Doctor Who. It's the image you leave the audience with that makes them want to come back for more. Sure, US shows only need attention to reach the other side of the ad break, but there's a ton of competition.
The lack of multi part numbering, even for stories that are in fact two parters... that might be more helpful to look at. Classic DW relied on their audience coming back once or even twice a week, every week, until the story was done. There were info dump recaps - why didn't they use 'previouslies'? Bit less intrusive than 'as you know bob' to my mind. ANYway, DW story arcs could last 4 to 6 weeks, and still have an audience at the other end. Why? Well, honestly, I don't think 'cool stories' is adequate explanation. You have to look at the exhibition context. Few channels, little choice. Apparently early TVs took ages to warm up so it were easier leaving them on in the corner all the time. An evening of television was watched as one evening line up of television. Which... I haven't a clue what's on after any of the shows I watch. I only know what's on before because I'll watch them live if I happen to be awake. Mostly my recorder box catches my chosen lineup for me, and I'll watch it back when I get around to it.
So between these extremes of technology, it went from two channels and little choice through 4 and a VCR to 5 and some satellite up to who even knows and a box that can record a whole season at one button press.
Actually that last might bring back the conditions where 25 minute episodes and long serials actually work again. Especially if you combine it with downloads. You wouldn't need to get an audience to commit to watching every week, just to click through at the end of one episode, subscribe to an RSS feed announcing them maybe, that kind of thing.
... and that's sounding kinda familiar, yesno? Not for DW yet, but.
So, anyways, DW used to have a large slice of a stays where it's put audience.
Then the audience started breaking up and moving around and stuff. The remote control was king.
Then they started moving DW around to chase a different bit of audience.
And then they decided it didn't work done that way.
What was that bit in the middle where 45 minute episodes were deemed not to work?
... I'd have to actually watch them to find out.
Do I want to watch the 6th Doctor with my brain actually working?
I've been thinking about episode structure because I've been thinking about writing some.
US style advert cliffhangers can be godawful cheesy, lacking in tension, resolved by someone shouting 'wait!'... no, that's DW, isn't it? Er, anyway, they can be bad, but the effect once you take the ad breaks themselves out is...
... I over geek on the metaphor here but I can't think of a less geek one. oh dear...
It's like magnets in an accelerator.
You've got the plot whizzing along. You give it a kick at the start, usually with a pre-credits sequence. Then it hits these fixed points in sequence and each give it a boost. And timing is critical - too soon and it's more like a stumble than a boost, too late and you're lucky to maintain speed.
Alt metaphor - rollercoaster.
Then you've got the long slow climb at the start. Things build up and up and up until they just *whoosh* and then you've got like loops and tall bits and all that. Only if you haven't built up enough momentum you get half way up the tall bits and never hit the next big *whoosh* cause everyone's got off to push already. Sort of thing.
And that longlonglong bit at the start of Leisure Hive isn't right, cause it doesn't go up and up at all, it's just trundling along a beach. There's no whoosh. To even get to the whoosh you either have to dig a really big hole or start the build up process, late, and with all that long bit wasted. Unless boredom is actually the intended effect.
Running along corridors is not in fact *whoosh*, cause things neither improve nor deteriorate, go up or down, they're just going along. No build up, no boost. You can't do much of that before losing momentum.
No, really. Even if it is traditional. Even if the characters are running, the plot is not.
SO... I have a theory about what I'll find if I watch the old 45 minute eps - they'll be structured like the 25 minute ones, with a kick at the end to get you into next week. And then they wouldn't work.
Since I haven't looked yet, I could well be wrong.
Now the modern eps - the good ones anyway, there's always a Random Shoes lurking in potentia - they take the US model lessons to heart. And I don't think it's so they can sell. It's because we all watched Buffy for 7 years, on BBC2, with the ad breaks taken out - *and the structure still works*. Because all that energy meant to get you past a boring bit of people trying to sell you stuff instead gets you into the next ten minutes without actually losing momentum through commmercials. They build up with more energy in the UK exhibition context. Really fast roller coaster.
There's potential to go off the rails some if a particular development really needs time to sink in... but they still save the big ones for the end of the episode, so that should work fine.
Less well on DVD when you can just watch them all in one gulp. Or the turn around in mood between Torchwood 1-12 and 1-13, where I couldn't really react to both at once cause they needed different mood muscles. Showing eps as doubles that were only made as one at a times has different effects.
Now some of the complaining I've heard/read - and it is definitely complaining - blames US television, MTV, and the tartrazine generation, all for a lack of attention span and tendency to chop story into 5 minute chunks and be forever moving on. And... well, I haven't the psych study to back me up here, but here's an alternative possibility: Modern readers 'get' the language of TV much quicker, so they don't need to stay with something so long to know what's going on.
It's not a negative no-attention-span thing, it's a positive grasps-quickly thing.
I mean, how often do you watch ye ancient reruns and wish they'd get moving cause you get it already?
There was a bit in one of the early About Time volumes about how there was a phase of thinking young kids want flashy choppy images and short attention span stuff, whereas all the research says they want a sort of tension between known and not-yet-known, suspense building up to predictable. Hmmm, did it say that? Book is in library. But... which age kids, when the research, and is both sets of idea missing how modern readers work?
If someone has to watch a whole minute of empty beach before getting the idea that this beach is indeed empty... no, can't really imagine that. Anyway. If someone can watch a montage of shots, say like when the light sweeps across the room and the people move but not significantly, like was used in two different sections of TW 2-12, then you can get empty-boring-beach without empty-boring-shot and it doesn't even take as long. Bore the characters, not the audience!
If readers are better at TV language then they don't have to pay attention for so long, is what I'm saying.
And we can pay attention to other things at once.
I mean, it's all very well talking about The Good Old Days where the whole family sat together and ate and watched Doctor Who, but really that means getting a running commentary from every family member, which is multi tasking, of a sort.
The classic thing to say about the difference between cinema and television is exactly that, the way cinema gets full attention in a dark room where television happens in a context of a whole bunch of other people, or other tasks, or other data sources.
I watch most things while sat at my computer. Not DW and TW, but most other things. I'll be checking email, LJ, my newspapers page, all that.
DW is way more interesting than news.
With so much competition for attention - other channels, other data sources, other media - then TV has to have an attention getter *often*, or you lose people for five minutes while you wander around corridors and they blog about it. People will, in effect, go to commercials on their own, unless you keep giving them fresh reasons not to.
And *that's* why the structure of New Series Doctor Who is different.
We're not slavishly imitating the USA for the money.
We're reacting to shared changes in exhibition context, not just in the multi channel TV environment, but in the changed family life and media reading habits of the viewing audience.
... now if I can 'prove' that with some close reading and theory quotes, I have me an essay.
Except I'm not sure I want to essay on that one.
... actually to be honest it's more like I'm not sure I want to hand in that essay. I wants to write an essay for all those questions.
:eyeroll: