lwu

Literatur in Wissenschaft und Unterricht

Theme Issue:
Serial Narratives
Kathleen Loock (Ed.)

XLVII . 1/2 . 2014

Literatur in Wissenschaft und Unterricht
ISSN 0024-4643

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lwu
Literatur in Wissenschaft und Unterricht
XLVII . 1/2 . 2014
Inhalt / Contents

Kathleen Loock:
Introduction: Serial Narratives.................................................................................5

Ilka Brasch:
Narrative, Technology, and the
Operational Aesthetic in Film Serials of the 1910s...............................................11

Rudmer Canjels:
Sensational Programs without Head and Tail: Transforming
and Distributing American Silent Film Serials in the Netherlands.........................25

Phyll Smith:
“Poisoning their daydreams”: American Serial Cinema,
Moral Panic and the British Children’s Cinema Movement................................39

Björn Hochschild:
Superhero Comics and the Potential for Continuation:
Identity and Temporality in Alan Moore’s Watchmen..........................................55

Guy Risko:
More than a Gangster: Trilogies, Genre, and The Godfather...............................67

Kathleen Loock:
“The past is never really past”:
Serial Storytelling from Psycho to Bates Motel....................................................81

Agnieszka Rasmus:
“I know where I’ve seen you before!”: Hollywood Remakes
of British Films, from DVD Box Sets to the Online Debate.................................97

Marla Harris:
No Longer Watching for the Plot?:
The Crime Drama Bron/Broën and Its Adaptations............................................111

Maria Sulimma:
Simultaneous Seriality:
On the Crossmedia Relationship of Television Narratives.................................127
Robyn Warhol:
Binge-watching:
How Netflix Original Programs Are Changing Serial Form..............................145

Nathalie Knöhr:
The Professional Practice of Serial Audio
Drama Production in the Age of Digitization.....................................................159

Ursula Ganz-Blättler:
The Medium Is the Audience:
Successive Talk as Narrative Pleasure................................................................175

Bettina Soller:
Fan Fiction and Soap Operas:
On the Seriality of Vast Narratives......................................................................191

Reviews
Shane Denson: Postnaturalism: Franken­stein, Film, and
the Anthropotechnical Inter­face (Dennis Büscher-Ulbrich)................................207
Carlen Lavigne (ed.): Remake Television:
­Reboot, Re-use, Recycle (Marla Harris)...............................................................208
Frank Kelleter: Serial Agencies:
The Wire and Its Readers (Marcel Hartwig).......................................................209
Sarah Schaschek: Pornography and S­ eriality:
The Culture of Producing Pleasure (Madita Oeming).......................................210
Rob Allen and Thijs van den Berg (eds.):
Serialization in Popular Culture (Daniel Stein).....................................................211
Amanda D. Lotz: Cable Guys: Television and
Masculinities in the 21st Century (Maria Sulimma).............................................212

Notes on Contributors......................................................................................215

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 Introduction: Serial Narratives
Since the nineteenth century, serial narration has been a preferred mode of popular
storytelling. From serialized novels to comic strips and film serials, from radio
plays and television series to video games and digital forms of storytelling – serial
narratives have proven to be an effective means of attracting and engaging mass
audiences, especially when new technologies (like the mass-production of cheap
novels or color print in newspapers) and new mass media (like film, radio, television,
or the internet) emerged.1 In a capitalist market society, serial narratives “[make]
excellent economic sense,” as Jennifer Hayward has observed (2). Producers can rely
on recurrent characters, ongoing storylines, and delayed narrative closure in order
to generate audience desire for future installments. In that regard, serial narratives
essentially promote themselves and the medium in which they appear, as consumers
must continue to read, watch, or listen over extended periods of time if they want to
gain access to the full story. Yet, seriality is more than a market-oriented production
and distribution mechanism that relies on standardization, schematization, and
sheer endless possibilities for variation and continuation. As a storytelling format,
seriality comes with a well-developed set of aesthetic practices and pleasures for
audiences that help explain the continuing popularity of serial narratives.2 The
particular appeal of a television series, for instance, may lie in ritualized viewing
practices, in a long-term emotional engagement with fictional characters and their
experiences, or in creative responses like fan fiction.
Up until the last decade, serial narratives have attracted little academic attention
because they were often considered trivial or ideologically tainted evils of modern
mass culture. Some of the early studies date back to the 1980s and 1990s and have
mostly focused on specific media or genres such as the nineteenth-century serialized
novel printed in magazines and newspapers or the television series, in particular
the soap opera.3 With the rise of so-called ‘quality TV’4 since the late 1990s and
early 2000s, academic interest in television has been steadily increasing, as scholars
from different disciplines explore the new aesthetics, narrative complexity, and
cultural work of shows like The Sopranos (HBO, 1999-2007), The Wire (HBO,
2002-2008), Mad Men (AMC, 2007-), and Breaking Bad (AMC, 2008-2013).5
This development has coincided with a boom in comic studies, where a number
of academics seek to investigate the serial dimension of the medium – from early

1 Cf. Hagedorn 28-29; Hayward 1-2.

2 This view on seriality is based on the theoretical framework of the interdisciplinary Research
Unit “Popular Seriality – Aesthetics and Practice” (www.popularseriality.de/en/); see also
Kelleter, “Populäre Serialität.”
3 On the serialized novel, see Radway; Vann; Neuschäfer, Fritz-El Ahmad, and Walter; Hughes
and Lund; Lund; Sutherland; Hayward; Law; and Payne. On television shows, see Ang;
Hickethier; Allen, Speaking and To Be Continued; and Schneider. Stedman’s book on film,
radio, and television serials was already published in 1971.
4 On the concept of ‘quality TV,’ see, for example, Jancovich and Lyons; McCabe and Akass;
as well as Blanchet et al. On the pay-TV channel HBO in particular, see Edgerton and Jones;
and Leverette, Lott, and Buckley. Earlier discourses on ‘quality TV’ can be found in Feuer,
Kerr, and Vahimagi; and Thompson.
5 Publications with a special focus on the serial format of these new television shows include
Allrath and Gymnich; Kelleter, Serial Agencies; and Mittell.

5
newspaper comic strips to the graphic novel.6 Even more recently, attempts have
been made to situate different medium-specific serial narratives within a larger
theoretical framework of serialization. They are informed by approaches which
foreground technological and institutional affordances of the evolving media
landscape and correlating possibilities for audience participation and fandoms.7
The result is an emerging field of seriality studies that examines serialization as
a dynamic practice which crosses media boundaries and constantly adapts to the
ever-changing media landscape and its latest technological innovations.
This special issue seeks to make an original contribution to the field of seriality
studies. It explores narrative, cultural, and historical dimensions of serial narratives
in an effort to come to terms with their changing forms and functions within the
field of popular culture. Altogether thirteen essays from leading and emerging
scholars in the fields of film and media studies, literary studies, cultural history,
ethnography and American studies address questions relating to the production
and reception of serial narratives in the past and present. How can the evolution of
serial forms be understood within particular theoretical frameworks? How does the
sprawl of serial narratives across different media challenge established notions of
authorship, narrative closure, and cultural legitimacy? How does it work to increase
audience loyalty and engagement? How do authors and producers respond to new
modes of consumption that differ from the ritualized experience of daily, weekly
or monthly installments? Do DVD sets, VOD (Video-on-Demand) services, and
streaming require new narrative strategies and storytelling techniques to satisfy the
repeat viewer of television series or the binge viewer, who consumes more than
one episode (sometimes even entire seasons) in one sitting? What effect has the
so-called ‘second screen’ (i.e. activities on laptops, tablets or smartphones that take
place in online forums while users are watching a television program on a ‘primary
screen’) on viewing experiences and (the semblance of) audience participation?
The first three essays engage with the still undertheorized film serial: Ilka
Brasch shows how the silent film serial’s specific mode of serial storytelling was
closely linked to the latest technological inventions of the 1910s and encouraged
a critical reflection of its own narrative organization. Rudmer Canjels extends this
analysis of American-made silent film serials with a focus on their distribution
in the Netherlands during the 1910s and 1920s, where they were often re-edited,
adjusted to local screening customs, and ultimately shown in a different way than
originally intended. Phyll Smith then turns to the production of British sound serials
in the 1940s, following immediately after the end of World War II. He addresses the
public debates surrounding the moral and psychological effects of film serials upon
their audiences and outlines how British producers created a distinct and influential
serial product which outlived the U.S. film serial industry and developed models
of seriality for contemporary British children’s television.
The second group of essays deals with serial transformations of iconic figures,
from American superheroes to the Godfather and Norman Bates. Björn Hochschild
argues that Alan Moore’s comic series Watchmen not only reflects on the identity and
history of American superheroes but also on the possibilities of representing time
that its own medium affords, and relates these ideas to challenges of temporality

6 See, for example, Ditschke, Kroucheva and Stein; Stein, Meyer, and Edlich; Gardner; Stein
and Thon.
7 See Blanchet et al.; Kelleter, Populäre Serialität; Mayer; Allen and van den Berg.

6
and seriality during the comic reading process. Guy Risko’s essay on Francis Ford
Coppola’s Godfather trilogy offers a theoretical approach that helps to understand
how the second and third film need to re-configure and re-invent the predecessor(s)
in order to create a beginning/middle/end structure for the entire trilogy. My own
contribution is concerned with the long-running Psycho franchise. I argue that the
films and television series, which function either as sequel, remake, spin-off or
prequel in relation to Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 classic, all build on the preexisting
narrative and memory of the original, treating it as an authoritative intertext. At
the same time, they mutually influence each other’s meaning(s) and affect the
viewers’ understanding of the Norman-Bates-character in an increasingly serialized
and complex storyworld.
The next group of essays opens transnational and transmedia perspectives on
serial storytelling. First, Agnieszka Rasmus looks at Hollywood remakes of British
films that were produced between 1995 and 2005. With a special focus on the DVD
releases of these films, she argues that former strategies of disavowal were gradually
replaced by extensive original-remake commentaries that address issues of seriality
and cater to audiences who find pleasure in (inter)active viewing practices. Then,
Marla Harris examines the current wave of transnational television remakes. She
focuses on the Swedish-Danish crime series Bron/Broen (SVT1/DR1, 2011-), the
remade U.S. version The Bridge (FX, 2013-2014), and the British-French co-pro-
duction The Tunnel (Sky Atlantic/Canal+, 2013-), and seeks to understand how
competition affects the viewing experience, as iTunes, Netflix, and Hulu, along with
the online ‘recap industry,’ attract audiences that are eager to watch multiple versions
of a serial narrative. Maria Sulimma complements the issues raised in this section
with an essay that explores the interactions between the different, simultaneously
progressing serial narratives that belong to the Walking Dead franchise: the comic
book series, AMC’s television show (2010-), and the video game.
The last group of essays deals with the new media and their effect on the serial
form. First, Robyn Warhol suggests that, in order to increase subscription rates and
compete with U.S. American premium TV channels like HBO, Netflix original
programming counts on ‘binge-watching’ to anchor its business model. To capitalize
on the ‘bingeing’ format that allows to stream episodes of the Netflix series Arrested
Development (2013), House of Cards (2013-), and Orange is the New Black (2013-)
in rapid succession, Netflix introduces innovations and departs from traditional
serial patterns. Next, Nathalie Knöhr’s essay examines the production of the popular
German audio play Die drei ??? (The Three Investigators), and asks how a digital
fan culture is changing the production process of the long-running series. Ursula
Ganz-Blättler then maintains that serial narratives do not only provide entertainment
by successfully feeding content to audiences but also by catering to the social need to
share one’s particular pleasure with recurring characters, their trials and tribulations
with others. In her essay, she analyzes the participatory pleasures and social functions
generated by ‘second screen’ communication about serial narratives. Finally, Bettina
Soller proposes that fan fiction should not only be examined as a form of literary
adaptation. Fan fiction, she argues, serializes the content and fictional universes of
existing media texts (like Joanne K. Rowling’s Harry Potter or Stephenie Meyer’s
Twilight series), and fan-produced texts themselves usually appear online in serial
installments and must therefore be understood as an audience practice that is located
within the dynamics of serialization in popular culture.

7
 This special issue concludes with a section of book reviews that covers some of
the recent publications in the field of seriality studies and fittingly complements the
wide range of seriality-related questions addressed in the essays. Overall, the aim is
to bring different, interdisciplinary perspectives to the analysis of serial narratives
that will contribute to a deeper understanding of their forms and functions, and,
more generally, to the ongoing research that is being done in seriality studies. It
therefore seems only appropriate to end this introduction with the exact same words
Robert C. Allen already used twenty years ago, when he stated that this “is work
that, like the form it analyzes, is necessarily ‘to be continued’” (“Introduction” 24).

Berlin Kathleen Loock

Works Cited
Allen, Robert C. “Introduction.” To Be Continued …: Soap Operas Around the
World. Ed. Allen. London/New York: Routledge, 1995. 1-26.
---. Speaking of Soap Operas. Chapel Hill, NC: U of North Carolina P, 1985.
---, ed. To Be Continued …: Soap Operas Around the World. London/New York:
Routledge, 1995.
Allen, Rob, and Thijs van den Berg, eds. Serialization in Popular Culture. New
York: Routledge, 2014.
Allrath, Gaby, and Marion Gymnich, eds. Narrative Strategies in Television Series.
Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2005.
Ang, Ien. Watching Dallas: Soap Opera and the Melodramatic Imagination. New
York: Methuen, 1985.
Blanchet, Robert, Kristina Köhler, Tereza Smid, and Julia Zutavern, eds. Serielle
Formen: Von den frühen Film-Serials zu aktuellen Quality-TV- und Online-
Serien. Marburg: Schüren, 2011.
Ditschke, Stephan, Katerina Kroucheva, and Daniel Stein, eds. Comics: Zur
­Geschichte und Theorie eines populärkulturellen Mediums. Bielefeld: transcript,
2009.
Edgerton, Gary R., and Jeffrey P. Jones, eds. The Essential HBO Reader. Lexington,
KY: U of Kentucky P, 2008.
Feuer, Jane, Paul Kerr, and Tise Vahimagi, eds. MTM “Quality Television.” London:
BFI, 1984.
Gardner, Jared. Projections: Comics and the History of Twenty-First-Century
­Storytelling. Stanford, CA: Stanford UP, 2012.
Hagedorn, Roger. “Doubtless to Be Continued: A Brief History of Serial Narrative.”
To Be Continued …: Soap Operas Around the World. Ed. Robert C. Allen.
London/New York: Routledge, 1995. 27-48.
Hayward, Jennifer. Consuming Pleasures: Active Audiences and Serial Fictions
form Dickens to Soap Opera. Lexington, KY: U of Kentucky P, 1997.
Hickethier, Knut. Die Fernsehserie und das Serielle des Fernsehens. Lüneburg:
Universität Lüneburg, 1991.

8
Hughes, Linda K., and Michael Lund. The Victorian Serial. Charlottesville, VA:
UP of Virginia, 1991.
Jancovich, Mark, and James Lyons, eds. Quality Popular Television: Cult TV, the
Industry, and Fans. London: BFI, 2003.
Kelleter, Frank. “Populäre Serialität: Eine Einführung.” Populäre Serialität:
­Narration – Evolution – Distinktion. Zum seriellen Erzählen seit dem 19. Jahr-
hundert. Ed. Kelleter. Bielefeld: transcript, 2012. 11-46.
---, ed. Populäre Serialität: Narration – Evolution – Distinktion. Zum seriellen
Erzählen seit dem 19. Jahrhundert. Bielefeld: transcript, 2012.
---. Serial Agencies. Winchester: Zero Books, 2014.
Law, Graham. Serializing Fiction in the Victorian Press. Basingstoke: Palgrave,
2000.
Leverette, Marc, Brian L. Lott, and Cara Louise Buckley, eds. It’s not TV: Watching
HBO in the Post-Television Era. New York: Routledge, 2008.
Lund, Michael. America’s Continuing Story: An Introduction to Serial Fiction,
1850-1900. Detroit, MI: Wayne State UP, 1993.
Mayer, Ruth. Serial Fu Manchu: The Chinese Supervillain and the Spread of Yellow
Peril Ideology. Philadelphia, PA: Temple UP, 2013.
McCabe, Janet, and Kim Akass, eds. Quality TV: Contemporary American Television
and Beyond. London/New York: Tauris, 2007.
Mittell, Jason. Complex TV: The Poetics of Contemporary Television Storytelling.
New York: New York UP, 2015.
Neuschäfer, Hans-Jörg, Dorothee Fritz-El Ahmad, and Klaus-Peter Walter. Der
französische Feuilletonroman: Die Entstehung der Serienliteratur im Medium
der Tageszeitung. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1986.
Payne, David. The Reenchantment of Nineteenth-Century Fiction: Dickens,
­Thackeray, George Eliot, and Serialization. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan,
2005.
Radway, Janice. Reading the Romance: Women, Patriarchy, and Popular Literature.
Chapel Hill, NC: U of North Carolina P, 1984.
Schneider, Irmela, ed. Serien-Welten: Strukturen US-amerikanischer Serien aus
vier Jahrzehnten. Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1995.
Stedman, Raymond William. The Serials: Suspense and Drama by Installment.
Norman, OK: U of Oklahoma P, 1971.
Stein, Daniel, and Jan-Noël Thon, eds. From Comic Strips to Graphic Novels:
Contributions to the Theory and History of Graphic Narrative. Berlin: De
Gruyter, 2013.
---, Christina Meyer, and Micha Edlich, eds. American Comic Books and Graphic
Novels. Special issue of Amerikastudien/American Studies 56.4 (2011).
Sutherland, John. Victorian Fiction: Writers, Publishers, Readers. Basingstoke:
Macmillan, 1995.
Thompson, Robert J. Television’s Second Golden Age: From Hill Street Blues to
ER. New York: Continuum, 1996.
Vann, J. Don. Victorian Novels in Serial. New York: MLA, 1985.

9
 Narrative, Technology, and the Operational
Aesthetic in Film Serials of the 1910s
Those who say that there is nothing new under the sun may be correct in the strictest sense
of the word, but the fact remains that there occasionally appears something which if not
altogether new is such an ingenious combination of things already known as to appear
actually novel. (“Pathé Serial Marks Era”)

Motion Picture News printed these words on December 19, 1914, in an article
describing the upcoming release of Pathé’s film serial The Exploits of Elaine. Published
a week before the release of the first episode, the essay stresses the novel character
of the serial, without neglecting its indebtedness to established cinematic forms. It
attributes the innovative aspects of the serial to the author, Arthur B. Reeve, who
wrote the script in association with Charles W. Goddard of Pathé studios. Reeve
was known for a series of short stories that appeared in the Cosmopolitan between
1910 and 1918, which revolve around the adventures of a Columbia University
professor who employs scientific and technological inventions in crime detection.
Reeve’s protagonist, Craig Kennedy, also figures as the central hero of The Exploits
of Elaine. As the article highlights, the serial is provided with an “added value […]
by the fact that his hero makes use of genuine scientific methods in the detection of
crime” (“Pathé Serial Marks Era”). It stresses Reeve’s interest in and knowledge of
new scientific discoveries. Allegedly, Reeve’s showcasing of devices in his short
stories had already sparked numerous purchases by police authorities. Additionally,
the presentation of science and technology was thought to provide the serial with an
advanced attractive formula, in contrast to established norms of serial storytelling.
Motion Picture News sums up that “the general scheme of the serial will be to
present a series of high class scientific detective stories. Instead of thrills created
by smashing property, there will be those caused by tense situations and marvelous
achievements of science” (“Pathé Serial Marks Era”).
As much as it praises Elaine’s innovativeness, this last comment simultaneously
points to the prejudices against film serials that circulated at the time. Film serials
were flooding the market in numbers that caused trade papers to dub 1914 “The
Year of the Serial” (Vela 41). Since Edison had released What Happened to Mary
in 1912, there seemed to be an endless iteration of regularly recurring, daring
heroines on American theater screens. The frequency with which they crashed cars
and other vehicles or ended up in burning buildings is what led Motion Picture
News to point to the “thrills created by smashing property.” It is the prevalence of
these daring ladies that caused film scholar Ben Singer to subsume most serials of
the time under the umbrella term serial-queen melodrama. According to Singer,
sensational melodrama was the only genre for film serials in the 1910s. Even though
individual serials would take up themes and imagery from detective, Western,
gothic, or other genres, they all were sensationalist in that they focused on action,
violence, fast-paced chases, and last-minute rescues (198). Similarly, Shelley Stamp
points to the many resemblances between different serials and their storylines,
albeit also noticing prominent counter examples (126-28).1 Both scholars arrive

1 Stamp mentions The Mystery of the Double Cross (Astra Film, 1917), in which a male hero
fights to gain his wealthy father’s inheritance (128).

11
at the conclusion that film serials are all the same, yet not quite. Their assessment
parallels the quote about The Exploits of Elaine heading this essay, which describes
the serial not as new, but as an assembly of themes and images that in combination
constitute something novel. However much this description of the serial was part
of Pathé’s own publicity campaign, considering film serials as a kind of montage of
numerous influences into one established formula seems to be a fruitful endeavor.
Instead of viewing The Exploits of Elaine as just another stage for international
film star Pearl White and as a remake of Pathé’s successful serial The Perils of
Pauline (1914), the following pages will study the staging of technology, which
Pathé’s advertisements foreground. Each episode of The Exploits of Elaine features
at least one technological or scientific invention and demonstrates its use. As I will
show, the serial thus caters to the audience’s interest in science, technology, and
mechanical processes. Moreover, the serial employs novel mechanisms in order to
exemplify its own narrative organization and its strategies of cinematic storytelling
more generally. I will further pinpoint how the diegetic technologies presented in
the serial enable and encourage a critical reflection of the serial’s specifically serial
mode of storytelling and of the repetitive aspects of its narrative.
Connecting and Surveilling Spaces: The Vocaphone
The Exploits of Elaine was released in weekly installments starting on the last
Monday in 1914.2 The story concerns Elaine Dodge (Pearl White), whose father
gains possession of secret papers revealing the true identity of an infamous villain
called the Clutching Hand (Sheldon Lewis). In the first episode, the Clutching Hand
employs a complex electrical and scientific set-up to murder Elaine’s father, and
Craig Kennedy (Arnold Daly) takes up the investigation. The ensuing episodes show
how Kennedy and his journalist companion Jameson (Creighton Hale) attempt to
identify and catch the Clutching Hand and how they thwart the villain’s attacks
on Kennedy, Jameson, and Elaine. Additionally, the serial features an interspersed
love-plot in which Elaine eventually chooses Kennedy over her lawyer Bennett
(Sheldon Lewis). Shelley Stamp stresses that although the serial is named for the
serial-queen, Elaine takes a minor role in favor of the much more central detective.
Moreover, Stamp highlights Elaine’s “loss of bodily and psychological control,”
for example, when the Clutching Hand enters her apartment at night and drugs her
in the second episode. In Stamp’s terms, “strong undercurrents of sexual violation
reverberate through the scenario” in this scene (135).
Both Kennedy as well as the Clutching Hand exploit novel inventions and
scientific knowledge, which trade papers continued to advertise as visual attractions.
Three months into the serial’s release, a Motion Picture News article highlights
the “Remarkable Mechanical Devices Used in ‘Elaine.’” Probably straight from
the studio’s press release (because an almost identical piece appeared in the trade
paper Motography), the article highlights that “the various remarkable mechanisms
shown are not the product of the studio workshop, but the genuine article, in one
instance at least the only one ever produced and tremendously costly” (32). The
Motography version features a closing statement, in which Theodore Wharton of
Pathé studios assures readers that

2 Like its predecessor, The Perils of Pauline, the Elaine serial appeared in synchronization with
a written tie-in in newspapers belonging to the syndicate of William Randolph Hearst (Mott
492-93).

12
 No, we are not faking any scientific apparatus in ‘The Exploits of Elaine.’ We don’t have
to. The inventors of these different remarkable machines voluntarily offer us the use
of their devices, feeling that the use of them in a motion picture with the circulation of
‘Elaine’ cannot help but bring new and valuable publicity. (“Remarkable Machines” 356)

In order to illustrate the mechanical inventions depicted in the serial, the article
lists the “vocaphone” (a loud speaking telephone cum surveillance mechanism), the
“electric resuscitator” (an early version of a defibrillator), and the “telegraphophone”
(an equivalent to today’s answering machine) (“Remarkable Mechanical Devices”
32). These and other mechanical marvels are not only a part of the serial’s mise-en-
scène. They appear much more prominently, as they are foregrounded in a storyline
that is arranged around their depiction and use. The diegetic characters demonstrate
individual mechanisms’ operation and optics, which are underscored by the use of
close-ups and tableau shots. The introduction of the “vocaphone” in episode eight,
“The Hidden Voice,” exemplifies the visual depiction of a novel mechanism as well
as its incorporation into the narrative. As I will show, the vocaphone is not just a
visual attraction, but it organizes the narrative and simultaneously serves to explain
the cinematographic techniques employed towards the conveyance of that narrative.

Figure 1: Detective Kennedy with the vocaphone at his laboratory desk.

Film still published alongside the serial’s written tie-in. Chicago Examiner
14 Feb. 1915: 42. Web. 25 Nov. 2014. <http://digital.chipublib.org>.

“The Hidden Voice” introduces the vocaphone in a comic sequence at the beginning
of the episode. The vocaphone is a loudspeaking telephone similar to an intercom,
which detective Kennedy hides in Jameson’s apartment. Kennedy then uses the
vocaphone to wake his young friend, who is asleep in his bed. Shots of Kennedy
at his laboratory’s desk are interspersed with shots of the cushions on Jameson’s
couch, underneath which Kennedy has hidden the vocaphone (Fig. 1). Kennedy’s
words appear in front of a still of these latter shots and they are illustrated similarly
to speech bubbles in comics. Having been urged to wake up several times, Jameson

13
climbs out of bed and scans his bedroom and an adjoining room for the sound’s
origin. Eventually, Kennedy submits “Look on the couch” through the mechanism.
When Jameson finds it, he answers: “What is that? Good luck Kennedy – to your
latest invention.”
This short sequence precedes any other plot development in the episode, and
it serves as a comic sketch that ridicules Jameson, who tousles his hair and has
obvious difficulties to gain consciousness after a good night’s sleep when Kennedy
is already up and awake in his laboratory. However, the scene also demonstrates the
operation and use of the vocaphone. It shows that the vocaphone does not need to
be picked up to function, and that there is no need to push a button before speaking.
Additionally, the scene clarifies that the vocaphone is loud enough to wake someone,
even when the mechanism is hidden under numerous pillows. Jameson’s answer also
indicates that the vocaphone works two ways, that Kennedy can address Jameson
and also hear what he replies. That knowledge about the vocaphone will be pivotal
for the audience to understand the episode’s climactic ending.
The vocaphone enables Kennedy’s aural and audible presence in the room. That
presence is additionally highlighted by the visualization of words that are specifically
not intertitles against a black background, but that are inserted in a film still of the
set and thus constitute an extra-diegetic mise-en-scène. This presence also points to
the surveillance function of the vocaphone. The sound transmission enabled by the
vocaphone merges with the cinematic camera in the sense that Kennedy seems to
know not only what he hears through the mechanism, but he also knows what the
audience sees. This becomes clear when Kennedy knows that Jameson did not get
up after the first call, and that Jameson was looking for the sound’s source after the
second call. Thus, Kennedy either bears a faultless intuition, or the vocaphone and
cinema’s own enabling apparatus merge into one master surveillance technology.
It is this surveillance function of the vocaphone, rather than the mechanism itself,
that will save Elaine in the end of the episode.
The detailed exhibition and explanation of the vocaphone suits the depiction
of an ingenious invention. However, an intertitle downplays the remarkable nature
of the apparatus before it is even shown: “Craig Kennedy, the scientific detective,
experiments on his friend Jameson, with his new Vocaphone, a recently invented
loud speaking phone.” Although it is difficult to pinpoint how novel the mechanism
would have appeared to the serial’s first audiences, the simple reference to the tele-
phone frames the vocaphone as new, but not as ground-breaking. After all, it is just
a slight alteration from the telephone, which was ubiquitous maybe not in private
households, but definitely on film screens (cf. Young). The vocaphone is thus marked
by a similar kind of novelty as the serial as a whole. Like the quote above this essay
stresses for The Exploits of Elaine, the vocaphone incorporates a combination of
known mechanisms and functions, rather than constituting entirely new technology.
Instead of its telephonic qualities, the most remarkable innovation included in the
vocaphone is its loud-speaking function. At the time, sound amplification was one of
the major problems to be solved both in phonography and in early advances toward the
establishment of sound film.3 Thus, the vocaphone is a novelty, but its close relation
to the telephone suggests a certain realism. Instead of over-the-top science fiction, the
serial presents a mechanism that is familiar and reasonable enough to be believable.
3 I am thankful to Shane Denson for pointing out sound amplification as the vocaphone’s chief
attraction.

14
 Figure 2: Detective Kennedy installs the vocaphone in a suit of armor.Film
still published alongside the serial’s written tie-in. Chicago Examiner 14
Feb. 1915: 43. Web. 25 Nov. 2014. <http://digital.chipublib.org>.

The episode that set out by demonstrating the use of the vocaphone ends in a climactic
scene, in which the Clutching Hand and one of his henchmen attack Elaine in her
parlor. Kennedy had previously hidden the vocaphone in a suit of armor that decorates
the room (Fig. 2). He is thus able to monitor the parlor and he hears when Elaine
is being attacked. Speaking into the vocaphone mechanism, Kennedy succeeds
to make the villains believe that someone in Elaine’s mansion called the police.
As a consequence, the crooks let go of the serial-queen and make a quick escape.
This turn of events is only understandable because the function of the vocaphone
and its possibilities of surveillance had been established at the beginning of the
episode. The narrative pattern of demonstration and application reoccurs several
times in The Exploits of Elaine, although not in every episode. Episode four, for
example, depicts a seismograph that Kennedy installs in his apartment. He shows
Jameson – and the audience – how the mechanism, which is hidden in the hallway,
allows the detective to monitor whether someone has entered his apartment during
his absence. Later in the episode, the seismograph will prove to be a life-saving
device because the Clutching Hand secretly sneaks into Kennedy’s apartment to set
up an elaborate death contraption involving several feet of string, a wall-mounted
picture of Elaine, and a revolver installed in the fireplace. Kennedy quickly notices
15
the danger, however, having been alerted via the seismograph. Similarly, the serial’s
final episode, “The Reckoning,” depicts Kennedy as he explains the use of an X-ray
to Jameson by scanning his hand. Shortly afterwards, the detective employs the
X-ray to scan a package delivered by a henchman of the Clutching Hand and he
discovers and disables a bomb hidden inside.4
The Operational Aesthetic
The strategy of presenting novel mechanisms in The Exploits of Elaine harks back
to what Tom Gunning has called the “Cinema of Attractions.” Gunning employs
this term to refer to short films made between 1895 and 1906 or 1907, which, as
he argues, first and foremost served to demonstrate film’s capacity to show moving
pictures (“The Cinema” 64). In the first decade of film exhibition and consumption,
film itself served as an attraction rather than the content depicted on screen (65).
This presentation of film as technology is connected to a broader nineteenth-century
culture of the public display of novel inventions. As Gunning stresses elsewhere,
film emerged
out of a tradition that has nearly been forgotten, the display of new technologies as
entertainment. Cinema simply joined a long list of new inventions that had been presented
to a paying public. During the latter part of the nineteenth century, audiences had gathered
to listen to concerts given over the phonograph and the telephone, and to watch demon-
strations of such new scientific marvels as X rays or incubators. (“Crazy Machines” 88)

Film’s indebtedness to this cultural context impacted the way in which early
audiences understood the short clips they were being shown. Gunning elaborates
on this with reference to the 1895 comic short film L’arroseur arrosé (Lumière).
The French film shows a boy who steps on a hose in order to disrupt the flow of
water with which a gardener is watering plants. When the gardener examines the
nozzle, the boy lets go and the water sprays in the gardeners face. Taking this film
as an example, Gunning ascertains that
L’Arroseur arrosé may have provoked laughter from its first spectators, but it was the
Cinematograph rather than the film which received praise. This show-biz strategy, called
the ”operational aesthetic” by Neil Harris, reflected a fascination with the way things
worked, particularly innovative or unbelievable technologies. (“Crazy Machines” 88)

In this passage, Gunning links the cinema of attractions to Neil Harris’ concept
of the operational aesthetic. Simultaneously, he points to the relevance of simple
mechanisms for the film’s short narrative sequence. As a mechanism that cannot
work by itself, the hose needs to be triggered by a character. It then causes the
somewhat delayed outcome of the gardener being sprayed. In this reading, which is
further exemplified by Lisa Trahair’s assessment of Gunning’s text, the hose brings
about a short structure of cause and effect in which the effect is delayed because of
the mechanism. It thus establishes a basic narrative structure in the film (Gunning,
“Crazy Machines” 91; Trahair).
Gunning explains that the operational aesthetic describes a “fascination with
the way things come together, visualizing cause and effect through the image of the
machine, [which] bridges the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the

4 Both of these episodes are archived at the George Eastman House in Rochester, New York.
Episodes eight and nine are archived in the Film & Television Archive at the University of
California in Los Angeles.

16
twentieth, shaping many aspects of popular culture” (“Crazy Machines” 100). As
we have seen in the earlier quote from “Crazy Machines,” this fascination applies
as much to the hose in L’arroseur arrosé as it does to the cinematic apparatus itself.
In the short film, however, this fascination coincides with a basic narrative structure
of cause and effect. In other words, the depiction of the mechanism in the film helps
to establish its narrative structure.
This conflation of mechanism and narrative is pivotal to the operational aesthetic.
Neil Harris coined the term in his study of P. T. Barnum, the nineteenth-century
perfectionist of publicized hoaxes. In the 1840s, Barnum displayed curious exhi-
bition pieces and he designed elaborate stories around them. Large audiences took
pleasure in evaluating whether the artefacts or tall tales were real (Harris 62-67).
Harris concludes that Barnum’s “American Museum, then, as well as Barnum’s
elaborate hoaxes, trained Americans to absorb knowledge. This was an aesthetic of
the operational, a delight in observing process and examining for literal truth” (79).
This delight informed a time when audiences similarly flocked to witness public
displays of novel inventions as Gunning outlines them, and they read detailed ac-
counts of such novelties in magazines and newspapers. This interest in mechanisms
and technology then converged with an appreciation of an aesthetics of process and
cause and effect. As Harris maintains,
Machinery was beginning to accustom the public not merely to a belief in the continual
appearance of new marvels but to a jargon that concentrated on methods of operation, on
aspects of mechanical organization and construction, on horsepower, gears, pulleys, and
safety valves. The language of technical explanation and scientific description itself had
become a form of recreational literature by the 1840s and 1850s. Newspapers, magazines,
even novels and short stories catered to this passion for detail. (75)

On a side note, Harris connects these developments to Edgar Allan Poe, who
also published during the 1840s. Harris stresses that the uncovering of elaborate
swindles was part and parcel of the delight arising from the hoax itself. Poe was
very much entangled in this public discourse, as he devised a narrative hoax about
a hot air balloon crossing the Atlantic Ocean for a newspaper, and he uncovered
that a supposedly automated chess player was forgery (Harris 83). Additionally, in
creating the protagonist of his detective stories, C. Auguste Dupin, “Poe created one
of the archetypes of detective fiction, the detached, powerful, analytic intellect who
solved crimes of the greatest mystery by logical method and intensive empathizing”
(85). In other words, Poe created a literary advocate of the operational aesthetic.
Although Harris himself stresses that there is no direct relation between Poe’s
detective stories and the operational aesthetic (cf. 86), the logical reasoning and
critical approach beneath Poe’s uncovering of the automaton chess player hoax and
Dupin’s solution to “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” are similar. Moreover, the
jargon of “mechanical organization and construction” does surface in Poe’s stories,
for example when Dupin studies a window to find out if it could have constituted
the murderer’s escape route in “The Murders in the Rue Morgue”:
‘There must be something wrong,’ I said, ‘about the nail.’ I touched it; and the head, with
about a quarter of an inch of the shank, came off in my fingers. The rest of the shank
was in the gimlet-hole where it had broken off. The fracture was an old one (for its
edges were incrusted with rust), and had apparently been accomplished by the blow of
a hammer, which had partially imbedded, in the top of the bottom sash, the head portion
of the nail. (419)

17
This careful description and close analysis of the window taps into the likes of a
readership that cares to observe process. Additionally, the language is informed
by a mechanical jargon, naming shanks, sashes, and gimlet-holes, very much
like Harris describes it. Rather than, or in addition to, facilitating readers with a
concrete image of the window’s mechanism, the technical terms employed endow
this paragraph with an aesthetics of the operational. Yet the operationality of the
window is simultaneously essential to the progress of the story, as the function of
the window constitutes the solution to the question of how the murderer could have
escaped the locked room.
The operational aesthetic therefore conflates a delight in observing mechanical
and technological process with an interest in narrative stunts, as in newspaper
hoaxes or in Poe’s fiction. As we learn from Gunning’s assessment of L’arroseur
arrosé, the cinema of attractions provides a rich ground for cultural artefacts that
cater to an audience’s interest in technology, process, and resulting storytelling
structures. Films of that era showcase their own enabling technologies as well as
diegetic cars, trains, or simple structures such as the hose. Thus, the engagement
with film in terms of the operational aesthetic takes place on numerous levels right
from the new medium’s inauguration. A decade after the cinema of attractions, in
The Exploits of Elaine, this engagement with medium and narrative gains further
complexity because the serial allows for an engagement not only with its enabling
and diegetic technologies and its storytelling structure, but also with its specifically
serial nature.
Technology and Narrative
In “The Cinema of Attractions,” Gunning states that the plotline in Méliès’ Le
voyage dans la lune (1902) merely serves to organize the tricks showcased in the
film. These tricks, again, demonstrate film’s capacity of showing seemingly magic
images (65). According to this understanding of attractions, narrative elements
generally function to organize a number of visual highlights rather than to tell a
coherent story. In the ensuing decade, The Exploits of Elaine turns this idea inside
out. Although the featured diegetic technologies remain fascinating in themselves,
the relation these mechanisms enter with the serial narrative is reversed. Whereas
previously, the narratives organized the order of attractions, the attractions now
serve to explain the organization of the story. To a certain extent, the tricks, stunts,
and visual highlights lose their significance in favor of the increasing significance
of storytelling and immersion. Nevertheless, cinema during the transitional era of
the 1910s continues to negotiate attraction and immersion.
In a study of diegetic telephones and telegraphs in films released during the
first two decades of the twentieth century, Paul Young analyses the function these
technologies assume in the context of the rise of narrative cinema. Films at the time
portray especially telegraphs as if they were novel mechanisms, even though teleg-
raphy was a firmly established fact at the time (Young 231). According to Young,
telephones and telegraphs served to explain the editing technique of cross-cutting
by visualizing the relation between individual cinematic settings. He maintains
that “the plots of films like The Lonedale Operator would have been difficult for
contemporary audiences to disentangle had the telegraph not provided justification
for Griffith’s crosscutting between one place and another” (229). The depiction of
telegraphs in films such as Edison’s The Great Train Robbery (1903) or The Life of

18
an American Fireman (1903) foreground “media transmission” by framing the link
between cause and effect by means of the telegraph as an interesting narrative in
itself. “But this time,” Young concludes, “the kinetograph is the medium whose power
demands the most attention” (246). Even as late as 1917, Young emphasizes, “cinema
was still presenting itself and its powers over space and time nearly as much as it
presented stories, and not without aspects of its electrical media legacy in tow” (254).
In a similar manner, The Exploits of Elaine employs diegetic technologies to
explain its narrative strutcture and editing by means of referencing its “electrical
media legacy.” However, the serial utilizes not only established technologies, but it
showcases novel or fictional ones and thus varies the formula identified by Young.
The vocaphone in chapter eight of The Exploits of Elaine is one such technology. The
vocaphone serves as the scene’s attraction, and it simultaneously assumes functions
very similar to those outlined by Gunning and by Young. Most basically, it introduces
a cause and effect relationship between Kennedy in his laboratory and Jameson’s
befuddled search of the origin of the voice in his apartment. Simultaneously, the
presence of the vocaphone explains the crosscutting between images of Kennedy at
his laboratory desk and Jameson’s apartment. Thus, when Kennedy leans back in his
office chair and enjoys himself, audiences know that he is laughing about the prank
he just pulled on his friend. The vocaphone thus explains the editing technique and
it establishes the causal relationship between the depicted locales, thus “visualizing
cause and effect through the image of the machine” (“Crazy Machines” 160). The
diegetic technological attraction thus structures the way the story is told, and it
explains the very means of storytelling. This is not the type of self-reflexivity that
necessitates Brechtian alienation. It rather corresponds to Jason Mittell’s application
of the operational aesthetic in his study of comtemporary American television series.
As he maintains, “operational reflexivity invites us to care about the storyworld
while simultaneously appreciating its construction” (35). The spectators are invited
to engage with the narrative in terms of the mechanism, and with the mechanism in
terms of the narrative. The introduction of the vocaphone in the episode reorients the
viewers’ study of the cinematic technology to an engagement with and appreciation of
the diegetically integrated vocaphone apparatus. By means of this strategy, the serial
circumvents the medial self-reflexivity of the cinema of attractions. Ironically, the
serial achieves this circumvention by taking recourse to the attractions model itself
when it showcases the vocaphone.
Nevertheless, when the vocaphone’s use is being exemplified in the beginning
of the episode, Kennedy hides the mechanism under the elaborate brocade cushions
on Jameson’s couch. Even though it visualizes cause and effect, the vocaphone as
connecting mechanism is deliberately hidden in The Exploits of Elaine. Thus the
serial prefigures that crosscutting can and does exist without the visual connection
between two settings. In other words, the episode explains its cinematic technique
and then hides its visualization in order to proceed telling the story. The equivalent
happens in the episode’s ending. Kennedy hides the vocaphone in a suit of armor that
decorates Elaine’s living room. Having placed her under surveillance, Kennedy can
save her when she is attacked by the Clutching Hand. The episode then ends with a
split screen image of Kennedy on the left and Elaine on the right, both holding the
vocaphone. The split screen foregrounds the parallel nature of the occurrences in
both spaces and the vocaphone as connecting mechanism again gains prominence in
visualization. At the same time, Elaine’s ‘hugging’ of the vocaphone is extended by

19
means of the split screen to the character of Kennedy. What could have suggested
a misguided love for the technology is thus assured to be a romantic interest in its
genius deviser. Moreover, the split screen serves to attribute the connection between
the settings, which supposedly arose through the diegetic mechanism, back to the
cinematic apparatus and technique itself.
Repetition and Meta-Seriality
A more complex visualization of connected spaces and chains of cause and effect
appears in episode nine, ”The Death Ray.” It begins with a note, in which the
Clutching Hand orders Kennedy to leave the country the following day. Should
the detective not comply, a pedestrian will die in the street in front of Kennedy’s
laboratory every hour, the villain threatens. Luckily, Kennedy receives his recently
ordered periscope that day. He shows Jameson how to use the periscope, who then
installs the visual mechanism in the laboratory window. The following morning,
Kennedy and Jameson monitor the street through the periscope and witness the first
murder. By means of a deadly light beam operated from an adjoining building, two
henchmen of the Clutching Hand murder a pedestrian but make it look as though
the uninvolved passer-by simply fainted or suffered a heart-attack. After the death
of this first victim, Kennedy calls up Elaine and her lawyer Bennett. In an act of
sensationalist voyeurism, the four characters join and watch a second passer-by
die an hour later.
This scene provides an interesting set-up of different technologies and cul-
tural references that need to be considered in the discursive context of the time.
Periscopes were important to the submarine warfare of World War I, and they
were omnipresent on film screens at the time. Keystone’s A Submarine Pirate
(1915), for example, provided a detailed view of a submarine’s interior and was
a “spectacle of technological process” (King 191). In fact, a periscope had even
been introduced in an earlier episode of The Exploits of Elaine (Pangburn). The
death ray, as Kennedy informs us later in episode nine, is really the infra-red ray
developed by the Italian scientist Guilio Ulivi. Indeed, Ulivi had been featured in
newspaper articles in 1913 and 1914, claiming to have invented an infra-red ray
that could be used to ignite a bomb on a submarine from a fifteen-mile distance.5
However, Ulivi failed to provide sufficient technological detail for his invention,
which caused the Scientific American to accuse the claims of “necromancy” and
add that Ulivi’s invention has been “regarded with suspicion in scientific circles”
(“Ulivi’s Experiments” 6). Even though the actual ray never materialized, the serial
takes up the juxtaposition of infra-red ray and submarine periscope to stage its own
confrontation of detective and villain.
This scene depicting the repeated murder of pedestrians, which Kennedy,
Jameson, Elaine, and Bennett watch through the periscope, constitutes an instance
of self-relexivity. The two viewings of the executions are once again reminiscent
of the repetitive nature of early cinema. The attraction, which the film recalls, is
that of a short actuality film – a kind of film often showing street scenes. Gunning
notes that advertisements highlighted the possibility to watch these films numerous
times – as opposed to observing street scenes without cinematic mediation. Repeated

5 Information on Ulivi’s invention was published in August 1913 in Kennewick, Washington

(“Ulivi Threat to End War”) and in October in Saint Paul, Minnesota (“Ulivi Threat to End
War”), for example.

