Comments on: Media Life

By: KF

KF — Sun, 22 Oct 2006 15:51:07 +0000

Hi there, Person. I have to say that, overall, I agree with you—I want the stylistic innovation that these series are experimenting with to be put to the use of something more important on the level of ideas, in the same way that I want stylistic innovation in the novel to be at the service of some significant meaning, rather than simply being postmodern fun & games for their own superficial sake. And I absolutely agree with your readings of the shortcomings of Gilmore Girls (which has become tedious) and Studio 60 (which is alarmingly quickly threatening to do the same). I don’t so much agree about The Wire, or perhaps I don’t quite see what you’re pointing out in the show’s simultaneous use and subversion of conventions, which strikes me as being a pretty sophisticated mode of exploring the structure and function of narrative. That said, your overall point is well taken, and was hardly confrontational. Thanks.

By: Person

Person — Sun, 22 Oct 2006 01:36:58 +0000

I would have to say that I have been trying to wrap my head around the complexity issue, ie good/bad measured by level of complexity. Just as Sudoku has been described as something that “challenges but does not enlighten,” there is a degree to which certain forms of “complex” television challenge but do not inform. For all the fast talk and references of a show like Studio 60, The Wire or The Gilmore Girls, they are only good, from my assessment, if they provide support and thoughtful encouragement to their audience.

The Wire is effective because it give me the sense that television can still be intrepid and explore the relationships that divide us and bring us together. But when the show gets too involved in character molds, genre and other conventions that it obviously fights, it loses value to me. similarly, if the Gilmore Girls gets too much into talking fast for the sake of it, or if Studio 60 refers to Faust to seem smart, I feel stifled.

I would rather see the Gilmore Girls showing some of the interesting nuances and frustrations of mother/daughter relationships being tested by economic and social distances (it really helps to explain the phenomenon of the “hip mama” lampooned very nicely in “Mean Girls"). I also like Studio 60 when it shows the nuances of and frustrations of working as a media professional in an industrial context.

But finally, it is essential that these shows reveal a working ethic that they can reaffirm. Networks hate presenting consistent ethical systems because ethics force networks into decisions based upon something other than economic considerations. I could say more but I am sure I’ve been confrontational enough.

By: KF

KF — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 01:19:47 +0000

But e.—pulp novels and porn magazines require cognitive work too, don’t they? To compare some shows to them is not to say that they’re brainless, only to say that they do have different goals, and require different work.

And I’m not thinking Everybody Loves Raymond when I talk about these pulp forms of TV. I’m thinking Fear Factor. Or the E! True Hollywood Story.

But, in answer to your second quote, for me, complex is good. I want to be challenged a little. I don’t think this goes against my argument, because complex != “high,” at least not necessarily....

By: e. fiction

e. fiction — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 00:58:46 +0000

I guess what I mean to say is: is “literary” something that TV shows should aspire to be at their very best? And if that is the claim you’re making, does it go against the broader aims of your work?

By: e. fiction

e. fiction — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 00:50:03 +0000

I have a feeling that I’m going to be playing the part of Mr. Obvious, but I’ve played that role before and I’m sure I’ll play it again.

I am curious about the persistence of a high/low distinction in your comment that “there will always be the pulp novels and porn magazines of television, too.” If what’s “literary” about television is its demand on the audience to interpret dialogue, trace character & plot development, and catch allusions, isn’t the very act of engaging with a TV show (as opposed to the quality of the show itself) a “literary” act? I guess another way to ask this is, when you say “complex characters” and “nuanced plot,” are complexity and nuance essential to your argument? (And I ask that as a genuine question.)

You see where this is headed: even a boneheaded show like Everybody Loves Raymond requires cognitive work on the part of its audience (to develop knowledge of its characters, to catch its cultural references & inter-episode developments, etc.). So, if a bad novel can rely too heavily on flat characters and predictable plot devices and still be undisputably a novel, why do the literary qualities of a TV depend on their aesthetic goodness for their very existence?

By: KF

KF — Sun, 08 Oct 2006 23:36:50 +0000

Thanks, Jason—I’ll have to go read your article. I’m a bit less willing to dump the idea of the “novelistic,” though, not because I don’t see television as a mature form unto itself (which I’m sure you already know), but because “novelistic” or “literary” function as a kind of code for “worth taking seriously.” Yes, of course, media culture should be worth taking seriously on its own terms, without having to claim some affiliation with “high” culture, but I have a vested interest (witness the entire project) in disrupting the position espoused by much of the literati that television is somehow stealing the novel’s audience, that television is dumbing down the culture, that television is making literature less important and us less literate. And so my arguments in this interview are primarily aimed not at suggesting that the particular narrative structures of the novel and television are all that comparable, but rather that television demands complex reading strategies, much like those of serious literature, and thus must make us question what we label “literary” and why.

By: Jason Mittell

Jason Mittell — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 19:36:02 +0000

I agree with all of your points about television narrative, except for evoking terms like “literary” and “novelistic” to describe complex TV narration (which comes more from the interviewer than KF). What such programs do with storytelling strategies is rarely parallel to the strengths of the novel - depth of character interiority, narrative voice, formal play, etc. Rather this type of television should be hailed on its own medium terms - it’s televisual in its most complex & mature form yet seen - rather than held up as legitimate simply by linking it to a more valued cultural form.

(And in the shameless self-promotion dept., I have an article in the new issue of Velvet Light Trap about these very narrative strategies in contemporary programming, downloadable in manuscript form from my website linked above...)