This document discusses several genres and subgenres of TV drama, including their defining characteristics and conventions. Crime drama settings involve dangerous cities and include crime solvers, victims, and criminals as characters. The crime is always solved by the end. Soap operas focus on domestic relationships and feature ongoing storylines. Medical dramas are set in hospitals and feature doctors and nurses dealing with medical crises. Costume dramas are set in the past and rely on historical costumes and settings to immerse viewers. Narrative theories also inform TV drama structure and characters.
2. Definition of Genre?
A category of artistic composition, as in music or
literature, characterized by similarities in
form, style, or subject matter. Examples being
horror, Comedy, romance and action.
3. Definition of sub Genre
• A subcategory within a particular genre.
• Examples include: crime, soaps, medical and
costume (period)
4. Conventions of Crime
Setting- Crime genre are set in a well known city or capital that is created to be a dangerous place
this is because there is a high crime rate there.
Characters- are crime solvers, criminals, victims, family and friends of victim.
Narrative- includes a crime that needs to be solved, at the end the crime is solved and criminal is
punished, lead characters will have a back story and include there personal life in the narrative,
there is also a mystery for the audience to solve.
Camera angles- the camera normally follows the detective who is solving the crime, there is close
ups and extreme close ups when the crime is on the verge of being solved or intense moments.
Lighting- the lighting is often dark when showing the criminal and the criminal is in dark clothes this
is to stereotype of a criminal.
Props- include guns, weapons, laboratory equipment, police cars/banners, magnifying glass and
newspapers.
Music- unusually a monotone humming in the background to create tension towards the audience.
5. How do we know Crime is a TV
Drama?
• Involves a crime and a criminal.
• Is a program not a film.
• Follows the different types of characters.
• The crime is always solved by the end of the
episode or series.
6. • Conventions that are found in soap operas include:
• Domestic themes and personal or family relationships occur
repeatedly between the characters to allow for the audience to
connect to these and for the soap to be as realistic as possible.
• Setting – The setting of soap operas are usually set around a
small, central area where the soap opera is filmed. These place
a lot of important on the community as they’re often set in
familiar and realistic surroundings.
• Central meeting points – These are points in the soap opera
where all the characters regularly go to interact with one
another.
• Cliff hangers – These are used when a dramatic situation
happens in the soap but the end is not shown until the next
episode to keep the audience wanting more and wanting to
watch it again.
• Characters – these are used to allow for the audience to relate
to the situation and the help pilot the plot.
Conventions of Soap opera
7. • On going – Series do not have a particular start or end as they usually run all year
round.
• Scheduling – Soaps are usually scheduled for target audience and is usually shown
on specific days and specific times related to the target audience.
• Includes real life issues – things like death, birth and marriage are often shown to
make the soap as real as possible.
8. Medical drama
A medical drama is a television drama in which
events center upon a hospital, an ambulance
staff, or any medical area.
Medical/hospital dramas play on the human
fascination of witnessing horrific events. They
often share narrative similarities with soaps but
can also be more informative/educational than
soaps
Casualty, Holby city, ER
9. conventions between all medical
dramas
A convention is a widely accepted device used in
television dramas.
Plot
Setting – ambulance, hospital
Characters – doctors, nurses
Themes
Narrative
10. Costume Conventions
• Any costume dramas are set in earlier
times and will be understood and
interpreted by the audience through a
sense of how those times were different.
• Costume dramas give the audience a sense
of how life in those days were different to
how life is today and the different aspects.
• Relies heavily on mise en scene due to the
costumes, props, lighting and setting.
• Plotline usually concentrates on
love, family and relationships.
11. Costume TV dramas as usually based upon/or simply includes a
distinguished historical event that occurred. They also feature
characters from that historical event to clarify the event properly.
12. Narrative theoriests
Russian theorist, Tzvetan Todorov, suggests that all narratives follow a three part
structure. They begin with equilibrium, where everything is balanced, progress as
something comes along to disrupt that equilibrium, and finally reach a resolution,
when equilibrium is restored this is used in the TV drama’s crime, medical and
costume.
Vladimir Propp, who came up with the theory that there are only a certain
number of characters, who appear in narratives. It is easy to spot the hero and
villain in most cases. Example is the hero who leads the narrative, is usually
looking for something to solve like a mystery.
Claude Levi-Strauss suggested that all narratives had to be by conflict that was
cause by a series of opposing forces. he called this the theory of Binary
Opposition, and it is used to describe how each narrative has its equal and
opposite. Examples include good/evil or poverty/wealth.