20
screenings would allow for spectators to study the scenes and notice details that
might have escaped their attention the first time (Gunning, “From the Kaleido-
scope” 35). The described instance in The Exploits of Elaine recalls such modes
of film spectatorship, and it addresses the voyeurism inherent in early reception
practices. Such a self-reflexive address of voyeurism is curious in a “serial-queen
melodrama,” a form which often catered to voyeurist modes of film viewing itself.
It does so especially by showcasing female protagonists in physically distressing
imperilment, as Ben Singer highlights (222, 255). Nevertheless, the repetitive
instance in The Exploits of Elaine does more than simply point to voyeurist film
viewing practices. Just as multiple screenings of short actualities enabled viewers to
study the scene depicted on screen, the repeated murder provides detective Kennedy
with a possibility to analyze the ongoing action. He watches the second murder in
order to understand the first one.
Nevertheless, the diegetic characters watch a second murder in the street instead of
an exact repetition of the initial death. Kennedy’s behavior in this instance embodies
the characterization of serial consumption: the urge to watch the next episode, and the
incentive to share the experience with friends. Almost ironically, the scene addresses
the repetitiveness of serial storytelling. As Ruth Mayer stresses concerning the nature
of serial storytelling more generally, “by now, in the wake of Umberto Eco’s and
other critics’ reflections on the principles of serial narration, it is almost a truism to
insist upon the productive effect of repetition and reiteration, especially in popular
culture” (124). Moreover, Frank Kelleter insists on the necessity and fruitfulness of
critical analyses of “the cultural work of repetitively varying narration” (13).6 It is
precisely this fruitfulness that the two murders in The Exploits of Elaine address.
Repetition becomes productive even though, or because exact reiteration is never
fully possible. Gilles Deleuze points to the fact that even exact duplications always
entail an alteration of the quality of the original. In other words, duplication turns
its original into a prototype, which thus loses its singularity (Deleuze 15-25). As a
consequence, repetition can always only be partial – just as variation, as the quote
captioning this essay claims, never provides something entirely new.
As mentioned earlier, contemporary analyses frequently stress the highly re-
dundant, formulaic character of film serials. That repetitive nature, I argue, does
not need to be evaluated negatively. Read as a self-reflexive rendering of serial
storytelling, the repeated viewing of the murder in episode nine on the one hand
points to the constructiveness of repetition. Just as detective Kennedy views a
second murder through the periscope in order to analyze the villain’s ongoing
scheme, cinema audiences similarly follow a repeated narrative formula with each
new episode, which provides them with a possibility to study both the techniques
of serial storytelling as well as – in a more immersed receptive state – the ongoing
crime plot. In The Exploits of Elaine – and maybe in film serials more generally –
repetition thus emerges as a means of analysis. A similar connection of repetition and
analysis is connected to the operational aesthetic. Barnum’s hoaxes as well as Poe’s
detective stories follow their own reiterative narrative structures. Even more so, the
aesthetics of process and cause and effect evolve in relation to the repetitive motion
of mechanisms such as trains, sewing machines, the complex production belts of
industrialization, and especially the endlessly repetitive motions that are constitutive
6 My translation. All translations from the German hereafter are mine. Original quote in German:
“Es geht um die kulturelle Arbeit wiederholt variierenden Erzählens selbst.”

21
of nineteenth-century optical toys such as zoetropes or phenakistiscopes.7 As a
consequence, the film serial with its repetitive form is especially apt for the kind
of storytelling that invites and encourages a reception in terms of the operational
aesthetic. Reading the film serial this way, it becomes obvious that rather than
enjoying film serials despite their constitutive repetitiveness, spectators may enjoy
film serials because of it. Serial film viewing thus emerges as a practice that differs
radically from that of the emerging feature film.
The reflection of repetition encouraged in The Exploits of Elaine resonates with
Andreas Jahn-Sudmann’s and Frank Kelleter’s study of meta-seriality. Writing about
television in the twenty-first century, they use the term “meta-seriality” in order
to describe a series’ or serial’s recursive engagement with its own serial organi-
zation and narrative structure (208, 221). Meta-seriality thus describes a form of
self-reference in which a televisual text encourages critical reflection of its narrative
organization and popular cultural function rather than on its medial apparatus in
a more traditional form of self-reflexivity. Jahn-Sudmann and Kelleter stress the
importance of such moments of meta-seriality for an analysis of individual serial
narratives, arguing that “if we want to understand how invariance and variability
interrelate, we should also consider the recursive dynamic of serial narratives, that
is their tendency to (medial) self-observation” (207).8 Such meta-serial moments
result from hyperbolically often reiterated instances of “outbidding” or surpassing,
in which series compete with bigger budgets or by showing more violent or faster
images etc. Repetition in such instances emerges as a “quantitative operation …
[that] culminates eventually in meta-serial intelligence” (Jahn-Sudmann and Kelleter
208).9 In other terms, one instance in a series is repeated often enough to spark a
critical reflection of repetition itself. In the periscope scene in The Exploits of Elaine,
a once repeated murder suffices to spark meta-serial awareness. This is possible
because the repetition coincides with a more traditional self-reflexivity that emerges
from the mediation of the moving images of the murders.
This more traditional self-reflexivity results from the use of diegetic visual
technologies, that is, the periscope and the death ray. The periscope presents the
action in the street as it is reflected in a mirror. The serial then provides close-ups
of these images in a frame-within-the-frame arrangement that causes cinematic
self-reflexivity. Moreover, the diegetic characters’ communal viewing reflects the
shared experience of spectators in the cinema. The death ray itself is a weapon
rather than a visual technology. However, the villains need binoculars to focus the
death ray, thus indeed connecting it to a surveilling visuality. Moreover, the prop
used to represent the death ray looks like a spotlight used in film production, thus
again referencing the cinematic apparatus. Rather than being about murder itself,
the scene stages a hierarchy between villain and detective in terms of their capability
of surveillance. Whereas Kennedy, Jameson, and Elaine can monitor the street, the

7 On the operation of and on repetition concerning nineteenth-century optical toys, see Strauven;
Dulac and Gaudreault.
8 Original quote in German: “Möchte man verstehen, wie sich Invarianz und Variabilität in
Serien zueinander verhalten, sollte man auch die rekursive Dynamik serieller Erzählungen
berücksichtigen, also ihren Hang zur (medialen) Selbstbeobachtung oder abstrakter gesprochen:
das eigendynamische Moment ihrer Evolution, ermöglicht durch ein konstant mitlaufendes
Reflektieren auf die Bedingungen und Möglichkeiten der eigenen Fortsetzbarkeit.”
9 Original quote in German: “Was zunächst und wesentlich über quantitative Operationen funk-
tioniert, kulminiert zuletzt in metaserieller Intelligenz.”

22
henchmen of the Clutching Hand visually penetrate both the street and Kennedy’s
laboratory. As much as the serial stages science and technology, it repeatedly casts
these technologies in terms of their surveillance functions, as the vocaphone and
periscope show.
This conflation of surveillance, self-reflexivity, and meta-seriality highlights not
just repetition as such, but the fact that the cinematic medium allows for it. While
the episode primarily showcases the periscope and the infra-red ray, the scene in
episode nine highlights cinema’s capacity to repeat as new – a capacity that was as
old as film itself at the time. Such a framing of repetition as novel resonates with
Jahn-Sudmann’s and Kelleter’s observation that series face the paradox challenge
of “practicing reproduction as innovation” (207).10 Similarly, Deleuze stresses the
practice of not trying to locate the new within repetition, but making repetition
itself a novelty (20-21). After all, The Exploits of Elaine employs science and
technology to critically reflect its own serial means of storytelling. The serial thus
negotiates repetition and variation at a historical moment in which the serial mode
of storytelling was well established in cinemas in the United States, but in which
serials were far from adhering to one established narrative formula.

Ilka Brasch Hannover

Works Cited
Deleuze, Gilles. Differenz und Wiederholung. Paderborn: Fink, 2007. Print.
Dulac, Nicolas, and André Gaudreault. “Circularity and Repetition at the Heart of
the Attraction: Optical Toys and the Emergence of a New Cultural Series.” The
Cinema of Attractions Reloaded. Ed. Wanda Strauven. Amsterdam: Amsterdam
UP, 2006. 227-44. Print.
Gunning, Tom. “Crazy Machines in the Garden of Forking Paths: Mischief Gags
and the Origins of American Film Comedy.” Classical Hollywood Comedy. Ed.
Kristine Brunovska Karnick and Henry Jenkins. New York: Routledge, 1995.
87-105. Print.
---. “From the Kaleidoscope to the X-Ray: Urban Spectatorship, Poe, Benjamin,
and Traffic in Souls (1913).” Wide Angle 19.4 (1997): 25-61. Print.
---. “The Cinema of Attraction: Early Film, Its Spectator and the Avant-Garde.”
Wide Angle 8.3-4 (1986): 63-70. Print.
Harris, Neil. Humbug: The Art of P. T. Barnum. Boston: Little, Brown, 1973. Print.
Jahn-Sudmann, Andreas, and Frank Kelleter. “Die Dynamik Serieller Überbietung:
Amerikanische Fernsehserien und das Konzept des Quality-TV.” Populäre
Serialität: Narration – Evolution – Distinktion. Zum seriellen Erzählen seit
dem 19. Jahrhundert. Ed. Kelleter. Bielefeld: transcript, 2012. 205-24. Print.
Kelleter, Frank. “Populäre Serialität: Eine Einführung.” Populäre Serialität: Narra-
tion – Evolution – Distinktion. Zum seriellen Erzählen seit dem 19. Jahrhundert.
Ed. Kelleter. Bielefeld: transcript, 2012. 11-46. Print.
10 Original quote in German: “Die Herausforderung besteht aus einem Paradox: Reproduktion
als Innovation zu betreiben.”

23
King, Rob. The Fun Factory: The Keystone Film Company and the Emergence of
Mass Culture. Berkeley: U of California P, 2009. Print.
Mayer, Ruth. Serial Fu Manchu: The Chinese Supervillain and the Spread of Yellow
Peril Ideology. Philadelphia, PA: Temple UP, 2014. Print.
Mittell, Jason. “Narrative Complexity in Contemporary American Television.” The
Velvet Light Trap 58.3 (2006): 29-40. Print.
Mott, Frank Luther. A History of American Magazines, 1885-1905. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard UP, 1957. Print.
Pangburn, Clifford H. “The Exploits of Elaine (Pathe-Fifth Episode).” Motion
Picture News 11.5 (1915): 45. Print.
“Pathé Serial Marks Era in Film History.” Motion Picture News 10.24 (1914): 33.
Print.
Poe, Edgar Allan. “The Mystery in the Rue Morgue.” Poetry and Tales. Ed. Patrick
F. Quinn. New York: Literary Classics of the United States, 1984. 397-431. Print.
“Remarkable Machines Shown.” Motography 13.10 (1915): 356. Print.
“Remarkable Mechanical Devices Used in ‘Elaine.’” Motion Picture News 11.9
(1915): 32. Print.
Singer, Ben. Melodrama and Modernity: Early Sensational Cinema and Its Contexts.
New York: Columbia UP, 2001. Print.
Stamp, Shelley. Movie-Struck Girls: Women and Motion Picture Culture after the
Nickelodeon. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2000. Print.
Strauven, Wanda. “The Observer’s Dilemma: To Touch or Not to Touch.” Media
Archaeology: Approaches, Applications and Implications. Ed. Erkki Huhtamo
and Jussi Parikka. Los Angeles: U of California P, 2011. 148-63. Print.
Trahair, Lisa. “The Narrative-Machine: Buster Keaton’s Cinematic Comedy, Deleuze’s
Recursion Function and the Operational Aesthetic.” Senses of Cinema 33 (2004): n.
pag. Web. 18 Dec. 2012. <http://sensesofcinema.com/2004/comedy-and-­perception/
keaton_deleuze/>.
“Ulivi’s Experiments in Exploding Bombs With Infra-Red Rays.” The Scientific
American 111 (1914): 6. Print.
“Ulivi Threat to End War.” The Kennewick Courier 29 Aug. 1913. Web. 15 Oct.
2014. <http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn87093029/1913-08-29/ed-1/
seq-6/>.
“Ulivi Threat to End War.” The Appeal 11 Oct. 1913. Web. 15 Oct. 2014. <http://
chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83016810/1913-10-11/ed-1/seq-3/>.
Vela, Rafael. “With the Parents’ Consent: Film Serials, Consumerism and the Cre-
ation of the Youth Audience, 1913-1938.” Diss. University of Wisconsin-Mad-
ison, 2000. Print.
Young, Paul. “Media on Display: A Telegraphic History of Early American Cinema.”
New Media, 1740-1915. Ed. Lisa Gitelman and Geoffrey B. Pingree. Cambridge,
MA: MIT P, 2003. 229-64. Print.

24
 Sensational Programs without Head and Tail:
Transforming and Distributing American Silent Film
Serials in the Netherlands1
The cinema-going public likes variation, a pleasant variation. They would usually rather
see five or six numbers on the screen instead of one series of a film of many miles and
in many episodes or chapters. The great seriefilms often create the danger that they
attract the interest of the public only moderately or will quickly deaden their interest.
(“Verscheidenheid” 1201)2

In 1919, an anonymous author discussed the positive aspects of a varied film

program and reported negatively on a form that had been popular in the Netherlands
for a few years: the ‘seriefilm,’ better known today as the film serial. During the
silent film period, film seriality was present not in just one single form – the
well-known American two-reel serial – but in a variety of heterogeneous forms
with very different lengths and uses. If one looks closely, this can be seen in
America, but it is especially in Europe that a diverse palette of serial narratives
existed. In the early twentieth century, film distributors could shorten and adjust
films without the consent of the producer in order to suit a presumed audience
taste or receive censorship approval. This essay shows that in the 1910s and
1920s Dutch film distributors could adjust the method of display of a whole film
form. The American film serial was shown and distributed in the Netherlands in a
different way than originally intended, absorbing and integrating local customs. By
means of a historical overview, I will focus on the distribution of American-made
serials, demonstrate the consequences of these adjustments and point out the
important transformative aspect of seriality. During the silent film period, the
serial was even more re-edited and re-shaped to fit different modes of distribution
than the feature film.3 The cultural circulation of serials can thus be described
as a process of adaptation and restructuring according to local film cultures and
cultural contexts.
Introducing the Serial
In the early 1910s, the terms ‘series’ and ‘serial’ were not used very specifically
in the U.S.: Even what today would be a fine example of a ‘proper’ American
serial, could be advertised as a “series,” “a picturized romantic novel,” or a “film
novel” (“Diamond” 1436; “Girl and the Game” 364-5). It was only after 1915 that
most cliffhanger productions were called ‘serials.’ In the Netherlands, the most
common term during this period, used for both series and serials, was seriefilm
(“De seriefilm” 2454).

1 This article is an extended version of Canjels, “Vom Beiprogramm.”

2 My translation. All translations from the Dutch hereafter are mine. Quote in Dutch original:
“Het uitgaande publiek houdt van variatie, van variatie die prettig bezighoudt. Het ziet over ’t
algemeen liever vijf of zes nummers op ’t doek dan één serie van een vele mijlen-lange filmband
in zóóveel episoden of afdeelingen. De groote seriefilms hebben vaak het gevaar in zich, dat
ze de belangstelling bij het publiek òf maar matig opwekken òf al gauw doen verflauwen.”
3 Not all transformative serial forms are discussed in this essay. On the various changing serial
forms, local film cultures as well as cultural contexts in America, France, Germany, and the
Netherlands, see Canjels, Distributing.

25
 In this essay, the definition of the ‘serial’ is restricted to a series of episodes
(usually released in a weekly schedule) with the same main characters and an
overarching or continuing narrative. The episodes could end with a cliffhanger,
but also with a more self-contained ending in which one situation might have been
resolved, but the ultimate goal had not been achieved yet, as long as the episodes
were not interchangeable and a pre-determined sequence is present. In America, with
the huge success of What Happened to Mary (1912, Edison) and its quick successor
Who Will Marry Mary? (1913, Edison), the serial form soon became very popular
and many companies followed suit, producing titles like The Adventures of Kathlyn
(1913, Selig Polyscope), The Perils of Pauline (1914, Pathé), or Lucille Love,
Girl of Mystery (1914, Universal). Their quick widespread release and promotion
created a known brand name that returned regularly to the theaters over several
months. Propelling the serial consumption to even greater heights was the use of
the tie-in, telling the story of the episode also in a magazine or newspaper, which
created an additional resonating vibe of seriality that helped push film distribution
and consumption in a rhythmic manner.
An American serial of this period usually had fifteen episodes of two reels each,
lasting around 20-25 minutes. One episode was intended to be shown each week,
and frequently episodes ended with cliffhangers.4 From 1915 the first American
serials started to invade Europe while at the same time more European serial
productions started to appear such as Les Vampires (1915-1916, Gaumont) in France,
Il Fiacre n. 13 (1916, Società Anonima Ambrosio) in Italy, or Homunculus (1916,
Deutsche Bioscop) in Germany. European serials were different: They typically
had fewer episodes than their American counterparts, they were of irregular length
and longer than the American two-reel variant (up to feature length), used various
genres (from action to melodrama), and very often did not have a cliffhanger.
The Key to Success
De Sleutel naar Geluk (The Master Key) is, as far as it has been possible to track
down, the first American serial released in the Netherlands.5 It was, in fact, Universal’s
second serial, an exciting adventure story featuring a much fought-over key that
would lead the heroine and her sweetheart to a rich lode of ore. The serial had
premiered in America in November 1914 and consisted of fifteen episodes. According
to the Dutch distribution company HAP, it was the first seriefilm to arrive in the
Netherlands. Indeed, even in comparison to long features, the 10,000 meters with
its thirty acts that would be shown in seven consecutive weeks from January 1916
onwards, represented an unprecedented length. Though foreign correspondents had
reported earlier about the tie-in successes abroad and The Master Key’s serial novel
by John Fleming Wilson had been syndicated in America, De Sleutel naar Geluk did
not use a serialized tie-in (something that happened only once in the Netherlands).6
Yet, the most striking piece of information about HAP’s announcement is the number
of weeks during which it was shown. Though it was common in the Netherlands to

4 On the American use of the silent serial, see Stamp; Singer; and Dahlquist.
5 In June 1915, it was advertised that De Avonturen van Mary (What Happened to Mary) could
be rented as 12 episodes. However, it does not seem to have been released in the Netherlands.
6 On the use of the tie-in to De Geheimen van New-York/Les Mystères de New-York (the French
re-edited version of three combined Pearl White serials), see Canjels, Distributing 39-60 and
77-83.

26
show short films alongside a long feature, this was generally not done with the serials.
While The Master Key ran fifteen weeks in America, with one two-reel episode per
week, the serial was released in only seven consecutive weeks in the Netherlands.
In the first six weeks, two episodes were screened in one film program and in the
last week three episodes. De Sleutel naar Geluk seems to have been a success in the
Netherlands: In February 1916, the serial was booked in ten cities (“Sleutel” 4). The
daily newspaper De Utrechtse Courant described it as an “extraordinary gripping
drama, exciting until the end.” The audience gave spontaneous “storms of endless
cheers, especially when the criminal was overpowered” (“Bioscoop: New York”).
The release pattern of De Sleutel naar Geluk would be the standard for American
serials for years to come.
Of all the American serials that were shown in the Netherlands between 1916
and 1929 (at least 67), none was released in its original form and exhibited in the
originally planned weekly schedule. In the Netherlands, the American serial would
function as the feature film, with two, three, or more episodes combined. The short
films (or later a second feature) that accompanied the serial and filled the rest of
the program were only mentioned in the advertisements after the serial had been
playing for several weeks. It was the distributor who was responsible for this mode
of exhibition. The distributor announced in advertisements, aimed at exhibitors, how
many episodes per week would be released. Sometimes the distributor mentioned
that the serial had originally been much longer, but that several episodes were now
exclusively shown in one program. Pathé announced for instance in December 1918
that at the request of their customers the soon to be released 15-week seriefilm would
be put together with several episodes per week (“Koningin verveelt zich” 4240-1).
If this change was indeed at the request of exhibitors or if this blurb was used by
Pathé as an advertising scheme remains unclear. Overall, exhibitors hardly seem to
have had room to maneuver or adjust the serial programming. Sometimes serials
that had been announced with a longer running time were later shortened by the
distributor. HAP was under the impression that they, “in accordance with the saying
‘Well begun is half done,’ should release the seriefilm Kaffra Kan de Geweldige
[The Yellow Menace, 1916, Serial Film Corporation] in an extraordinary way and
distribute it in six weekly series instead of seven” (“Kaffra Kan” 12).7 It rarely
happened that a different pattern was played in a cinema than the one initially
announced by the distributor.
Various advertisements, program outlines, reviews, and municipal censorship
descriptions suggest the idea that episodes were un-edited and shown back-to-back in
a single program. Original episode titles were often quoted and descriptions indicate
that various cliffhangers were still intact. However, the few transcripts of intertitles that
have survived in the files of the Central Film Board (a centralized censorship Board
only began to function in 1928) show that episodes from serials had sometimes been
edited together.8 For instance, in the case of De Groote Onbekende (The Silent Avenger,

7 Quote in the Dutch original: “[G]edachtig aan de spreuk ‘een goed begin is ‘t halve werk,’ de
seriefilm Kaffra Kan de Geweldige buitengewoon te moeten inzetten en de film in plaats van
in zeven in zes weekseriën uit te geven.”
8 Prior to the centralized censorship (from 1913 onwards), municipal and regional boards were
set up in the Netherlands (often related to a specific religious background), making it possible
for a film to be censored in one city but not in the next. By the end of 1920, the municipal
Amsterdam film commission came into effect; see Dibbets.

27
1920, Vitagraph), the recaps of previous episodes were systematically removed. A
slight pause after the cliffhanger nevertheless still remained. For example, after the
words “Philip sees the terrible danger before his eyes … but he cannot stop,” the
announcement is made that it is “the end of the second reel of episode seven.” This
is immediately followed by the next intertitle “The Silent Avenger, episode eight,
Hideout in the Rocks, first reel,” and the story continues (“Censorship file”). While
this example highlights an intervention for the Dutch market, some serials had already
been altered for French cinemas. Instead of releasing fifteen episodes or more, Pathé
Consortium released many American Pathé-Exchange serials with fewer episodes in
France, while conserving more or less the same episode length. These films eventually
reached the Netherlands (possibly via England during the war).
Local Versions and Reasoning
The American serials were generally shown in the Netherlands at a rate double
that of their original distribution, though in the first two years there was still some
variation in screening patterns.9 For instance, Pathé’s first serial in the Netherlands
was De Avonturen van Elaine (The Perils of Pauline), originally shown in twenty
episodes in America, but in the Netherlands it was screened in nine weeks in 1916
(Fig. 1). This version was, however, an adjusted French version that had been recut
into nine episodes of around 30 minutes and released as Les exploits d’Elaine.

Figure 1: Pathé Frères’ promised with De Avonturen van Elaine (The

Perils of Pauline, 1914) to provide exhibitors nine-week long “sensation
after sensation!” Advertisement, De Bioscoop-Courant 21 Oct. 1916: 8-9.

Interestingly, Pathé Frères was the only Dutch distributor who tried to release a serial
at the rate of one episode per week (though their serials had already been shortened
for release in France). With the release of the adventure serial called De Roode Cirkel
(The Red Circle, 1915, Balboa Amusement) in 1917, a Pathé advertisement was
published on the cover of the Dutch film journal De Bioscoop-Courant that explained
how serials could be shown in two different ways:
Serie-films can be shown with several episodes a week. Together they form the feature film
and therefore carry the program. However, serials can also be shown as an extra-feature.
Every week only one episode will be shown next to the regular feature. Serie-films that
follow this latter option will offer more advantages to the exhibitor, such as: 1. They make

9 The serials were usually shown during the entire week.

28
 the program more varied and offer something for everybody. 2. They last longer, as a
result of which more weeks will provide bigger box-office receipts and regular customers
will be cultivated. (“De roode cirkel” 16 Nov.: 8)10

By putting so much emphasis on the use of serials as an extra-feature, it appears as

if Pathé preferred this model of distribution. De Roode Cirkel was indeed released in
its adjusted export version in Amsterdam, with only one episode per week. However,
even though the serial itself got a positive review, the mode of distribution did not.
According to De Bioscoop-Courant it was clear that the serial took too long and
would have benefited if three or more episodes had been shown in one program (“De
roode cirkel” 30 Nov.: 31).
After De Roode Cirkel, Pathé never released another serial with only one episode
per week nor did it offer a choice to exhibitors. Therefore, the adjusted Pathé serials
reached their final episode even quicker than in France. For example, the original
fifteen-part The Shielding Shadow (1916, Astra Film) that had been recut in France
into ten episodes as Ravengar was subsequently shown in the Netherlands in six
weeks (also as Ravengar). Other serials followed the same pattern, such as The Fatal
Ring (1917, Astra Film) – originally twenty episodes, recut into fifteen episodes as
La reine s’ennuie and shown in five weeks as De Koningin Verveelt Zich – or The
Mystery of the Double Cross (1917, Astra Film) – originally twenty episodes, recut
into nine episodes as Le Mystère de la Double Croix and shown in three weeks as Het
Geheim van het Dubbele Kruis. This method was used until 1924 in the Netherlands
for many American Pathé serials.11 In France, other distribution companies did the
same with their products. But while, for instance, Universal’s Liberty, A Daughter of
the USA (1916) was released in France as Suzy l’américaine in sixteen episodes, in
the Netherlands the original number of twenty episodes was bundled and screened
in seven weeks. Whereas the subsidiary of Pathé-Exchange imported their serials
via France, the Universal serials did not come from France. The Dutch subsidiary of
Trans-Atlantic (Universal’s European branch) probably obtained them from England.
There are two possible reasons as to why American serials were released in such a
different form in the Netherlands. First, there could have been practical considerations:
As film reviewer Felix Hageman claimed in 1919, “a serial in six episodes is usually
less expensive than six single films” (15).12 This statement could be an economic
explanation as to why in the Netherlands episodes of a serial would be used to cheaply
fill a program with episodes instead of separate films. Unfortunately, this is the only
statement concerning this practice. It was, however, wartime during the introduction
of the American serial and, even though the Netherlands remained neutral and films

10 Quote in Dutch original: “Serie-Films kunnen vertoond worden in meerdere episoden per week.
Zij vormen dan het hoofdnummer en dragen dus het programma. Serie-Films kunnen evenwel
ook vertoond worden als extra-hoofdnummer. Iedere week wordt dan naast het gewonen
hoofdnummer slechts eene episode op het witte doek gebracht. Serie-Films welke op laatstge-
noemde wijze in circulatie worden gebracht bieden H.H. Exploitanten meerdere voordeelen
o.a.: 1e. Zij maken het programma meer gevariëerd en geven dus ‘Elck wat wils.’ 2e. Zij duren
langer, waardoor meerdere weken van grootere recettes gemaakt worden en waardoor tevens
een vaste cliëntele gekweekt wordt.” This example also shows the exhibitor still had room to
maneuver and could adjust the program, though it was only at the discretion of the distributor.
11 This concerned serials that had been produced until 1921, when Pathé-Exchange was sold to
Merrill Lynch, causing Pathé in France to drop imports from the company.
12 Quote in Dutch original: “[E]en serie-film van zes afdeelingen is in huur meestal goedkooper
dan zes afzonderlijke films.”

29
could still be imported throughout World War I, a shortage of films existed and
prices continued to rise. With the war, Brussels had vanished as a distribution center
for the Dutch. The import of German films remained possible though many foreign
production companies were disappearing from Berlin. When Italy joined the Allied
forces in 1915, the import of Italian films also became more difficult (Blom 247-8). It
was possible to obtain foreign films (including French films) from London, but the trip
was not without dangers (“Reisbeschrijving” 2). Filling up a program with serials that
apparently were cheaper to rent thus seems a logical solution to the shortage problem.
The second explanation for the different distribution pattern could be that films which
were called seriefilms had not been successful in the Netherlands prior to the release
of the American serials. Perhaps this could have stimulated distributors to change the
schedule of around fifteen weeks to a shorter time frame by showing more episodes in
one program. When film journals and newspapers began to write about the new trend
in the Netherlands, it was often remarked that before distributor HAP had its initial
success, these kinds of films were not thought of as popular (“De seriefilm” 2454;
“Advertisement F.A.N.” 5). Because of the unclear use of the term seriefilm as well
as the fact that between 1912 and 1914 many issues of two important Dutch film
weeklies are lost, it remains unclear which seriefilms were meant. It is most likely,
however, that they were European series like the French Zigomar (1911-1913, Éclair),
Rocambole (1913, Pathé) and Fantômas (1913-1914, Gaumont), or German feature
films that were part of a so-called Monopol-series.13 It was probably no coincidence
that HAP released the first American serial in the Netherlands. HAP was a newcomer
in the film market and had to get a foothold. Other companies did probably not want
to burn their fingers with serials given the past failure of seriefilms. Only after HAP
released a second successful serial, other distribution companies followed. HAP would
be one of the biggest serial distributors alongside Pathé.
Reviewing Spectacle and Audience
Long after the first premieres and despite the continuing successes, reviewers
and critics questioned the film form and kept repeating: The Dutch public would
not like to go and see continuous episodes and would not be able to keep up
their interest in a serial for weeks. As could also be read in the opening quote,
the serial was seen as a negative component in a varied film program. According
to the popular newspaper De Telegraaf, “[a] large proportion of visitors [feels]
duped, when a program is almost completely filled with a lump, an incomplete
piece, where head and tail are missing. It is as unmotivated as when for instance
a newspaper would be completely filled with ‘continuations’ of serial novels”
(“Regulierbreestraat”).14
Besides doubts about the stamina and interest of the viewer, the serial – according
to some – represented everything that was bad in the film industry. Simon B. Stokvis,
a fervent opponent of sensational films, wrote in 1917 about Universal’s circus-action
serial The Adventures of Peg o’ the Ring (1916): “The latest phenomenon in film, one

13 A Monopol film series was a German production and distribution framework, bundling a group
of feature films usually centered around an actor or actress, see Müller 105–57.
14 Quote in Dutch original: “[E]en groot deel der bezoekers [voelt] zich gedupeerd, wanneer een
programma bijna geheel gevuld wordt met een brok, een incompleet stuk, waar kop en staart
aan ontbreken. Het is even ongemotiveerd als een dagblad dat bijv. geheel gevuld zou zijn met
‘vervolgen’ van feuilletons.”

30
that removes the last difference between cinema literature and dime novels: The film in
episodes” (9).15 According to Stokvis, at the cinema an external exuberant display was
often combined with an inner void. Literary works were trampled upon and presented
as art to the ignorant people. The audience became immune to the real enjoyment of
art, one that required effort. Interestingly, artistic and aesthetic qualities were thus
more important from his point of view than the preservation of morals. For Stokvis,
the decline in taste and numbing of the senses constituted the core of the “cinema evil”
(Vermoolen 262). He thought that within the serials any sentiment or psychological
development had been replaced by a multitude of threats of impending disaster and
subsequent violence. “My God, there is so much fighting in Peg. It is unbelievable. In
the end, it is an endless series of boxing matches … without boxing gloves, in a show
of male swiftness and male power that is unprecedented in the world” (Stokvis 9).16
It is possible that Stokvis found the story even more repetitive and its eternal
boxing matches so offensive precisely because several episodes were shown back
to back. It is also conceivable that the serial episodes seemed more implausible and
childish because of this exhibition pattern. In the episode that followed, one could,
for instance, immediately see how the inevitable threat from the end of the previous
episode was easily circumvented. It was easier to detect that some cliffhangers played
‘false.’ The hero or heroine whom the audience had seen drowning in the quicksand
at the end of one episode could somehow divert this fate and continue the adventure
unharmed in the next.
Not much is known about the audience who watched these serials because they
hardly left a trace. During the war, a total of twelve American serials were released
in Amsterdam (and the same number of European serials). From film reviews
and comments in film journals, it can be inferred that both children and adults
watched these serials. The reaction of the audience was, according to the reviewers,
enthusiastic. There were often long queues, police had to be invoked to restrain the
waiting people, and the enthusiastic audience cheered during the show. A discussion
of the popular Eddie Polo wild west serial Koning der Cowboys (Bull’s Eye, 1918,
Universal), that was shown in Rotterdam, provides insight into how the audience
may have behaved during performances:
As soon as the title appeared on the canvas, cheers (or rather roars) erupted, a proof that
the series had begun. Exclamations such as ‘Here he comes again,’ ‘Give them a whack,’
resounded through the hall and the public sympathized wholeheartedly with the sensational
adventures of the sympathetic cowboy Ed Cody (Eddie Polo), so that each time when Ed
performed his heroics, applause and cries of joy resounded. (“Olympia Theater” 34)17

15 Quote in Dutch original: “Het nieuwste verschijnsel op filmgebied, waarmee het allerlaat-
ste onderscheid tusschen bioscoopliteratuur en anderhalvecents roman is weggenomen: De
film-in-afleveringen.”
16 Quote in Dutch original: “Mijn God, wat wordt er in Peg gevochten. Het is ongelooflijk. Het komt
ten slotte alles neer op een eindelooze reeks van bokspartijen … zonder bokshandschoenen, op
een vertoon van mannelijke vlugheid en mannelijke kracht, die nergens ter wereld een weerga
vindt.”
17 Quote in Dutch original: “Nauwelijks was de titel op het doek verschenen of een gejuich (beter
gezegd gebrul) barstte los; met een bewijs dat de eerste serie was ingeslagen. Uitgeroepen
als: ‘Daar komt ie weer,’ ‘Geef ze d’r portie’ weerklonken door de zaal en het publiek leefde
dermate mede met de sensationeele avonturen van den sympathieken cowboy Ed. Cody (Eddie
Polo), dat telkenmale vreugdekreten en applaus weerklonken, wanneer Ed. weder een zijner
heldendaden volvoerde.”

31
 Film reviews of the daily and weekly newspapers suggested that visitors to the
serial mainly came from the lower socio-economic class (P.K.). The serial was meant
for the masses and the “highly primitive minds.” Reviewers seemed to assume that the
educated public was generally not interested in serials and regarded them as inferior
film products. One critic found the serial only appropriate for evaluating how poorly
the cinema was doing (v.H. 3). According to Stokvis, those sensitive to cinema art
only watched in admiration for the fighting skills and techniques; the art lover would
not become as excited as the rest of the audience (9). Nevertheless, in its earlier years
of success, some descriptions occasionally state that the serial was attended by the
“educated” public of the higher social class.
There should be some courage, to follow a film like Op Hoop van Zegen with Het Mysterie
der Roode Oogen [The Crimson Stain Mystery, 1916, Metro]. The difference between the
two is too striking not to express the assumption that this involuntary has to interfere with
the attendance. But guess what? The attendance was very satisfactory and the content was
not what one expected. On the contrary. The respectable public showed equal interest in
the completion of this complex story as the ‘common.’ (“Kosmorama-Bioscoop” 45)18

Whether the last point in the film magazine was truthful or meant to promote the film,
remains unclear. It exposes, however, a bias of the time, namely that it was assumed
that the educated public was generally not interested in serials and considered them
to be inferior (a concept which today is still often held concerning television soap
operas). Probably though, at least in the beginning of the serial popularity, the audience
was not as strictly divided as some critics wanted their readers to believe.
European Eminence
As a result of the longer duration, European serials were at first not shown with
multiple episodes in a single program. This began to change from 1918 onward, when
for instance Pathé’s Le comte de Monte-Cristo (1918) was shown in four weeks with
two episodes of around 1,000 meters each (around fifty minutes) in a single program.
It is not so strange that American and European serials were screened with around
1,500 to 2,000 meters worth of episodes. Features were also getting longer at that time,
and serials in the Netherlands adjusted to this: The only Dutch serial that was ever
made, Oorlog en Vrede (1918, Filmfabriek Hollandia), consisted of three episodes of
around 2,000 meters; Feuillade’s Judex (Gaumont) had only five (adjusted) episodes
of around 1,700 meters when shown at the end of 1919; and Arbeid (Travail, 1920,
Le film d’art) was released in 1920 with several episodes accumulating a length of
even more than 2,000 meters each. Because the two-reel structure of an American
serial episode did not change as the feature films grew longer in the Netherlands, more
episodes of an American serial were needed to keep up with this length.
In 1920, increasingly more negative reviews of the serials were printed in the
Dutch newspapers. It was clear that the critics were tired of the American serials; for
them the serial form was feeble and predictable. The public, however, had still not
had enough as De Telegraaf reported on April 25, 1920:
18 Quote in Dutch original: “Er behoort wel eenigen moed toe, om na een film als Op Hoop van
Zegen een film te gaan geven als Het Mysterie der Roode Oogen. Het verschil tusschen beide is
te opvallend om niet de veronderstelling uit te spreken, dat dit onwillekeurig het bezoek moet
belemmeren. En wat blijkt? Dat het bezoek zeer bevredigend is en niet van het gehalte, wat
verwacht werd. Integendeel. Het nette publiek blijkt evenveel belangstelling te koesteren in
de afwikkeling dezer ingewikkelde geschiedenis, als wat men het ‘gewone’ noemt.” Op Hoop
van Zegen was based on a famous and appreciated Dutch play by Herman Heijermans.

32
 [W]hen a cinema theater continues to serve the public – that sadly is only too happy to
go – such brain and taste spoiling products to the detriment of morale and to the benefit of
their own wallet, a policeman should be placed at the entrance. However, in Amsterdam
there will not be enough policemen to prevent the people seeking relaxation by watching
gross sensational films. (“Cinema Palace”)19

None of the critics and commentators could have predicted that in 1920 the largest
number of serials yet would reach the Netherlands. At least eleven American serials
were offered for distribution and no less than eight productions were released in
Amsterdam, each serial filling up a weekly program for around six weeks. As distributors
usually advertised for a longer period of time and used more striking advertisements
than features, looking at the advertisement section in film journals the film market
seemed to have been inundated with serials.20 Both large distributors as well as small
and new businesses offered serials.
Another difference between European and American serials was that American
serials were rarely screened in the new and classier theaters of Amsterdam, while
European serials could be viewed there. De Koningin der Aarde (Die Herrin der
Welt, 1919, May-Film), the German super-production of eight episodes of around
2,000 meters per week dealing with the globe-trotting adventures of heroine Maud
Gregaards (Mia May), was released in the Netherlands in August 1920 by the
Nordisk Film company.21 Unlike American serials, it was promoted rather lavishly
with colorized advertisements on expensive paper that celebrated the exotic nature
of the picture and the grandeur of the sets. Film journals and newspapers mentioned
the epic quality of the production, focusing on the visual spectacle and massive sets
built to impress the viewing public.
In August 1920 the newspaper De Telegraaf responded to the production of De
Koningin der Aarde: “What can one say about such sensational nonsense, it is of
no better or worse quality than the rest” (“Rembrandttheater” 29 Aug.).22 However,
after several episodes the newspaper concluded in September that the serial was,
because of its mixing of sensational, tragic, and comic elements in a plausible and
natural way, an example of what a serial should be. “We are glutted with American
serials, we were tired to see all those incredible sensationalistic stories and look,
the German film gives an example of what a big serial – an inevitable but accepted
product on the film market – has to look like” (“Rembrandttheater” 25 Sept.).23
Nordisk also used this two-sidedness of American and European qualities in its
advertisements: “American in its grand conception! German … in its eminence and

19 Quote in Dutch original: “[W]anneer een bioscooptheater voortgaat het publiek – dat het helaas
maar al te graag wil – zulke hersen – en smaakbedervende producten toe te dienen, tot schade
van het moreel en tot voordeel van eigen portmonnaie, dan zou er een politieagent voor de deur
gezet moeten worden. Er zullen echter in Amsterdam geen politieagenten genoeg zijn om de
menschen tegen te houden die hun ontspanning zoeken in het bekijken van grove sensatiefilms.”
20 European serials had their share as well: Twenty European serials were released that year,
usually lasting two or three weeks.
21 At that time, Nordisk released all Ufa films in the Netherlands.
22 Quote in Dutch original: “Wat zal men van deze sensationeele nonsense zeggen, dan dat zij
niet meer of minder in kwaliteit is dan de rest.”
23 Quote in Dutch original: “Wij zijn door de Amerikaansche seriefilm overvoerd geworden – wij
waren er beu van die ongelooflijke sensatieverhalen bij te wonen en ziehier de Duitsche film
een exempel leveren van wat de groote seriefilm – het ‘artikel’ als noodzakelijk op de filmmarkt
eenmaal geaccepteerd – zijn moet.”

33
consistency, this film is a masterpiece in its entirety!” (“Koningin der Aarde”).24
De Koningin der Aarde thus combined American and European filmmaking, whereby
the European film style could complete and improve an American concept.
Though De Koningin der Aarde functioned as a serial, it was viewed as belonging
to a better category than the American serials of the time. Overall, European serials
earned better reviews than American ones. De Koningin der Aarde also suited the local
serial distribution pattern in the Netherlands. Instead of several episodes tied together
that must have caused a restless movement from one cliffhanger to the next, this serial
had a more consistent storyline and structure with less repetition, while it could boast
marvelous sets and adventures. Through upscale advertisements and promotions, a
higher sense of quality was conveyed, enabling the serial to be screened in one of the
most luxurious theaters in Amsterdam. This split in conception of different audience
target groups would become increasingly pronounced in the following years, not only
in the Netherlands but in other countries as well (cf. Canjels, Distributing).
Ups and Downs
At the end of 1920, the local Amsterdam film commission, led by the headstrong
Stokvis, came into force. From that moment on, distributors and exhibitors needed
to present their films to the committee. A quality mark was introduced which
indicated that the film had been approved. American serials often could not get
the approval of Stokvis’ film commission. Out of the seven serials playing in
Amsterdam in 1921, five were forbidden for children under sixteen or eighteen.
De Telegraaf welcomed this new film censorship:
In so many other aspects it appears this young man [Charles Hutchison in Jack de
Wervelwind (The Whirlwind, 1920, All Good Pictures)] is such a bruiser that the official
disapproval of this film for children is a pleasant relief. Already whole rows of children
older than 18 reach a state of noisy excitement at the sight of all the feverishly running,
breakneck train-experiments, fine low right-wingers and all what there is to admire for
powerful agility. (“Theater Pathé”)25

The censorship of Stokvis’ Amsterdam commission probably impacted the serials.

It is likely that with the disappearance of the young group of viewers the sensational
American serial became less attractive for distributors and theater owners. Perhaps
as a result of the Stokvis’ commission, the total supply of serials offered as well as
the number of serials shown in Amsterdam slowly decreased.26 At the same time,
the percentage of European serials increased: in 1922, thirty European serials
were released (mostly consisting of two episodes), and only five American serials
(consisting of around six episodes, as well as D.W. Griffith’s Orphans of the Storm
[1921] that was shown in two episodes). Reviewers probably welcomed this change
as it was frequently indicated that if a choice had to be made, preference was given
to the more prestigious and less sensational European serials (“Rembrandttheater”

24 Quote in Dutch original: “Amerikaansch in de grootsche opvatting! Duitsch … in zijn voor-

treffelijkheid en consequentie, is deze film een meesterwerk in zijn geheel!”
25 Quote in Dutch original: “In zooveel andere opzichten blijkt dit jongmensch trouwens zoo’n
pooteling dat de officieele afkeuring van deze film voor kinderen een aangename gerustelling
is. Reeds nu geraken heele rijen kinderen-boven-de-18 in een staat van luidruchtige opwinding
bij het zien dezer opgewonden rennen, halsbrekende sneltrein-experimenten, klinkende lage
rechtsen en wat hier weder aan krachtigen behendigheid te bewonderen valt.”
26 Often, other municipal and regional boards set up in the Netherlands prohibited serials as well.

34
25 Sep). From that time onwards, the larger distributors also began the retreat from
the American serial market. Even HAP that concentrated on sensational films, seemed
less and less interested in distributing American serials. Smaller and new distributors
tried to fill the space. The reasons for the shift and the waning interest in serials
was partly due to a change in the audience. From 1916 until 1922, the Amsterdam’s
cinemas tried to attract a wealthier audience with new, more comfortable theaters at
higher ticket prices. The opening of the luxurious Tuschinski in 1921 joined in this
trend. It is quite possible that this new group had very little interest in sensational
serials. Some European serials played in the prestigious Tuschinski and relatively
luxurious cinemas like the Cinema Royal or the Rembrandt.
As fewer American serials were presented and shown, newspapers and film magazines
hardly printed reviews. There was barely anything positive to read about the serials. In
1923, even distributors no longer beat around the bush: American serials were intended
for a specific audience that was mainly there for the never-ending thrills. “For lovers
of great excitement, this film [Jack Hoxie, de Dolle Bliksem (Lightning Bryce, 1919,
National Film Corporation of America)] gives the lovers of the genre certainly value
for their money. This film is not great art, but a seriefilm of three weeks, offering the
necessary variation that will always find its special faithful audience” (“Jack Hoxie”
10).27 Similar to other American serials at the time, Jack Hoxie, de Dolle Bliksem
was shown at a frantic pace in three weeks, with no less than five episodes in a row.

Figure 2: In 1924, Pathé released the ten episodes of De Doodende Straal in two
weeks. The Sky Ranger (1921) originally consisted of 15 episodes, but in France
it had already been restructured into ten episodes and shown as Les Rôdeurs de
l’Air. Advertisement, Nieuw weekblad voor de cinematografie 27 June 1924.

In 1924, a total of six American serials were advertised for distribution, but only
two of them were shown in Amsterdam (Fig. 2). The total supply in the Netherlands
was reduced to a paltry number of two serials in 1925; no serial seems to have been
released in Amsterdam. In the years up to 1929, usually a few American serials

27 Quote in Dutch original: “Voor liefhebbers van geweldige sensatie biedt deze film de minnaars
van het genre zeker ruimschoots waar voor hun geld. Deze film brengt geen groote kunst, maar
een seriefilm van drie weken, die de noodige afwisseling brengt, zooals hier, zal steeds wel een
speciaal getrouw publiek vinden.”

35
would be offered by distributors, but they were hardly advertised and did not receive
any attention from reviewers. The European serial did not fare much better; the
costly serial features were hardly made anymore. Non-serial feature production had
become the standard for international production and distribution.
Conclusion
The different distribution and exhibition forms of the American serial proved successful
in the Netherlands and even might have caused a quick popularization of the genre.
Yet the same mode of distribution also caused its downfall. Because the serial was
presented as a feature and not a filler, the waning audience interest that could be
observed in 1920 meant a rapid end for the American serial in the Netherlands. If
the American serial had been part of the films surrounding a feature, it probably
would have lasted longer. The public still went to the cinema in large numbers and
shorts would be screened alongside the main film for years to come. The major
distribution companies began to step out of the serial business, however, and fewer
and fewer American serials played in Dutch cinemas. European serials or multi-part
features lasted a little longer. This is not surprising, as European serials usually had
a bigger budget, were less repetitive, and did not end abruptly, thereby catering to
a different market section as well.
There is no clear explanation as to why the public was no longer interested
in the American serial after only a few years. Perhaps the abundance of serial
productions that quickly filled the cinemas explains the aversion to serials. After
the war, there were also more films for distributors to choose from, perhaps other
genres appealed to the audiences. Maybe the higher socio-economic class that
became increasingly interested in the medium film was quickly bored by the serial,
never enabling its crossover to more luxurious cinemas. Perhaps the sequentially
shown episodes made for a little varied release schedule, suffocating the program,
lacking head or tail, while exposing its repetitive narrative and structure. Maybe
Dutch audiences felt coerced by having to go to the cinema every week. Perhaps
due to local censorship, the youth market fell away and cinema owners lost interest.
All of these hypotheses connect to the important fact that the manner of display
and the viewing experience in the Netherlands were significantly different from
those of the serials’ country of origin (and most other countries to which they were
exported). Instead of one episode of 20-25 minutes, Dutch viewers were treated
to several consecutive episodes, all featuring a compact tale with plenty of thrills,
dangers and a cliffhanger.
Besides shedding light on local distribution and exhibition practices, away
from standardized international formats, this essay reveals one important quality of
seriality during the silent film period: Its capacity to appear in several forms. Serial
products were constantly changing, mostly shaped by distribution – a forceful factor
in creating film forms and local serial transformations. Serials were not merely
distributed in their original form upon import. This specific transformative quality of
seriality and the importance of distribution can only be understood in a comparative
framework, i.e. not from a national but from a transnational perspective. In Europe,
with its many national differences, the serial could constantly adapt to different
forms. This can also be seen outside the Netherlands, for instance in Germany and
France, two countries that produced and imported many serials, as well as in the
U.S. where Europeans serials were confronted with different requirements. The

36
cultural circulation and transformation of seriality can therefore be described as a
process of adaptation and formal restructuring, depending on local film cultures as
well as on specific cultural contexts.
It would not be until the 1940s and 1950s that the film serial again became popular
in the Netherlands and cliffhangers kept audiences in suspense for weeks. Again,
however, these serials were adjusted by distributors and shown in feature-length
episodes. In other words: to be continued …

Amsterdam Rudmer Canjels

Works Cited
“Advertisement F.A.N.” De Bioscoop-Courant 11 Aug. 1916: 5. Print.
“Bioscoop: New York.” De Utrechtsche Courant 5 June 1916. Print.
Blom, Ivo. Jean Desmet and the Early Dutch Film Trade. Amsterdam: Amsterdam
UP, 2003. Print.
Canjels, Rudmer. Distributing Silent Film Serials: Local Practices, Changing Forms,
Cultural Transformations. New York: Routledge, 2011. Print.
---. “Vom Beiprogramm zum Hauptprogramm: Distribution und Transformation
US-amerikanischer Stummfilmserials in den Niederlanden.” Serielle Formen:
Von den frühen Film-Serials zu aktuellen Quality-TV- und Online-Serien. Ed.
Robert Blanchet, Kristina Köhler, Tereza Smid, and Julia Zutavern. Marburg:
Schüren, 2011. 319-36. Print.
“Censorship file 1614.” 7 Aug. 1928. Nationaal Archief, The Hague. Print.
“Cinema Palace.” De Telegraaf 25 Apr. 1920. Print.
Dahlquist, Marina, ed. Exporting Perilous Pauline: Pearl White and the Serial Film
Craze. Chicago: U of Illinois P, 2013. Print.
“The Diamond from the Sky.” Advertisement. Moving Picture World 20 Nov. 1915:
1436. Print.
Dibbets, Karel. “Het bioscoopbedrijf tussen twee wereldoorlogen.” Geschiedenis
van de Nederlandse film en bioscoop tot 1940. Ed. Dibbets and Frank van der
Maden. Weesp: Het Wereldvenster, 1986. 229-70. Print.
“The Girl and the Game.” Advertisement. Moving Picture World 15 Jan. 1916:
364-5. Print.
Hageman, Felix. “Seriefilm of niet?” De Film-Wereld 51 (1919): 2. Print.
“Jack Hoxie, de Dolle Bliksem.” Advertisement. Nieuw Weekblad voor de Cine-
matografie 16 Mar. 1923: 10. Print.
“Kaffra Kan de Geweldige.” Advertisement. De Bioscoop-Courant 16 Nov. 1917: 12.
Print.
“De koningin der aarde.” Advertising supplement. Kunst en Amusement 5 Aug.
1920. Print.
“De koningin verveelt zich.” Advertisement. De Kinematograaf 27 Dec. 1918:
4240-1. Print.

37
“Kosmorama-Bioscoop.” De Bioscoop Courant 7 Mar. 1919: 45. Print.
Müller, Corinna. Frühe deutsche Kinematographie: Formale, wirtschaftliche und
kulturelle Entwicklungen, 1907-1912. Stuttgart: Metzler, 1994. Print.
“Olympia Theater.” De Bioscoop-Courant 2 May 1919: 34. Print.
P.K. “Onder de streep, bij den weg.” Algemeen Handelsblad 9 Feb. 1920. Print.
“Regulierbreestraat: De Verborgenheden van Parijs.” De Telegraaf 25 Jan. 1920. Print.
“Reisbeschrijving.” De Bioscoop-Courant 26 Feb. 1915: 2. Print.
“Rembrandttheater.” De Telegraaf 29 Aug. 1920. Print.
“Rembrandttheater.” De Telegraaf 25 Sept. 1920. Print.
“De roode cirkel.” Advertisement. De Bioscoop-Courant 16 Nov. 1917: 8. Print.
“De roode cirkel.” Bioscoop-Courant 30 Nov. 1917: 31. Print.
“De seriefilm.” De Kinematograaf 18 Aug. 1916: 2454. Print.
Singer, Ben. Melodrama and Modernity: Early Sensational Cinema and Its Contexts.
New York: Columbia UP, 2001. Print.
“De sleutel naar geluk.” Advertisement. De Bioscoop-Courant 28 Feb. 1916: 4. Print.
Stamp, Shelley. Movie-Struck Girls: Women and Motion Picture Culture after the
Nickelodeon. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2000. Print.
Stokvis, Simon B. “Peg o’ the Ring.” De Amsterdammer: Weekblad voor Nederland
2066 (1917): 9. Print.
“Theater Pathé.” De Telegraaf 31 July 1921. Print.
Vermoolen, Joost. “Simon B. Stokvis (1883-1941). De strijd van een omstreden
filmkeurder.” Jaarboek Mediageschiedenis 6 (1995): 258-78. Print.
“Verscheidenheid in het programma.” De Film 28 Nov. 1919: 1201. Print.
v.H. “Wetenschappelijke films en filmwetenschappelijkheid.” De Nieuwe Amster-
dammer 126 (1917): 3. Print.

38
 “Poisoning their daydreams”: American Serial Cinema,
Moral Panic and the British Children’s Cinema Movement*1
While weekly serials and series were a common and popular form of cinema
entertainment worldwide during the second half of the silent era, production of
sound serials was far less widespread. Only Hollywood maintained a consistent
production, servicing the world market until the 1950s. While occasional serial type
products were made within other national contexts, both academic and scholarly-fan
writing characterise a transfer of serial content (and its audiences) to sequel
feature or ‘series film’ production with less frequent and regularised distribution
in the sound period.1 No concerted and sustained cycle of sound serial production
continued outside the United States until serial production restarted in the UK in
the 1940s. 38 serials were produced by the Children’s Film Foundation between
1954 and 1979 following six serial productions by its precursor organisation, Rank/
GBI’s Children’s Entertainment Films that were filmed between 1945 and 1950
and remain relatively unknown.
British sound serials bear little relation to their silent forbears which were
­modelled after contemporaneous Hollywood serials, and differ importantly from
these in content, form, production method, funding, and intended audience.2 These
differences reflect an attempt to negotiate a widespread criticism of serial texts, which
had periodically medicalised (or psychologised) a class prejudice around serial audi-
ences and their apparently vulgar, repetitive content, and projected physical, mental
and social harms that arose from the exposure to such texts. In short, all of the classic
hallmarks of the “moral panic,” and at turns the “weak-minded subjects” of these
panics were similarly usual suspects: working-class men, women, immigrants, and
children – the uneducated and the unwashed. The decision to restart serial production
in Britain and the evolution of a new, and successful, model of serial making comes
as a direct response to one such outburst of anti-serial hysteria in the 1940s.
In order to understand how suitable conditions for serial production emerged in
the British film industry at a time when US serial production was becoming unten-
able, it is important to look at three aspects: (1) the backlash to American serials,
and to serial entertainments more widely, and their implications for specifically
child audiences; (2) the uniquely producer-led movement to improve children’s
entertainment production in Britain and its values and motivations in committing
to serial products; and (3) the longitudinal relationship between nascent British
serial production in the 1940s and the parallel judicial and legislative interventions
into the serial debate. The serials produced in the immediate post-war period
changed the broader British filmmaking landscape, facilitating a sustained period
of serial production in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. Holding a decisive place in
the evolution of the Children’s Film movement, and so in children’s media, they
form a bridge between the adult orientated American serials of the 1940s and the
specifically tailored children’s programming of modern television.

*1 With thanks to Lawrence Napper for instigating this research and Mark Jancovich and Charles
Barr for their assistance and feedback on various incarnations of this work.
1 Singer, for example, mentions the Indian Hunterwala/Fearless Nadia series, Rainey discusses
Mexican and Japanese feature products.
2 For a critical history of British silent serials, see Marlow-Mann.

39
 Special children’s cinema clubs had been an irregular experiment in Britain
before the Second World War, though children had always formed a significant, and
sometimes troublesome, section of all cinema audiences. British serials were the stuff
of provincial and working-class audiences – that both the financial range and aesthetic
tastes of children (particularly of the working class) coincided, had been noted as
early as 1918: “[I]n those ramshackle ‘halls’ of our poorer streets, noisy urchins await
the next episode of some long since antiquated ‘Transatlantic Serial’” (Boyd 617).
Criticisms, linking proletarian and juvenile audiences with an alleged rise in
immorality and delinquency, and accusations of unethical producers exploiting
impressionable audiences, emerge worldwide during this period and stayed with
the serial through the thirties in recurrent media panics.3 While producers in the
United States emphasised the juvenile section of the serial audience as a useful
barometer of popular taste, in the UK, the children in the audience were seen
as problematically unsuited to the product. British critics feared the effects not
only of the Hollywood serial’s vulgar form, but their ‘Americanising’ (i.e. violent
and commercial) cultural content. The cinema, like other forms of consumption
emerging in the early twentieth century, was contentious precisely because of its
unknown effects on impressionable audiences.
The First Episodes of British Sound Serial
Production and the Serial Debate
When, at the onset of the Second World War, cinemas were encouraged by local
authorities to provide entertainment for evacuated children, J. Arthur Rank, who owned
the country’s two largest theatre chains, instigated a nationwide programme of cinema
clubs. When the Methodist Rank enquired which films would be a suitable influence
on children, he was told “there aren’t any” (Wood 173), and so a children’s film unit
was tasked with providing morally instructive film. In charge of that unit was director/
producer Mary Field, answerable in turn to an advisory council of state and religious
bodies interested in children’s education, health and welfare.
Field had been a teacher, and a maker of scientific and educational films (including
the Secrets of Nature documentary series) with a thorough knowledge of pedagogic
theory, including the need for demonstration, explanation and repetition in learning
amongst adults as well as children. Part of Gaumont-British Instructional, Field re-
named the unit Children’s Entertainment Films (CEF) believing that education without
entertainment was impossible, and recognising that to make an impact on the young
audiences, “Our films would have to be of every type to permeate the programmes
at the cinema clubs and not merely be short interludes” (Field, Good Company 10).
In order to permeate the cinema club bills and the children’s long term conscious-
ness, Field felt that the repeated, regular, reinforced exposure of the serial format was
the best way to get across the subtler moral messages which the CEF sought to promote
(though Field’s “morality” was perhaps a more liberal one than Rank’s). As she knew
from her documentary series, serial forms could bring across subtler, more complex
ideas in short, iterative bursts. With audience members ranging from 4 to 15 year-olds,
many attendees had very short attention spans and had trouble following features
even of just an hour’s duration. Looking back on serial production, she notes how
useful they are in conditioning audiences through repeated exposure, citing the gradual

3 Cf. Canjels; Dall’Asta 301-2; Hughes 299-300; Vela.

40
recognition and acceptance of “modern” and experimental music that accompanied
Riders of the New Forest (1949) as proof that children “could gradually be trained to
enjoy any good music” (90).
Having made just five short films in their first year, CEF’s 1945 roster announced
two six-episode serials. Rank’s sponsorship and guaranteed distribution allowed
a variation to the 13-15 episode model dictated by US distribution patterns, and
allowing a production schedule that fitted into standard British industrial practices
(being roughly the footage of an average feature) – and still producing enough
episodes across the two serials for one quarter’s screenings. However, the first serial,
Smugglers’ Cove, ran into difficulties with lessons long since learnt by US serial
makers, namely that serials must be made quickly, in controlled environments, with
meticulous pre-production. Driven out of Wales by excessive rain in the summer of
1945, the production moved to the Devonshire coast before being finally abandoned
with less than half an episode completed. Plans to re-write and reshoot Smugglers’
Cove in the studio the following February of 1946 were abandoned because in
the meantime “the voice of the hero had broken and the small girl who played the
heroine had grown to Junoesque proportions” (Field, Good Company 17).
The second serial, Bush Christmas, being shot in New South Wales, should
have been a more predictable location shoot but production was hampered by rare
snow falls in the Blue Mountains. The production was engineered to piggyback
on Ealing’s The Overlanders (1946) by producer Ralph Smart, using locations,
performers and technicians from his first film to make the serial. An ex-colleague
of Field, Smart knew of the difficulty the CEF had in hiring young child actors due
to legal restrictions in the UK, and decided to use Australian child actors instead.
Despite problems with weather, snakes on the set, and the necessity to fit in lessons
for the child performers, filming went ahead through the winter of 1945/46 and the
film was, eventually, completed.
What Field could not have anticipated was a snake attack at home in England:
Rank, it appeared, had been nursing a viper in his bosom. In mid-1944 permission
had been given to J. P. Mayer, a sociologist at the London School of Economics,
to attend cinema clubs and in early 1946 an anonymous Times leader entitled
“Films for Children” appeared which only Mayer could have written. He attacked
firstly the cinema clubs (accusing them of being quasi-fascist and calling for their
closure), secondly the serials they showed (claiming they induced delinquency
and psychopathy, and demanding that children should be banned from them), and
finally the films of the CEF (which he found “unsatisfactory and insignificant”) (5).
Rank severed their relationship, and Kine Weekly exposed Mayer as the author
of the piece. Over the following weeks, The Times had a lengthy debate in its letter
column in which Field herself claimed the two serials she had in production, Bush
Christmas (1947) and Dusty Bates, to be entertaining “films of fact”: imaginative
introductions to everyday life, fictions against a documentary background (“Films for
Children” 5). Bush Christmas (1947) was released to worldwide acclaim and success,
showing to both children and eventually adult audiences; but not as a serial. The
impact of Mayer’s article, re-enforcing so many existing serial prejudices, prompted
the CEF advisory committee to edit the film as a feature – the fate of many a failed
US serial befell Bush Christmas as post-production began.
The Voyage of Peter Joe (1946) was described and promoted as a “character
based series,” rather than a serial in order to avoid the negative connotations of

41
the term. However the idea of releasing a serial at all was initially opposed by the
advisory council on Children’s Film, who refused to give the film their approval
after a private test screening. Field later noted that the film is “not popular with
adults unaccompanied by a child” (Good Company 172). The unsuitability of Peter
Joe lay both in the working-class milieu through which Peter moved, with its stock
cockney characters and star personas of performers such as Graham Moffat and
Mark Daly, which fixed the series too close to the serial’s traditional audience,
and in the very seriality of the text – its repetitions of character and event whose
recognition and anticipation were key to the enjoyment of young audiences – making
the film ironically too “childish” for the tastes of the Council. All of these points
seem to have been remedied by the observation of child audiences’ reactions to
the films and the discovery that “with child audiences the charm of a serial lies in
the familiarity of the characters and not in the suspense from week to week” (172):
by the next meeting, several member of the Council had been to see Episode One at a
children’s cinema club in the Edgware Road and immediately withdrew their criticisms,
since the old-style slapstick comedy, not very entertaining to a small group of adults
viewing it in a private cinema, was an uproarious success with an audience of 1,500
children to whom all the old gags were brand new and who had seldom had an opportunity
of laughing at something which was neither violent nor suggestive, nor entirely adult in
approach. (Field, Good Company 47)

A serial already in the can was bolder, “with a background of the London Docks,
[it] grew out of the abandoned Smugglers’ Cove and demonstrated that we had
mastered the art of Serial making, which was attempted by no other group in this
country” (20). The Adventures of Dusty Bates was unashamedly an adventure
serial, and an attempt to take the place within the cinema club programme of the
American serial, the most disagreeable feature of the bill to most critics, but the
most enjoyable to children.
It is the story of a boy, Dusty (Anthony Newley), who stows away on a Thames
river boat and, with the children of the boat’s Captain, captures a gang of smugglers,
recovers the stolen jewels and clears his own relatives of blame. As the children
investigate, fights with gang members ensue on the boat, on the docks and in
the surrounding warehouses; and on several occasions they are rescued in the
nick of time by adults, including both the police (whom the children have tipped
off earlier), and, when trapped in a burning building by the thieves, by the fire
service. The various perils are resolved within each episode, but leave the audience
aware of an advantage the villains have over the protagonists, thus forming the
‘cliffhanger’ quandary.
This film was found acceptable by the Council and critics, and proved an enormous
success with audiences. Kine Weekly, went so far as to say “we fail to see why it
shouldn’t be shown in all halls where chapter plays are taken” (Billings 20) – that is,
to adult serial audiences as well as children. This was achieved by some high profile
publicity on the part of the CEF and the advisory council, who invited the popular
and influential Picture Post to report on their work and the production of Dusty Bates
(Moy 24-7). The piece, printed two weeks after a parliamentary debate on children’s
cinema clubs, and immediately before the release of J. P. Mayer’s book detailing the
results of his cinema club study, was an attempt by the board to get their retaliation in
first. Such public presentations of the unit’s serials became important in this discourse
in positioning the films for adult readers who would never see the films themselves.

42
 The piece was instigated by CEF and their Ministry of Education representa-
tive, the archaeologist and writer Jaquetta Hawkes, at the suggestion of producer
Geoffrey Barkas, both of whom had close links to Picture Post staff. Laid out in
house style – large, arresting photographs (supposedly) of the production, Council
members, and stills from the film, each with pithy, apparently objective captions
which tell the bulk of the story, illustrate a short article that presents the papers’
succinct editorial line on the subject. Comparing the stills with others in the Picture
Post archive reveals how the images were selected: a fight scene showing a character
who is being strangled and is mugging comically for the camera, while a third character
looks on with comic dismay, is chosen over the more exciting image of a chair being
broken over another character’s head – the choice here highlighting slapstick elements
in the fight scenes over violent action.
Two of the four large pictures are of the Council and Field, and all but two
sentences of the article are about the need for good children’s films and the role of the
expert advisory council. Only at the end does the article admit, almost apologetically,
that in addition to their worthy work the department has also begun to make serial
stories. Drawing the conclusion that, while children’s filmmakers learn the craft of
producing “new film classics on a higher level than even the best adventure stories,”
base films such as serials must be made at first, as despite the author being “impatient
to see in production the great children’s classics […] it is better not to plunge into
such ventures […] until there are producers who can be guaranteed not to go wrong
on such delicate affairs as Alice in Wonderland or The Water Babies” (27). In doing
this, it manages to fend off the typical calls for literary classics while intimating that
serial production is somehow a step towards them. The many images from the serial
make the film appear exciting and action-packed, while the captions are designed to
underline Field’s theories and rules of children’s filmmaking, reassuring readers that
the violence is clean, fun and non-lethal, that the children are law abiding, virtuous
and have complete faith in the adult authorities, and that they win through ingenuity,
co-operation and fair play. Resolutions to all of the exciting situations are given within
the captions, along with affirmations that children are not held in suspense for too
long and “can breathe freely again” as “virtue wins out”; countering the argument
that children are “over stimulated” or left in a traumatic state of suspense. No mention
is made of Dusty’s betrayal by the owner of the shipping line, the middle class head
of the crime ring, to whom the child turns for help – only reassuring messages of
social stability are advertised here. Significantly, the article answered all of the points
which had been raised in the Parliamentary Adjournment Debate on 27 November
1946. Through the advisory council’s N.U.T. representative W. Griffith M.P, Field
was aware in advance of the debate’s tabled motions, and she and Barkas tailored
the material for the article accordingly.
Although the article was effective and there was no outcry against the film, the
advisory council, for all their support for this finished film, had reservations that they
had gone too far toward making a “child’s serial along the lines of adult serial films,
but with violence and suspense moderated” as Field had wished (Good Company 66).
However, the annual summary of audience reactions to CEF films shows it to be the
single most popular film, with no unfavourable or non-committal responses whatso-
ever, and the Wheare Report, published well after the initial commotion surrounding
children’s clubs and serials, praises both these first two serials as “exciting without
being frightening” and providing “the continuity of interest that children enjoy” (29).

43
 The Sociology of Film and Observations of Cinemagoing
On its publication at the end of 1946, Mayer’s Sociology of Film proved to have
little more to say on serials than had been included in the Times article, an expanded
version of which formed Chapter IV of the book, entitled “Impressions and Reflections
on Children’s Cinema Clubs”:
Last, but not least, come the serials, e.g. Don Winslow of the Navy. They are of American
origin. I was never able to discover a coherent plot in the serials. A considerable amount
of shooting goes on, with nerve-racking persecutions of the bad men who have kidnapped
the beautiful, innocent blonde secretary. There is no lack of submarines (they are usually
Japanese, and only “recently” Nazi) being hunted down by aeroplanes, ships, etc., etc.
Undoubtedly these serials are, from the point of view of the children, the highlights of the
cinema clubs, but they are pernicious in their psychological effects, leaving the children
at a high pitch of expectation for the next weeks show, poisoning their daydreams and,
by an utterly artificial unreality, influencing their play. (53-54)

Mayer’s insistence that his failure to understand, or enjoy, the serial must be the
fault of the film, rather than his own “incorrect” method of viewing the film (i.e.
not watching each episode in order) is typical of the surety of his imagined social
capital as an expert, sociologist and university lecturer – terms by which he refers
to himself regularly and through which he justifies many an un-evidenced opinion.
That the children, presumably neither experts nor lecturers, seem perfectly capable
of deciphering and enjoying the film is dismissed as they lack the forms of social
and cultural capital Mayer is prepared to recognise. This point is made clear by
the Association of Cine-Technician’s Ralph Bond, writing in the Times, whose
own dislike of serials was based on their commerciality and American-ness, not
on a class habitus:
I think he exaggerates the harmful effects of Westerns and serials. It is perhaps a tribute
to the healthy good sense of the children that they cheer lustily when their favourite serial
star appears, and boo the coloured slide asking if they intend going to Sunday School. (5)

Elsewhere in Mayer’s book, there is scant explicit reference to serials at all. One
girl, R.E. (12½), states:
As for serial films, I like one about an American family; and the other about a group of
children, including a little boy with a deep, very growly voice, who have many adventures.
They too are very jolly. (111)

Clearly the pernicious stuff of “poisoned daydreams.” Mayer’s child samples are
small and with the exception of six responses (only three of which are printed)
are middle class. As such, his sample groups were unlikely to attend the types of
matinees that showed serials in the general programme, while his cinema club
questionnaires went largely unanswered. His dislike of the serials is obviously
based upon his distaste at their voluble audience, and in noting his objection to
the audience’s behaviour he attributes this distinction to the influence of the serial
form, rather than a difference in age or cultural capital:
In the two serial pictures, booing of the villain reached an almost hysterical pitch, and
catching of breaths was audible during situations of tension, also exclamations of “Oh!”
when some ill had befallen the hero. The excitement of the children was, in fact, quite
obvious, both during the performance of the films and in the intervals.

44
 This form of emotional possession is more prevalent among children than adolescents
[…] how apt they are to give expression to their over-stimulated feelings by shouts and
cries, or even physical movement when an instalment of the serial picture is in progress.
There is tremendous excitement whenever the hero or heroine is in danger, or is rescued,
and particularly when any kind of fight takes place. Groans accompany the successes of
the villain, and sighs of relief are heard when the peril is past […] little attention is paid
to scenes which do not contain an element of danger and discussion of earlier fighting
scenes goes on during the sequences which show the happy ending. (61)

These observations of the active participation of children with film are interpreted
in the opposite way by Field whose detailed photographic studies of children’s
responses in the cinema showed that it was action, rather than explicit violence,
and editing technique, which held children’s attention, and used the “emotional
possession” of children as an indication that films were doing their job in entertaining
the audience. When it was suggested to her that special films for children should be
replaced by “organized fun,” she responded that “the shouts of laughter at Three
Bags Full or the quiet happiness induced by Riders of the New Forest [are] perhaps
too spontaneous to win her approval” (Field, Good Company 144).
Mayer’s attitude toward the serial’s influence was rooted in arguments of the
1930s and the bulk of his “evidence” is borrowed from the American Payne Fund
studies, the results of which he pastes into his own observations as contemporaneous
child’s accounts, including his key example of serial effects, in fact, from an adult
over a decade earlier, recounting his experiences of silent serials a decade before that
(Blumer 120-1). But this does not stop Mayer claiming: “These very same serials
are still being used in British film matinees for children” (161), and elaborating
his central theory that:
The characteristic feature of the serial is that it stops abruptly when suspense is at its
height, and instead of the child being left in a state of tranquillity it is keyed up during
the whole of the subsequent week, and is brought to the same condition again by the next
instalment. It is impossible to say definitely what permanent effects this perpetual state
of suspense may have on the child’s mind, although it seems certain that these effects
are of an important kind.
Infected by a high degree of emotional possession […] the child may be prepared to do
things […] of a delinquent type. (161)

In this last paragraph Mayer seems able to speculate precisely about those things
he has just admitted are “impossible to say definitely.” The reaction from the
advisory committee to Mayer’s outburst was felt by the serial in production during
this furore: Riders of the New Forest. In order to avoid accusations of “emotional
possession,” the board sought to cut not just violence, but all “adventure” from
the film. Riders was in production and post-production for two years, undergoing
this process of fine honing, before the CEF felt the British public (or critical
media) were ready for another serial. The board acknowledged it had ultimately
been too heavy handed in its editing, however the balance was found with what
would prove to be their final serials: Three Bags Full (1949) and Mystery of the
Snakeskin Belt (1950).

45
 The Final CEF Serials, and the Blueprint for 30 Years of Production
The decision to retain the serial format at this point was bolstered by the release of a
British Film Institute (BFI) inquiry on children and film commissioned in response
to Mayer’s book: the Children’s Cinema Clubs Report. The report considered all
of Mayer’s criticisms of both clubs and serials. The serial formed the structure of
its methodology, with its two authors, Mary Parnaby and Maurice Woodhouse,
attending the Odeon National Cinema Club for Boys and Girls at the Bradford
Odeon for thirteen weeks during the entire run of Jungle Queen. In experiencing
clubs for the whole of a serial cycle, Parnaby and Woodhouse gained a much clearer
understanding of the ways in which audiences behaved when watching serials.
While their list of concerns was as long as Mayer’s, their reasoning and proposals
were very different.
We have witnessed the whole of Jungle Queen. The plot is at times involved and the
photography poor. The story is crude and sensational, and evidently designed for adult
audiences of low intelligence. But there are elements in it which appeal to children –
fast-moving action, excitement, pictures of animals and jungle life, and repetitive incidents
for which they look from week to week. (7)

Here, they vitally separate the ‘crude’ appeals of the serial and their attractions to
children, which are synonymous and contingent in Mayer’s theory. While they were
not impressed by the cliffhanger’s “with one bound he was free” conventions, they
were heartened by the children’s reactions to them:
Each episode ends, characteristically, with the heroes and/or heroines in an apparently
impossible impasse. The following week there is a slight alteration in the timing, which
allows them to extricate themselves. This is a crude artifice. The children detected this, and
occasionally expressed disappointment and annoyance that such unfair technique had
been employed. (7)

In seeing little or no aesthetic or narrative quality in the serials, but recognising

the children’s own film literacy and ability to critically read what they watched in
a way that would have been unlikely if they had not immersed themselves in the
serial-going experience along with the children, Parnaby and Woodhouse found the
form had much to recommend it to young audiences: “We urge the retention of the
serial because of its appeal to the natural interests of children – weekly familiarity
with screen personalities and settings, suspense, and anticipation” (7). These were
the elements which drew children to the cinema and which helped them enjoy and
understand it. They credited the audience with the intelligence to observe, recognise,
anticipate and understand the formal elements and shortcomings of the production.
They recommended the serial as a key and important element in children’s cinema
diet, promoting the development of media literacy, facilitating learning through
repetition, engaging the audience through action and suspense, promoting memory
and retention through the broken narrative. Parnaby and Woodhouse were the first to
explicitly state that the serial format was a positive and useful media tool, for, while
Field had inferred this, most previous arguments had begun from the standpoint
of the serial as a necessary evil. They recommended the making of “better” serial
product, more technically accomplished, less crude in character and story, suggesting
again British children’s literary classics as a model subject. Having not seen the
output of the CEF during their tenure in Bradford, they managed to recommend
precisely the form, if not the content, that Field and company had now arrived at.

46
 Following the attacks upon Cinema Clubs and serials across the media, serial
production had gone into hiatus, but following good notices for their Squirrel War
at Christmas 1947/48 (Norgate 3),4 and a special prize for the un-recut Riders of
the New Forest tentatively shown at the Venice Film Festival 1948, the final season
of serials went into production.
Three Bags Full was designed to be flexible for the exhibition needs of audi-
ences. The three two-reel episodes could equally be put together as a feature, or
even shown as six one-reel episodes, or three episodes with an intermission (for
younger children with shorter attention spans). Each reel would end with some
anticipatory high-jinx leaving children in wait of a punchline in lieu of a cliffhanger.
The formulaic physical comedy which serves to replace violent adventure was
considered particularly suitable for younger children. The trade press certainly
found little issue with it:
Deliberately avoiding serial sensationalism, and making the most of regulated surprise and
humour, the result is simple, homely slapstick which never over-taxes the imagination.
There is a healthy absence of all things lethal and what a worthwhile change that makes
for juvenile adventure entertainment. Excellent offering for matinee clubs. Simple homely
slapstick, healthy atmosphere, sufficient thrills and juvenile star attraction. (Chappell 17, 22)

In choosing director Baxter, comedy, and the Moffat-Daly pairing, popular from
The Voyage of Peter Joe, the CEF were not playing to a safe respectable middle
class ideal, but rather to a familiar staple. Baxter’s working-class comedies, often
with Daly, came from the Music Hall tradition with all its crudities, while Moffat,
known from his roles alongside Will Hay, was associated with a similar idiom.
While the child stars of the film are clean cut, morally upstanding and somewhat
classless, Moffat and Daly (their adult allies) are as a chef and a handyman, clearly
working-class; and the working-class characters throughout are similarly sympathetic
and agents of good. The story was devised by Mary Cathcart Borer, CEF’s staff
writer with whom Baxter had previously worked on his Old Mother Riley films; but
on this film Geoffrey Orme, Baxter’s regular script writing partner wrote the final
screenplay and the film has more of Baxter’s trademark working-class sympathy
than his earlier CEF films.
While the serial was by no means as bawdy as Old Mother Riley or even Will
Hay, the music hall clowning of its humour led to the picture being criticised in
similar ways to Voyage of Peter Joe by those who found it too low brow. Sonika
Bo condemning both comedies as “‘burlesques’ that excite rather than entertain …
contain[ing] bad examples” in the UNESCO enquiry (95-6). However Three Bags
Full is not a mere tit-for-tat comedy in a loose adventure story, but a humorous
lesson in following a moral compass, even if that means following it against those
who appear to be one’s betters. Field’s belief in theme over plot reinforces Baxter
and Orme’s recurrent desire to illustrate a type of moral value or honesty held by
the working class whose circumstances bring them into opposition with the law, as
seen in The Common Touch (1941), or Justice Deferred (1951) (Brown and Aldgate
109-10). Both Baxter and Field would clearly prefer to depict both good and “bad
examples” and demonstrate virtue as a choice, rather than hiding wickedness – or
class – from the delicate eyes of their audience.

4 The three part Squirrel War (1947) was commissioned from Analysis Films and the first ever
serial cartoon.

47
In the shape of the two slapstick serials, the CEF managed to create the first real
comedy serials in two quite new and different modes. The semi-serial Voyage of
Peter Joe had an over-arching story but with individual sub plots completed in each
episode. Three Bags Full used easily anticipated character dynamics and comic
implication as the serial draw to see “what happens next,” exchanging the fear of
the punch for the desire for the punchline.
Finally came The Mystery of the Snakeskin Belt which had been commissioned
and shot alongside Three Bags Full in the summer of 1948.5 A synopsis for the
serial appeared in The Cinema Club Annual 1949 – a very safe vision of the film
when the stills depicted are compared to those which illustrate the novelisation
of the film two years later. Exciting action in the film such as the aircraft wreck,
the white water rafts, abseiling out of danger, boulders being rolled off cliffs – the
fare of the average adventure feature or serial – are absent from the synopsis (but
evident in the novel), even the moments of comic retaliation, such as the children
assaulting their antagonists with overripe pumpkins. More restrained images appear
in the Annual, despite them being less visually amusing, but presumably less likely
to attract charges of leaving the readers in an unhealthy state of excitement and
artificially influencing their playtime activities. Notably, neither depiction nor, of
course, the film itself shy away from the scene in which the children are threatened
with a gun. Where the Dusty Bates article had pointed to its “violent but not lethal”
fighting (25), presuming the absence of firearms to be a virtue in films for children,
here a firearm in the possession of a middle class figure and in an exotic setting is
apparently acceptable (Fig. 1). The threat of violence from working-class characters
and in British industrial contexts formed the basis for the limited amount of negative
feedback amongst the critics of Dusty Bates; a waterman with a wrench is somehow
less clean, less honest than a clerk in a pith helmet pointing a gun. Such middle
class figures are of course not unusual as criminals, but it is interesting to note
their lack of hired muscle amongst the African cast, while they do bribe a native to
steal the belt for them, no African character is cast in a threatening or violent role,
leaving the bosses to point their own guns. Once again the team appear to have
gotten the balance right, the film full of action and incidents, but still “good healthy
fun” without the realism, that is to say the working-class nature, of Dusty Bates.
In Good Company, Field mentions that this is “[t]he first serial to be shot in
Africa,” and alludes to the “important role” played by “a native child” (183).
While the serial “introduced the colour problem indirectly” (172), Field states the
company’s intentions more clearly in her submission to the 1950 UNESCO Report
on Entertainment Films for Juvenile Audiences: “Then came ‘The Mystery of the
Snakeskin Belt’ in which members of the family as well as coloured children were
featured, to accustom the young children to ideas of racial equality” (51).
The regular, repeated viewing of the weekly serial was seen as ideal for intro-
ducing and reinforcing these types of didactic messages and eroding pre-existing
stereotypes, in keeping with the latest in educational theory. What began as an
exotic expedient to get around the UK child employment laws was bent to the
department’s progressive political aims. Later with the Children’s Film Foundation
(CFF), and with child employment legislation no longer a barrier, the process of
international co-operation and desire for racial equality continued, and produced
5 The combined eight and three episodes forming another quarter of the annual cinema club
serial roster.

48
 Figure 1: Middle class threat, though potentially deadly, sits happily in the middle of
episode five of Mystery of the Snakeskin Belt and in its accompanying promotional
materials, and forms acceptable action, but not a cliffhanger.

uniquely internationalist films. Serials were made in Australia, New Zealand, Rho-
desia, Morocco, Egypt, Malta, Tunisia and Libya, encouraging an international feel
and market for the films while avoiding the now dated racial politics of much of
the US serial output.
The Mystery of the Snakeskin Belt received trade screenings in March 1950, but
a new storm over serials appearing in the press just a few weeks later meant that
the film emerged with very little press and no fanfares. By the time the serial was
in the cinemas, and the UNESCO report and the parliamentary Wheare enquiry
both came out offering resounding support for CEF serial production, Rank had
pulled the plug on unprofitable children’s production and the CEF was no more.
The final damning article “Films Your Children See” appeared on 6 May
1950 in the previously supportive Picture Post. It showed selectively cropped
photographs of children at a matinee apparently cowering, crying, hiding and
emotionally scarred by the horrors onscreen. Their reactions were blamed once
again on the morning’s serial (Monsey 11-15). The article itself was a smokescreen,
photographer Maurice Ambler had taken images at arbitrary points in a Cinema
Club presentation in imitation of Field’s own infrared photography experiments.
Picture Post cropped out the context to highlight responses, juxtaposed a startling
caption, alongside a still showing unsavoury scenes from a serial episode that had
not even been showing at the time and pulled in Mayer as expert witness to explain
the traumatic nature of the serial form. Readers of the article and the defenders of
serials and cinema clubs were unaware of this deception, but comparing Ambler’s
original photographs and those published indicates how ambiguous the original
images had been, with the apparently abandoned traumatised children surrounded
by others laughing, eating and picking their noses (Fig. 2). Even if they could have
been linked to specific moments on screen, they were meaningless.

49
 Figure 2: Maurice Ambler’s original photograph shows a variety of reactions,
whilst the cropped area can be interpreted as Picture Post captioned it “one
who is overwhelmed by distress.”

The Legacy of Early British Sound Serials: The BBC and the CFF
The relationship the CEF and their advisory council had with the BBC was one of
close co-operation, with the head of Children’s programming Derek McCulloch
(“Uncle Mac”) on the council. Once the unit was closed those in charge of asset
stripping the CEF were quick to offer their materials to the BBC. Screenwriter
Mary Cathcart Borer, who had been poached by the BBC, recommended the serial
product as both potential content for children’s magazine programmes, and as
templates for future programme making.6 The fruit of CEF’s lessons are evident
in the BBC’s first serials. Production of such a lowbrow form would have been
unthinkable had the CEF not done so much to rehabilitate the serial (the BBC had
resisted the serial format even on radio until as late as 1938), as with their earliest
radio serials, they offset the lowbrow associations of the serial by initially making
acceptable “classics” that were so often suggested by commentators in the debate.
Field’s work on the particular attractiveness and suitability of the serial format to
children was drawn upon here, though these serials are strictly “family viewing for
mixed audiences” and there is no attempt to make them children’s programmes.The
methods for constructing such a narrative in terms of length, pacing, construction
of chapter-endings etc. comes not from the radio or US serial model, but the CEF.7
Commissioned on the release of the Wheare Report which recommended Field’s

6 The BBC appear to have bought just Dusty Bates and Mystery of the Snakeskin Belt.
7 The first BBC “family” serials – Little Women (TX 12/12/50, 6 episodes), The Railway Children
(TX 6/2/51, 8 episodes) and Treasure Island (TX 1/5/51, 8 episodes), all broadcast during the
“For the Children” slot, on Tuesday from 5:30 to 6 p.m. With the successful children’s (or at
least family) serial, the BBC launched Anthony Trollope’s The Warden, a serial in six parts on
12 May 1951.

50
serial model, the first BBC television serials were broadcast live in the same
Tuesday teatime “For the Children” slot from Christmas 1950, and, following three
experiments with family serials, the BBC launched their first Saturday evening
classic costume serial on 12 May 1951, a form for which it has been a major part
of its stable ever since.
The CEF serials remained in cinema circulation and formed an important, though
not major, part of children’s serial viewing through the fifties until production
resumed under Field and the Children’s Film Foundation (CCF) in 1955. The
CFF’s move back into the serial market seems to be in reaction to three things: the
final publication of Field’s work on children’s cinema and serials for the Carnegie
UK Institute.8 This sought to end the moral panics surrounding the serial and to
disassociate serials from the debate that had begun in Picture Post and had, by this
time, moved on to American horror comics and other aspects of children’s culture.
Secondly, the production of serials by the BBC, which had been so facilitated by
the CEF, lent their historical or literary serials the respectability of a state institu-
tion – which Rank’s commercial enterprise had never attracted, and which CFF
serials subsequently benefitted from. Finally, the end of serial production in the
United States meant that there was a real chance of replacing the American serials
in children’s performances altogether if a suitable roster of British films could be
produced.
There is no room here for an adequate summary of the CFF serials, that British
serials managed to evolve a successful balance between moral and literary accepta-
bility on one hand and action and adventure on the other is commemorated in some
way in the type of young talent they nurtured: British serials saw not only the screen
debuts of two Artful Dodgers – Anthony Newly (Dusty Bates, 1947; Oliver Twist,
1948) and Jack Wild (Danny the Dragon, 1967, Oliver!, 1968), but also the two actors
to don the Boba Fett rocketman costume in the Star Wars series, Jeremy Bulloch
(Young Jacobites, 1959; The Empire Strikes Back, 1980) and Temura Morrison
(Rangi’s Catch, 1972; Star Wars Episode I: Phantom Menace, 2000). Ironically as the
last of the theatrical serials Broken Arrow (1979) was produced, came that wave of
Hollywood features soaked in Serial nostalgia and rhetoric Star Wars (1977), Raiders
of the Lost Ark (1980), Romancing the Stone (1983). While children attending the
cinema unaccompanied became increasingly unusual, television drew more heavily
on the lessons learnt by serial production and their producers and genre products
moved to TV.
The Foundation’s serials were both serious works by established filmmakers,
and the testing ground for fresh new talent who went on to become major players
in film and television around the globe, and to ignore them is to create significant
gaps in not only the careers of the Foundation, their filmmakers and the British film
industry, but also in the global history of serial production. The ethos of the CEF as
it carried over to the CFF, was one of excellence and experimentation, as such their
influence has been felt upon children’s film and television production ever since.
Between them, the CEF and CFF form the only significant body of sound serials
outside Hollywood, and one which did not imitate the US model, but innovated
and built upon it to be distinct, original and important.

Phyll Smith East Anglia

8 See Field, Children, and “Children’s Taste.”

51
 Works Cited
Billings, Josh. “Dusty Bates.” Kine Weekly 25 Sep. 1947: 15, 20. Print.
Borer, Mary Cathcart. The Mystery of the Snakeskin Belt. London: Pitman, 1951.
Print.
Bond, Ralph. “Films for the Young.” Letter. The Times 12 Jan. 1946: 5. Print.
Boyd, Ernest A. “The ‘Movie Fan.’” The New Statesman 30 Mar. 1918: 617. Print.
Brown, Geoff, and Tony Aldgate. The Common Touch: The Films of John Baxter.
London: BFI, 1989. Print.
Blumer, Herbert. Movies and Conduct. New York: Macmillan, 1933. Print.
Canjels, Rudmer. Distributing Silent Film Serials: Local Practices, Changing
Forms, Cultural Transformations. New York: Routledge, 2011. Print.
Chappell, Connery. “The Film and Its Impression on the Juvenile Mind.” Kine
Weekly 2 Jan. 1947: 4, 22. Print.
Dall’Asta, Monica. “Italian Serial Films and International Popular Culture.” Film
History 12.3 (2000): 300-7. Print.
Field, Mary. Children and Films: A Study of Boys and Girls in the Cinema. Dun-
fermline: Carnegie, 1954. Print.
---. “Children’s Taste in Films.” The Quarterly Journal of Film Radio and Television
11.1 (1956): 14-23. Print.
---. “Films for Children.” Letter to the editor. The Times 30 Jan. 1946: 5. Print.
---. Good Company: The Story of the Children’s Entertainment Film Movement in
Great Britain, 1943-1950. London: Longmans Green, 1952. Print.
Hinxman, Margaret. “Twenty Five Years Young.” Young Cinema: 25 Years of the
Children’s Film Foundation. London: CFF, 1976. 4. Print.
Hughes, Stephen Putnam. “Silent Film Genre, Exhibition and Audiences in South In-
dia.” Explorations in New Cinema History. Ed. Richard Maltby, Daniel ­Bitereyst,
and Philippe Meers. Oxford: Blackwell, 2011. 295-307. Print.
Marlow-Mann, Alex. “British Series and Serials in the Silent Era.” Young and
Innocent? The Cinema in Britain 1896-1930. Ed. Andrew Higson. Exeter:
Exeter UP, 2002. 147-61. Print.
Mayer, J. P. “Films for Children, by a Special Correspondent.” The Times 5 Jan.
1946: 5. Print.
---. The Sociology of Film Studies and Documents. London: Faber, 1946. Print.
Moy, Lorna. “Making Films for Children.” Picture Post 14 Dec. 1946: 25. Print.
Monsey, Derek. “Films Your Children See: Can’t We Do Better Than This?” Picture
Post 6 May 1950: 11-15. Print.
Moss, Robert. Boys’ and Girls’ Cinema Club Annual. London: Juvenile Productions,
1949. Print.
Norgate, Matthew. “Films.” Tribune 9 Jan. 1948: 3. Print.
Parnaby, Mary, and Woodhouse, Maurice. Children’s Cinema Clubs Report. London:
BFI, 1947. Print.

52
Rainey, Buck. Serials and Series: A World Filmography. Jefferson: McFarland,
1999. Print.
Singer, Ben. “Serials.” The Oxford History of World Cinema. Ed. Geoffrey
­Nowell-Smith. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1996. 105-11. Print.
Stock, Henri. UNESCO Studies in Press, Film, and Radio in the World Today:
The Entertainment Film for Juvenile Audiences. Paris: UNESCO, 1950. Print.
“Three Bags Full.” Kinematograph Weekly 17 Mar. 1949: 17, 22. Print.
“Three Bags Full.” The Cinema 16 Mar. 1949: 10. Print.
Vela, Rafael. With the Parents’ Consent: Film Serials, Consumerism and the Cre-
ation of a Youth Audience 1913-1938. PhD Dissertation U of Wisconsin, 2000.
“The Voyage of Peter Joe.” Kinematograph Weekly 28 Nov. 1946: 32. Print.
Wheare, K.C. Report of the Departmental Committee on Children in the Cinema.
London: HMSO, 1950. Print.
Wood, Alan. Mr Rank: A Study of J. Arthur Rank and British Films. London: Hodder
and Stoughton, 1952. Print.

53
 Superhero Comics and the Potential for Continuation:
Identity and Temporality in Alan Moore’s Watchmen
It is almost impossible to think about comics without considering the concept of
seriality. The phrase “to be continued” has been a part of comics since they first
appeared as serialized newspaper strips. The genre of the superhero comic practices
a very particular form of serial narration. It is special not only because of the large
amount of issues the genre produces every year, but also because of the complexity
of its storyworlds. Why are such a complex and often even conflicting narrative
universes so popular in superhero comics?
This essay aims to show that this popularity has its foundation in the conventions
of the medium itself. I will analyze two issues from Alan Moore’s Watchmen series – a
comic that reflects not only on the superhero but also on its own medium –, and use
Ole Frahm’s concept of “weird signs” to describe challenges in comic reading that
constitute both the comic’s potential for continuation and the overall pleasure in
reading superhero comics. First, I will examine how the superhero genre practices a
special form of serial narration and discuss why Watchmen – in its reflection on super-
heroes and comics – is an apt case study for this essay. I will then use the parodistic
aesthetic described in Frahm’s concept of “weird signs” in order to examine issue
3. The analysis will show how the parodistic aesthetic, which, among other things,
concerns the question of character identities in comics, poses various challenges for the
readers. An analysis of issue 4 will then expand Frahm’s concept and his thoughts on
character identities by adding a temporal dimension that is located within the reading
experience. Finally, I will demonstrate how this temporal dimension and the question
of identity ensure the comic’s continuation or serial potential.
Serial Narration in Superhero Comics
Serial narration shall be understood as a rhythmically continued and interrupted
composition of coherent narrative entities.1 In the superhero genre, this kind of
composition has spawned the development of complex narrative universes. Since
its rise to prominence in the 1930s and 1940s, the superhero comic quickly started
to expand its separated linear series, by creating connected, parallel, convergent or
even colliding universes, multiverses and metaverses.2 Nowadays, characters move
through multiple, sometimes incommensurable narrative threads and worlds.3 As
a result, serial narration in superhero comics has developed into a structure whose
origin is as difficult to determine as its potential conclusions are to predict.
This complex serial narration also influences the ways in which superhero comics
are being read. Whenever the narration leaves a singular linearity, whenever its
fragments do not fit in seamlessly with one another, the superhero comic challenges

1 Note how this definition of serial narration already creates a connection to the medium of the
comic. A comic panel can be described as a coherent entity of narration; and the white space
between the panels can be described as a rhythmical interruption of the narration, defining the
rhythm of the narration itself.
2 For an overview of the increasing complexity of serial narration in superhero comics, see
Kelleter and Stein.
3 Batman, for example, exists in multiple variations and storylines, such as Batman, Batman &
Robin, Batman R.I.P., Batman Beyond, The Dark Knight, etc.

55
its readers to become active and to form those missing connections themselves.
Various scholars have explored how readers become active when reading comics.
Stephanie Hoppeler and Gabriele Rippl, for example, locate the pleasure of comic
perception within the readers’ activity of closing narrative gaps between issues and
panels, of “understanding inter- and intratextual and also inter- and intramedial
references” (370),4 and argue that comics increasingly rely on a lack of continuity.
Comic reading is not limited to the specific subject of narration but means to connect
this subject to other narratives and media. In the superhero genre this activity is
particularly important because it enables superhero characters to live beyond, and
around, their singular appearances in comics. Batman, for example, becomes a
hypertext: We know who Batman is, yet he is always more than what we see in one
of his singular appearances. The assumption being that the reading of Watchmen
foregrounds particular elements that encourage the readers’ engagement with the
text, I will now introduce the series and show how it reflects its own medium.
Watchmen: A Superhero Comic Reflecting on Itself
Watchmen is a twelve-issue comic series from 1986/87 that is set in the United States
during a time when the world is expecting a Third World War. In this narrative universe,
superheroes have existed for over 40 years. The story focuses on Rorschach, The
Comedian, Dr. Manhattan, Nite Owl II, Ozymandias and Silk Spectre II, a second
generation of superheroes who call themselves Watchmen. Their predecessors, the
Minutemen, were mainly active during the times of the Second World War, while
the Watchmen fought in Vietnam. Even though they helped winning the war, they
fell into disrepute – mainly due to extreme methods employed by some of the
superheroes, which resulted in the legal prohibition of their profession. When the
Comedian is murdered, the sociopathic Rorschach suspects a conspiracy against
the Watchmen. By the time he can prove his suspicions, however, it is already too
late. The traitor Ozymandias has fulfilled his master plan and killed the Comedian
to keep it secret. He abuses Dr. Manhattan’s powers to activate a global catastrophe
that kills countless civilians, staging it as an attack from outer space. This turn of
events ultimately unites all nations against a fictitious enemy and thus prevents the
Third World War.
Watchmen takes place in a closed universe. Therefore, it may come as a surprise
that it should be the subject for analyzing the connection between superhero comics
and serial narration, since its serial narration is nowhere close to the complexity of
other superhero comics such as, for example, Batman or Superman. However, Watch-
men does take part in a greater narrative structure, namely the history of the superhero
comic itself. Up until the release of Watchmen, the history of superhero comics was
often divided into a Golden and a Silver Age,5 and the two generations of superheroes
in Watchmen correspond to this historical classification: The Minutemen, characters
from the Second World War, allude to the Golden Age, a time when superhero comics
first became popular and characters like Batman and Superman were created. The

4 My translation. All translations from the German hereafter are mine. Original quote in German:
“Dabei ist wichtig zu verstehen, dass für Comic-Book-Rezipienten das Entdecken und Verstehen
von inter- und intratextuellen sowie inter- und intramedialen Verweisen einen Großteil des
Rezeptionsvergnügens ausmacht.”
5 Kniep delivers an insightful analysis of the history of superhero comics and divides it into a
Golden, Silver and Bronze Age.

56
Watchmen are connected to the Vietnam War and, therefore, represent the Silver
Age, in which superhero comics celebrated their first comeback, reinterpreting old
characters and inventing new ones, like Spiderman or The Hulk, for example. Also,
most of the characters from the Watchmen universe have famous counterparts in the
history of superhero comics. The Comedian resembles Captain America with his Stars-
and-Stripes costume, while Nite Owl II recalls Batman: Both dress as nocturnal flying
creatures and derive their power from expensive technical gadgets that they buy from
a large inheritance.6 By referring to the greater narrative structure of superhero-comic
history, Watchmen constantly reflects on the composition of its own characters within
the genre. It is a superhero comic about superheroes.
A first glimpse at issue 3 shows how Watchmen’s conception of the superhero
character is also a reflection on the comic as a medium. The issue opens with the
introduction of two new characters that share the name Bernhard: A newspaperman
and a boy sitting close by the newsstand, which acts as a crossing point for various
characters throughout the Watchmen series. The first four panels of the issue form
a backward movement, with each panel revealing more of the newsstand’s setting.
From a smaller panel showing parts of a sign in a close-up, the arrangement changes
to a larger panel that shows the entire setting. In the foreground, Bernhard is sitting
next to his stand, while the younger Bernhard is on the ground, smoking and reading
a comic. Most noticeable in these panels are the speech bubbles: Besides the well-
known white speech bubbles with round shapes, the panels show speech bubbles
with beige backgrounds and rolled up, torn edges that resemble scrolls of papyrus.
While the white speech bubbles have tips that point to the source of their words, the
papyrus speech bubbles are unattributed. Not even their words (“Delirious, I saw
that hell-bound ship’s black sails against the yellow sky, and knew again the stench
of powder, and men’s brain’s and war”) help to identify their source. The issue’s
opening panels thus confront the readers with signs they are unable to connect to
others within the panel because they are significantly different from the rest.
Until the issue’s second page, it remains unclear where the strange signs are
coming from. The first panels show that the smoke of young Bernhard’s cigarette
always tracks towards the unfamiliar papyrus speech bubble – something that could
already be seen on the first page, yet becomes noticeable in its multiple repetition.
The smoke thereby becomes a replacement for the papyrus speech bubble’s missing
tip. At the same time, the first six panels of the second page are gradually zooming
into Bernhard’s comic. While barely recognizable as a comic in the first panel, the
fourth panel is revealing the comic’s content and the sixth panel is filled with a
detail of one panel within that comic.
Delayed by one and a half pages, then, readers finally get to know the source of
the papyrus speech bubbles: It is young Bernhard’s comic, a pirate story entitled The
Black Freighter, which this and later Watchmen issues will repeatedly merge into
the main storyline. Readers become immersed in a metadiegetic level of narration,
which according to Dennis L. Seager is “both a narrative within a narrative and a
narrative about narrating. Ultimately, metadiegetic narrative is about […] the innu-
merable ways in which we perceive and organize the world” (24). Accordingly, the
appearance of The Black Freighter within Watchmen makes it not only a superhero
comic about superheroes, but a superhero comic that is contemplating comics.
6 Many resemblances of characters from Watchmen to other superheroes of the Golden and Silver
Age are analyzed in Kukkonen.

57
 “Weird Signs”: The Challenges of Reading Comics
and the Challenge of Identity
The opening of issue 3 introduces the subject of its contemplation: the confusion
caused by signs that are identified as different and the readers’ challenge to relate
them to other signs. In Ole Frahm’s concept of “weird signs” this challenge is not
limited to special cases like the papyrus speech bubble, but rather accounts for
all heterogeneous signs in comics. In accordance with Frahm, the papyrus speech
bubble only visualizes a challenge that is inherent in comic perception in general.
Comics constantly mix heterogeneous signs, i.e. linguistic signs (like spoken words
or onomatopoeia) and pictorial signs (like drawings or diagrams). Yet readers
always try to combine the heterogeneous signs to an understanding of the entire
panel. This understanding must be located somewhere between those signs, for it
is never completely represented by either one of them alone, and yet it is never
complete without the other.7
Frahm, however, points out that it is impossible to achieve such an understanding
of an entire panel with heterogeneous signs. Rather, he tends to read the framework
of heterogeneous signs in comics as a parody of the idea that a sign always refers
to what Frahm calls an “original” that is verified in its consumption.8 Frahm un-
derstands parody as a distorting, overdrawing or satirizing mimicry. Unlike many
theorists, he neither emphasizes the seriousness of parody, nor does he diminish its
satirizing aspect. For him, comics are “a parody on the referentiality of signs. They
parody the presumed relation between signs and objects. And they make fun of the
recurrent notion that, in some cases, a proximity between object and sign actually
exists that can be called truth” (“Weird Signs” 179-80).
But what do the heterogeneous signs relate to and how do they create a parody?
Jens Balzer points out that the comic’s heterogeneous signs do not just interact
and influence one another, but that they tend to mutually interlock and dissolve
a text-image dualism (144). It is crucial that these heterogeneous signs, while
they interlock, do not lose their individual materiality and remain heterogeneous.
According to Balzer, this is possible because of the simultaneous organization
of signs in comics: “In spoken and written language, the signifiers are organized
sequentially in time that is one after another; in visual representations however,
they are organized simultaneously, coincidentally in space” (143).9
Any random Watchmen panel with speech bubbles demonstrates this. Panel
eight on page eight of issue 3, for example, shows Silk Spectre II crying. A speech
bubble explains the reason why: “I left Jon.” Both, the image of her outer shapes
and the words in the speech bubble seem to refer to the same character. Yet their
individual materiality remains untouched. Even if they seem to refer to the same
7 Comics certainly tend to mix all kinds of heterogeneous signs. Mahne, for example, describes
how the writing in comics differs from the writing in literature because it has the capacity to
illustrate even supra-segmental properties of language, such as volume, emphasis or mood (47).
8 The assumed connection between a sign and an original includes causal connections of indexical
signs (rising smoke as a sign for an invisible fire), as well as connections of similarity of an
iconic sign (a stickman referring to a real human being), and connections that are based neither
on causality nor similarity of the symbolic sign (in language, the word “tree” neither look
similar to the actual object of the tree, nor does it have a causal connection to it); cf. Peirce.
9 Original quote in German: “In der gesprochenen und der geschriebenen Sprache […] werden
die Signifikanten sequentiell, also nacheinander, in der Zeit organisiert; in der graphischen
Repräsentation […] dagegen simultan, gleichzeitig, im Raum.”

58
thing, they will always be perceived as words and images. The parodistic aspect of
this panel becomes clear, when trying to describe the original – the identity of Silk
Spectre II – these different signs supposedly refer to. The word “I” is connected to
Silk Spectre’s outer shape and declares it as its original in the same way in which
this image seems to refer to the “I” and declare it as its original: “The word ‘I’ is
already other than the drawing,” Frahm notes. “The word ‘I’ repeats the drawing
as ‘another,’ and vice versa. The difference of each identity is as apparent here, as
is its need to be repeated with different signs. In other words, identity constitutes
itself in the very repetition of the different signs” (“Weird Signs” 186-87). This
circularity of a sign’s reference is repeated within comics. They are a parody of the
idea of a character’s identity, because the repetition constantly creates the notion of
an identity, while this identity never becomes visible or receptacle, and therefore
exposes the inability of this identity’s existence.
Watchmen visualizes this parodistic aspect of identity in comics on pages 4 and
5 of issue 3: Here, Dr. Manhattan creates three identical copies of himself in order
to sexually stimulate his girlfriend and continue his scientific work at the same time.
The particularity of this situation is that three shapes of the same character appear
within one panel. According to Frahm, this is not very different from any random
comic page showing the same character in different panels, because here, too, the
character simultaneously appears in multiple copies before the readers’ eyes. In this
sense, the comic page behaves like a single panel: “If pronoun and character, name
and character, character and character taken together make up one signified, one
unified identity, then this denies the signifiers’ heterogeneous, parodistic materiality
so significant for comics. The signs are others, always” (“Weird Signs” 188).
While reading comics, the question of identity becomes a continuous challenge.
It is similar to the challenge visualized by the papyrus speech bubble. There is no
manifest original identity in comics and yet their signs are constantly repeated in
order to prove their existence: “Because of their own identity of ‘signness’ which
refers to nothing but further repetitions, the repetitions both confirm and diffuse one
identity,” Frahm notes (“Weird Signs” 189). In his parodistic aesthetic of comics,
heterogenous signs constitute a paradoxical interaction as they repeatedly create the
expectation of something beyond themselves that will never be fulfilled.
Elisabeth Klar describes how these repetitions constitute the interest in comic
characters, which is “an interest in an identity that constantly needs to recreate itself
and playfully illustrates continuity, variance and change. Each panel not only poses
a threat to continuity, but is also a chance for change” (232) .10 This is particularly
important for superhero characters. They often visualize what Frahm considers to
be a constitution of identity relevant for all comic characters: “Being another, the
character has to be repeated to preserve its continuity. Identity therefore exists only
from repetition to repetition, it is, to borrow from Gilles Deleuze, a ‘mask’ that hides
no real identity but is itself identity” (“Weird Signs” 183). Many superheroes lead a
double life – one as a masked or costumed hero, one as an ordinary citizen. When
Batman disposes of his costume, Batman disappears and a very different identity
emerges. Batman is not a customized Bruce Wayne, but his mask, his costume.

10 Original quote in German: “Die Lust an der Comicfigur ist […] eine Lust an einer Identität,
die sich immer wieder neu erschaffen muss, […] und Kontinuität wie Abweichung oder Ver-
änderung spielerisch performiert. […] Jedes Panel bedeutet nicht nur eine Gefährdung der
Kontinuität, sondern auch eine Chance auf Veränderung.”

59
 Figure 1: “How did everything get so tangled up?” (Watchmen, issue
3, page 10, panels 1 and 2).

Here, identity is a mask and the assumed “true” Batman behind that mask is without
a manifest existence, while the mask keeps the assumption of its existence alive.
The Semiotic Challenge as a Question of Time
While the opening of issue 3 used the papyrus speech bubble to demonstrate what
it means when a sign remains without an original – a phenomenon that Frahm has
identified as valid for all signs in comics – the rest of the issue demonstrates that
this phenomenon has an influence on the readers’ perception of time in comics. Over
a span of eight pages, each panel of the issue jumps back and forth between Dr.
Manhattan giving a television interview and Silk Spectre II turning to Nite Owl II
for comfort, before getting into a fight with a street gang. The speech bubbles play
an important part in the transitions between each panel. The first panel on page ten,
for example, shows a mug of coffee, reflecting Silk Spectre II’s face (Fig. 1). Two
connected white, round speech bubbles display what she is saying: “Yeah, here’s
looking at me. Y’know sometimes I look at myself and I don’t understand …”
Her lack of understanding when she looks at herself, refers to the reflection of her
face in the coffee mug. The continuation of her speech, implied by the “…,” can
be found in the next panel within a squared white speech bubble: “Sometimes I
look at myself and think, how did everything get so tangled up?” The background
however, does not show Silk Spectre anymore, but Dr. Manhattan, who is standing
in front of a mirror and uses telekinesis to tie his tie. Unlike the papyrus speech
bubble that first hides its reference and then reveals it, this squared speech bubble
does not lack an assumed reference, but a definiteness of its reference: While being
a continuation of the speech from the previous panel, the content of its words refer
just as much to the image in its panel’s background. Dr. Manhattan is also looking
at himself, literally dealing with something that is tangled up: the knot of his tie.

60
 In accordance with Frahm, it is clear that the exception of this situation cannot
be described by simply calling this speech bubble ambiguous. Instead of referring to
two originals, this speech bubble would have to refer to the notion of a single original
that contains these two references and would need to be located in an indefinable
space between the two panels. Here, Frahm’s parodistic aesthetic becomes experi-
enceable while reading the comic: The issue encourages readers to jump back and
forth between its panels in order to clarify their connection to each other. In order
to actually gain a notion of an original between the panels, it becomes necessary to
perform a repetition in the process of reading itself. The aspect of repetition – that
has already been described as crucial for the appeal of superhero characters in
comics – demonstrates the importance of temporality in comic reading. Just like
serial narration, this repetition as well as comic reading, relies on time elapsing.
With this in mind, an analysis of issue 4 will hereafter expand Frahm’s concept by
an aspect of temporality that becomes another crucial challenge, and that makes
the (superhero) comic attractive for serial narration.
Time and temporality are the main topic of issue 4. It tells the story of how Dr.
Manhattan gained his powers, which among other things provide him with a non-hu-
man perception of time. While accidentally being trapped in a nuclear test chamber,
the physicist Jon Osterman completely dissolves. But somehow his spirit learns to
recombine his particles, allowing him to return to life as Dr. Manhattan. In a new shiny
blue shape, he is able to use his knowledge and bend matter to his will. He also starts
to perceive his own past, present and future simultaneously. The narration in issue 4
is framed by a moment on the planet Mars, in which Dr. Manhattan thinks about his
life while looking at a photo of his first love. His perception of time leaves its marks
on the composition of his life-story. Instead of proceeding in chronological order, it
seems that the issue randomly changes time and space within the story. It is mostly Dr.
Manhattan’s speech, displayed in blue squared speech bubbles that connects one panel
to the next. While square speech bubbles usually express the continuation of a speech
from a previous panel, the permanent use of them in issue 4 expresses Dr. Manhattan’s
perception of time. When the past, present and future are perceived simultaneously,
every moment would be a present, past and future moment. That is why these blue
speech bubbles theoretically have no situation they refer to. They are always now,
always before and always after, and yet they never really have a before, now or after.
Dr. Manhattan’s speech itself behaves in a similar manner. It is constantly written
in the present tense: “Dr. Manhattan lives a consciousness in which he is “unstuck
in time.” For instance, within one panel, Manhattan’s narrative jumps from 1959
to 1965 to 1985, from human state as Jonathan Osterman to superman state as Dr.
Manhattan” (Elmwood 270). Inevitably, Dr. Manhattan’s perception of time causes
him to face a dilemma: “Unanchored in time but drawn inescapably to a photograph
that is linked to his genesis as a superhuman being, Dr. Manhattan attempts to narrate
the achronological state of being without a life narrative” (Elmwood 271). He wants
to tell a story that for him has no chronology whatsoever, while storytelling is based
on arranging events in a form of chronology – be it linear or volatile. What comic
readers inevitably have to perceive sequentially, happens simultaneously for Dr.
Manhattan. Therefore, his story is impossible to be told, yet, within the comic, it is
not impossible to be illustrated. The toggling panels and the constant use of squared
speech bubbles and present tense in issue 4, are a successful illustration of what
could be a trace of Dr. Manhattan’s perception of time.

61
 While it can be illustrated in the comic, it remains impossible for the readers to
adopt Dr. Manhattan’s perception of time. Dr. Manhattan expresses this impossibility
in panel nine on the issue’s first page, when he draws an analogy between the stars
and the photo in his hands: “All we ever see of stars are their old photographs.”
Just like it is impossible to see stars in their original present temporality, it also is
impossible for the readers to see the signs and panels of Dr. Manhattan’s story in
their original simultaneous temporality. In this manner issue 4 demonstrates that
every sign in a comic refers to its own temporality. One would need Dr. Manhattan’s
perception of time to perceive all of them at once. For example, when one panel
contains the text “The photograph lies at my feet, falls from my fingers, is in my
hand” (panel six on the second page), and an image of the photograph in Dr. Man-
hattan’s hand, readers can make sense of each sign sequentially and understand the
moment of time each sign refers to. But readers may never perceive all temporalities
of all signs within the panel at once. They either perceive the moment of lying,
the moment of falling or the moment of holding – no matter in which order, but
definitely always one after another.
In issue 4, Watchmen visualizes a phenomenon that can be claimed to account
for reading comics in general. While the panels create the notion of an existing
present – a present of the entire panel, perceivable while reading – this panel’s
present can never be perceived, for it contains signs referring to heterogeneous
temporalities. But a panel’s temporality is not just based on the temporalities its
signs refer to. As part of their heterogeneous materiality, the signs themselves have
temporalities within their perception. Nicole Mahne indicates that while static
images consolidate temporal events to a simultaneously perceivable moment, words
always need to be read sequentially, even when they describe actions and events
that happen simultaneously (45). A moment described in an image is perceived
instantly and can then be examined in details, while a moment described in text
always needs time to be read and sequentially unfolds in all detail in the mind.
In other words: images are seen, words are read. This is why the comic uses
“sequentiality and simultaneity, both modes of temporality, as its material of
composition” (Balzer 144). 11
Because comic readers can never perceive all modes of temporality simultane-
ously, the moment of presence in a panel is lost, whenever it contains heterogeneous
temporal signs. Readers can either read the words or look at the image, but never
both at once: “We have to decide between reading the words or the images, and
yet we need to read both. We have to read and reread, to look at the words and the
pictures again and again. Only then we start to evaluate them” (Frahm, “Too much
is too much”). In order to think of the panel as a unity, readers have to use their
memory while repeating to read the panel. When they first look at the image and then
read the text, they are only able to associate the text with the image by remembering
the image while reading and vice versa. They can repeat this process as often as
they like, but they will never actually perceive a unified present of image and word.
Ultimately it can be said, that the process of comic reading itself is what comes
closest to Dr. Manhattan’s perception of time: “Dr. Manhattan is capable of taking
in past, present, and future in a glance, of moving back and forward between them
effortlessly […] Dr. Manhattan, that is, sees time like a comic reader” (Gardner 188).
11 Original quote in German: “Sequentialität und Simultaneität, also die beiden Modi von Zeitlich-
keit, zum disponiblen Gestaltungsmaterial.”

62
 The readers’ capability to jump back and forth between moments, counts for
all sign systems within a comic. Mahne points out that the spatial arrangement
of time frames on a page (or double page) merges past, present and future in the
readers’ sweeping glance (62). Therefore, the double page as the comic’s largest sign
system that is visible at once can be understood as the surface for a perception of
time that is similar to Dr. Manhattan’s.12 This is why Dr. Manhattan’s dilemma – to
communicate his perception of time, while knowing that ultimately only he is able
to experience it – can best be expressed and illustrated in the medium of the comic.
While the comic is constantly creating a notion of a unified present that can never
be perceived by the readers, it also points to the existence of an unexperiencable
temporality (just like Dr. Manhattan’s).
The Potential for Continuation
It is thus apparent that the comic not only parodies the recurrent notion of a sign’s
original and a character’s identity but also of a present moment in its perception.
Within this parody the comic shows that original, identity and presence are only
imaginations, while simultaneously reproducing these imaginations in processes
of repetition. The comic produces confusion in the form of a recursive loop: In its
repetition the confusion is reversed and hidden at the same time that it is remembered
and made visible. The multiple challenges when reading a comic – the challenges of
originals, identities and temporalities – can be condensed into one unique challenge
to deal with these types of confusion. It is this challenge that I will now connect to
serial narration and describe as the comic’s potential for continuation.
Issue 4 demonstrates what this challenge means for comic readers. In this issue,
Dr. Manhattan can be understood as the personification of that challenge. The second
last panel shows how Dr. Manhattan tries to save disassembled parts of a clock,
that his father wanted to toss, from falling: “I am standing on a fire escape in 1945,
reaching out to stop my father, take the cogs and flywheels from him, piece them
all together again ... But it’s too late, always has been, always will be too late.”
Here, he metaphorically expresses the wish to recreate a chronology of his own
life story. The decomposed clock represents Dr. Manhattan’s loss of perceiving a
present moment.
Elmwood describes this loss as an absence of completeness: “There is no mo-
mentary being – no becoming, no forgetting, and no memory – because everything
(or almost everything) is recorded indelibly, yet it is also never complete” (271). At
first glance, it seems odd that Dr. Manhattan’s consciousness should be incomplete,
precisely because he perceives everything indelibly and simultaneously. This should
present him with an overall, and therefore complete, view of his entire life, which
human perception of time with its expectations, memories and forgetting could
never achieve. But while the information about his life may be complete, he can
never reach the state of being in the moment. Precisely because he cannot forget,
remember or expect anything, everything loses its anchoring in time. His being and
his consciousness float through the aether without ever finding a place of belonging.
While Dr. Manhattan’s perception of his own life story is complete, it remains
incomplete because it has no space in time, it has nowhere to be fulfilled. The
challenge he faces follows the same structure as the comic readers’ challenge: Every
12 Dittmer even considers entire comic collections as a simultaneous display of coexisting panels
(134).

63
repetition of the expression of his consciousness brings Dr. Manhattan a step closer
to a present moment, while at the same time foregrounding its elusiveness. This
is the confusion in the form of a recursive loop that has been described as a basic
challenge in comic reading. It further adds the urge to repeatedly meet a challenge
that can never be met. Just like Dr. Manhattan strives towards his unreachable state
of being in the moment, comic readers strive towards an unreachable moment of
present in the perception, or to a notion of a nonexistent identity, or to a notion of
an original. All these urges, that are constantly repeated yet never fulfilled, create a
process of endless continuation; a continuation that strives for a completion it can
never achieve, and that yet seems to get closer to completion with every repetition.
At this point, it becomes clear that the superhero comic plays a specific role in
a medium, whose perception is traversed by this urge for continuation. The superhero
comic in its largest possible framework – its specific form of serial narration, its
periodic and often endless publication cycles, its universes, multiverses and metaverses
that keep filling the shelves of comic book stores – visualizes what the comic in its
smallest possible particles is composed of: “The daily published comic strip, by itself
the smallest unit of meaning in comics, is simultaneously part of a greater whole,
that actually never builds a coherent entity, because, based on its extent, it is part of
a process of constant expandability” (Hein 57).13
Jason Dittmer uses the idea of a database as a metaphor to describe the pleasure
in reading comic series. He uses the Black Freighter comic in the Watchmen series
to describe how comics create topological spaces and how readers behave similar to
gamers: they engage in a process in which they try to discover an algorithm through
a multiplicity of topological relations (136). Yet it seems important to mention that
this “database” will never be complete. Just as the originals of identity and presence,
it only exists as an idea, a notion that will never be reached. Therefore, it can be said
that once readers start reading a comic, they would – ideally – never stop.14 Because
as long as the process of reading remains in motion, the confusion created by the
heterogeneous signs remains in the constant interdependent process of recreating
itself, while simultaneously deconstructing itself. This is the instant in comic reading
where its potential for continuation unfolds. Comics constantly produce moments that
demand to be continued with the awareness that this urge for continuation is endless:
“reading […] comics is precisely not about reconstructing unity (of whatever) but
rather to appreciate the heterogeneous signs of script and image in their peculiar
material quality which cannot be made into a unity” (Frahm, “Weird Signs” 177).
This repeated appreciation of an impossibility unfolds as an attractive challenge of
comic reading and demands its continuation. This challenge is also the reason why
the medium of the comic with its potential for (endless) continuation, especially the
genre of the superhero comic, is so attractive to serial narration.

Berlin Björn Hochschild

13 Original quote in German: “An sich die kleinste sinnvollkommene Einheit im Bereich des
Comics, ist der täglich in Serie erscheinende Comicstrip zugleich Teil eines Ganzen, das
überhaupt keine geschlossene Einheit bildet, weil es sich seinem Umfang nach in einem Prozeß
der ständigen Erweiterung befindet.”
14 The superhero comic produces countless examples in which superhero stories continue to exist
beyond their ending, beyond their physical existence, like in Batman R.I.P.

64
 Works Cited
Balzer, Jens. “Der Horizont bei Herriman: Zeit und Zeichen zwischen Zeitzeichen
und Zeichenzeit.” Ästhetik des Comic. Ed. Michael Hein, Michael Hüners, and
Torsten Michaelsen. Berlin: Erich Schmidt Verlag, 2002. 143-52.
Beechen, Adam, Ryan Benjamin, John Stanisci, Bob Kane, Jeph Loeb, and Jim Lee.
Batman Beyond: Hush Beyond. New York: DC Comics, 2011.
DiGiovanna, James. “Dr. Manhattan, I presume?” Watchmen and Philosophy: A
Rorschach Test. Ed. Mark D. White. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, 2009.
103-14.
Dittmer, Jason. “Serialization and Displacement in Graphic Narrative.” Serialization
in Popular Culture. Ed. Rob Allen and Thijs van den Berg. New York: Routledge,
2014. 125-40.
Elmwood, Victoria A. “Fictional Auto/Biography and Graphic Lives in Watchmen.”
Graphic Subjects: Critical Essays on Autobiography and Graphic Novels. Ed.
Michael A. Chaney. London: U of Wisconsin P, 2011. 265-78.
Frahm, Ole. “Too Much Is Too Much: The Never Innocent Laughter of the Comics.”
Image & Narrative 7 (2003). Web. 1 Dec. 2014. <http://www.imageandnarrative.
be/inarchive/graphicnovel/olefrahm.htm>.
---. “Weird Signs: Comics as Means of Parody.” Comics & Culture: Analytical and
Theoretical Approaches to Comics. Ed. Anne Magnussen and Hans-Christian
Christiansen. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum P, 2000. 177-91.
Gardner, Jared. Projections: Comics and the History of Twenty-First-Century
­Storytelling. Stanford: Stanford UP, 2012.
Hein, Michael. “Zwischen Panel und Strip: Auf der Suche nach der ausgelassenen
Zeit.” Ästhetik des Comic. Ed. Hein, Michael Hüners and Torsten Michaelsen.
Berlin: Erich Schmidt Verlag, 2002. 143-58.
Hoppeler, Stephanie, and Gabriele Rippl. “Continuity, Fandom und Serialität in
anglo-amerikanischen Comic Books.” Populäre Serialität: Narration – Evolu-
tion – Distinktion. Zum seriellen Erzählen seit dem 19. Jahrhundert. Ed. Frank
Kelleter. Bielefeld: transcript, 2012. 367-82.
Kelleter, Frank, and Daniel Stein. “Autorisierungspraktiken seriellen Erzählens. Zur
Gattungsentwicklung von Superheldencomics.” Populäre Serialität: Narration –
Evolution – Distinktion. Zum seriellen Erzählen seit dem 19. Jahrhundert. Ed.
Kelleter. Bielefeld: transcript, 2012. 259-92.
Klar, Elisabeth. “Wir sind alle Superhelden! Über die Eigenart des Körpers im
Comic – und über die Lust an ihm.” Theorien des Comics: Ein Reader. Ed.
Barbara Eder, Klar, and Ramón Reichert. Bielefeld: transcript, 2011. 219-34.
Kniep, Matthias. Die drei Zeitalter des Superhelden-Comics (Gold, Silber und
Bronze): Von der Geburt, Demontage und Wiederbelebung eines amerikanischen
Mythos. Kiel: Ludwig, 2009.
Kukkonen, Karin. Neue Perspektiven auf die Superhelden: Polyphonie in Alan
Moores Watchmen. Marburg: tectum, 2008.
Mahne, Nicole. Transmediale Erzähltheorie: Eine Einführung. Göttingen: Vand-
enhoeck & Ruprecht, 2007.

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Miller, Frank, Klaus Janson, Lynn Varley, John Costanza, and Bob Kane. Batman:
The Dark Knight Returns. New York: DC Comics, 2002.
Moore, Alan, and Dave Gibbons. Watchmen. New York: DC Comics, 1986/87.
Morrison, Grant, Tony S. Daniel, and Guy Major. Batman R.I.P: Der Tod des
dunklen Ritters. Stuttgart: Panini Comics, 2009.
Peirce, Charles S. Phänomen und Logik der Zeichen. 3rd ed. Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp,
1998.
Seager, Dennis L. Stories within Stories: An Ecosystemic Theory of Metadiegetic
Narrative. New York: Lang, 1991.
Tomasi, Peter J., Patrick Gleason, and Mick Gray. Batman and Robin Vol. 1: Born
to Kill (the New 52). New York: DC Comics, 2013.

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 More than a Gangster:
Trilogies, Genre, and The Godfather
Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather, Part II (1974) opens with Michael Corleone
(Al Pacino) in a light shirt with suspenders, his face serene and emotionless as he ex-
tends his hand to be kissed (Fig. 1). This opening shot establishes narrative continuity
by recalling the iconic closing scene of Coppola’s The Godfather (1972). The camera
changes positions from the outside of the room, where originally Michael’s wife Kay
(Diane Keaton) watches as genuflecting men affirm his becoming Don Corleone, to
a close-up that brings the viewer into Michael’s world. This subtle shift signals the
differences and narrative overlaps between the iterations that will continue through
Michael’s lonely death at the end of Coppola’s The Godfather, Part III (1990).

Figure 1: Michael Corleone’s (Al Pacino) serene face

dominates the screen as The Godfather, Part II opens.

Film critics praised The Godfather for telling an identifiable story about the fluc-
tuations of power and violence in immigrant America. Vincent Canby’s New York
Times review from 1972, for example, is a typical response to the film. He describes
The Godfather as “one of the most brutal and moving chronicles of American life
ever designed within the limits of popular entertainment. […] The film is about an
empire run from a dark, suburban Tudor palace where people, in siege, eat out of
cardboard containers while babies cry and get under foot.” The trilogy structure
shifts the focus away from the broader category of “American life” and “an empire
run from a […] Tudor palace” to a story about a singular figure controlling all of
those machinations. Part II starts from the previous film’s final shot, focusing
exclusively on Michael. The opening establishes the film’s central conceit in a
manner that reframes the narrative of The Godfather. This shift affects the possible
readings of each film independently and together. However, the film’s relationship
with those that come before and after currently lacks a sufficient vocabulary allowing
for the explication of the particularities associated with the trilogy structure.
Despite the constant presence of trilogy segments on cinema marquees, there
has been little scholarly work that examines the related and overlapping norms of
the structure. The few analyses of individual trilogies fail to interrogate the role
played by the tripartite structure in affecting or determining narrative constraints.
Perceived as money grabs and industrial gimmickry, film critics largely treat iter-
ations of trilogies as either sequels that desecrate the original, or as self-contained
films worthy of analysis despite their derivative position. They often deny the
67
narrative-producing roles played by the breaks and restarts, discontinuities and
similarities between three independent yet mutually constituting texts. Discussions
avoid crucial moments of artistic creativity and the strategies of re-engagement
deployed in keeping an audience interested and a story continuing.
This essay attempts to respond to the intellectual vacuum by using work done
in the areas of sequelization and narrative theory to justify treating trilogies as a
genre that balances and builds on both the industrial/commercial desire to repeat
the success of a popular story and the artistic/aesthetic drive for narrative closure
or completeness. By examining Francis Ford Coppola’s Godfather trilogy, this
essay will show that the trilogy structure produces generic tropes that differentiate
it from other serialized narratives, specifically those associated with the re-framing
of previous films.
The production history of The Godfather trilogy makes the films a good starting
point for discussing the usefulness of isolating ‘trilogy’ as a construct of genre.
That director and critics historically separate the films from the category of trilogy
make them an interesting testing ground for the structure’s critical potential. If the
structure of the trilogy, and the generic tropes associated with that structure, affect
the narrative relationships between the films in the face of refusal, then the trilogy
may have exciting properties heretofore unexamined in film criticism.
Coppola’s resistance to add sequels to the original stands in contrast to reading
the films as related at all (a feeling shared by many critics). Even as recently as
2012, Coppola has adamantly argued for the independence of each film, telling
MTV in an interview that “I’ve always maintained there should have been one
‘Godfather,’ though I’m proud of the second one, and I thought the third should have
been considered a coda” (Horrowitz). Coppola’s initial reluctance and continued
disavowal of the idea that these films are structurally related prevents a reading
of the films as a trilogy. Even for critics, the relationship between the films is not
additive or reflexive, but negating. In his analysis of The Godfather, Part II, Todd
Berliner argues persuasively that the film’s success emerges out of its failures
to build upon the original story: “Unlike most sequels […] [the film] gives us
ostensibly less of what we liked about the original movie. The film has none of
the romance, glamor, or charm of the first Godfather, and its protagonist […] has
none of the glamour, romance, or charm of the old don” (113). Berliner offers a
compelling explanation of the film’s success, but he does so in a way that does not
interrogate the narrative structure that exists despite Coppola’s desire to refute it.
All three films are undergirded by a narrative sub-structure that harkens back to
the classical demarcations of plot (beginning/middle/end) in such a manner that
deserves attention. That the three films titled The Godfather are removed from the
category of ‘trilogy’ by their director makes them an optimum testing ground for
the possibility that such a structure produces, or at least alters, narrative content.
This essay provides the foundation for isolating the trilogy as a narrative genre
defined by its mixture of serialized and classical deployments of connected plots. It
reformulates industrial readings of sequels and trilogies by putting them in conversa-
tion with a narrative-focused analysis. It transposes the study of bounded serialization
onto a new approach via narrative time, where the trilogy sacrifices the temporal
individuality of a single film for the classical linearity of a beginning/middle/end plot
structure. The trilogy’s position as a genre comes through the ordered and temporal
arrangement of individual texts, individually constituted and mutually reinforcing.

68
 In order to connect narrative temporality to genre, this essay harnesses the work
of Paul Ricoeur on narrative and representational temporality in order to elucidate
the role played by the tripartite structure in producing a unique mode of serialized
time. The three-part make-up of the structure produces a specific and visible tem-
poral arrangement that I call ‘trilogic.’ The classical temporality defined by the
beginning/middle/end structure determines trilogic narratives in such a manner
that it produces generic tropes. Endings to individual films morph into bridges
to the eventual culmination of the whole series. Each new film must re-configure
and re-invent ways to read and understand the prior ones. Trilogies make present
a linear, additive mode of storytelling across three iterations that restrict temporal
freedom in a manner distinct from other narrative genres. In order to illustrate
the presence and possibility of the genre, this essay reads the overlapping scenes
between the first two Godfather films. The overlapping scenes show how the slow
development of the overarching stories offers new interpretive insights for film and
narrative criticism. The trilogy’s last scene, far from presenting the merciful end
to a disappointing film, acts to put a final period on a story started in Part I, made
narrow in Part II, and finished in Part III. The uniqueness of the trilogic structure
comes from the evolving relationships between the films, from the fact that each film
builds on its predecessor and in doing so offers new frameworks of interpretation.
Audiences and critics therefore receive a doubly new narrative: an additional film
and potential way to re-read the previous films.
Market Forces, Narrative Overdetermination,
and the Discovery of a Genre
In the summer of 2013, film critic Mark Harris wrote a feature-length piece for
the sports and pop culture website Grantland that dealt with the career trajectory
of Bradley Cooper in the wake of his decision to appear in The Hangover Part
III (Todd Phillips, 2013). In the opening of this piece, Harris places Cooper’s
upcoming works within the contemporary moment of Hollywood production
practices. He offers a series of observations regarding trilogies within the Hol-
lywood market system, specifically their economic determination and simplistic
repetition of tropes/themes:
[The Hangover III] is billed as the end of a trilogy – a word that should probably not
be deployed for anything that doesn’t involve hobbits, Batman, or the annual earned
income of George Lucas. […] the latest Hangover is exactly what most Part 3’s are: a
feature-length exploration of the interface of rising costs and (judging by the numbers)
swiftly diminishing returns.

Harris refers to the massive popularity of Star Wars, The Dark Knight, and The
Lord of the Rings in order to make a distinction between a trilogy and a series that
concludes with ‘Part 3.’ For Harris, only pre-formulated trilogies earn access to
the category – all others merely try to piggyback on their level of success. He also
includes a footnote illustrating the antagonistic relationship between the industry
and popular mass culture critics: “The rule is, if the first movie ended and you
didn’t walk out of the theater saying ‘Oh my God! What’s gonna happen next?!’
what follows is not the completion of a trilogy but the fulfillment of an economic
opportunity” (Harris). Speaking quite loudly from a high perch with a large audience,
Harris’ perspective epitomizes the norm in popular thinking about trilogies that
deride Hollywood mechanizations as mere financial schemes.
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 Harris’ description of Hollywood’s production practices is typical for a general
sense of malaise over the assumed money-or-nothing use of the term ‘trilogy’ to
justify production under a veneer of artistic respectability. Underneath the worries
of economic over-determination exists a lacuna where the pre-eminent mode of
analyzing trilogies comes from this simple demarcation between true trilogies and
economic games without any artistic credibility. This binary annuls any methods
of interrogating these narratives via tropes and conventions. Questions of how a
second film recasts a first, or how a third film’s ending re-constellates relationships
between the first two films are ignored. Critics recoil either because the films merely
desecrate one another in a cycle of endless consumerism or where the breaks only
serve to whet the appetite of the audience.
The small number of scholarly theorizations of individual trilogies largely
affirms the popular understanding epitomized by Harris: that the form emerges
from the anti-artistic drives of the market. Recently, studies of serialization and the
sequel addressed the concept of the trilogy in a single collection: Film Trilogies:
Critical New Approaches (2012). In the construction of the trilogy as a discrete
form of film that resides just outside of categories like ‘sequel,’ the co-editors
Constantine Verevis and Claire Perkins produce a schematic that resonates with
Harris’ readings, but with more faith in the form’s artistic possibilities. Verevis
and Perkins’ collection places trilogies into two categories that echo the popular
understanding: Industrial and Auteur.1 Critics most often analyze industrial trilogies
and the productive context that surrounds them: “These trilogies function as planned,
tripartite exercises, where the designation is a specific prop in the films’ production
and marketing” (Verevis and Perkins 4). Here, ‘trilogy’ represents a signifier of
critical aspirations, an attempt to connect a set of films to the history of popular
trilogies. The individual films draw in audiences with the promise of a concluding
narrative. The other type of trilogy is approached from an Auteur-focused mode of
criticism, where “the link between trilogies and (authorial) remaking” shows how
“a director’s repetition of style and technique” can harness sets of three texts to
place a magnifying glass on a single director’s oeuvre (4). These trilogies do not
need a narrative connection because the directorial undercurrent keeps the films
glued together. The trilogy, here, exists only externally to the sets of films and, as
such, does not offer a sense of the generic qualities of the films themselves. These
trilogies are also industrial, as the characteristics that produce them are visible only
on the level of productive context. A study focusing on narrative tools deployed by
trilogies can offer another, supplemental way to explore the limits and potentials
of the trilogy within the framework of filmic criticism.
The focus on the industrial contexts of the trilogy, the industrial/auteur binary
does little to clarify the role and representational functions of the structure. Verevis
and Perkins reinforce the fetishization of the single-director over prospects of
comparison via the disavowal of any aesthetic uniqueness. In his article focusing

1 Perkins’ own article in the collection, “The Scre4m Trilogy,” offers the clearest formulation of
an industrial trilogy that overlaps with broader publishing practices: “Scream is also positioned
as a specifically industrial brand of organic trilogy, the tripartite identity described as a strategy
that appeals to a particular type of audience (fan) desire, and is ultimately designed to translate
into box-office returns” (89). Industrial trilogies do not simply exist for the sake of broadly
based, blockbuster type films: they also find the term as a useful attribution on smaller, more
defined scales.

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on French film director François Truffaut, Murray Pomerance positions the trilogy
well within the distinctions similarly made by at least Harris, Verevis, and Perkins:
“the problem of the trilogy in art is either aesthetic or financial […] one can consider
the trilogy form either from the point of view of the artist […] or from the point
of view of the producer” (233). The story itself, the narrative tropes deployed and
limitations grappled with, fall out of the analysis.
This simplification, then, removes comparison, non-auteur, and political-cultural
readings of trilogies and avoids a discussion of what this essay calls the ‘trilogic’
relationship between texts – narrative particularities tied to overarching thematics
across three texts in a manner that develops a set of tropes. ‘Trilogic’ encompass-
es the narrative strategies by which a singular whole becomes determined and
differentiated from three individual constitutive parts; where the starts and stops
of style, narrative, and readerly processes act to determine the meanings of each
individuated text and the trilogy as a whole. ‘Trilogic’ exemplifies the collected
logics at work within a tripartite schema, where the presence of a meta-narrative
relies on three fully independent texts and their determinate connective tissue. The
trilogic structure allows to examine the totality of trilogies, relying on the classical
understanding of beginning/middle/end plot, dialectical modes of closure, and to
focus on the narrative growth and change to signal the formation’s added textures.
It can do so while also paying close attention to the industrial pressures that find
commercial value in such an aesthetic system.
Studies of serialization offer one potential starting point for producing a model
trilogic interpretation. Carolyn Jess-Cooke’s book Film Sequels: Theory and
Practice from Hollywood to Bollywood (2010), for example, decenters economic
considerations with a framework of conversation and interactions between simul-
taneously present desires for repeated profits and repeated experiences. It includes
the role that the audiences play in determining the recurrent types of changes to
stories. Her work specifically focuses on the “process by which subconscious
forces compel individuals to repeat events over and over again” (9). Her attempt
to formulate an analytic framework that takes into account the crisscrossing flows
of commercial power and repeated experiences can be thought within the context
of trilogic norms: that industrial/commercial, textual, and receptive/cultural factors
all converge at the site of the trilogy.
Trilogic interpretation emerges as a discourse on the narratively-productive
tension between the autonomy of three separate narratives and an overarching
story. Each film within the set offers a new way to read each of its predecessors.
There are stable, transcendent structures in place (a set of three independent and
narratively complete texts), but each trilogy activates them in different ways crucial
to their narratives. For example, the second and third films of The Godfather trilogy
must resuscitate the ending scenes of the previous films to reconfigure the central
conflicts. They repeat the ending with a difference to establish both continuity and
independence. These films deal with the gap between iterations without sacrificing
the constitution of the individual film. They remind audiences of the overlap and,
as will be shown later, re-cast those moments within a new narrative present. The
repeating intra-textual norms (two gaps, three texts) do not universally determine
readings – films can treat each of these five segments differently within any partic-
ular trilogy, but their presence makes them a discreet genre.

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 That such disparate sets of films harness a singular form illustrates the possibility
of treating the trilogy as a category of genre defined by its structure and its resulting
tropes. Out of the structural similarity emerge patterns of engagement. The narrative
structure’s demands for overlap, continuity, and closure produce sets of tropes. In
an essay, Katie Owens-Murphy has called for a re-configuration of genre studies
in order to avoid the arbitrary freezing of categories into unimpeachable positions,
leading her to focus on the tropes present within individual works. Her work greases
the wheels of trilogic readings by arguing that the intellectual value of generic
criticism comes from tropological malleability rather than stasis. Owens-Murphy’s
affirmation of genre, defined as “any category under which we classify and analyze
a group of texts on the basis of similarities in either form or content,” allows her
to activate generic tropes as a tool in comparing hybrid texts: “texts can and do
inhabit multiple generic positions at once, it also reminds us that genres provide
valuable ways of understanding difficult works by situating them in relation to
other works with like properties” (241). Owens-Murphy produces a justification
for treating the trilogy as a generic category because of the “basis of similarities
in either form or content” (240). Content norms and tropes emerge both within
individual trilogies and trilogies within larger more diffuse trope-producing genres.
The intertextual relationships between iterations across trilogies produce tropes and
generic continuities that reveal the presence of temporality inscribed both through
form and content.
Keeping in mind the material history of production, genres emerge from the
competing and contradictory demands for recurrent experiences and the desire
for creativity. In his work on the relationship between Hollywood production
practices and genres, Barry Langford argues that “[the] combination of sameness
and variety is the lynchpin of […] genre. Pleasure is to be derived from generic
narratives through the tension between novel elements and their eventual rein-
corporation into the expected genre model” (8). Genres come from the desire to
build on artistically useful and commercially successful tropes in extending the
narrative into further films. Thought within the context of the trilogy, the “tension
between novel elements” includes the relationships between iterations recorded on
the same narrative plane. The inter-textual and inner-textual relationships double
generic tensions within trilogies and force them to grapple with both a contained
narrative and the presence of expectations external to the set. On the one hand, the
specific genre conventions produce narrative expectations (i.e. the science-fiction
norms and the various Star Wars trilogies, gangster films/novels and The Godfather
trilogy). On the other hand, the particularity of a single three-part story produces
intertextual tension, where continuity between iterations forces repetition but the
continuing story demands change. The particulars of the trilogy distance it from
sequel theory toward something more independently defined: because trilogies
include a supra-narrative that each film enters into, the production of second and
third divisions require narrative continuity. In order to continue the narrative into
another iteration, trilogies must risk effacing or altering previous films. The drive
toward a singular end of closure requires change rather than mere repetition.
The trilogy meets the requirements for a genre in their commercial and ar-
tistic underpinnings. They manage conventions across three different iterations
while responding to commercial and consumer demands. Susan Hayward refers
to the changing production and reception practices in order to show how tropes

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evolve in response to audience desires: Genres, she writes, “are not static, they
evolve […] even disappear. Generic conventions […] become transformed for
economic, technological and consumption reasons. Thus, genres are paradoxically
placed as simultaneously conservative and innovative in so far as they respond to
expectations that are industry – and audience – based” (185). Tied to the drives
for ordination and closure not seen within indefinite sequels and diffuse generic
iterations of sitcoms or superhero films, the pressures to repeat and change determine
the narratives of trilogies more than other genres. Films in a trilogy must grapple
with the expectations created by their predecessors. Because in their constitution
trilogies produce their own sets of expectations, “paradoxically placed” between
repetition and uniqueness, critics should try to understand them as a generic category
through the competing drives for stability and creativity.
When genres gain stability within the imagination of audiences and industry
figures, the tropes become so ensconced in broader discourses that critics cannot help
but become enamored with their particularities. Yet, the lack of critical treatment of
trilogies as a genre begs the question of the tropes that emerge from its constituting
forces. The inescapable presence of temporality within the constitution of trilogic
meaning formulates the defining qualities to the idea of genre. Thomas Kent has
outlined a method of categorization that organizes genre around the moment of
interpretation, even if the expectations change in the time between production and
reception: “A genre, then,” he concludes, “is constituted by synchronic and diachronic
conventional expectations,” by the moment of interpretation of a text as within a genre
and the historical construction and attribution of genre to new categorical relationships
of texts (152). That trilogies have an order thrown into a larger sea of discourses
makes it so that the presence of temporality produces the trilogy as a genre defined
by its manifold locations of temporal experience. Each individual film can grapple
with how it deploys and utilizes temporality; they still much relate themselves to an
overarching, three-part structure. The relationships between iterations within a trilogy
are necessarily temporal, even if the very idea of linear temporality is effaced. They
must relate to each other – indifference is not an option.
The study of the trilogy’s temporal tropes requires an interrogation of its three-
part structure. In particular, the trilogy makes present a three-part articulation of
plot (beginning/middle/end) that resonates with a very classical understanding of
narrative closure. Despite the fact that the individual films may have freedom in how
they represent temporality (i.e. the basic linearity of The Godfather compared to the
reliance on flashbacks in Part II) the trilogy must provide closure for its overarching
narrative. The work of Paul Ricoeur offers a starting point for building on the
genre’s potential contradiction between the freedom of the individual work and
the imposition of a totalized narrative. Ricoeur’s core contentions, specifically that
narratives rely on a form of representational time that makes a story whole through a
three-part structure, can be easily applied to the tropes of the trilogy. The structure of
narrative temporality only necessarily emerges through the attempt to communicate
experience with language. The production of linear and understandable experience
through narrative results in the demarcation of plot and time. The beginning/middle/
end structure of narrative does not reflect in any way the experience of ‘real’ time.
It molds temporality onto a narrative in order to make it interpretable. Ricoeur’s
articulation of time and narrative outlines a presence of temporality made available
within the trilogy: “it is only in virtue of poetic composition that something counts

73
as a beginning, middle, or end” (Ricoeur 38). The beginning/middle/end structure
does not occur naturally within the bounds of a narrative; rather, it is an artistic
decision that alters the communication of a story. Where and how a ‘middle’ occurs,
or what aspects of a film become a part of the closure, are decisions that affect the
narrative as well as the available modes of its interpretation. Crucial for this study,
the composition of the trilogy relies on a form of narrative temporality that relates
more closely to the communication, rather than experience, of life.
In his explication of fictive time, Ricoeur argues that “an action is whole and
complete if it has a beginning, a middle, and an end; that is, if the beginning introduces
the middle, if the middle with its reversals and recognition scenes leads to the end,
and if the end concludes the middle” (20). The end’s conclusion must also fulfill the
trajectory of narrative and leave as little as possible unaccounted for or incomplete.
Fictive time communicated to an audience does not reflect any phenomenological
realities of time’s presence or existence: it compensates for its own incompletion by
constructing order. Trilogies rely on a classically understood notion of emplotted
temporality (beginning/middle/end) in their attempt to produce a single story of three
narrative iterations that individually do not rely on such a demarcation. Generally
speaking, each text in a trilogy foregrounds the temporal concept aligned with its
position. The first installment of a trilogy offers an understanding of ‘beginning’ – the
introduction of a narrative world, the apparent political and metaphysical rules at play,
and the major protagonists. The second installment accounts for ‘middle-ness’ – a
variety of narrative and temporal perspectives born of both a consistency with and,
more powerfully and more often, of the breaks with the first. What aspects of the
first film are carried over or not, serves to largely define the temporal understanding
of the trilogy. The final installment creates closure, encapsulating (if not accounting
for) the beginning and end of the trilogy. What narrative elements are taken up in the
last installment illustrates how a particular trilogy values the potential of ‘ending.’
Even when trilogies subvert or diverge from this linearity, the differences merely
make more visible the expected patterns of growth.
This articulation of the trilogy’s narrative stakes emphasizes its generic underpin-
nings. Poetic temporality makes it possible to analyze trilogies in their deployments of
demarcation of repetition and closure. Even couched within the language of separate
genres (i.e. the Western and the gangster film), trilogies can be analyzed through
their treatment of those concepts born out of their inter-textual, interstitial narrative
relationships (middle-ness, closure, etc.). An individual film contains representations
of time without necessarily relying on the poetic presence of beginning, middle,
and end. Out of these norms come the generic tropes that make the trilogy unique.
When analysis centers on the norms of the trilogy, the meaning of individual films
can change, morph, and evolve. Even those films so well known that their existence
overshadows the whole of the trilogy, are affected by their temporal position. In this
case, the most popular films within a trilogy (equally known for failing to support
the grandeur of the other two iterations) change when analyzed from the trilogic
perspective. When thought of in terms of narrative temporality, The Godfather trilogy,
for instance, becomes a story not about the broad context of one mafia family, but of
one son’s rise to power. The changes to the story’s structure ushered in by the first
film, and the lonely last shot of the final chapter, produce a central protagonist whose
gravitational pull changes the way audiences understand each film.

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 Showing the Contours:
The Godfather Trilogy and the Creation of Generic Demands
The cultural relevance and position of The Godfather trilogy makes it both the most
obvious and most risky place to demonstrate the potential of trilogic reading. The
first two films in the trilogy earned cultural resonance as both the best film and the
best sequel of all time. The third film, however, testifies to the over-commercial-
ization and artistic indifference critics see within the genre. The trilogy’s scenes
of transition and recurrence illustrate the role the generic qualities play in altering
and affecting the overarching narratives. The opening scenes, sequences, and shots
from The Godfather, Part II and Part III reconfigure and refract the available
interpretations of each individual film. The enunciation of Part II produces a new
way to read The Godfather.
The cultural import of The Godfather trilogy has produced strong, protective
readings that want to save the first film (or two) from what is following. One
analysis in particular, R. Barton Palmer’s “Before and After, Before Before and
After: Godfather I, II, and III,” argues for reading the films only as a series that
happens to end after three films, and against any attribution of qualities of genre or
inter-textual relationships. Palmer’s perspective goes so far as to annul the idea of
the trilogy within the context of The Godfather, “there is no Godfather trilogy,” he
writes. “Any sense we might have of an overarching structure emerged only after its
‘parts’ came into existence and when, because of the death of Michael Corleone in
the concluding scene of The Godfather, Part III, it became likely, if not inevitable,
that no more such parts would be forthcoming” (70). Palmer’s perspective may be
accurate in the emergence of the possibility of the trilogy as a tool of analysis, but
his refusal ignores the potential additives available for the sake of producing the
‘true’ reading of the three texts. It avoids any conversation about the tension between
the repetition of tropes and the demands for closure connected to the overarching
story. The opening scene of The Godfather: Part II shows that, far from merely
extending or repeating the tropes of the original movie, the relationship between
the two films is one of complication and radical re-thinking. In other words, the
opening of the second film does not merely engage the prior film through addition,
but by re-conceptualizing the original.
The end of The Godfather puts an ellipsis on the film: The rise of Michael has
sloughed his family’s position while potentially alienating those around him. The
ambivalence of his choices in the film comes to head in this final sequence. As
Michael’s wife leaves his office, the room fills with his underlings. The door closes
as men lean to kiss Michael’s hand, and the door closes, leaving his wife Kay on the
outside of his life. As the door closes, it becomes clear that Michael’s professional
life and personal life exist on two different planes. On its own, this scene can
signify the collateral damage sustained by Michael’s desire for the survival of the
family. From the perspective of the trilogy, this scene morphs into the end of the first
chapter of one man’s rise and fall from power. The Godfather, Part II reconfigures
the closing scene in order to offer a new analytic framework for the previous chapter.
The opening shot re-stages the first film’s closure in a manner that frames it as
a single part of a larger narrative. The film uses a close-up on the face of Michael
Corleone, a young and striking Al Pacino looking forward into the darkness, as the
screen fades. The last potential patriarch standing earns center stage, dominating the

75
screen. Michael’s hegemony offers a seismic shift regarding the central concerns
of the first film as the opening credits begin. The next shot, of an unfilled chair,
shows the emptiness of the Godfather signifier. While the previous film told of
the struggles of controlling the family business, the real story is of Michael, not
the lifeless, empty chair. The large family battles and iconic scenes of violence
and transition become rungs on the ladder of Michael’s growth, waypoints along
one man’s tragic story arc. These subtle shifts are underwritten by the flashback/
flash-forward cycle that jumpstarts the narrative.
The film shifts to a flashback of Michael’s father Vito’s (Robert De Niro) trip
to the United States, positioning Michael’s own rise and attempts to expand power
within the larger history of men similarly struggling to progress in an increasingly
global world. Despite its start in Italy, this ten-minute flashback defines Michael’s
world. The reason for his success is located within the context of global migration
to the United States, the myth of America as a land of opportunity, where individual
progress relies on an assumed meritocracy rather than European aristocracy. The
reiteration of Michael’s trip to Italy where the death of his first wife cements his
rise within the family underwrites, rather than effaces, his centrality. In showing his
father’s original voyage from Italy to the United States, Michael’s trip gets recast as
a right of ascension. By reaching back to a time prior to the opening events of the
first film, this opening (as well as the whole flashback cycle it enunciates) uses past
events to re-center the dominant narrative onto the present. From the perspective of
the trilogic genre, in which this film stands as the ‘middle,’ the use of past affirms
the centrality of Michael by framing his version of the journey to Italy as the center
from which Vito diverges. In other words, the temporal order of the trilogy itself
takes narrative precedence over the historical order of events.
The flashback that opens the film tells of Vito’s struggle for freedom from
the violence of Old World Italy in a manner that reflects the shared adversity of
Michael’s own rise. The most resonant moment of Vito’s heartbreaking trip across
the Atlantic occurs at the moment of his re-naming. In this scene, the relationship
between the Corleone name and Vito’s birthplace shifts from a symbol of power
to one of dispossession. Standing in the final line at Ellis Island, Vito, up until this
point unable to speak, is asked for his name. He does not answer the immigration
officer, who then replaces Vito’s last name with the name of his hometown. Given
a new name, the process of immigration breathes an American life into Vito. It
starts his, and Michael’s, trajectory of power and growth. Changing the relationship
between the family name and the town in the middle film shifts the fundamental
value structure: rather than tell a story about the maintenance of an already-existing
modality of power, Michael and his father share personal histories of self-reliance
and the overcoming of adversity.
This moment of re-naming alters the narrative of The Godfather by undergirding
the importance of Michael’s path. It forces audiences to rethink the fundamentals
of the first film and, in doing so, grants Part II power over Part I. The present tense
of the ‘middle’ forces a re-interpretation of the ‘beginning’ in a way that makes it
history. That Vito shares a name with a city in Italy shows not a long history of a
singularly important family, but the emergence of a Mafia don out of a moment of
erasure. The first film shows a similar build: Michael does not inherit the power of
his father, but consolidates power out of necessity. Michael’s story, then, repeats
his father’s story via the doubled presence of the past. On the one hand, the first

76
film’s central story, as a historical artifact in the middle film, becomes a story
about Michael’s rise. On the other, the presence of a more overtly ‘past’-ness of his
father’s own rise illustrates the repetition of Michael’s journey. Both the structure
and the individual narratives of the films activate the temporality of the beginning/
middle/end structure.
In a similar way, the shift to the present day continues the story from The
Godfather, but with a new sense of centrality to Michael’s story. The slow fade
into the next scene with the description “His grandson Anthony Vito Corleone
Lake Tahoe, Nevada” enunciates the start of the trilogy’s second chapter by making
Michael suspiciously absent textually. In the openings of the bookends of the long
flashback, Michael’s name is only made visible through its absence. The two figures,
Vito and Anthony, become satellites pulled into orbit by Michael’s gravitational pull
as the central figure of the overarching story. The shot shifts from a small hospital
room housing a young and frail Vito to a large, naturally lit church during a first
Holy Communion ceremony in Lake Tahoe, Nevada. This change resonates with
both the scope of the narrative (from Italy to the western U.S.) and its narrow social
outlook (the reiteration of Catholic symbolism). Michael has moved his family out
to Nevada and begun to purchase the power of national politicians. While the film’s
use of flashbacks as a narrative device explains the methods used by Vito to create
a mafia family, they also serve to illustrate that this trilogy, despite the plots and
subplots that crisscross each film, concerns itself with Michael’s growth from aloof
son to mafia boss. In establishing worldly continuity between the two films, The
Godfather, Part II’s opening ten minutes tells audiences that these films are about
Michael, the world he lives in, and the limitless possibilities of improvement and
betterment that faith in America offers him.
Most revered for its filmic and narrative skill, the movement of The Godfather
trilogy from Part I to Part II typifies the structuring and tropological norms of filmic
trilogies. In this opening sequence, The Godfather, Part II illustrates the crucial
relationship between fully independent texts that, taken together, complicate and
enrich a greater whole. On its own, the original Godfather film presents a story
of revenge and the violence necessary to maintain a gangster family’s position.
Similarly, Part II tells of a man mastering the craft of ruling as his power slowly
deteriorates his social moorings. Read within a trilogy formulation, the opening
of Part II makes Part I the first chapter in the rise of Michael Corleone, the story
of his father illustrating in part the American culture that enables his position. The
dual-pronged narrative of Part II, bookended by the fall of aged Mafia dons in Part
I and III, highlights the overarching focus of the trilogy on Michael.
Palmer’s reading of the trilogy argues that the story’s end, the solitary shot of
an old and frail Michael dying in a churchyard in Italy, concludes the narrative
arc in a manner indifferent to its position at the end of a three-part story. From
this perspective, the story is a serialized narrative that ends almost by accident
and arbitrarily. That Michael dies at the end of the third movie does not offer any
special significance. Yet, Palmer’s reading, specifically the disavowal of the trilogy
structure, speaks more to the disappointment wrought by the film than the fitting
end it offers the trilogy. From the perspective of trilogic organization, the story that
is being developed in all three movies allows for an affirmation of that final shot:
it closes off the story of Michael by showing how, at the end of his life, his actions
refuse him the happy relationships with grandchildren that his father earned. By

77
ending with the death of Michael, the film returns to the trilogy’s opening in an
inverse manner. Part I opens with a statement of belief in America, and an aged
Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando) showing that even in the twilight of his life his
strength and stature remain. Vito’s eventual death includes family and support.
Michael dies alone, with the wreckage of his path for improvement decimated.
Ending with a repetition with difference, The Godfather, Part III underscores the
trilogic structure of series. The three films are connected stylistically and structurally,
and their overlap and recurrence constantly offer new ways to read and understand
the previous installments. Without taking seriously the genre considerations of
the trilogy, these crucial overlaps and re-framings go unseen. Only by taking the
three-part structure seriously can trilogies be understood on their own terms. From
here, critics could begin to re-evaluate, and newly appreciate, these films.

Cleveland, OH Guy Risko

Works Cited
Berliner, Todd. “The Pleasures of Disappointment: Sequels and The Godfather,
Part II.” Journal of Film & Video 53.2+3 (Summer/Fall 2001): 107-23. Print.
Canby, Vincent. “The Godfather (1972).” New York Times 16 Mar. 1972. Web.
<http://www.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=EE05E7DF1739E464BC4E52D-
FB5668389669EDE>.
Harris, Mark. “The Smartest Star in Hollywood.” Grantland. Grantland, 29 May
2013. Web. 20 Oct. 2014. <http://grantland.com/features/bradley-cooper-smart-
est-star-hollywood/>.
Hayward, Susan. “Genre/Sub-Genre.” Cinema Studies: The Key Concepts. New
York: Routledge, 2006. 185-92. Print.
Horrowitz, Josh. “Francis Ford Coppola: There Should Only Be One ‘Godfa-
ther.’” News. MTV, 3 Dec. 2012. Web. 13 Dec. 2014. <http://www.mtv.com/
news/1698276/francis-ford-coppola-godfather-bluray/>.
Kent, Thomas. Interpretation and Genre. Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell UP, 1986. Print.
Langford, Barry. Film Genre: Hollywood and Beyond. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP,
2003. Print.
Owens-Murphy, Katie. “Trope Theory, Cane, and the Metaphysical Case for Genre.”
Genre 46.3 (2013): 239-63. Print.
Palmer, R. Barton. “Some Thoughts on New Hollywood Multiplicity: Sofia Coppola’s
Young Girls Trilogy.” Film Trilogies: New Critical Approaches. Ed. Claire
Perkins and Constantine Verevis. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillian, 2012.
35-54. Print.
---. “Before and After, Before Before and After: Godfather I, II, and III.” Second
Takes: Critical Approaches to the Film Sequel. Ed Carolyn Jess-Cooke and
Constantine Verevis. Albany, NY: SUNY P, 2010. 65-85. Print.
Perkins, Claire. “The Scre4m Trilogy.” Film Trilogies: New Critical Approaches.
Ed. Perkins and Constantine Verevis. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.
88-108. Print.

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---, and Constantine Verevis. “Introduction: Three Times.” Film Trilogies: New
Critical Approaches. Ed. Perkins and Verevis. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan,
2012. 1-32. Print.
Pomerance, Murray. “‘Antoine Doinel, Antoine Doinel, Antoine Doinel’: François
Truffaut’s ‘Trilogy.’” Film Trilogies: New Critical Approaches. Ed. Claire Per-
kins and Constantine Verevis. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. 226-42.
Print.
Ricoeur, Paul. Time and Narrative. Vols. 1-3. Trans. Kathleen McLaughlin and
David Pellaur. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1984. Print.
The Godfather. Dir. Francis Ford Coppola. Perf. Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James
Caan, and Diane Keaton. 1972. DVD. Paramount Home Video, 2003.
The Godfather, Part II. Dir. Francis Ford Coppola. Perf. Al Pacino, Robert Duvall,
Robert De Niro, and Diane Keaton. 1974. DVD. Paramount Home Video, 2003.
The Godfather, Part III. Dir. Francis Ford Coppola. Perf. Al Pacino, Diane Keaton,
Andy Garcia, and Talia Shire. 1990. DVD. Paramount Home Video, 2003.

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 “The past is never really past”:
Serial Storytelling from Psycho to Bates Motel
Mrs. Bates – probably the most famous corpse in cinema history – is very much
alive in the new television series Bates Motel. Together with her 17-year-old son
Norman, she runs a family motel in the small town of White Pine Bay, Oregon.
The show, produced by Carlton Cuse from ABC’s Lost (2004-2010) and Kerry
Ehrin from NBC’s Friday Night Lights (2006-2011), premiered in March 2013 on
the cable channel A&E, and describes itself as a contemporary prequel to Alfred
Hitchcock’s genre-defining 1960 classic Psycho: Set in the present, Bates Motel
explores the formative years of the murderer Norman Bates (played by Freddie
Highmore). As a prequel and because of the serial dynamics that come with the
television series format, Bates Motel is not exclusively about young Norman (who
goes to high school and lives in a modern world of cell phones and iPads), but
remakes and expands the familiar storyworld of Psycho through a multiplication
of plot lines that revolve around newly invented and resurrected characters like
Norman’s mother (Vera Farmiga), his estranged half-brother Dylan (Max Thierot),
and various local people from White Pine Bay. In fact, Mrs. Bates, who was more
or less absent in earlier renditions of the Norman-Bates-story, becomes one of the
series’ most important driving forces.
With the new focus on Norman’s coming-of-age-story and the strong female
lead that replaces the mother’s long-dead corpse, Bates Motel takes up “unfinished
business” (Braudy 331; Oltmann 42-46) and thoroughly reinterprets themes, char-
acters, and events that are already known from Psycho. In this sense, “[t]he past is
never really past,” as Norman Bates tells a reporter in one of the Psycho sequels
from the 1980s. The question of how the past affects the present and future lies
at the heart of the Psycho franchise that has produced three sequels – Psycho II
(Richard Franklin, 1983), Psycho III (Anthony Perkins, 1986), and Psycho IV (Mick
Garris, 1990) –, the (failed) television pilot Bates Motel (Richard Rothstein, 1987),
a much-maligned remake (Gus Van Sant, 1998), and, most recently, the television
series Bates Motel.1
The line “[t]he past is never really past” from one of the sequels sums up
Norman’s constantly recurring feeling of being trapped, of not being able to escape
from what he does and from who he is. To some extent, it echoes the conversation
between Norman Bates and Marion Crane in the parlor sequence in Hitchcock’s
Psycho.2 Marion Crane (Janet Leigh), a Phoenix secretary who has stolen $40.000
from one of her employer’s clients, is on the run when she checks into the remote
Bates Motel. The nervous but friendly proprietor Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins)
prepares a light dinner for her to eat in the motel parlor. At first, they talk about
trivial matters but the conversation quickly shifts to a more serious, more intimate
tone when Marion asks about Norman’s mother, and he wants to know what she
is running away from.

1 Robert Bloch, the author of Psycho, wrote two sequels that built on his 1959 novel: Psycho II
was published in 1982 and Psycho House in 1991. Neither has been taken up by filmmakers
and adapted for the big screen so that they remain largely unconnected to the Psycho film
franchise. The franchise also includes the direct-to-video documentary The Psycho Legacy
(Robert Galluzo, 2010) and the biopic Hitchcock (Sacha Gervasi, 2012) that are not set in the
diegetic world of Psycho but deal with the making of the film (and its sequels).
2 For a detailed analysis of the parlor scene, see Rothman 277-88; Kolker 227-38.

81
 NORMAN: You know what I think? I think that we’re all in our private traps. Clamped
in them. And none of us can ever get out. We scratch and claw but only at the air, only at
each other. And for all of it, we never budge an inch.
MARION: Sometimes ... we deliberately step into those traps.
NORMAN: I was born into mine. I don’t mind it anymore.
MARION: Oh, but you should. You should mind it.
NORMAN: Oh, I do ... [laughs] But I say I don’t.

As William Rothman has pointed out, “Psycho’s shower-murder scene,” that follows
the parlor sequence, “has passed into the consciousness of the world. An uninitiated
viewer – one who does not already know Norman’s story or Marion’s fate – can
scarcely be found” (266). Viewers are likely to possess a “narrative image” (Ellis
30-37) of the shower sequence and Bernard Hermann’s shrieking violins, but they
may be less familiar with the conversation in the parlor that precedes it. Yet, it
functions as a carefully orchestrated “setup sequence” (Kolker 228), in the sense
that it misleads audiences into believing that Marion will be able to return the stolen
money and that Norman and his mother exist as two separate beings. These two
fraudulent plotlines (or “MacGuffins”) distract audiences and thus reinforce the shock
effect of the shower sequence as well as the final revelation that Norman and his
murderous mother are, in fact, one and the same (cf. Kolker 228). With hindsight,
one might even argue that the parlor sequence sets up the entire Psycho franchise
because it establishes Norman Bates as a sympathetic, almost “normal” character:
Norman is “a killer to care about,”3 and his desire to escape from his “private trap”
becomes the “storytelling engine” (Chabon 47) of all subsequent Psycho films and
the new television series Bates Motel.
And yet, a line like “[t]he past is never really past” expresses more than a mere
diegetic concern with Norman Bates’ mother issues and mental illness. Uttered in
a sequel by a recurring character, it is also a comment on the mechanics and effects
of sequelization, remaking, and, indeed, serial storytelling at play in the Psycho
franchise, and on how they challenge notions of causality and linear temporality.
Along these lines, I argue that individual entries to the franchise function as serial
installments in an ongoing narrative and draw attention to the impact remaking has
on dynamic processes of meaning-making over time. I will first discuss theoretical
implications resulting from Psycho’s evolution into a long-running franchise with
different cinematic and televisual formats of repetition, variation, and continuation.
Drawing on recent studies of the film remake and related concepts of “unfinished
business,” Nachträglichkeit and retrospective serialization, I will propose an ap-
proach that takes into account different ways of repeating, modifying and extending
the narrative. I will then apply my findings to the individual entries of the Psycho
franchise, and finally position Bates Motel within the storyworld and examine how
it works as a prequel series.

3 Richard Franklin, director of Psycho II, said in an interview: “In movies like Halloween [John
Carpenter, 1978], we’re told the killer is less than human. Halloween is actually a monster
movie. But in Psycho, Norman Bates was not just a character, but a sympathetic character. The
difference is that you cared about the killer” (qtd. in Mills 2D).

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 Another Take on the Remake: Unfinished Business,
Nachträglichkeit, and Retrospective Serialization
In his afterword to the collection Play It Again, Sam: Retakes on Remakes (1998),
Leo Braudy notes that the remake “is a meditation on the continuing historical
relevance […] of a particular narrative” (331). He further states,
A remake is […] always concerned with what its makers and (they hope) its audiences
consider to be unfinished cultural business, unrefinable and perhaps finally unassimilable
material that remains part of the cultural dialogue – not until it is finally given definite
form, but until it is no longer compelling or interesting. (331)
Katrin Oltmann has expanded on this idea, suggesting that the remake resumes unfinished
business in more than one sense: Economically speaking, the remake means unfinished
business for the film studios, because they can literally get back into business with
a “presold” property. From a culture and film studies perspective, the remake is still
undertheorized; it is one of the most longstanding cinematic conventions but has only
recently emerged as an object of scholarly interest and debate. Another aspect Oltmann
mentions – and which is most closely connected to Braudy’s observation – concerns
the fact that the remake takes up and negotiates cultural unfinished business from
earlier film versions. It comments, for instance, on changing gender representations
and thus takes part in shaping gendered discourses of the past and present. Finally,
Oltmann sees unfinished business in the remake’s palimpsest-like layering of memories
of earlier films. Its genre conventions, narrative elements, production background as
well as the actors’ star and screen personas, she argues, influence the production and
reception of the remake (cf. 43, 45).
Oltmann’s understanding of “unfinished business” is further complicated by the
theoretical framework she develops to approach the film remake. Remake criticism,
she writes, is strongly invested in concepts of authorship, authenticity, originality and
identity – concepts which emerge from hierarchically organized binary oppositions such
as authenticity versus plagiarism, original versus copy, production versus reproduction,
art versus commerce etc. The dichotomies are discursively “naturalized” in the sense
that they are presented as inherent qualities of either the original film or the remake (27).
Yet this rhetoric, which generally favors the original film over the remake, conceals
the fact that both categories actually depend on one another, that they come into being
because of each other (27). Accordingly, a linear model that traces the trajectory from
a superior original to an inferior remake does not suffice to describe the process of
remaking, which is why Oltmann proposes a circular model rooted in Sigmund Freud’s
psychoanalytic concept of Nachträglichkeit. Translated from German as après-coup,
deferred action or afterwardsness, Nachträglichkeit describes how a later event prompts
the retroactive attribution of meaning to an earlier event, its belated understanding or
even revision. The remake – if grasped along these lines – has not only to come to terms
with the cultural unfinished business and memories of the earlier film, it also creates
the original in the process, retrospectively transforms its meaning in significant ways
and thereby hints at the instability of narratives in general (28).4

4 These ideas resonate, of course, with recent theoretical approaches that reject an essentialist
understanding of cinematic remaking as “a one-way process” (Verevis, Film Remakes 58, “For
Ever Hitchcock” 15) in favor of broader – and more productive – views; see Forrest and Koos;
Horton and McDougal; Loock and Verevis; Mazdon; Verevis, Film Remakes. On the concept
of afterwardsness in cinematic remaking, see Sutton, “Afterwardsness,” and “Prequel.”

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 Oltmann’s circular model is helpful if one wants to study the cultural work of
remakes and their narrative possibilities of innovative reproduction. However, it
makes sense to further expand her model so that it does not only apply to the film
remake, but also to the sequel and prequel, and, in fact, to all formats that repackage
an already familiar story. The result would be an intertextual web or remaking
network in which very different versions of the same narrative influence, modify
and extend each other. Although this approach broadens the concept of remaking to
refer to more than just the film remake, it nevertheless proves to be more accurate
when analyzing narratives that initially exist as self-contained works of art and are
then re-activated, repeated, changed, updated, and continued in the act of remaking.
To be sure, the concept of remaking I am adopting here does not border on more
global notions of intertextuality that would encompass all kinds of cinematic quo-
tations, allusions, or generic variations. Rather, I am interested in films that revolve
around diegetically consistent plotlines and characters within a joint storytelling
universe. Hollywood has, in fact, produced a long list of movies that were conceived
and marketed as stand-alone features and have then been followed by films that
continue the story of a protagonist (sequel), repeat a narrative (remake), or provide
a backstory for popular characters (prequel). In these cases, it makes sense to think
of remaking in terms of seriality because the processes of repetition and variation
at work are structurally akin to the more explicitly serialized aesthetics in other
popular media. Different versions of one and the same narrative that emerge from
the practice of remaking are not unconnected, but rather, they are retrospectively
serialized with each new installment that is added to the franchise.5 As I will show
in the following, the films and television series of the Psycho franchise, which
function either as sequel, remake, spin-off or prequel in relation to Alfred Hitch-
cock’s classic, all build on the preexisting narrative and memory of the original,
treating it as an authoritative intertext. At the same time, they mutually influence
each other’s meaning(s) in significant ways and affect the viewers’ understanding of
the Norman-Bates-character in an increasingly serialized and complex storyworld.
The Psycho Franchise
In 1998, Gus Van Sant’s alleged shot-by-shot remake of Psycho was met with
incomprehension, frustration, and outrage. Hitchcock fans, critics, and academics
disapproved of the film and responded with overwhelming hostility to what they
felt was “the defilement of a beloved classic” (Verevis, “For Ever Hitchcock” 15).
In this context, Constantine Verevis has remarked he found it “curious that few (if
any) of the commentaries at the time of the release of Psycho 98 drew attention to
the ways in which Psycho 60 had already been ‘remade’” (“For Ever Hitchcock”
26). With the word “remade” he refers to
broader, intertextual relations [that] range from the generic repetitions of Halloween and
other slasher movies, to the careful acts of homage evident in [Brian De Palma’s] Body
Double [1984], Dressed to Kill [1980] and Blow Out [1980], to the various other limited
remakings of Psycho such as the hilarious shower scene spoof in High Anxiety (Mel
Brooks 1977) and the masochistic parody of the same in Psycho Too (Andrew Gluck
Levy 1999). (“For Ever Hitchcock” 26; cf. Film Remakes 72-74)

5 See Kelleter and Loock. These ideas are currently being developed in the larger research project
“Retrospective Serialization: Remaking as a Method of Cinematic Self-Historicizing” (Freie
Universität Berlin) as part of the DFG-funded Research Unit “Popular Seriality – Aesthetics
and Practice” (www.popularseriality.de/en/).

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 Figure 1: Schematic Overview of the Psycho franchise.

While I do not consider films that pay visual tribute to Hitchcock’s Psycho by
recycling specific themes, shots or sequences but are not otherwise part of its
storyworld in this essay, Verevis’ observation is nevertheless crucial for my argument.
It attests to the fact that Van Sant’s remake of Psycho has above all been perceived
in relation to Hitchcock’s film and, not surprisingly, almost exclusively in terms
of the hierarchically organized dichotomies mentioned above. What is more, the
Psycho sequels, which had remade and continued the Norman-Bates-story throughout
the 1980s, were rarely if ever mentioned by fans and critics at the time the remake
was released – or later, for that matter, when Van Sant’s Psycho gradually rose to
become the (probably) most discussed remake in the history of academic quarterlies.6
It is, however, the Psycho franchise in its temporary entirety that provides the
framework for understanding the reactions to Van Sant’s remake. The franchise has
been running for over 50 years and each entry attests to the “continuing historical
relevance” (Braudy 331) of the narrative about the murderer Norman Bates. Figure
1 provides a schematic overview of how the films and television series have con-
tinued, expanded and remade this narrative over time. The chart indicates when the
individual entries to the franchise have been made (time of production axis), and
when they are set in relation to the murder of Marion Crane in Alfred Hitchcock’s
Psycho (story time axis).
Psycho was followed by a somewhat belated sequel in 1983, in which Anthony
Perkins reprised the role of Norman Bates. Psycho II was quite aware of its predecessor
and its own status as a sequel. Its tagline ran, “Just when you thought it was safe
to go back in the shower,” piggybacking on the successful promotional campaign
of Jaws 2 (Jeannot Szwarc, 1978) with its ubiquitous publicity line: “Just when
you thought it was safe to go back in the water” (Smith 186). In a decade when,

6 Meanwhile, the initial film critical and academic reactions to Van Sant’s remake have themselves
become the object of study. For insightful analyses, see Kelleter, “Das Remake”; Leitch; and
Verevis, Film Remakes 58-78, “For Ever Hitchcock.”

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according to contemporary film critics and commentators, “sequelitis ran rampant”
in Hollywood (Hoberman 38), Psycho II stood out in the long list of movies with
Arabic or Roman numerals as part of their titles because it did not arrive on the
screen within two or three years of its predecessor but after nearly a quarter of a
century and because it tried to follow in the footsteps of “the now almost mythical
Psycho,” as one of the critics put it (Sublett 10B).7
In Psycho II, Norman Bates is released from a hospital for the criminally
insane after 22 years. He returns to the Bates Motel, starts to work in a local
diner, and wants to begin a new life. But Lila Loomis (Vera Miles),8 sister of the
shower-murder victim Marion Crane, and her daughter Mary (Meg Tilly) plot to
have Norman re-institutionalized. When he receives mysterious notes and phone
calls from his deceased mother, Norman fears that he is losing his sanity again, and
when several people are brutally murdered, he thinks he is responsible for their
deaths. As it turns out, however, both Lila and Mary have masqueraded as Mrs.
Bates in order to drive Norman crazy, while the murders have been committed
by the kindly Mrs. Spool (Claudia Bryar), who works with Norman at the diner.
At the end of the film, she visits Norman and claims to be his real mother upon
which Norman kills her with a shovel and carries the body upstairs. In the final
scene, Mother’s voice can be heard warning Norman about “filthy girls” and
instructing him to re-open the motel.
Unlike the black-and-white original, Psycho II is in color. It does not only quote
lines from the 1960 movie, but also makes free use of the footage of Hitchcock’s
famous shower scene, recycles shots, entire sequences, lighting effects, and camera
angles. For New York Times critic Vincent Canby, this sequel was therefore “as much
of an homage as it is a rip-off,” a film, he wrote, that felt “as if you’re seeing a couple
of precocious film students play with artifacts found in the Hitchcock mausoleum,”
or that could almost pass as “an academic thesis” (C14). Psycho II was a financial
success, but reviews were mixed. While some critics recognized “a real kinship to
its 1960 predecessor” (Sublett 10B), others saw a “Half-Baked Hitchcock” on the
screen (Sterritt 17). Village Voice critic Andrew Sarris suggested:
The best way to enjoy Psycho II is to think of it not as a stylistic echo of the Hitchcock
original, but as a welcome reminder of how much Psycho owed to Tony Perkins in the
first place. Now, 23 years later, Perkins invests Norman Bates with fascinatingly rueful
resonances of a legendary part from which he can never entirely escape. He is no longer
part of Sir Alfred’s personal nightmare. His Norman Bates has taken on a life of his own
[…]. (45-46)

This comment is remarkable for a number of reasons: First of all, Sarris – who,
inspired by the French Cahiers du cinema critics, had introduced and popularized
auteur theory in the U.S. during the 1960s9 – reluctantly acknowledges that filmmaking
is a collaborative effort. In fact, his evaluation of Psycho II leads to a retrospective
re-interpretation of Psycho, of Hitchcock’s and Perkins’ authorial roles as director

7 For a discussion of Hollywood sequels in the 1970s and 1980s, and the Jaws sequels in
particular, see Loock.
8 Vera Miles played Lila Crane in Hitchcock’s film. Her name Lila Loomis in the sequel reveals
that she eventually married Sam Loomis (John Gavin), her dead sister’s boyfriend in the 1960
movie. Note that the character Sam Loomis had its own afterlife: the name is given to Michael
Myer's psychiatrist, Dr. Loomis, in the Halloween franchise.
9 See his “Notes on the Auteur Theory.”

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and actor, respectively. Following this line of thought, Psycho can ultimately be
understood as “both a vindication of the auteur theory (inconceivable without
Hitchcock’s genius) and an annihilation of it,” as C. Jerry Kutner has suggested.
It is through the process of sequelization (and in the absence of Hitchcock) that
Norman Bates unmistakably emerges as “a joint creation, originating with [Robert]
Bloch’s novel, radically reimagined by Hitchcock and [Joseph] Stefano in their
screen adaptation, realized in an intensely personal way by Anthony Perkins, and (not
least) deepened and illuminated by Bernard Hermann’s score” (Kutner; emphasis in
original). Secondly, Sarris notes that Anthony Perkins had become closely identified
with his character. That connection is reinforced by his return as Norman Bates in
Psycho II and the fact that Perkins went on to play his patented role in two more
sequels. Perkins himself pointed out resemblances between the character’s and
his own life in interviews promoting Psycho II (cf. Kutner), and often claimed the
sequel would satisfy continuous audience demand: “Over the years, even 20 years
later,” Perkins said, “people kept coming up to me and asking me what happened
to him. I decided that we should give them more of Norman” (qtd. in Richard 40).
When Sarris finally asserts that “Norman Bates has taken on a life of his own,” he
stresses that the character exists detached from Alfred Hitchcock. This observation
chimes with recent research in the field of seriality studies that investigates the
agency of series and serial characters and their (often unauthorized) proliferation
and sprawl across media.10 As the ending of Psycho II lays the groundwork for
another sequel, it paves the way for Norman Bates’ becoming a serial character that
could no longer be controlled or contained by one director (Hitchcock), let alone
one movie (the original Psycho).
By the time Psycho III was released in 1986, the trade paper Variety wrote of
the “[l]atest installment in the adventures of everybody’s favorite psychopath”
(Cart.) – a statement that simultaneously accepts and fuels the notion that Psycho
had finally evolved into a series about Norman Bates. The second sequel, which
was also Anthony Perkins’ directing debut, picks up where Psycho II ends, with
Norman running the motel and Mrs. Spool’s corpse set up in Mother’s room.
This time, Norman struggles hard to lead a normal life. He falls in love with the
suicidal Maureen Coyle (Diana Scarwid), a young, tall, pretty woman with very
short blond hair who flees from a convent at the beginning of the movie and
finds refuge at the Bates Motel. But Maureen brings back memories of his earlier
crimes, and before long Norman falls under the spell of his dead mother again,
dresses up in her clothes and kills women who arouse him.
The opening sequence of Psycho III is a full-fledged homage to Alfred Hitch-
cock’s Vertigo (1958), and the movie later restages memorable scenes from Psycho.
Like the first sequel, it makes use of shower-murder footage from the original – this
time blending, mixing, and transforming it in innovative ways that arguably antici­
pate Van Sant’s editing, use of color, and the decision to cast Anne Heche, who is a
dead ringer for Diana Scarwid’s Maureen, in the role of Marion Crane in the remake.
Norman agrees to do an interview with a reporter (Roberta Maxwell) who writes
a piece on the insanity defense law. They meet at the diner, where Norman used to
work, and – consumed with remorse for the crimes he has committed – Norman
explains: “The past is never really past. It stays with me all the time. And no matter

10 See, for example, Kelleter, Serial Agencies, “Toto”; and Mayer.

87
how hard I try, I can’t really escape. It’s always there, throbbing inside you, coloring
your perceptions of the world, and sometimes controlling them.” While Norman
utters these words, he is distracted because Maureen arrives and enters the diner.
The reporter continues to talk to him, but when Maureen passes by them, he sees the
initials “M.C.” on her suitcase and remembers the murder of Marion Crane, whom
this young woman so strongly resembles. Black-and-white footage from Psycho
is then intercut with close-ups of Norman and Maureen in the diner, ending with
Maureen’s (not Marion’s) dead face pressed against the bathroom floor – another
black-and-white shot that fades into color and establishes a link between Norman’s
past and present, between original and sequel.
In addition, Psycho III also lifts material from the first sequel and replays it in
black-and-white. This kind of flashback is a typical strategy for sequels to refresh
the viewers’ memory. By evoking its two predecessors in this manner, the sequel
visually reaffirms that all three movies function as installments of an ongoing
narrative, and this retrospective serialization ultimately affects the ways in which
audiences make sense of Norman Bates’ actions in the earlier films. Or, as Roger
Ebert observed in his favorable review of this sequel: “For the first time, I was able
to see that the true horror in the Psycho movies isn’t what Norman does – but the
fact that he is compelled to do it.”
Psycho IV was produced in 1990 for the television network Showtime and
functions as a prequel in the sense that it traces the adolescence of Norman Bates
through a series of flashbacks exposing the psychological tortures heaped upon
him by his manipulative mother Norma. Kutner notes how Anthony Perkins (who
played the adult Norman Bates one last time) and screenwriter Joseph Stefano
(who had put together the script for the 1960 original and would later update it
for the Van Sant remake) tried “[t]o engineer Norman’s final cure” in this film by
letting him “[face] everything that Hitchcock’s Norman (and his director) could
not.” Psycho IV deals with Norman’s past, his mother, and the matricide that has
determined his entire life.
The film begins with 58-year-old Norman who has been released from the
mental institution, and lives in a beautiful house with his loving wife. One night,
he calls into a radio talk show on the topic “Boys Who Kill Their Mothers” and
speaks about his past as well as his current crisis: He has just learned that his wife
is pregnant and plans to murder her in order “to protect the world from this aging
bad seed known as Norman Bates.” The film alternates between flashbacks and the
present situation, between the construction of his deterministic cage and his final
(and ultimately successful) attempt to escape from it. In the face of his impending
death from AIDS, actor Anthony Perkins wanted this sequel to offer an upbeat
conclusion to “his” Norman-Bates-story. When the sound of a crying baby can
be heard at the very end of the film, after the screen has cut to black, Psycho IV
opens the door for further sequels that no longer revolve around Norman but his
son. The film similarly introduces new actors portraying a beautiful Mrs. Bates
(Olivia Hussey) and a young version of Norman (Henry Thomas) thus offering a
distinct perspective and arguably paving the way for the prequel series Bates Motel.
Although there are no direct references to the earlier sequels, Psycho IV still
works within the Psycho storyworld. The failed TV pilot Bates Motel and Gus
Van Sant’s Psycho, in contrast, are the odd ones out in a franchise that essentially
thrives on the audiences’ ongoing fascination with Anthony Perkins’ Norman

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Bates. Whenever Perkins was asked about the reasons for this fascination, he
responded: “They want to know him, understand why they feel sympathetic toward
him” (“Production Notes” 4). While each of the sequels continues his story, and
reveals some new information about Norman, adding more and more layers to
his characterization, the TV pilot and Van Sant’s remake are the two entries in the
franchise that stand out because they do not.11
Norman Bates dies of old age at the beginning of the TV pilot from 1987, and
leaves his motel to Alex, a young man he has befriended in the mental institution.
Alex is played by Bud Cort, an actor who is well known from the black comedy
Harold and Maude (Hal Ashby, 1971). Norman, whom viewers hardly get to see,
is not played by Anthony Perkins, but his close friend and stunt double Kurt Paul
(Kelleter, “Das Remake”). Shortly after Norman’s death, Alex is released, and
(taking Norman’s ashes with him) sallies out to reopen the motel and live in his
friend’s old mansion. One part of the story that ensues is about Mother’s ghost
haunting the property and is resolved by the end of the film. (As it turns out, a
greedy real estate agent dressed up as Mother hoping to scare Alex into selling
him the valuable land.) The other part concerns a suicidal motel guest and her
life-saving encounter with a group of time-traveling ghosts, and sets the tone for
a “guest-of-the week” series à la Fantasy Island (ABC, 1977-1984), if the Bates
Motel spin-off series would have been picked up (cf. Cruz).
Gus Van Sant’s remake plays a strange role within the storyworld of Psycho and
the horror genre as such. It acts as if the sequels, which had ultimately established
Anthony Perkins’ Norman Bates as a serial character, did not exist, as if the slasher
genre that took Hitchcock’s Psycho as its model had not peaked, declined and
recently been resurrected with films like Wes Craven’s Scream (1996) that added
self-referential humor to the mix (Kelleter, “Das Remake”).12 Regardless of the film
critical and academic reactions to Van Sant’s Psycho, the remake is very instructive
as to what could and could not be done with the Norman-Bates-story – especially
after Perkins’ death in 1992. To some extent, Van Sant’s Psycho has also become a
precedent for how to deal with pop-cultural classics, maybe even paving the way
for the current prequel trend in cinema and television.
As a mode of filmmaking the prequel has, of course, a longer history: The
Western Butch and Sundance: The Early Days (Richard Lester, 1979) is thought
to have given rise to the term (Grimes 15). It followed ten years after the success
of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (George Roy Hill, 1969) but was set
before the events of that film. After the financially successful release of George
Lucas’ new Star Wars trilogy (1999-2005), the prequel has eventually become a
major production trend in Hollywood with such tentpole movies as Star Trek (J. J.
Abrams, 2009), The Thing (Matthijs van Heijningen Jr., 2011), Rise of the Planet of
the Apes (Rupert Wyatt, 2011), Prometheus (Ridley Scott, 2012), and Oz the Great
and Powerful (Sam Raimi, 2013), as well as horror fare and various X-Men films

11 This is also why some fans and critics do not consider them to be part of the “Psycho canon”
(cf. Kelleter, “Das Remake”). Both films are excluded from the documentary The Psycho
Legacy and from DVD collections that comprise Psycho and its sequels.
12 Along these lines, Kelleter even reads the remake as Van Sant's attempt to write an alternate
film history in which the 1998 Psycho exists as an original that is completely detached from
any prior version of the Norman-Bates-story (“Das Remake”).

89
that explore the past of their protagonists. Most recently, television has picked up
on the trend and developed prequel series based on well-known properties, among
them The Carrie Diaries (The CW, 2012-2014), Hannibal (NBC, 2013-), Gotham
(Fox, 2014-), Better Call Saul (AMC, 2015-), and: Bates Motel.
The prequel circumvents the film remake or sequel and detaches characters from
familiar plots. Thus, it offers new creative possibilities to explore characters and
storyworlds within the constraints of the already-established narrative framework.
That the ending of the prequel is determined from the very beginning, poses a
formidable narrative challenge. Yet the prequel also promises a broad range of
rewards and pleasures for viewers who actively engage with its formal structures,
creative techniques, references and complex constellations of meaning within the
larger storyworld.
The Prequel Series: (Re)Inventing Characters, Expanding Storyworlds
The first episode of A&E’s television series Bates Motel presents Norma Bates
and her son Norman as two characters who want to escape their past and start a
new life in a small town in Oregon. As mother and son arrive at the house and
motel they have bought in a foreclosure with the insurance money Norma received
after the “accidental” death of her husband, Norman reacts to his mom’s desire to
begin a new life by saying: “Maybe some people don’t get to start over. Maybe
they just bring themselves to a new place” (Fig. 2). Within the diegetic world of
the series, Norman’s response is, of course, a foreboding of what is to come: They
will not be able to escape from whatever happened in their past, and they can most
certainly not escape from their future. Viewers already know about the characters’
fates because this is a prequel supposedly leading up to Norman’s matricide and,
ultimately, the events taking place in Psycho. Norman’s response can also be read
as a self-referential comment on the series’ indebtedness to Hitchcock’s film: Bates
Motel cannot entirely escape from Psycho (or its other predecessors).
Although it is set in the present, the series indulges in retro design and codes
Norma and Norman as eerily removed from their contemporary surroundings. This
“postmodern temporal pastiche” (Scahill) establishes an interesting connection to
Hitchcock’s film, but also to the sequels and, in particular, to Van Sant’s remake,
which is similarly set in the present, yet somehow exists “in an historical limbo, a
product of both the ‘60s and the ‘90s, and therefore, really, of neither,” as Thomas
Leitch has put it (251).13 The series’ link to its predecessors is further enhanced by
iconic spaces like the Psycho mansion and motel, or the shower, and objects such
as the shiny, triangular butcher knife. Yet, as Vulture’s Matt Zoller Seitz points out,
“the visual style is Modern Cable Drama, with a desaturated color scheme and lots
of handheld shots, and the overall feeling is more Twin Peaks [ABC, 1990-1991]
than Psycho.” Despite its reliance on the original, the television show attempts to
create its own aesthetic in order to find its own place within the Psycho storyworld.
All things considered, though, each film of the franchise tries to both pay homage
to and distance itself from Hitchcock’s Psycho. This is probably most visible in the
ways in which the house and motel as narrative locations are being inhabited and
indeed remade by the character(s): After his return from the mental institution in

13 Leitch provides a detailed discussion of Van Sant’s attempt to be true to Hitchcock’s original but
also update it to the 1990s and the resulting “logistical problems” and “glaring anachronism[s]”
(251).

90
Figure 2: Norma and Norman Bates want to make the house and motel their new home in
the prequel series Bates Motel.

Psycho II, Norman paints the motel and in doing so not only underlines that he wants
to start a new life but also that this is a color film, unlike Hitchcock’s black-and-white
Psycho. Later he is trapped in the attic of the old house while more murders are
taking place – again, a powerful image that serves as much more than a mere plot
device: Norman feels trapped by the house, and by the past it represents. At the end
of Psycho IV, Norman sets fire to the mansion to “get rid of the past, for good,”
and to finally feel free. In the TV pilot, Alex undertakes extensive renovations,
and adds a fountain and restaurant. Contractors dig up various corpses during their
work, which propels the story forward. Gus Van Sant chooses a different strategy
altogether: He replaces the iconic buildings – which continue to be prominent
features on the Universal Studio Tour – with a new mansion and a new motel, even
putting up a big, self-referential sign that advertises the “air conditioned, newly
renovated, clean rooms with color TV.”
In Bates Motel, these small but meaningful touches are taken to a whole different
level as a central plot line of the first season revolves around how Norma and
Norman are making the house and motel their new home. It sets the tone for the
entire series and starts a chain of events that will determine their life in White Pine
Bay. A couple of days after Norma and Norman have moved in, Keith Summers (W.
Earl Brown), the former owner of the motel, stands at the doorstep and threatens
them. Norma tells him to get off the property he no longer owns, but he returns
one night, breaks into the house, overpowers Norma and brutally rapes her. When
Norman comes back home and registers what is happening, he knocks Keith over
the head and runs up the stairs to get a first aid kid – only to find his mother stabbing
Keith with the butcher’s knife as he comes back down. Afterwards, they try to cover
up the murder thereby setting different sub-plots in motion.
During this early sequence, the familiar image of the murderous, knife-wielding
mother is projected from Norman onto the Norma Bates of the series. In fact, the
sequence confirms suspicions that Norma might also have killed Norman’s father in
order to rid herself of an abusive husband and receive his life insurance money. Yet,

91
the first season goes on to reveal that Norman has already killed people (including
his father) even though he is yet to become the cross-dressing murderer viewers
know from Psycho. Here, Norman wants to protect his mother from abusive men,
and she wants to protect her son from himself. Their relationship is at the center of
Bates Motel. It is twisted and too close but it does not yet play up the incestuous
undertones that can be found in Hitchcock’s Psycho and the sequels, especially
Psycho IV (cf. Seitz). As Seitz has observed: “There’s something deep and scary
about Norman and Norma’s relationship, but only when you stand outside of it; when
you’re inside with them, it seems quite comfortable. Norma is as attractive-repulsive
an antihero as Breaking Bad’s Walter White.” As the series unfolds, this clever
(re)invention of Norma and Norman Bates manipulates the understanding of the
“known” characters and events.
Bates Motel further offers particular rewards for active viewers. Following Neil
Harris’s work on P.T. Barnum, Jason Mittell has called the viewers’ pleasurable
mode of engagement with the narrative mechanics of complex television series
“operational aesthetic” (“Narrative Complexity”). In the case of Bates Motel, this
operational aesthetic is on display whenever viewers realize that they already
know Norman’s story and stop to marvel about how the series will eventually get
there. In this sense, Bates Motel encourages viewers to take an almost “forensic”
interest in references and clues that join the “puzzle pieces” of the prequel with the
larger Psycho storyworld.14 Norman’s introduction to taxidermy is such a clue, or
his blackouts and the fact that he hallucinates conversations with his mother, but
also every interaction between mother and son as it might potentially shed light on
what has gone wrong.
The serial dynamics that come with the television series format – especially the
narratively complex contemporary American television series – requires this kind of
intricate character development. It also demands ongoing plotting which is why the
Norma and Norman Bates’ storyworld has been significantly expanded in Bates Motel
to include new characters and edgy plotlines that revolve around the dark secrets in
the small town of White Pine Bay: corruption, rape, murder, an Asian sex slave ring,
a drug cartel. All of these storylines influence the characterizations of Norma and
Norman because they provide an alternative context for understanding their situation
and motivations. In this world of crime and violence, they almost emerge as “largely
innocent victims” (Scahill) who can rely on no one but themselves.
Conclusion
As Norma takes matters into her own hands, she deals with “unfinished business”
from the earlier Psycho films. She is a tormented character, who uses flirtation or sex
to manipulate local men who might otherwise cause problems for her, who makes
her son an accessory to crimes and weighs him with her own traumas and horrible
feelings of guilt for behaving like a normal teenager (Seitz). Yet, in contrast to
earlier renditions, she is no longer a stuffed corpse or merely the result of Norman’s
imagination. Norma is very troubled but she is also very much alive and viewers can
get to know – and maybe even like – her as the series progresses. As for Norman:
In his case, the series builds on what Kutner has identified as “Norman’s potential
for growth, the sense we all felt that under the right circumstances he could be

14 On the forensic mode of viewer engagement, see Mittell, “Lost.”

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‘normal’ (whatever that means), [which] became the explicit subject of the three
Psycho sequels.” It is in this sense that the series can – paradoxically – still make
audiences root for Norman, even though they are aware of the prequel format and its
promise to stay within the constraints of the already-established narrative framework.
The result is a curious dynamic between the “beforeness” of the prequel and its
“afterwardsness,” because as Bates Motel is coming to terms with the “unfinished
business” of “Mother” in the earlier films and of Norman’s “becoming” a serial
killer, it sets out to retrospectively transform the meaning of the Norman-Bates-story
in significant ways and thereby proves the instability of the narrative over time.
Frank Kelleter has remarked that “[r]emakes and series often work this way: their
narrative accomplishments are oriented backwards as much as forwards; they
provide continuity by changing their own past” (“Toto” 26). The format of the
prequel series further complicates the temporal order of cause and effect laid out
by earlier entries of the franchise but it still strives for overall continuity. In the
end, then, it is just as Norman says in Psycho III: “The past is never really past.”

Kathleen Loock Berlin

Works Cited
Braudy, Leo. “Afterword: Rethinking Remakes.” Play It Again, Sam: Retakes on
Remakes. Ed. Andrew Horton and Stuart Y. McDougal. Berkeley: U of California
P, 1998. 327-34.
Canby, Vincent. “Film: Sequel to ‘Psycho.’” New York Times 3 June 1983: C14.
Cart. “Psycho III.” Variety 2 July 1986.
Chabon, Michael. “Fan Fictions: On Sherlock Holmes.” Maps and Legends: Reading
and Writing along the Borderlands. San Francisco: McSweeney’s, 2008. 35-57.
Cruz, Gilbert. “We All Go a Little Mad Sometimes: On Norman Bates and Psycho’s
Four Sequels.” Vulture 25 Mar. 2013. Web. 3 Oct. 2014. <http://www.vulture.
com/2013/03/thoughts-on-norman-bates-and-psychos-4-sequels.html>.
Ebert, Roger. “Psycho III.” RogerEbert.com. Ebert Digital LLC, 2 July 1986. Web.
3 Oct. 2014. <http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/psycho-iii-1986>.
Ellis, John. Visible Fictions: Cinema, Television, Video. London: Routledge, 1982.
Forrest, Jennifer, and Leonard R. Koos, eds. Dead Ringers: The Remake in Theory
and Practice. Albany, NY: SUNY P, 2002.
Grimes, William. “Home Alone 2: Sequel Success? Or Pow! Splat!” New York
Times 16 Nov. 1992: 15, 20.
Hoberman, Jim. “Ten Years that Shook the World.” American Film 10 (1985): 34-59.
Horton, Andrew, and Stuart Y. McDougal, eds. Play It Again, Sam: Retakes on
Remakes. Berkeley: U of California P, 1998.
Kelleter, Frank. “Das Remake als Fetischkunst: Gus Van Sant’s Psycho und die
absonderlichen Serialitäten des Hollywood-Kinos.” Pop: Kultur und Kritik
(2015, forthcoming).
---. Serial Agencies: The Wire and Its Readers. Winchester: Zero Books, 2014.

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---. “‘Toto, I Think We’re in Oz Again’ (and Again and Again): Remakes and
Popular Seriality.” Film Remakes, Adaptations and Fan Productions: Remake
| Remodel. Ed. Kathleen Loock and Constantine Verevis. Basingstoke: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2012. 19-44.
---, and Kathleen Loock. “Hollywood Remaking as Second-Order Serialization.”
Media of Serial Narrative. Ed. Kelleter. Columbus, OH: Ohio State UP, 2016
(forthcoming).
Kolker, Robert. “The Man Who Knew More Than Too Much.” Alfred Hitchcock’s
Psycho: A Casebook. Ed. Kolker. Oxford/New York: Oxford UP, 2004. 205-55.
Kutner, Jerry C. “Who Owns Norman Bates? On Psycho IV, III, II, I and More.”
Bright Lights Film Journal 54 (Nov. 2006). Web. 16 Oct. 2014. <http://bright-
lightsfilm.com/54/psychoiv.php#.UnPXtCfwpqM>.
Leitch, Thomas. “Hitchcock without Hitchcock.” Literature Film Quarterly 31.4
(2003): 248-59.
Loock, Kathleen. “Zwischen Jawsmania und Sequelitis: Die Fortsetzungen von
Jaws.” Der weiße Hai revisited: Steven Spielbergs Jaws und die Geburt eines
amerikanischen Albtraums. Ed. Wieland Schwanebeck. Berlin: Bertz+Fischer,
2015. 231-44.
---, and Constantine Verevis, eds. Film Remakes, Adaptations, and Fan Productions:
Remake | Remodel. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.
Mayer, Ruth. Serial Fu Manchu: The Chinese Supervillain and the Spread of Yellow
Peril Ideology. Philadelphia, PA: Temple UP, 2013.
Mazdon, Lucy. Encore Hollywood: Remaking French Cinema. London: BFI, 2000.
Mills, Michael. “‘Psycho’ Is a Tough Act to Follow.” USA Today 3 June 1983: 1D, 2D.
Mittell, Jason. “Lost in a Great Story: Evaluation in Narrative Television (and
Television Studies).” Reading Lost: Perspectives on a Hit Television Show. Ed.
Roberta Pearson. London: Tauris, 2009. 119-38.
---. “Narrative Complexity and Contemporary Narrative Television.” The Velvet
Light Trap 58 (Fall 2006): 29-40.
Oltmann, Katrin. Remake | Premake: Hollywoods romantische Komödien und ihre
Gender-Diskurse, 1930-1960. Bielefeld: transcript, 2008.
“Production Notes.” Psycho III. Universal Studios, 1986. 1-10.
Richard, Julie. “Movie Sequels … More to Come.” Boxoffice (Dec. 1985): 38, 40.
Rothman, William. “Psycho.” Hitchcock: The Murderous Gaze. Cambridge, MA:
Harvard UP, 1982.
Sarris, Andrew. “Norman’s Best Friend Is Still His Mother.” Village Voice 14 June
1983: 45-46.
---. “Notes on the Auteur Theory in 1962.” Film Culture 27 (Winter 1962/63): 1-8.
Scahill, Andrew. “Serialized Killers: Prebooting Horror in Bates Motel and Hanni-
bal.” Multiplicities: Cycles, Sequels, Remakes and Reboots in Film & Television.
Ed. Amanda Ann Klein and R. Barton Palmer. Austin, TX: U of Texas P, 2016
(forthcoming).

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Seitz, Matt Zoller. “Seitz on Bates Motel: I Dismember Mama.” Vulture 18 Mar.
2013. Web. 6 Oct. 2014. <http://www.vulture.com/2013/03/tv-review-bates-
motel.html>.
Smith, Joseph W. The Psycho File: A Comprehensive Guide to Hitchcock’s Classic
Shocker. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2009.
Sterritt, David. “Half-Baked Hitchcock.” Christian Science Monitor 23 June 1983: 17.
Sublett, Scott. “Comedy Lifts ‘Psycho II’ a Cut Above other Slashers.” Washington
Times 6 June 1983: 10B.
Sutton, Paul. “Afterwardsness in Film.” Journal for Cultural Research 8.3 (2004):
385-405.
---. “Prequel: The Afterwardsness of the Sequel.” Second Takes: Critical Approaches
to the Film Sequel. Ed. Carolyn Jess-Cooke and Constantine Verevis. Albany,
NY: SUNY P, 2010.
Verevis, Constantine. Film Remakes. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 2006.
---. “For Ever Hitchcock: Psycho and Its Remakes.” After Hitchcock: Influence,
Imitation, and Intertextuality. Ed. David Boyd and R. Barton Palmer. Austin,
TX: U of Texas P, 2006. 15-29.

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 “I know where I’ve seen you before!”:
Hollywood Remakes of British Films,
from DVD Box Sets to the Online Debate

Introduction
Remaking is as old as the Hollywood film industry itself. The proliferation of such
activities usually occurred at crucial times for the development of cinema. For
example, writing about Hollywood remaking its own works in the 1950s, Druxman
notices: “Possibly the best reason for redoing classic films is to adapt these
vintage stories to new screen techniques [...]. The coming of sound, for instance,
inspired the studios to film their more popular pictures again [...]. The advent of
color and, later, the wide screen, prompted additional remakes of properties that
would be enhanced by these new processes” (15-18). In a similar fashion, with
the development of digital technology in the 1990s came the desire to update old
titles by means of special effects, particularly when one takes action, horror, and
science fiction movies into consideration. It should come as no surprise, then,
that in 1998 Leo Braudy should declare that “[o]ur time is particularly heavy
in remakes” (332). His words ring true when one considers the unprecedented
proliferation of Hollywood remakes of classic and cult British films which began
in 1995 and by 2005 had resulted in a total of eight makeovers: Village of the
Damned (1995), The Jackal (1997), Get Carter (2000), Bedazzled (2000), The
Italian Job (2003), Alfie (2004), The Ladykillers (2004), and Flightplan (2005).
However, the reasons behind the recent proliferation of these remakes are not just
related to computer-generated imagery (CGI). Digital technology of the 1990s
has had an equal if not greater impact on the distribution and reception channels,
which contributed to the remakes’ visibility and an increase in the awareness of
their existence as well as that of their cinematic predecessors.
All of the remakes discussed in this essay were released during an important
transitional phase marked by two main events. The first was the arrival of DVDs
in the late 1990s, which, as Barbara Klinger observes, inspired “cinema’s con-
temporary cultural omnipresence” (58). DVD culture has not only encouraged
film collecting, but also helped revive forgotten cult and classic films of the past.
Above all, as Chuck Tryon notices, DVDs with their inherent time-shifting,
fragmentation, and bonus materials such as deleted scenes or alternative endings,
have turned “films into objects that can be manipulated at will, not only by
consumers but also by producers. [...] In this sense, digital media, and DVDs in
particular, work against the notion that media objects can ever be truly finished”
(151). DVDs have thus opened up the way for remakes to be perceived as yet
another version of an old story. By allowing “viewers to recognize that texts were
ready to be ripped apart and reassembled in playful new ways” (151), DVD culture
has fostered a remix sensibility that informs not only the fan activities that Tryon
refers to but is also a founding block of contemporary film industry practice.
The second major event was the launch of Web 2.0 in the late 1990s which has
since connected once isolated film consumers and given them a forum in which to
voice their opinions, exchange knowledge, and share their expertise. The internet

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has offered movie geeks of the VHS era and the later DVD generation a perfect
outlet and provided them with a meeting place and companionship. Unlike in the
past, today’s viewers are no longer seen as a homogeneous and passive group.1
Users’ interactive participation and “the ability of networked movie audiences
to shape the reception of a movie” (Tryon 2) need to be acknowledged together
with Henry Jenkins’ important distinction between the old consumers as isolated,
silent and invisible individuals and the new consumers who are more socially
connected, noisy, and visible (19). In fact, all these recent developments have
led Richard Grusin to propose that “by looking at the relation between cinema
and new media, we can see that we already find ourselves in a digital cinema of
interactions” with “an interactive spectator in a domestic or other social space
rather than an immobilized spectator in the darkened dream-space” (73, 75). As
Constantine Verevis aptly points out, remaking is not just an inherent quality of
the texts themselves but the result of “broader discursive activity” (106). Thus,
without interactive spectators whose knowledge, memory, and expertise shape
film reception, in some cases it would not even be possible to discuss remakes
as remakes at all. This is because the growing interest and awareness of popular
seriality and the possibility of discussing remakes in terms of hybridity – a melting
pot and meeting point between two or more works – are facilitated thanks to the
collective intelligence of the networked movie audience.
Hollywood remakes of British films were only a sporadic affair in the years
prior to the digital revolution. Their unusual proliferation from 1995 to 2005 can
be explained as the outcome of the technological developments which have had
a major impact on promoting a more reflexive way of film appreciation. DVD
culture has inspired people to revisit classic films as well as created interest in
their new makeovers.2 A growing awareness of film history, film collectability,
and virtually unlimited access to online film archives together with the popularity
of websites such as the Internet Movie Database (IMDb) have all created an
opportunity for interactive viewing with the audience being able to find, compare,
and discuss different versions of the same story at a click of a mouse.3
Another important aspect that needs mentioning and that differentiates this group
of remakes is that both versions are in English. This creates ample opportunity for
the works to connect with, circulate, and interact with each other. As a result, the
remake often welcomes comparison rather than hiding its roots. It acknowledges its
predecessor not only on a textual level but especially in increasingly more extensive
industry-sanctioned paratextual materials. As Catherine Grant observes, “the most
important act that films and their surrounding discourses need to perform in order to
communicate unequivocally their status as adaptations is to (make their audiences)
recall the adapted work, or the cultural memory of it. There is no such thing in

1 See Klinger 139-40; Tryon 32-37, 79-82; Gray 144-47; and Jenkins.
2 Note that Hollywood remakes of British classic and cult films from the 1970s continued past
2005 with The Wicker Man (2006) and Sleuth (2007).
3 IMDb was launched in 1990 and is a free online source of information on films, actors, pro-
duction details, box office results, official reviews, and other film-related paraphernalia. It is
one of the most visited websites in the world allowing users to post film reviews, participate
in discussions and rank films by giving them 1 to 10 stars.

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discourse as a ‘secret’ adaptation” (57).4 The nature of the exchange between British
films and their American updates is thus of a different kind, pointing to a symbiotic
rather than parasitical relationship. It can no longer be discussed in terms of the
remake obliterating the little known original also on another account. The majority
of the updated British titles are classic and cult films treated with reverence by the
British public. As the close scrutiny of IMDb forums devoted to each title reveals,
they are also often familiar to the American and global viewer.56

British Theatrical U.S. DVD Hollywood Theatrical U.S. DVD

originals release release remakes release release
Village of the Village of the
1960 20045 1995 1998
Damned Damned
The Day of the 1973 1998 The Jackal 1997 2001
Jackal
Get Carter 1971 2000 Get Carter 2000 2001
Bedazzled 1967 2007 Bedazzled 2000 2001
The Italian Job 1969 2003 The Italian Job 2003 2003
Alfie 1966 2001 Alfie 2004 2005
The Ladykillers 1955 2004 The Ladykillers 2004 2004
The Lady Flightplan 2005 2006
1938 19986
Vanishes
Table 1: British films and their Hollywood remakes according to the date of
theatrical and DVD release in the United States.

For the remake to be acknowledged, it has to rely on the audiences’ memory and/
or awareness of the existence of prior works. This essay attempts to discover
to what extent recalling has become a regular feature of paratextual materials.
DVD supplements of eight Hollywood remakes of British films (Tab. 1) will
shed light on the extent to which the former game of hide-and-seek has been
gradually replaced by an elaborate original-remake coverage which accounts
for the seriality that lies at the heart of the pleasure of interactive viewing.7 The
selected case studies challenge Druxman’s proclamation from 1974 that “[t]he
biggest ‘cross’ that the producer of a remake must bear is his audience’s memory”
(24) to embrace a new dictum offered by Linda Hutcheon in 2006 that sees
repetition with variation, recognition, remembrance and change as formative to
the enjoyment of serial narratives such as remakes (4). Or, as Christine Geraghty
puts it: “In their emphasis on repetition and difference, adaptations [and remakes]
are not unique; cinema and television continually present what is familiar (generic

4 Linda Hutcheon defines adaptation as: “An acknowledged transposition of a recognizable

other work or works, [a] creative and an interpretive act of appropriation/salvaging, [a]n
extended intertextual engagement with the adapted work” (8). Her broad definition includes
remakes whose complex operations and intricate relation to the earlier works involve all of the
characteristics mentioned above. Remakes work in a similar way to adaptations also in terms
of producing the same kind of pleasure which this essay addresses.
5 Released as a double bill with its sequel Children of the Damned (1964).
6 Criterion released it again in 2006 and re-released a new DVD edition in 2007.
7 For a discussion of remake releases in DVD box sets, see Kelleter and Loock.

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iconography, stars, character, stories, formats) in new contexts. Adaptations [and
remakes] are, though, distinctive in the way they make this process an overt part
of the pleasure of viewing” (5).
Village of the Damned (1960/1995)
Village of the Damned is based on John Wyndham’s 1957 novel The Midwich
Cuckoos. Its story about an English village where all women of reproductive
age give birth to identical-looking children with telepathic powers must have
appealed to the horror guru John Carpenter, who saw in it potential for revision.
Even though Carpenter’s 1995 remake of Wolf Rilla’s 1960 horror classic was made
before the advent of DVD and Web 2.0, its DVD release in 1998 coincided with
the transitory phase described above. The late 1990s were still the start-up phase
of Web 2.0. For example, the user reviews feature on IMDb was only added in
1998. The first ever user comments on both the remake and original version of
Village of the Damned were posted in 1999. Although the bonus materials on the
remake DVD are still limited in their original-remake debate, they point to the
direction in which most later releases would go.
The 1998 DVD cover design is meant to echo that of Rilla’s original version
which had been available on VHS since 1995, thus the year the remake came out
in the theatres. This shows that Universal Pictures was happy to promote both titles
at the same time and to foster a link between them. The DVD bonus materials are,
however, still rather modest, offering production notes that are approximately one
and a half pages long. The existence of the original is never dismissed but cleverly
employed to sanction the need for the new version by, for example, mentioning
that Wolf Rilla flew in from Europe to visit Carpenter’s set and found the project
exhilarating. Quoting Carpenter in its opening paragraph, the notes reveal a typical
tension-ridden discourse which characterizes remakes: that of appreciation for
the original film mixed with the desire to improve on it. Thus, according to the
production notes, Carpenter saw the project as “an opportunity to remake a kind
of classic science fiction thriller.” The director then adds,
The novel had a lot of rich textures that I felt weren’t in the original film, and I wanted
to recapture them, bring them out a bit more. I retained the feeling of the original novel,
but hopefully brought it into the ‘90s.

The notes point to the outdatedness of the first film (Communism, chauvinism)
which the update seems to amend by giving it a feminist spin. The overall im-
pression is that Carpenter takes up the story where Rilla left off and – thanks to
technological and social developments – is allowed to improve on the first film
and also do justice to John Wyndham’s novel. Such comments position Carpenter’s
film in a triadic relationship with both earlier texts. Moreover, to emphasize a
sense of continuity, one is reminded of the American director’s status as a horror
genre auteur and encouraged to perceive his Village of the Damned not only in
conjunction with its two sources but also in terms of Carpenter’s earlier works,
such as The Fog, which was shot at the exact same location. Village of the Damned
is thus presented as offering numerous points of entry into the text in the way it
reworks, continues, and elaborates on not only the original story but the horror
genre as well.

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 The Day of the Jackal (1973)/The Jackal (1997),
Get Carter (1971/2000), Bedazzled (1967/2000)
The next three remakes were all released on DVD more or less at the same time and
are thus worth examining together. We can observe three strategies at play here: one
that balances uneasily between having to ignore and wanting to acknowledge its
source (The Jackal), one that promotes seeing both films together (Get Carter), and
one that starts off by breaching the link between the two films for fear of unfavorable
comparisons and ends up finally endorsing it (Bedazzled).
The Day of the Jackal, based on a successful 1971 novel by English author
Frederick Forsyth, is a cat and mouse thriller about a joint attempt by the French
and British governments to prevent the killing of the President of France, Charles
de Gaulle, by a professional assassin called the Jackal. The remake from 1997 was
given a slightly different title as a result of a dispute between Universal Pictures
and the original’s director Fred Zinnemann. He objected to the studio’s cashing in
on the well-known title because the original film was still being broadcast all over
the world and was a popular rental video, claiming that “[i]t’s totally wrong to take
a title away from a picture that’s still alive.” The novel’s writer also joined in the
argument and wished to distance himself from the new project on account that it was
not really a remake: “These plotting elements have absolutely nothing to do with the
original story, while the tradition of remakes is that at least the basic elements should
be retained” (qtd. in Gritten). This situation is poignantly reflected in the 2001 DVD
release of the remake. Its “making of” documentary tries to achieve the impossible:
a compromise between paying homage to the earlier work and distancing itself from
it completely. Thus, on the one hand, Bruce Willis (who plays Jackal) remarks: “It
is a good story. It’s a very-well written story. It’s a great book. It was a good movie
the first time and it’s a very good script.” And, on the other hand, Richard Gere
(who plays his nemesis) claims that all the characters are new inventions that have
nothing to do with the original movie or the book. The same strategy of recall and
disavowal is at work in the director’s audio commentary. Michael Caton-Jones refers
to the original only at one point with a surprising dismissive comment: “I never saw
the original film. I was always told that the scene with the pumpkin was the scene
that stood out in everyone’s memory. So even though this scene was not written to
have a pumpkin I thought we should just stick a pumpkin in one way or another.”
He seems to want to appeal to the ones in the know with this inside joke, while at
the same time alienating fans of the original with this less than reverential attitude.
The Jackal DVD bonus materials prove that, as we enter the second phase of the
digital era around the year 2000, the paratexts seem more responsive to the growing
demand of the media-literate and digitally-savvy audience by providing them with
some updating commentary. It is likely that the DVD would have contained more
information if Universal Pictures had not had to both recall and distance itself from
the original.
Get Carter from 1971 is a crime film about a London gangster, Jack Carter
(Michael Caine), who returns to his hometown, Newcastle, for his brother’s funeral
suspecting foul play. This story of revenge was remade in 2000 but, interestingly, it
never opened in UK cinemas. As the author of British Film Guides series devoted to
the original, Steve Chibnall, explains: “It [2000 Get Carter] was so poorly received
in the USA that Warner Bros. chose not to release the film for theatrical exhibition

101
in Britain, where among the ranks of reviewers, fans of the original were eagerly
sharpening their knives in anticipation” (110). Thus, its DVD was the only available
point of reference for UK viewers who had to wait two years for a Region 2 version.
Chibnall comments further:
UK consumers who had gone to the expense of importing the American DVD were likely
to echo one of Michael Caine’s last lines in the film: “What a mess, eh? All over a shiny
piece of plastic.” More than eighteen months after its première, the film went straight to
video/DVD rental in Carter’s homeland. (110)

However, despite 2000 Get Carter’s critical and financial failure, it apparently did
help the revival process of the original that had already been stirring in the UK but
had not yet reached American shores. Chibnall writes:
In October 2000, with the remake in American cinemas, and Hodges’ sleeper movie,
Croupier (1999) doing good business on the art-house circuit, Warner Bros. released
a digitally remastered Get Carter for the first time on DVD and in widescreen video.
The movie was accompanied by its American trailer, footage of Roy Budd playing the
theme tune, and Caine’s filmed introduction for the Newcastle première, with additional
commentary by Hodges, Caine and Suschitzky. Warner’s marketeers pulled out all the
stops, offering a limited-edition run in ‘luxury film cases’ with a copy of the screenplay
and four collectors’ images, and ballyhooing the release with full-page advertising in the
film monthlies and point-of-sale displays in retail outlets. MGM’s previous releases of
Get Carter on video had conformed to the standard practice, for films of this vintage,
of presenting it as part of a series, but Warner Bros. decided to promote the film as if it
were new product. Rejecting the multiplicity of images with which the film had been
promoted in the past, the new release used the BFI poster to establish a single icon for
Get Carter: the National Heroes publicity photograph of Caine levelling a pump-action
shotgun – presumably a more familiar gangster’s weapon to American audiences than
the long-barrelled gun actually used on screen. (110-2)

Thanks to its monochrome color and Caine’s posture, the new cover produced a pow-
erful resemblance to the remake’s black and white promotional materials featuring
Stallone’s Carter in a suit, holding a gun (Fig. 1). If Warner advertised the original

Figure 1: Get Carter (1971/2000) DVD covers.

DVD as new product, it did so through the associations with its remake. 1971 Get
Carter had already experienced its own revival in Britain in the 1990s, becoming a
cult film for the lad generation as well as being embraced by the film establishment.

102
It is not surprising therefore that the director, Stephen Kay, would comment: “We’re
going to get crushed in London. It’s tantamount to a British film-maker remaking
Mean Streets” (qtd. in Chibnall 110). Well aware of the original’s new found status,
Kay opens his remake DVD commentary by admitting how daunted he was by the
prospect of remaking a film he really admired. It appears that his only solace came
through Michael Caine’s involvement with the new version. Through the ironic
casting choice of Caine playing Brumby – a man he kills as Jack Carter in the
original – his presence establishes a serial relationship between the two works and
encourages intertextual readings. Kay quotes the actor’s remark to him on the set,
“I think Sly makes a great Carter,” in an effort to validate the update with Caine’s
own name and to acknowledge Sylvester Stallone as the Brit’s worthy successor.
Such insider comments on the DVD are not only meant to justify and sanction the
remake, but also to create a sense of continuity, a rite of passage and a dialogue
between the two texts without ever attempting to erase or diminish the original work.
Caine’s presence in the remake could also be read in another way, as suggested by
Elvis Mitchell of the New York Times: “Mr. Caine appears here in a role that will
increase regard for the original. Maybe that was his intention.”
The newly designed DVD reissue of the original Get Carter took it to number
three in the DVD sales charts (Chibnall 112). Also, between October 2000 and April
2002 the number of people registering their vote on IMDb for the original increased
by 300 per cent, which, as Chibnall notices, is “astonishing for a thirty-year-old
film, and a revealing measure of Carter’s new stature” (103). This proves how the
British classic has actually benefited through its association with the remake, often
finding new audiences not only in the UK but also across the Atlantic. Judging
by IMDb user comments, many have been prompted to seek the original having
first been introduced to its update. With the two films in circulation and with the
networked movie audience able to post their reviews and shape reception, it should
not be surprising that, since April 2002, there has been a steady flow of traffic and
an increase of votes on the original on the IMDb site, from the initially small figure
of 1,362 to 18,926 as of November 2014.
Discussing the original’s second life, Chibnall sums up: “Finally, Get Carter
displays a prime criterion of success in the postmodern film marketplace: the ability
to offer multiple points of access to diverse audiences” (125). What, according to
Chibnall, might afford numerous pleasures of repetitive viewing: “a love of 1970s
style,” “an affection for the north east,” or “the sexual appeal of the domineering
male” (125) should also include 2000 Get Carter as yet another reference point.
The remake has helped solidify and revive the awareness of its predecessor in the
United States alone “where the film has been largely unavailable since its original
patchy release” (118). In fact, its revival in the United States has been so noteworthy
that the less successful American version and its DVD have been transformed into
the original’s promotional paratexts. In this case, the success of the new release
shows how “DVD audiences can revisit and embrace cult films or other movies that
have typically been marginalized within standard reception cultures” (Tryon 21).
So far it appears that by the year 2000, DVD extra features establish a link
between two versions, occasionally devoting space to original-remake background
information in an effort to appeal to numerous audiences. By creating a sense of
continuity across two works, such products become promotional materials for both
films while simultaneously opening them up to new interpretations and encouraging

103
self-reflexive and interactive viewing. This is why a huge gap of time between the
DVD release of 2000 Bedazzled and its 1967 British version comes as a surprise.
The original Bedazzled is a swinging sixties take on the Faustian myth written and
performed by British comedy duo Peter Cook and Dudley Moore. Faust becomes a
fast-food chef, Stanley Moon (Moore), who signs over his soul to the Devil (Cook)
in exchange for seven wishes to help him win over the woman he loves. The remake
follows the original’s plot quite closely, but relocates its action to contemporary San
Francisco, where a socially inept computer nerd (Brendan Fraser) strikes a similar
deal with the Devil (Elizabeth Hurley). The remake was released on DVD in 2001 in
both the United States and the UK, but this did not go hand in hand with the revival
of the earlier version, as was the case with Get Carter. The 1967 Bedazzled had a
limited DVD release in 2005 in the UK. In the United States, it was issued in 2007.
Considering that both films were distributed by Twentieth Century Fox, delaying
the release of the original on DVD for so many years suggests that it was conceived
as a direct competitor to the update. Such a marketing strategy upset many fans of
the original work who welcomed the remake, seeing it as an opportunity for the
revival of their favorite British classic. Thus, the sense of continuity and seriality
that characterized the marketing of both versions of Get Carter was breached in this
case, implying a lack of understanding of the needs of the interactive spectator for
whom part of the enjoyment of watching the remake may lie in the discovery of its
predecessor and the possibility of comparing different versions.
The IMDb user comments on the original prove that such a marketing strategy
may not have paid off. Contrary to expectations, even U.S. viewers, whose only
access to the original must have come through faded VCR copies, posted favorable
reviews of the 1967 version prompted by the update’s theatrical release. Often the
original received more positive opinions in comparison to its successor. Looking
at the IMDb forum devoted to the remake from the moment it hit the screens in
2000 to the year 2007, when Fox finally released the DVD of the original, about
30% of the user comments on the site are devoted to the original vs. remake
debate, thus shaping film reception and fostering links and comparisons across
the two titles in spite of the distributor’s efforts to the contrary.
As for the original Bedazzled on DVD, its limited UK release in 2005 was han-
dled by Hollywood Classics Ltd. on behalf of Twentieth Century Fox. The bonus
materials are quite modest. Its cover depicts Peter Cook and Dudley Moore with
the inscription below “The original comedy classic.” None of its supplemental
features, including a short impromptu interview with Cook as the Devil conducted
by Moore on the set or an extensive interview with Barry Humphries, who plays
Envy, about his involvement with the two comedians, mention the remake made
five years earlier. Humphries’ closing remark about Bedazzled’s cult status, “I’d
like to think … well … cult or not … really it’s worth reviving. And that’s about
all I can say on the matter,” could be read as the only veiled comment on the
remake and the deliberate procrastination of the DVD release of the original.
When the DVD finally reached the United States in 2007, its look and bonus
materials were altered for American viewers. Even though its release date coin-
cided with the original’s 40th anniversary, no attempt was made to advertise it as
such. Looking at the cover, one can see the change of emphasis from the British
duo in the 2005 UK release to Raquel Welch (who plays a small part of Lust) in
a bikini, echoing the remake’s cover design with the seductive Elizabeth Hurley.

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Arriving seven years after the remake’s theatrical release, it uses the new version
as a vantage point from which to access the original with the update’s director,
co-writer and co-producer, Harold Ramis, expressing his appreciation for the
old classic and placing it in a larger context of the history of British comedy
in “A Bedazzled Conversation with Harold Ramis.” The director’s status as an
American comedy genius sanctions the original through his involvement with the
update, thus reversing the order of entry into the two films. The impression from
“A Bedazzled Conversation” is of Ramis discovering the little known original for
the unaware American viewer.
When it comes to DVD bonus materials of the U.S. version from 2001, they
do not address seriality at all and rather encourage one to see the remake on its
own terms. The HBO “Making of Bedazzled” featurette is narrated by Elizabeth
Hurley. This casting choice of a Brit with the RP accent could be seen as the only
nod to the original film. The documentary establishes a different kind of continuity,
however, in terms of Harold Ramis’ career, recalling his past works and emphasising
his comedic expertise. Unless viewers switch on audio commentary track with the
producer and director reminiscing watching and loving the 1967 Bedazzled in their
youth, they will not hear of the original at all.
In June 2008, at long last, Fox openly acknowledged the relationship between
the two films by releasing a “Double Take: Original and Remake” box set. This
came seven years after the original DVD release of the remake and a year after the
official Fox release of the original on DVD. Although arriving very late, it shows
that the re-release of remakes in DVD box sets together with their predecessors
endorses interactive viewing, encouraging one to see both films as hybrids that
can be appreciated in conjunction. This process of recall allows viewers to build
up a collection for comparison, which, as Geraghty points out when talking about
DVD releases of film adaptations, “feeds into the emphasis on intertextuality
[...] since there are potentially numerous points of comparison that might be
brought to bear on a new version” (16). Still, this double feature DVD box set is
not available in the UK. A German distributor has recently announced a Blu-ray
triple disc that will cater to the needs of fans of both versions, satisfying their
pleasure of interactive viewing.
The Italian Job (1969/2003), Alfie (1966/2004)
When one examines the DVD releases of the next two Hollywood remakes of
British national treasures, The Italian Job and Alfie, one can observe that by this
time bonus materials had become much more sophisticated in response to the needs
of the networked movie audience, allowing for repeat viewings and collectability.
Both DVDs exhibit a growing interest in remake vs. original debates and have
received generally good reviews for their extra materials on DVD reviewing sites.
As was the case with Get Carter and Village of the Damned, the DVD of 1969
Italian Job was released to coincide with the buzz surrounding its remake, thus
pointing to the distributor’s efforts to promote both titles at the same time by raising
interest in the earlier film while benefiting from its classic status. The British version
is a comedy caper dressed in the cockiness of 1960s London about a bunch of
British gangsters led by Charlie Croker (Michael Caine) trying to steal gold from
under the noses of the Italian Mafia. The U.S. DVD of the original came out at the
same time its remake hit the American screens. In Britain, however, Paramount had

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already released the original in 2002. Even though the disc of the original contains
rich bonus features, they do not make any connections to its remake. The only
exception is a remark made by the original’s script writer, Troy Kennedy-Martin, in
the audio commentary track when he observes that while his film enjoys cult status
in England, “[i]n America it means nothing. They just think of Mark Wahlberg.”
Since then, the 1969 Italian Job has been repeatedly re-issued in special collections
to, for instance, mark its 40th anniversary, as well as in a golden box set with the
remake in 2004, which would contradict Kennedy-Martin’s words and suggest that
the remake may have generated new interest in the original and further stimulated
its revival. This seems supported by numerous user comments placed on IMDb by
viewers who have been attracted to seek the earlier film after watching the remake.
The original’s continued longevity on DVD shows that thanks to its remake it has
gained a new audience interested in comparing the two versions.
The DVD for the remake released in 2003 offers a rich amount of bonus materials
with many references to the earlier work. Throughout, the viewer is presented with
extensive footage from the British original such as the famous “You were only
supposed to blow the bloody doors off” scene, thus clearly trying to appeal to the
tastes of its fans by selecting iconic images and cult one liners. Actors, producers,
and the director, F. Gary Gray, all express their admiration for the British film and
point to the ways in which the new version departs from it. Thus, in “The Making
of The Italian Job: Pedal to the Metal,” Gray says: “I rented the original Italian Job
… and I loved it.” Seth Green, one of the cast, calls the original “a funny and quirky
movie.” In a documentary devoted to the new screenplay, the writers Donna Powers
and Wayne Powers express respect for the earlier work and acknowledge seeing it
only once before then creating their own version of the heist story.
The examination of such DVD bonus materials reveals that by 2003 the entire
cast and crew responsible for the remake make a point of showing the viewers that
they have studied the original and are therefore qualified to remake it. Comments
such as the one by Michael Caton-Jones would no longer be a welcomed DVD
extra. The reverential attitude to the original present on the DVD might be the
reason why the update has proven successful not only in the domestic market
but also overseas, becoming Paramount’s highest-grossing picture of the year.
On IMDb, even some ardent British fans of the original give the new version a
high score and admit to enjoying it despite their initial prejudice. To date this
Hollywood remake has received the highest score of 7 out of 10 from IMDb
users when compared to other Hollywood remakes of British films. Interestingly,
people who have endorsed it emphasize that it is not a remake but “a reimagining,”
“a reinterpretation,” “a follow up,” “a homage,” “a revamp,” or “an inspiration,”
thus echoing the approach to remaking from the DVD supplemental materials.
A very similar discourse accompanies Alfie. The DVD of the original from
1966 appeared in 2001 in the United States and in 2002 in the UK, thus in this case
predating the cinematic and DVD release of its remake which occurred in 2005 on
both sides of the Atlantic. The role of Alfie, a swinging 1960s Cockney womanizer
whose responsibility-free lifestyle finally catches up with him, catapulted Michael
Caine into stardom. The remake stars Jude Law as a contemporary English lothario
who now lives in New York. The box set with both versions was released in 2006
on both sides of the Atlantic, showing that by then the act of comparison had
become a legitimate practice for the industry as well.

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 The critical and box office disappointment in the case of the update may have
resonated in extensive bonus materials on the DVD where its creators go to many
lengths to justify the reasons behind the remake while at the same time providing
the viewer with some of the most elaborate comparisons between original and
source to date. Its special features include two commentary tracks by its writers,
film editor, producer and director, as well as a number of mini documentaries:
“Round Table of Alfie,” “The World of Alfie,” “The Women of Alfie,” each address-
ing updating by examining such elements as location, character, cinematography,
set design, genre, and many others. During “Round Table of Alfie,” the director
opens the discussion by asking his crew how they felt about remaking the original,
thus pre-empting the question that many reviewers and members of the audience
were asking themselves. In another featurette, “The World of Alfie,” the entire
genesis of the project is revealed. While expressing love for the British classic,
Elaine Pope insists that it needed updating. Her choice of words echoes the
discourse of The Italian Job and Village of the Damned remakers. She claims
she wanted to “reimagine” or “reinvent” rather than “remake” the original. “The
Women of Alfie” then offers a point for point analysis of the old versus new
characters using a split screen technique for comparison and plenty of footage
from both pictures. As Geraghty notices: “The commentaries and features offered
by the DVD can also be seen as part of the process of recall that helps to fix a film
as an adaptation [remake]” (171). In the case of Alfie, its supplemental materials
provide a specific frame for interpreting the film wherein the viewer is encouraged
to perceive and appreciate it through the eyes of its double.
The Ladykillers (1955/2004)
By comparison, another update made the same year, the Coen brothers’ version of 1955
Ealing classic The Ladykillers released on DVD in 2004 came with no original-remake
coverage. The British version is a dark comedy caper about a bunch of criminals who
rent a hideout room from an old English lady. She assumes they need it to practice
their music while in fact they are planning a robbery. When she discovers the truth, the
robbers decide to kill her, which then proves very difficult. The remake follows this
premise quite closely, but the Coens move the story from post-war London to modern
Mississippi and turn the sweet English lady into a tough-looking and church-going
African-American widow. Looking at DVD review sites, the humble amount of DVD
bonus materials is immediately discernible. As Diane Wild comments: “But there’s
no commentary or the usual behind-the-scenes featurettes – little for Coen brothers
fans to really sink their teeth into.” Unlike Alfie, whose creators saw the DVD as a
chance for communicating their ideas to a wider audience, The Ladykillers’ lukewarm
reviews and its modest box office did not produce similar reactions. The brothers,
known for their reluctance to provide audio tracks, mocked this practice in Blood
Simple DVD (2001) by scripting a fake commentary. Their complete involvement
in the project – they wrote, directed and produced The Ladykillers – left no one else
to divulge adaptation and production details to the spectators. The study of IMDb
comments reveals, however, a need for such a discussion amongst the Coens’ followers
and fans of the original film who often commented on the update in terms of seriality:
both a narrative continuity via remaking and a continuity of the Coens’ body of work.
Many decided to seek the original encouraged by the online debate and the availability
of the DVD issued in the United States in 2004.

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 The Lady Vanishes (1938)/Fligthplan (2005)
The last pair of films to be examined shows how by 2005 the networked movie
audience had become such sophisticated intertextual readers that they were able to
recognize a remake and shape its reception without having to rely on industry-cre-
ated paratexts. “I know where I’ve seen you before!” shouts Kyle Pratt (Jodie
Foster) in Flightplan when she recognizes her daughter’s kidnappers, mirroring the
responses of those viewers who realized they were watching a remake of Hitch-
cock’s The Lady Vanishes.8 Although critics such as Roger Ebert did not recognize
that Flightplan was a remake, some viewers did and have since circulated their
findings on film blogs and reference sites, such as IMDb. 40 user comments out of
592 make a direct connection between the two films while numerous others refer
to Hitchcock’s influence on Flightplan’s visual style and atmosphere, which is
enough to guarantee that the film enters an altogether different debate. The audience
also enjoys recognizing familiar narrative patterns across other titles, genres, and
film styles, e.g. Bunny Lake is Missing, Into Thin Air, The Sixth Sense, Frantic,
Dangerous Crossing, The Forgotten, Panic Room, and even L’Aventura, like “the
navigational viewer” described by Janet Murrey who “takes pleasure in following
the connections between different parts of the story and in discovering multiple
arrangements of the same material” (qtd. in Jenkins 119). Moreover, a short fan video
is available on YouTube which juxtaposes two key fragments from Hitchcock’s and
Schwentke’s movies to show how they mirror each other.
As a result, when googling the two titles together, over 8,330 hits come up that in
one way or another refer to the films’ unique bond. Wikipedia’s entry on Flightplan
announces in its opening paragraph that the movie was based on The Lady Vanishes.
Whereas the amazon.co.uk review of the DVDs released by 2007 did not mention
its source, since then it has had an added synopsis in brackets: “Flightplan owes a
sizable debt to Hitchcock’s 1938 thriller The Lady Vanishes.” Amazon.com goes
a step further by mentioning The Lady Vanishes and Bunny Lake Is Missing as its
sources. Likewise, on a site devoted to Blu-ray releases, the review of the Criterion
2011 Blu-ray DVD of The Lady Vanishes mentions the bond as well: “The plot of
The Lady Vanishes has been borrowed, recycled, and reinvented many times since
Hitchcock’s film premièred, perhaps most recently in Jodie Foster’s Flightplan”
(Krauss 2011). Thus, despite not being advertised as a remake, audience-created
paratexts have provided Flightplan with a new interpretive frame, showing their role
“in challenging or supplementing those created by the industry [...] and in carving
out alternative pathways through texts” (Gray 156).
Conclusion
The examination of eight Hollywood remakes of British films produced between
1995 and 2005 reveals that with each year marketing strategies shifted to accom-
modate for revolutionary changes taking place. The release of DVD box sets
with increasingly interactive supplements responds to the needs of the networked
movie audiences’ experience in understanding film as a text that may come in
many shapes and forms. The few exceptions to the rule only seem to confirm
the ingenuity of the interactive viewer who would then go online to satisfy their
desire for binary discourse and paratextual information. This is why by 2005 the

8 For a detailed discussion, see Rasmus.

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producers of Flightplan, who did not have the copyright to the 1938 classic, knew
that their ‘hidden’ remake would still circulate online as a Hitchcock rewrite. This
all goes to confirm Braudy’s claim made at the turn of the millennium that “[i]t is
the audience, or the audiences, that decide what is variable and what is unchanging
in art, what vanishes and what lasts, what can be revived and what remains dead.
Only one member of that audience is the remaker, and only one is the critic” (333).

Łódź Agnieszka Rasmus

Works Cited
Alfie. Dir. Charles Shyer. Perf. Jude Law. Paramount, 2004. DVD.
Amazon.co.uk review of Flightplan (2005). Web. 10 Nov. 2014. <http://www.
amazon.co.uk/Flightplan-Blu-ray-US-Jodie-Foster/dp/B000J6I0UW/ref=s-
r_1_15?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1417086814&sr=1-15&keywords=flightplan>.
Amazon.com review of Flightplan (2005). Web. 10 Nov. 2014. <http://www.amazon.
com/gp/product/B000J6I0UW/ref=s9_simh_se_p74_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPD-
KIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=search-desktop-advertising-no-results-center-1&pf_rd_
r=1HW7R9XGNYTVT9Z77VVK&pf_rd_t=301&pf_rd_p=1912906142&pf_
rd_i=Flithgplan>.
Bedazzled. Dir. Harold Ramis. Perf. Elizabeth Hurley, Brendan Fraser. Twentieth
Century Fox, 2001. DVD.
Bedazzled. Dir. Stanley Donen. Perf. Peter Cook, Dudley Moore. Hollywood Clas-
sics, 2005. DVD.
Bedazzled. Dir. Stanley Donen. Perf. Peter Cook, Dudley Moore. Twentieth Century
Fox, 2007. DVD.
Braudy, Leo. “Afterword: Rethinking Remakes.” Play It Again, Sam: Retakes on
Remakes. Berkeley: U of California P, 1998. 327-34. Print.
Chibnall, Steve. Get Carter. London: I.B. Tauris, 2003. Print.
Druxman, Michael B. Make It Again, Sam: A Survey of Movie Remakes. New York:
A. S. Barnes, 1975. Print.
Geraghty, Christine. Now a Major Motion Picture: Film Adaptations of Literature
and Drama. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. Print.
Get Carter. Dir. Mike Hodges. Perf. Michael Caine. Warner, 2000. DVD.
Get Carter. Dir. Stephen Kay. Perf. Sylvester Stallone. Warner, 2000. DVD.
Grant, Catherine. “Recognising Billy Budd in Beau Travail: Epistemology and
Hermeneutics of Auteurist ‘Free’ Adaptation.” Screen 43.1 (2002): 57-73. Print.
Gray, Jonathan. Show Sold Separately: Promos, Spoilers, and Other Media Para-
texts. New York: New York UP, 2010. Print.
Gritten, David. “Jackal Filmmakers Assail New Film With Classic Title.” Los An-
geles Times 28 Oct. 1996. Web. 10 Nov. 2014. <http://articles.latimes.com/1996-
10-28/entertainment/ca-58620_1_film-director>.

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Grusin, Richard. “DVDs, Video Games, and the Cinema of Interactions.” Ilha Do
Desterro 51 (2006): 69-91. Print.
Hutcheon, Linda. A Theory of Adaptation. New York: Routledge, 2006. Print.
Jenkins, Henry. Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide. New
York and London: New York UP, 2006. Print.
Kelleter, Frank, and Kathleen Loock. “Hollywood Remaking as Second-Order
Serialization.” Media of Serial Narrative. Ed. Frank Kelleter. Columbus, OH:
Ohio State UP, 2016 (forthcoming). Print.
Klinger, Barbara. Beyond the Multiplex Cinema, New Technologies, and the Home.
Berkeley: U of California P, 2006. Print.
Krauss, David. “Review of The Lady Vanishes (1938).” High-Def Digest. 12 Dec.
2011. Web. 10 Nov. 2014. <http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/5897/lady_vanishes.
html>.
Mitchell, Elvis. “Review of Get Carter (2000): Slimline Stallone, With a Bruising
Touch and a Gentle Mutter.” New York Times 7 Oct. 2000. Web. 10 Nov.
2014. <http://www.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=980CE5DE153CF934A-
35753C1A9669C8B63>.
Rasmus, Agnieszka. “‘I know where I’ve seen you before!’: Remaking Gender,
Class, Nationality and Politics from The Lady Vanishes (1938) to Flightplan
(2005).” Ekphrasis: Images, Cinema, Theatre, Media 10.2 (2013): 26-38. Print.
The Italian Job. Dir. Peter Collinson. Perf. Michael Caine. Paramount, 2009. DVD.
The Italian Job. Dir. F. Gary Gray. Perf. Mark Wahlberg. Paramount. 2003. DVD.
The Jackal. Dir. Michael Caton-Jones. Perf. Bruce Willis, Richard Gere. Columbia
TriStar, 2001. DVD.
The Ladykillers. Dir. Ethan & Joel Coen. Perf. Tom Hanks. Buena Vista, 2004. DVD.
Tryon, Chuck. Reinventing Cinema Movies in the Age of Media Convergence. New
Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers UP, 2009. Print.
Verevis, Constantine. Film Remakes. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 2006. Print.
Village of the Damned. Dir. John Carpenter. Universal, 1998. DVD.
Wild, Diane. “Review of The Ladykillers (2004).” DVD Verdict. 26 Oct. 2004. Web.
10 Nov. 2014. <http://www.dvdverdict.com/reviews/ladykillers.php>.

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 No Longer Watching for the Plot?:
The Crime Drama Bron/Broën
and Its Adaptations
The current wave of transnational television crime drama remakes that began with
the transformation of the Danish Forbrydelsen (DR1, 2007-2012) into the American
program The Killing (AMC, 2011-2013, Netflix 2014), has renewed the debate
about the value and purpose of remaking foreign television series. Transplanting a
series runs the risk of eliminating precisely those elements of a foreign-made text
that are a significant part of its appeal for some audience members: “[F]ar from
feeling alienated by cultures, customs, locations and languages they aren’t familiar
with, viewers are attracted to these aspects” (Hayley).While past theorizing about
remakes has focused primarily on film, television remakes face similar challenges
in trying to satisfy skeptical critics and audiences. Those viewers who have seen the
original paradoxically “want the same story again, though not exactly the same,” a
delicate balancing act that can backfire (Leitch 44). The American show Gracepoint
(Fox, 2014-), for example, shares plot, director, writer, and even a star (David
Tennant) with its source, the English program Broadchurch (ITV, 2013-). The
parallels between the first episodes, however, prompted a rash of critical responses
like “Gracepoint Goes through the Motions” (Gilbert), “When TV’s Copy Machine
Gets Jammed” (Stuever), and “The Curious Case of Broadchurch’s US Remake
Gracepoint: Why Bother?” (Moylan). At the same time, a remake also has to reach
an audience that has not seen the original; Gracepoint’s showrunners pointed out
that relatively few Americans saw Broadchurch when it aired on BBC America, a
premium cable channel, so that not only would it likely win a larger U.S. audience
on Fox’s basic cable channel, but most of those viewers would come to it with no
preconceptions (Deggans).
Although the American market is at the center of most discussions of television
remakes (often in relationship to British television), remakes are not an exclu-
sively American phenomenon, as is attested by the fact that a French version of
Broadchurch is in production. They can be sound economic investments, as Brian
Moylan explains, using the analogy of leasing a property compared to owning it
outright; “[i]f Fox just rented Broadchurch it would only make money by selling
advertising against it. If it remakes it, it can own the product, thereby licensing it
to Netflix or to other secondary markets, including DVDs, downloads and sales to
foreign markets” (“Luther Remake”). In fact, the crime drama remake has become
a recipe for jumpstarting a new series by following the original script, more or less,
for the first season, with a ready-made cast of characters, and then establishing its
own identity with “original” plots in subsequent seasons, a recipe that has met with
varying success: the American remake The Bridge (FX, 2013-2014) was canceled
after its second season, and The Killing’s American version struggled to keep its
audience at AMC before moving to Netflix for its fourth season. More surprising
than the corporate appetite for remaking foreign television crime series is that there
is an audience that is willing to seek out the remake(s) after seeing the original, and
the original after seeing the remake(s). As Ellykelly, a poster on the Reddit website,
confesses, “I don’t feel I can accurately say ‘Bron is better’ until I’ve watched both
of the others.”
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 Elke Weismann has observed that “the place of genre in transnational imaginings
of television drama” has historically been undertheorized (96). Similarly, little atten-
tion has been paid to the role of genre in discussions about transnational television
remakes. While anyone who has ever seen and enjoyed one version of a film or
television program necessarily comes to a remake with expectations and a certain
amount of foreknowledge, my contention is that crime drama, specifically long-form
serial crime drama, presents a special case. For Mark Lawson, for example, “so
much of [Broadchurch’s] power came from the astonishing implications of the
killer’s identity, watching it while already knowing their identity becomes like a
game of spot the ball in which the newspaper has accidentally left the X printed on
the picture.” In this essay, then, I examine the American series The Bridge (hereafter
The Bridge US) and the English-French series The Tunnel (Sky Atlantic/Canal+,
2013-) as remakes of the first season of the highly-acclaimed Bron/Broën (SVT1/
DR1, 2011-). Numerous reviewers and bloggers have already addressed specific
similarities and differences among the versions, but given that crime drama remakes
are a trend that shows no signs of imminently dying out (despite the naysayers), I am
interested in trying to understand more broadly how it is that “we watch differently”
when it comes to viewing multiple remakes of a crime drama, and why we keep
watching (Lawson).1
Transnational Television Remakes in Context
First, let me begin by briefly summarizing the plot of the first season of Bron/Broën,
which opens with the discovery of a female corpse that is in fact the halves of two
different women, from two different countries, strategically placed on the Øresund
Bridge, which forms the border between Malmö, Sweden and Copenhagen, Den-
mark. Solving that mystery and the murders that follow brings together Danish cop
Martin Rohde (Kim Bodnia) and Swedish policewoman Saga Norén (Sofia Helin).
The culture and personality clash between easygoing and pragmatic Martin, who is
willing to break rules, including his marriage vows, and socially awkward Saga, a
highly focused career woman with (undiagnosed) Asperger’s, is as important to the
show’s appeal as the intricacies of the police procedural.2 The main plot revolves
around tracking down a serial killer, the so-called Truth Terrorist, who justifies
violence as a means of exposing societal injustices; in fact, he is a former police
colleague of Martin who faked his own death and has come back to punish everyone
associated with the car crash that killed his wife and son. Blaming Martin for having
an affair with his late wife, he takes his revenge by seducing Martin’s wife, and
abducting and ultimately murdering Martin’s oldest son, before he is captured in
a climactic confrontation on the bridge (Fig. 1). The remakes effectively draw on
this undercurrent of cross-cultural tension by relocating the story to more socially
and politically charged border regions. Thus The Bridge, set on the U.S.-Mexico
border between El Paso and Ciudad Juárez, pairs an American policewoman, Sonya
Cross (Diane Kruger), with Mexican cop Marco Ruiz (Demián Bichir), while French
policewoman Elise Wassermann (Clémence Poésy) joins forces with Karl Roebuck
(Stephen Dillane), an English cop, in The Tunnel, which takes place in and around
the Channel Tunnel, the border between France and the UK.

1 See, for example, Langlais; Thorsteinsson; Frost; and Rolamb.

2 In interviews Sofia Helin (with Forshaw) and Diane Kruger (with Goldman) have acknowledged
how researching Asperger’s has informed their respective performances.

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 Figure 1: Saga (Sofia Helin) and Martin (Kim Bodnia)
in Bron/Broën.

If the transnational television remake is not solely American, neither is it a twenty-first

century phenomenon. Tasha Oren and Sharon Shahaf note in Global Television
Formats, television history has been and continues to be marked by “both formal
and unofficial exchanges, in the form of ‘cloning,’ borrowing, or influence” (4-5).
However, the contemporary dynamic significantly breaks with the past in several
key ways. First, whereas earlier television audiences, in the United States and
elsewhere, often did not know about and/or had no access to the foreign originals of
the programs on their screens, today there is far greater transparency. As the buying
and selling of formats is reported routinely in the press, audiences are more likely to
be aware that what they are watching is a format, a template that has been localized,
unique insofar as it has been tailored for them: “We have entered an age where
publicity about the success of a format has become part of the format” (Bourdon
122). Viewers tuning in to The Tunnel, for instance, may have seen neither Bron/
Broën nor The Bridge US, but simply knowing about the existence of those shows
and their positive reception sets up expectations that predispose them to treat The
Tunnel as television worth watching.
One source of information about television shows comes from blogs and
websites like TV.com, IMDb.com, Denofgeek.com, and Reddit.com. Through
these online venues, which Weismann describes as “transnational knowledge com-
munities,” viewers from around the world share information about international
television programs, and where to find them, from shared links to quasi-legal
streaming websites to advice on how to unlock Netflix in different countries (31).
This kind of information counts as valuable expertise that plays an increasingly
important role “in [the] decision-making processes of audiences,” and is furthered
not only by the internet, but also by the increasing real-world mobility of per-
sons, including tourists, expatriates, and immigrants (Weismann 31). In addition,
professional television critics regularly review programs made available to them
for advance screening, increasing audience awareness of international television
generally, even when those shows are not aired widely or not available at all in
their home countries.
Second, whereas historically there was a time lag between the broadcast of
a television program and its remake(s), today the speed of (re)production across
national borders has become dizzying, as with the Australian crime drama
Secrets & Lies (Network Ten, 2014) being remade in the United States: “Since
both the Australian and U.S. versions of the series are set to run in 2014, ABC

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[American Broadcasting Corporation] should at least be able to preempt criticism
from fans of a foreign original decrying the inferiority of the American edition. In
fact, there’s an outside chance this show could be the first-ever remake to air before
the original” (Vago). The airing of remakes before or concurrent with the original
challenges the traditionally privileged status of an original text. In some countries
the Colombian telenovela Yo soy Betty, la Fea (RCN TV, 1999-2001), remade in
the US as the sitcom Ugly Betty (ABC, 2006-2010),
airs in two versions, with both a local adaptation and a regional or global import vying for
the hearts of audiences. This is another distinctive characteristic of the global television
format trade; there is room for multiple competitors in a market. Multiple versions can
coexist, since re-versioning adds to the broader, transmedia story. (Torre 184)

Third, while the import/export of sitcoms has a long history, there has been a shift from
the replication and circulation of unscripted or loosely scripted formats originating in
another country – the permutations of competition shows and lifestyle programming
that fall under the umbrella of reality television – to the import/export of formatted
fiction. Crime dramas like NBC’s Law and Order franchise (1990-), for example, that
combine the police procedural with forensic investigation, have proved to be especially
portable. However, over the past five years, long-form serial crime drama has become
a highly marketable format. What distinguishes this kind of television crime narrative
is that the entire season builds to the climactic reveal of the murderer(s), so that each
season can stand alone. While earlier television series like The Fugitive (ABC, 1963-
1967), in which David Kimble (David Janssen) hunts down his wife’s killer in order
to prove his innocence, successfully delayed the resolution of its murder mystery for
years, the contemporary serial crime drama makes an implicit pact with the viewer that
the crime(s) will be solved by the end of the season. Violating this understanding can
lead to disgruntled viewers; most notably, this occurred with The Killing’s American
version, whose plotting for the first season closely followed that of Forbrydelsen,
but deviated by postponing the unmasking of Rosie Larsen’s killer(s) until the end of
the second season.3 At first glance, the highly plot-driven nature of the crime thriller
would seem to make this genre a poor candidate for remakes, especially since today,
as Sarah Hughes observes, “the original ending is only a click away on the internet,”
but that has not been the case.
All of these factors have contributed to the emergence of a viewing audience
eager to seek out and watch multiple versions of television crime dramas even when
they know the plot, when they recognize the characters, in short, when suspense, in
the usual sense, is no longer an issue. Arguably the situation of the remake merely
amplifies what have become everyday aspects of contemporary television viewing
practices – from purchasing boxed DVD sets in order to rewatch a favorite series to
reading recaps, which can serve as previews as well as reviews – that subordinate
suspense to other elements. A decade ago, Emily Nussbaum announced “The End
of the Surprise Ending,” since online spoilers made it possible for viewers to forego
watching for the plot, and instead to “watch the show with distance, analyzing
like a critic.” Today the months-long delay between filming and airing a lifestyle
reality television show like Bravo’s The Real Housewives (2006-) means that the
audience is well aware through media gossip of a character’s impending bankruptcy

3 See Toder. The failure to identify the murderer by season’s end also contributed to audience
disillusionment with Mark Frost and David Lynch’s cult classic Twin Peaks (ABC, 1990-1991).

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or divorce, knowing, sometimes in great detail, what is going to happen. In 2014,
ITV (in the UK) launched its Encore channel, featuring reruns of popular crime
dramas like Broadchurch, and though some of its audience are undoubtedly catching
up with series that they have not yet seen, others are rewatching.
The rise of the recap, which mixes plot summary with interpretation, has also
helped encourage viewers to think like critics. Rachel Lubitz prefaces her recap of
Gracepoint for The Washington Post by explaining that
I’ll be doing a quick rundown of what happened before embarking into a breakdown
of what was different or similar in ‘Gracepoint’s’ arguably better BBC American sister
‘Broadchurch.’ (‘Gracepoint’ is a remake of ‘Broadchurch,’in case you’ve been out of the
loop entirely.) Viewers who want to know everything about ‘Gracepoint’ can read until
the ‘Broadchurch’ business begins, while viewers of both series or viewers just a tad bit
interested in ‘Broadchurch’ are free to read through to the end.

The implication here is that this kind of comparison and contrast is enjoyable in
and of itself, and something that people want to read. In her parenthetical dismissal,
“in case you’ve been out of the loop entirely,” she also caters to her readers’ sense
of belonging to an in-group of savvy viewers who are up-to-date on international
television. In finding fault with Gracepoint because “[t]he thrill of learning a new
story was gone, replaced by a weary, cynical analysis” for those who have seen
Broadchurch, Eric Deggans may be missing the point, for the ideal re-viewer of
television crime drama remakes, amateur as well as professional, relishes analysis.
She is propelled partly by curiosity and partly by a desire to prolong the pleasure
of watching a favorite show; Ginger Crawford explains in a blog post that “This
way we get another telling with a different ending and I’m glad since I practically
have Broadchurch memorized by now.”
Defining the Television Remake
Significantly, by referring to Gracepoint and Broadchurch as sisters, rather than
regarding Broadchurch as a parent text, Lubitz stresses their equality. Even the
unavoidable term ‘remake’ itself is problematic, since for many critics it implies a
hierarchical relationship between texts that does not accurately convey the way in
which contemporary television remakes are treated by many viewers, that is, not
as inferior copies but as originals in their own right.4 Although a remake differs
from an adaptation in that the latter involves transferring a story from one medium
into another, such as from novel to film, while a remake operates within a single
medium, usually film or television, both remakes and adaptations are reinterpre-
tations of earlier texts, even when they aim to be scrupulously faithful. However,
what Leo Braudy observed of film remakes in the late-twentieth century, that “the
remade film is less frequently an homage or revival than an effort to supplant its
predecessor entirely,” is not necessarily true of contemporary television remakes
(327). Instead, rather like a spin-off or a sequel, today’s television remake is more
likely to claim to be “an addition” to the original or source text that potentially
“establishes new audiences both for the remake itself and for the source” as part
of a larger franchise (Mazdon 151). As Julia Tulloh points out, the situation, at
least in twenty-first century television, is further complicated by the fact that

4 Scholars have increasingly challenged negative attitudes about remakes. See Forrest and Koos;
Horton and McDougal; Mazdon; Lavigne and Marcovitch; Loock and Verevis.

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“[w]e can’t talk about ‘originality’ without acknowledging that producers often
willingly sell and adapt their own work. Nor can we necessarily speak of remakes
as bastardisations of original works, since the same people are often involved in
creating both the new and old series.”
Further undermining the usefulness of the term ‘remake,’ theorists like William
Proctor have persuasively argued that every text is “already a remake of existing
discourses, tropes, quotations, and allusions alongside narrative components and
generic features”; the website Tvtropes.org is devoted to making this intertextuality
explicit (6). Bron/Broën, for example, borrows from or reflects the influence of
numerous prior film and television texts, including Dirty Harry (Don Siegel, 1971),
Twin Peaks (ABC, 1990-1991), Seven (David Fincher, 1995), and Bon Cop, Bad Cop
(Eric Canuel, 2006), just to name a few. The latter is a Canadian film that, like Bron/
Broën, incorporates mismatched cops, a divided corpse found on a border (between
Ontario and Quebec), linguistic and cultural differences, and a serial killer, but differs
in stirring up these ingredients for comic effect. Bron/Broën is also frequently cited
as an example of Nordic Noir, a contemporary category of Scandinavian crime
fiction “synonymous with well-crafted and electric plots, memorable characters, and
a tremendous sense of setting” as well as strong female characters like Saga Norén
(Lacob). Thus Bron/Broën self-consciously recycles and recombines established
generic elements, unsettling definitions of what constitutes an original and a remake.
A precedent for today’s transnational television remakes may be found in an
earlier moment in American cinematic history, when Hollywood briefly experiment-
ed with parallel-language versions of films as it sought to negotiate the transition
from silent films to talkies and move away from the subtitles that accompanied
silent films. No relation to The Tunnel, the English film The Transatlantic Tunnel
(Maurice Elvey, 1935), the German film Der Tunnel (Curtis Bernhardt, 1933), and
the French film Le Tunnel (Curtis Bernhardt, 1933) are three adaptations, all based
on Bernhard Kellerman’s German novel Der Tunnel (1913), each set in a different
location in order to make the story more relevant to each specific national audience.
Just as the same directors might oversee the filming, the same stars might appear in
different national versions, not unlike David Tennant’s reprising his Broadchurch
role in Gracepoint.
A contemporary example of a parallel-language remake is the Welsh crime drama
Hinterland (Y Gwyll, BBC Wales, 2013), filmed twice, once in Welsh and once in
English. Despite having “the same dialogue, actors and story lines, the two versions
offer slightly different performances,” partly a function of the language, according
to actor Richard Harrington: “Welsh is more poetic. You can get to places a lot
quicker with just using a few words, or sometimes just a vowel sound” (Rochlin).
A third (bilingual) version was created by combining parts of both the Welsh and
English-language versions. In the case of Hinterland/Y Gwyll, therefore, it may not
be possible to claim that there is an original at all.
The Serial Crime Drama Remake as Drama
Apart from recognizing the generic and formulaic aspects of television crime drama,
there might be other reasons for contemporary viewers’ attitudes towards remakes,
ranging from tolerant to enthusiastic. It may be that the rise of reality television
formats in general has made us more aware or more accepting of television texts
and plots as commodities. Just as one national version of Big Brother has no greater

116
status than another, so we have become used to regarding the multiple versions of
a reality show as existing on an equal footing, whatever the national origins of the
concept. Changing ideas about the ownership of texts may also affect the perception
of remakes as creative, rather than derivative, as individuals – through fan fiction
and mash-ups – become accustomed to employing the plots, characters, and images
of others to create and share their own original texts.
Yet that does not explain why certain iterations of the crime drama have moved
beyond mere formulas to become prestige formats. Episodic police procedural
series like the Law and Order franchise have produced spin-offs and remakes in
other countries, but they lack the cultural cachet of shows like Bron/Broën and its
remakes. The history of television, according to Michael Z. Newman and Elana
Levine, has been marked by attempts at “aligning television with that which has
already been legitimated and aestheticized,” that is, by emphasizing its similarities
to other, more highly regarded media (5). The long-form serial crime drama, with
its sprawling, multi-plot structure, building to a climax over a number of weeks,
resembles nineteenth-century British serial novels like Charles Dickens’s Bleak
House (1853) and Wilkie Collins’s The Moonstone (1868). Fittingly, then, although
television texts like Forbrydelsen and Broadchurch began as television scripts,
rather than as adaptations of crime novels, they have subsequently been novelized
as David Hewson’s The Killing (2012) and Erin Kelly’s Broadchurch (2014) re-
spectively, reinforcing television serial crime drama’s connections to literature, as
well as contributing additional versions of the story.
Another analogy is offered by Lars Blomgren, executive producer of Bron/Broën.
Instead of comparing the long-form serial to a novel, he explicitly emphasizes the
“drama” in “crime drama,” asserting that watching a remake is “like watching a
good theatre play several times in different versions. If you like the story, this is a
new take on the story” (Blomgren). Broadchurch’s creator Chris Chibnall similarly
explains that “I come from theatre and you have different productions of a text
in theatre” (Jeffery). Likening these kinds of television crime drama remakes to
theatrical productions may be valid, but it is also a strategic way of asserting the
artistic value of these remakes, while differentiating them from other mass-market
television formats, such as reality television. Thinking of remakes as theatrical
productions goes some way towards understanding why audiences remain intrigued
when they already know the ending. The viewers’ enjoyment lies elsewhere, in
attending to the nuances of casting and differences in setting, taking note of what
is added, deleted, or changed. Even when scenes are reproduced nearly shot for
shot, as with Saga/Sonya/Elise’s visit to a bar in search of a one-night stand, the
actresses’ performances are not identical.
However, these remakes, like any remake, have to reach out to those who have
not previously seen any version and those who have seen one or more versions. In
contrast to The Tunnel, which is a fairly faithful adaptation, The Bridge US seems
cannily aware of its multiple audiences, turning minor characters from Bron/Broën
into major ones without changing the basic plot, in what might be a nod to Tom
Stoppard’s play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1966). For the viewer
familiar with Bron/Broën and/or The Tunnel, it comes as something of a shock to
realize that the unscrupulous and unlikeable reporter, Daniel Frye (Matthew Lillard),
survives the killer’s attempt to blow up his car, unlike his less fortunate counterparts
Daniel Hillier (Tom Bateman in The Tunnel) and Daniel Ferbé (Christian Hillborg

117
in Bron/Broën). Frye is later shot on the bridge during the climactic confrontation
(in place of the woman hostage in Bron/Broën). However, he returns to become a
key character, pairing up with fellow investigative reporter Adriana Mendez (Emily
Rios) in an unlikely detecting partnership that rivals in interest that of Sonya Cross
and Marco Ruiz. So, too, rich widow Charlotte Millwright (Annabeth Gish), who has
only a small role in Bron/Broën (as Charlotte Söringer, played by Ellen Hillingsø)
and The Tunnel (as Charlotte Joubert, played by Jeanne Balibar), emerges from
the background in The Bridge US to find that she has inherited a tunnel used for
trafficking people and drugs, in what becomes a darkly comic subplot.
Despite the claims of Blomgren and Chibnall that a remake is like another
production of a play, from which it would seem to follow that knowing the plot need
not detract from the audience’s enjoyment, the showrunners of crime drama remakes
often feel compelled to restore the element of suspense by changing the ending,
as with The Killing’s American version and Gracepoint. But would an audience
watching Shakespeare’s Hamlet accept a production in which Gertrude proves
to be the murderess rather than Claudius? The comparison is not so far-fetched,
since serial crime dramas often aspire to be tragedies, with painful life-changing
consequences for everyone involved, including the detectives. Tampering with the
ending of a long-form serial crime drama risks turning it into the television version of
the film Clue (Jonathan Lynn, 1985), which boasts three alternate endings, randomly
offered up to film audiences, or into Shear Madness (Scherenschnitt oder der Mörder
sind Sie, 1963), Paul Pörtner’s interactive murder mystery play set in a hair salon.
Produced in versions around the world, much like a contemporary television format,
Shear Madness relies on local variation and improvisation within fixed parameters
of plot, setting, and character types. As with a twenty-first century reality show,
each audience votes on the identity of the killer for that particular performance.
The ending is subject to change, since the killer can be any of the characters. What
works for a comedy, however, as a way to lure audiences back for repeat visits
problematically undermines the coherence of a serious crime drama, potentially
transforming it into parody. Naming a different killer in Gracepoint, for instance,
necessitates a major shift in character development, since the shattering discovery
of lead female detective Ellie Miller (Olivia Coleman) that her own husband abused
and killed their son’s best friend shapes not only her character going forward, but
also affects the subsequent seasons of the series.5
One productive way of thinking about transnational remakes is to ask, following
Vincinius Navarro, who has studied the transnational transformation of reality show
formats, “What does the adaptation allow for, enable, or reveal? And how is the
foreign interpreted, mimicked, or repossessed?” (36). Here, the subtitles, present in
the bilingual remakes as well as in the exported version of the original series, are
a constant reminder of the otherness that is thematically central to the story. But
whereas Bron/Broën downplays linguistic and cultural differences between Saga and
Martin, both The Tunnel and The Bridge US emphatically foreground linguistic and
cultural differences, deriving humor more from those cultural misunderstandings
than from the female detective’s social miscues. Marco comments, for instance,
after meeting Sonya in The Bridge US that “I can’t tell if she’s crazy or if it’s just

5 In the end, Gracepoint tried to have it both ways; Joe (Josh Hamilton), the husband of Ellie
(Anna Gunn), was charged with murder, covering up for their son Tom (Jack Irvine), who had
accidentally caused his friend’s death.

118
because she’s a Gringa” (Episode 1); cognitive differences clearly pale beside ethnic
ones. As language is a formidable barrier in the remakes, so, too, is the border
itself, whether the forbidding desert dividing Texas from Chihuahua or the English
Channel. The immigration politics that are the subject of the Truth Terrorist’s fourth
truth in Bron/Broën become a major theme in both The Bridge US and The Tunnel.
The narrower nationalistic focus of The Bridge US paints Mexico as a morally
corrupt and dangerously violent society, where corporate leaders, drug lords, and
the police are implicated in drug smuggling and sex trafficking. In contrast, The
Tunnel’s cross-cultural collaboration is set against a broadly European canvas, as
the protagonists’ half-German names suggest, albeit a European Union under threat
by England’s UK Independence Party and France’s Front National. In that sense,
The Tunnel is the most political of the three versions (Fig. 2).

Figure 2: The Tunnel’s Elise (Clémence Poésy) and

Karl (Stephen Dillane).

Perhaps the chief difference between The Bridge US, on the one hand, and Bron/
Broën and The Tunnel, on the other, is that The Bridge US, after tying up the loose
ends of the serial killer plot in episode 11 (“Take the Ride, Pay the Toll”) of its
thirteen-episode season, continues for two more episodes, beginning to confront
the social justice issues that were introduced merely as red herrings in Bron/Broën
and The Tunnel. Picking up the unanswerable question posed by the killer early in
the series – “Why is one dead white woman more important than so many dead just
across the bridge?” – The Bridge US moves from fictional crime to real-life crime,
although some viewers have strongly criticized the series’ depiction of Juarez in
particular and Mexico in general.6 The last episodes promise not only a serious look
at the sexual violence perpetrated against young Mexican women like Eva Guerra
(Stephanie Sigman), but also a sympathetic exploration of the everyday lives of
Mexican families, when we are introduced to Adriana’s mother and sisters, gathered
around the dinner table.7 Unlike either Bron/Broën or The Tunnel, The Bridge US
concludes with a cliffhanger, as Adriana’s younger sister is kidnapped as she waits
for a bus after work. A cynic might wonder if this shift of focus to Juarez had
anything to do with the network’s desire “to aggressively market The Bridge to the
Hispanic community in an unprecedented way” in order to – in the words of Sally
Daws, senior VP of consumer marketing at FX – “leverage those relationships for
[other] shows” (Morabito).
6 See, for instance, Cruz; Powell.
7 Disappointingly, the second season of The Bridge US abruptly discarded this plot trajectory.

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 Unequal Access: Television within Borders
In each case, as these remakes themselves are marketed globally they become far
more than local adaptations of a foreign series; there can be few places in the world
today where at least one season of Bron/Broën, The Bridge US, or The Tunnel
has not been shown. On the one hand, these versions are in competition with one
another. Even the American title The Bridge, widely used as the English translation
of Bron/Broën, seems calculated to confuse viewers. Moreover, The Bridge US’s
ability to premiere its first season “in 122 countries across all continents in 35
languages all at the same time” threatens to displace other versions like The Tunnel,
which has a far more restricted reach, and to dampen the prospect of future local
or national versions that otherwise might arise (Bibel). An element of strategizing
is even evident in scheduling decisions. The first season of Bron/Broën aired in the
UK in April 2012, for example, but its initial French broadcast was delayed until
after the English-French co-production The Tunnel had aired (in November 2013),
ensuring greater critical success and audience interest in France for The Tunnel,
since the majority of French viewers would have seen neither Bron/Broën nor The
Bridge US (which aired later in 2014 on the French satellite cable Jimmy), and
so would be kept in suspense, unlike British viewers. On the other hand, as with
the franchising of Yo soy Betty, la Fea, Bron/Broën and its remakes have become
part of a larger brand, with each new remake (and subsequent season) potentially
extending viewer interest in the different versions by sustaining a steady television
presence. In Australia, for example, Bron/Broën 1 aired in September 2012, The
Bridge US 1 in September 2013, Bron/Broën 2 in April 2014, The Tunnel in June
2014, and The Bridge US 2 in July 2014.
Just because multiple versions exist, however, it does not follow that they are
equally or easily accessible to all viewers, even when they are aired in a particular
country. In the case of this trio of crime dramas, only a minority of viewers has
seen all three. Economic factors, such as the ability to pay for subscriptions to
niche cable and satellite channels, and to on-demand streaming services like Hulu
and Netflix, and/or to purchase DVDs, affect what people can watch. Where one
lives matters too, for “[w]hile the ownership of channels and the content on them
are reflective of a globalized industry, the performance of television, as well as the
parameters of its consumption, often remain rigidly national” (Burroughs and Rugg
368). Just as the plots of Bron/Broën, The Bridge US, and The Tunnel necessitate
much border-crossing on the part of the principal detectives on the case, would-be
viewers who find their access to international television blocked may themselves be
tempted to become transgressive (cyber) border-crossers. Thus Benjamin Burroughs
and Adam Rugg, investigating geographical disparities in the real-time broadcasting
of the 2012 Summer Olympics, document the ways in which frustrated American
viewers sought “to circumvent NBC’s coverage and access the live (and more
comprehensive) Internet streaming coverage of the BBC” (366). While they are
particularly interested in the implications of geo-fences for sports broadcasting,
their observations are relevant to other kinds of television entertainment, including
transnational crime drama, since viewers who have successfully used “Alternate
Methods” to watch global sports events like the Olympics and the World Cup might
be tempted to transfer those skills to watch other kinds of television entertainment
(Becker). Elisabeth Siegel ponders the dilemma facing an American fan of Downton

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Abbey (ITV, 2010-): “If PBS is going to delay the premiere of Downton Abbey by
four months (necessitating the highly unseasonal viewing of the Christmas special
in February), viewers will take matters into their own hands [...]. Suddenly, illegal
streaming becomes the measure of a true, dedicated fan.”
Conclusion
It is ironic that television producers should feel that in order to tell the story of
Bron/Broën, a story which is, after all, about encountering and crossing bridges to
the Other, on multiple levels, that it should have to be transplanted to somewhere
more familiar to the target audience. The trend for remaking television crime drama
series has to be placed within the context of contemporary international television,
specifically foreign-language drama, since these remakes, when exported abroad,
are themselves foreign-language drama, and that may be part of their appeal. Prior
to the cancellation of The Bridge US, it would not have been wild speculation to
predict that that show would usher in a tolerance of subtitles that would bring the US
more into line with other countries in which “foreign-language drama is booming.
Through a combination of sophisticated viewing habits and the digital availability
of world-class drama with a national flavour and a foreign tongue, the citadel of
subtitle-intolerance has been stormed” (Collins). However, it remains to be seen
what message U.S. networks and television production companies will take from
the demise of The Bridge US.
In Dead Ringers: The Remake in Theory and Practice (2002), Jennifer Forrest
and Leonard R. Koos, citing French film theorist André Bazin’s belief that showing
foreign films to American audiences would make remakes of them redundant, pose
the rhetorical question “Why would Hollywood want to remake a film that has
earned recognition both for its artistic and/or commercial value, especially if it is
available for rescreening?” (22). The same question could be asked of television
series today. For his part, Blomgren, in a September 2014 interview, does not
foreclose on the possibility of still further remakes of Bron/Broën, acknowledging
that “I’ve had suggestions from maybe 20 different territories, from South America,
Asia, Russia, Ukraine, Italy, Albania,” as well as North and South Korea (Carugati).
The extraordinary popularity of Bron/Broën in the UK and Broadchurch in France
has not deterred producers from setting those stories in another location closer to
‘home,’ but rather the opposite. Meanwhile, the pejorative connotations of ‘remake’
are being erased, due to the high quality of these crime drama productions, the
relative novelty of this kind of series being treated openly as a portable format,
the involvement of the creators of the ‘original’ series in subsequent remakes, and
the insistence of showrunners like Blomgren and Chibnall on the literary value of
their products. It appears that once a remake is made there will be audiences eager
to see it for themselves, perhaps to have their own critical evaluation validated, or
simply because it is becoming part of what it means to be a ‘well-read’ television
viewer today.

Winchester, MA Marla Harris

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 Simultaneous Seriality:
On the Crossmedia Relationship
of Television Narratives
In August 2014, Starz, flagship channel to the large U.S. American premium cable
and satellite television network Starz Inc., aired the first episode of its original
historical drama/romance series Outlander. The series follows the story of World
War II nurse Claire (Caitriona Balfe) who time travels to the Scottish highlands of
the eighteenth century and falls in love with a clansman. The premiere attracted the
channel’s largest audience so far.1 To do justice to Outlander’s fast-paced success
story and heightened audience attention, one has to take into account that the
television show is based on a bestselling, long-running, and still ongoing series
of novels written by author Diana Gabaldon.2 The Outlander series is, in fact, the
most recent example of a group of television narratives that are being developed
from already existing and parallel continuing book or comic series.
This essay explores the interaction between serial texts of a franchise and
takes into account the feedback between television show and book or comic
series, as well as the specific practices of production and reception that these
simultaneously progressing serial narratives facilitate. Besides collecting a body
of texts that can be grouped under what I tentatively label simultaneous seriality,
I will also discuss potential approaches that the fields of adaptation studies and
transmedia storytelling have in store. However, this essay can ultimately only lay
the groundwork for further analyses. A lot is to be gained from considering these
series’ interactions not only concerning different textual strategies but also the
ways in which television narratives are made and received within a “convergence
culture” (Jenkins, Convergence).
An Overview of Simultaneous Series
Every year, the blog Torrent Freak, which features posts about topics surrounding
piracy and collaborative filesharing systems, compiles a list of the most-download-
ed television shows and contrasts this data with the estimated television ratings of
audiences in the United States. Among the most downloaded series between 2009
and 2013 are Game of Thrones (HBO, 2011-), Dexter (Showtime, 2006-2013),
The Walking Dead (AMC, 2010-), or True Blood (HBO, 2008-2014). The figures
can be indicative of audiences’ viewing preferences and illustrate that some of the
currently most popular U.S. American television shows are based on a novel or
comics series. Regarding content, production and reception, there is an obvious
difference between a television series like The Leftovers (HBO, 2014-), that is
derived off a single, standalone publication (Tom Perrota’s The Leftovers) and a
series that is created from an ongoing text on which the narrative development
of the series can have an influence in turn and which can be watched alongside
the ongoing ‘source’ text.

1 Ratings for the Outlander premiere ranged from 3.7 to 5 million (Kang, Selcke).
2 The television series started airing 23 years after Gabaldon had published her first novel in 1991.
At the time of writing this article (November 2014), Gabaldon’s eighth novel made headlines
for outselling Hillary Clinton’s biography Hard Choices (McKinney).

127
 Television Series

Title (Network) Creator/Showrunner Seasons

Outlander (Starz) Ronald D. Moore 1 season (2014-)

Game of Thrones (HBO) D.B. Weiss, David Benioff 4 seasons (2011-)

The Walking Dead (AMC) Frank Darabont (Season 1), 5 seasons (2010-)
Scott Gimple (Season 4 and 5)

True Blood (HBO) Alan Ball 7 seasons (2008-2014)

Gossip Girl (The CW) Josh Schwartz, Stephanie 6 seasons (2007-2012)

Savage

Dexter (Showtime) James Manos, Jr. 8 seasons (2006-2013)

The Vampire Diaries (The Kevin Williamson, Julie Plec 6 seasons (2009-2014)
CW)

Pretty Little Liars (ABC Oliver Goldstick, Marlene 5 seasons (2010-)

Family) King

Rizzoli & Isles (TNT) Janet Tamaro 5 seasons (2010-)

Bones (FOX) Hart Hanson 10 seasons (2005-2014)

The Dresden Files (Sci-Fi Jim Butcher 1 season (2007)

Channel)

Roswell (The WB/UPN) Jason Katims 3 seasons (1999-2002)

Goosebumps (Fox Kids) Deborah Forte, R. L. Stine 4 seasons (1995-1998)

Legend of the Seeker (ABC Sam Raimi 2 seasons (2008-2010)

Studios)

Women’s Murder Club Elizabeth Craft, Sarah Fain 1 season (2007)

(ABC)

Table 1: Overview of simultaneously progressing serial narratives.

128
 Novel or Comic Series

Title (Publisher) Author Installments

Outlander (Random House) Diana Gabaldon 8 novels (1991-2014)

A Song of Ice and Fire George R. R. Martin 5 novels (1996-2011, 2

(Bantam Books) more announced)

The Walking Dead (Image Robert Kirkman, artist: Tony 134 comic books
Comics) Moore /Charlie Adlard

Southern Vampire Mysteries Charlaine Harris 13 novels (2001-2013)

(Ace Books)

Gossip Girl (Little, Brown Cecily von Ziegesar 11 novels (2002-2007),

and Company) prequel (2009) and
sequel (2009)
Dexter (Random House) Jeff Lindsay 7 novels (2004-2013)

The Vampire Diaries L.J. Smith 13 novels (1991/1992,

(Harper Paperbacks) 2009-2014)

Pretty Little Liars (Harper Sara Shepard 15 novels (2006-2014)

Teen)

Maura Isles & Jane Rizzoli- Tess Gerritsen 11 novels (2001-2014)

Series (Ballantine Books)

Temperance Brennan-Series Kathy Reichs 17 novels (1997-2014)

(Scribner)

The Dresden Files (Roc Jim Butcher 15 novels (2002-2014)

Books)

Roswell High (Pocket Melinda Meetz (and others) 10 novels (1998-2000)

Books)

Goosebumps (Scholastic R.L. Stine (and others) 62 novels (1992-1997)

Publishing)

The Sword of Truth (Tor Terry Goodkind 13 novels (1994-2013)

Books)

Women’s Murder Club (Lit- James Patterson 13 novels (2001-2014)

tle, Brown and Company)

129
 While, at first, this group seems to disproportionately consist of current premi-
um cable television shows that primarily fall into the genres of horror and fantasy,
Table 1 provides an overview of all television series that are being produced parallel
to an ongoing, serial text that precedes them. The chronological overlap of both series
is the decisive factor for a crossmedia relationship based on dialog, competition
or response. The table allows to identify other genres within this group: There are
successful (network) shows geared towards teenage or Young Adult audiences, like
Gossip Girl (The CW, 2007-2012), The Vampire Diaries (The CW, 2009-2014), and
Pretty Little Liars (ABC Family, since 2010), for example, as well as series from the
genre of detective or crime fiction, like Bones (Fox, 2005-2014), and Rizzoli and Isles
(TNT, 2010-2014). Any such list could never be exhaustive due to the ongoing sprawl
and vastness of contemporary popular culture.3 Yet, I suggest that considering these
types of material as a phenomenon with diverse but also somewhat similar practices
of reception and production does justice to the connections between the serial texts.
The narratives compiled in the table have all had dedicated audiences before
moving to television. In each case, readers were previously invested in either
characters or storyworlds and producers could rightly assume that these audiences
would be interested in seeing the narratives expand on the small screen as long
as the television series would do justice to the source text’s narrative rules or
aesthetic (cf. Klastrup and Tosca; Jenkins, “The Walking”). Concurrent to relying
on long-running texts with built-in audiences, it is also the commercial interest of
television series to extend their viewership beyond this initial group towards new
consumers who are unfamiliar with the preceding book or comic series.4
Authorship and Simultaneous Seriality
This dilemma of appealing to a variety of viewers is solved differently in the
television series. One strategy of establishing a connection between texts is the way
and the extent to which an author or creator of the preceding series is involved in the
television show, i.e. as executive producer, writer, consultant, or spokesperson. For
instance, novelist Kathy Reichs, who based the protagonist of her crime novel series
on her own experiences as a forensic anthropologist, also produces the television
series Bones. George R.R. Martin, who has experience as television and film writer,

3 I have not included television series that are based on comic characters of the DC or Marvel
superhero universes, e.g. Arrow (The CW, 2012-), Gotham (Fox, 2014-), or Marvel’s Agents
of S.H.I.E.L.D. (ABC, 2013-). While several of the dynamics and practices I describe here
also apply to these series, the process of crossmedia interaction is complicated by practices of
alternative content universes/multiverses and the retrospective alteration of content (retcon/
retroactive continuity). See Kelleter and Stein. Related are U.S. American adaptations or
remakes of Scandinavian television series such as The Bridge (FX, 2013-2014) based on the
Danish and Swedish series Broen (DR1)/Bron (SVT1, 2011-2013) or The Killing (AMC,
2011-2013/Netflix, 2014) based on the Danish Forbrydelsen (DR1, 2007-2012). While the
U.S. versions of these series closely resemble their Scandinavian precedents, their narratives
diverge considerably as the series progresses while still maintaining a close textual relationship
to the foreign original.
4 Although I have monitored various online forums, discussions following episode recaps, and
social media for The Walking Dead, it is hard to determine how large the segment of audiences
exhibiting these reception practices is. At the PCA/ACA National Conference 2014 in Chicago,
Ofer Berenstein, Aiden Buckland, and Angie Chiang presented research on the connection
between comic sales and television ratings. Their findings correspond with my research in
suggesting that audiences tend to migrate in both directions.

130
is involved in some of the writing of the Game of Thrones series for which he is
an executive producer. And while Jeff Lindsay was apparently not involved in the
production of Dexter, he is acknowledged in a cameo role in the third season.
Both the challenge and potential that result from incorporating authorial presence
are especially interesting in the case of The Walking Dead comic creator Robert
Kirkman. Kirkman started to write the comic in 2003 with artist Tony Moore (fol-
lowing issue 7, artist Chris Adlard replaced Moore). The Walking Dead currently
has 135 comic issues and 5 seasons on AMC. Both television and comic series
describe themselves as ‘stories of survival horror’ and focus on the social interactions
in communities of humans formed to survive hostile surroundings after a zombie
apocalypse. Kirkman functions as executive producer of the television series, he
is part of the writers’ room and was credited with the writing of seven episodes so
far.5 Whereas others have talked about the complicated conditions under which the
show was developed (Platts), the way it confused AMC’s developing brand identity
(Jaramillo 179), and the “slow-burn narrative” format of the network’s other programs
(Smith), little has been said about Kirkman’s connection to the television series.
Kirkman has occupied a very central position as the creator of the franchise and
spokesperson and/or author figure for both the television series as well as the comic
series. Therefore, he is positioned to provide continuity and fill a void caused by
the fluctuation of showrunners (Frank Darabont, Glen Mazzara, Scott M. Gimple).
This dual author role may cater to the audiences’ desire for a unifying author figure
but also privileges the reception of both texts alongside each other.6
Possible Frameworks:
Transmedia Storytelling and Adaptation Studies
The sprawling tendencies of so many current media texts are often subsidized under
the label of transmedia storytelling. The term has become a buzzword in the past years
and continues to be attractive to practitioners, academics and journalists alike. Whereas
Marsha Kinder was the first to introduce the term “transmedia entertainment” in her
study of children’s franchises, the person whose name has been permanently attached
to the concept is Henry Jenkins. His frequently quoted definition is:
Transmedia storytelling represents a process where integral elements of a fiction get
dispersed systematically across multiple delivery channels for the purpose of creating a
unified and coordinated entertainment experience. Ideally, each medium makes its own
unique contribution to the unfolding of the story. (“Transmedia”)

Jenkins has adamantly argued against a very broad use of the concept and it is his
notion that each text has to contribute something new and unique to the franchise,
that has been heavily debated especially with regard to the question of whether

5 Season 1, Episode 4 (1.4.) “Vatos,” 2.1. “What Lies Ahead” (co-written with Ardeth Bey),
2.13. “Besides the Dying Fire” (co-written with Glen Mazzara), 3.8. “Made to Suffer,” 4.3.
“Isolation,” 4.9. “After,” and 5.2. “Strangers.”
6 After AMC had picked up the rights to the comic in 2009, Kirkman announced his involvement
in the upcoming television series in the comic’s letter column “Letter Hacks.” The letter column
has since then become a space in which the comic is discussed alongside the television show
with readers responding to plots developments of both, discussing possibilities of adaptation,
and media affordances of each. See Stein on letter columns and authorship practices; Jenkins,
“The Walking.” In my dissertation project, I analyze the “Letter Hacks” as authorized paratext
of the television series.

131
adaptations have a place within transmedia storytelling and are able to provide
their “own unique contribution” (cf. Dena; Cardwell).
A second theoretical framework for understanding the interaction between the
different serial texts of a franchise comes from the field of adaptation studies. How-
ever, the much lamented textual fidelity/infidelity debate with its inherent dynamics
of evaluation and hierarchization continues to haunt the field because analyses are
often based on the primacy of a source text (cf. Cobb; Leitch). With regard to the
simultaneously progressing texts that inform each other, hierarchies of one text over
the other are evoked by producers of the second text (in the rhetoric of wanting
to do justice) and sparingly by audiences when it comes to expressing personal
preferences of either one text (cf. Proctor). Yet, television and comic or novel series
are not evaluated or measured up against each other in the fashion of for example
Shakespearian plays and their film adaptations. In the case of The Walking Dead,
Game of Thrones or True Blood, critics and/or recappers of the television shows have
turned to the book or comic series in order to predict plot or character developments.
As Sanders has argued, adaptations always reinforce the canonical status of the
texts they adapt (120). However, the largely synchronically, simultaneous series
seem to rather reinforce each other. Overall, it is surprising how little echoes the
crossmedia relationship of these texts has sparked in their (critical) receptions.
Audiences are aware of the existence of the other serial narrative and while not
every consumer may turn to that text, they do confess interest in its development
as is evident in social media or message board discussions. Instead of viewing this
other series as something that has to do justice or done justice to an ‘original’ in the
sense of textual fidelity, these audiences consider it as part of the same franchise
that uses different means to present a familiar narrative.7
Jason Mittell suggests that Jenkins’ concept describes an ideal type and cannot
account for the practical circumstances of television production.8 Mittell goes on
to refer to that ideal type as “balanced transmedia” and distinguishes it from what
he calls “unbalanced transmedia,” in which the center of a transmedia franchise is
clearly identified as the television series with corresponding transmedia extensions
functioning as paratexts (220-22). In other words – and Mittell draws on a term
that Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse have used to describe the position of their
television series Lost (ABC, 2004-2010) at the center of a transmedia franchise:
television storytellers must privilege the mothership by designing experiences that viewers
can consume in a wide range of ways without sacrificing coherence or engagement,
regardless of how aware they may be of the paratextual extensions. (222)

The “mothership” metaphor is not only an apt visualization of “unbalanced trans-

media storytelling” but also of the relationship between simultaneously serial texts.
According to Mittell, transmedia extensions serve to keep audiences interested in the
“mothership” (the television series), especially during the gaps in-between episodes
or seasons (222). These paratextual “satellites” provide additional information but
are not necessary for the “passengers” on the “mothership.” In regard to simulta-
neous seriality, one could picture not one but two “motherships” with paratextual

7 AMC has understood these reception practices and attempts to capitalize on them with the
development of a spin-off series set in the same narrative universe as The Walking Dead
(Ausiello).
8 On industry practices and perspectives, see Evans; and Dena.

132
satellites possibly referring to either one or both. Contentwise, the ships may follow
similar or different routes; their paths may cross, but also widely diverge at other
times. Audiences may travel on one ship or on both, or they may treat one ship as the
paratext of the other ship. Because different segments of audiences will approach the
series differently, the texts have to accommodate for all of these possible scenarios.
Seriality enables or forces these texts to interact with one another concerning devel-
opments of plot, characters or storyworld. As my case study on The Walking Dead will
illustrate, rather than solely intertextual references (e.g. the mise en scène of significant
scenes of the television series that restage covers of the comic book) the different texts
may also explore different aspects of a theme.9 The relationship between both texts has
to be understood not as a fixed configuration but rather as an ongoing process in which
both occupy different positions, imitating, supplementing, contrasting or competing
with one another.10 These considerations raise pertinent questions concerning the impact
of such a dynamic process of intermedial exchange on the storytelling mechanics, and
the types and moments of interactions between the narratives.
During a Q&A following the world premiere of Outlander, the show’s creator
and showrunner, Battlestar Galactica (Sci-Fi, 2004-2009) veteran Ronald D. Moore,
was asked how closely he planned on following the books in the television series.
Moore answered:
The plan is to be as faithful to the books as we can … the show has its own life. The
show has its own, you know, story going forward. So you do make changes … I think
our intention is always to be as true to the path that Diana [Gabaldon] has laid out for
us and when we make a variation, then we try to bend it back, you know, one way or
the other. If we can’t bend it back, right away, then eventually we will bend it back in
another format. (Starz)

This symbol of a path is something the creator of The Walking Dead television series
(and showrunner for the first season), Frank Darabont, has also repeatedly invoked in
interviews: “[We will] take every, every interesting d-tour we feel like taking as long
as in the long run we’re still following what Robert [Kirkman] has done … expand
the narrative … veer off the path as long as we get back on it” (“Making Of”).
Transmedia storytelling and adaptation studies maintain that there is something to
be gained by not viewing these texts as different entities but instead being aware of
the ‘paths’ they travel on and diverge from. The following case study of The Walking
Dead is informed by this theoretical inquiry into the nature of simultaneous seriality,
transmedia storytelling and adaptation studies. However, the ongoing controversies
surrounding the nature of transmedia storytelling and which texts might or might not be
grouped under such a label as well as the textual fidelity/infidelity dilemma are surely
justified within academic fields, but ultimately tell us more about the participants in
these debates than the material they analyze.11
Hence, I will focus on the relationship and dialog of the two (in this case: even
three) simultaneously progressing “motherships” in The Walking Dead franchise.

9 On the theme of parenthood, see Sulimma.

10 Kelleter and Jahn-Sudmann have described this occurrence as serial one-upmanship or outbid-
ding (“Überbietung”), a “strategy of competitive continuity” in serial narratives (Kelleter 8).
11 My research is indebted to the work developed and discussed within the interdisciplinary
Research Unit “Popular Seriality – Aesthetics and Practice” (www.popularseriality.de/en/).
I especially thank Bettina Soller, Britta Lesniak, and Kathleen Loock for their productive
feedback, corrections, and support of my research and earlier versions of this essay.

133
 “We are the Walking Dead”
in Comic, TV Series, and Games Series
The Walking Dead franchise has been situated within the discourse of “Quality Tele-
vision” (Hassler-Forest) or the framework of adaptation studies (Proctor; Jenkins,
“The Walking”). William Proctor understands the series as part of what he calls a
“Zombie Matrix,” i.e. as a remake of existing zombie movies such as George A.
Romero’s films or Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later (6). While this analysis enables
him to place the franchise in a certain tradition, Proctor neglects that The Walking
Dead is foremost a serial narrative. In the words of Todd Platts: “The Walking Dead
continues this tradition, but with a simple catch – the story never ends” (294). It is
precisely this notion of a never-ending zombie film that is evoked repeatedly as a
new or unique attribute of the franchise. Ultimately, by not having all characters
rescued by some type of militia or eaten by zombies at the end of a film, the franchise
is able to place a central appeal of zombie narratives, namely the issue of ongoing
survival horror, the handling of trauma and the connected question of ‘what would
you do in a zombie apocalypse’ at its core.12
When it comes to surviving the undead, media savvy audiences are at an ad-
vantage over the characters. Kirkman has stated on several occasions that zombie
films do not exist in the narrative universe of The Walking Dead. Hence, characters
do not know what these creatures are or what to call them: Walkers, lurkers, biters,
roamers, deadheads?
“We are the walking dead”/ “We’re all dead” is a key scene in the franchise
because it establishes that the title-giving ‘walking dead’ are in fact not the zom-
bies but the characters attempting to survive in a post-apocalypse environment.
It confirms the audience’s growing realization that instead of the zombies – that
provide genre fare and gory scenes – the primary narrative focus is on the abysmal
depths of the humans, and the question of what they will do to each other in order
to survive. I want to look at the different renditions of this significant scene in the
comic, television series and video game.13
In comic book issue 15, protagonist Rick is shocked to discover that two mem-
bers of his group, Julie and Chris, reanimate as zombies after having committed
suicide. Prior to this, characters (and readers) had assumed that a person had to
be bitten by a zombie in order to contract the deadly disease that would turn him
or her into a zombie. Rick goes to the rest of his group and tells them what has
happened. But he downplays the event and tells everyone to go back to sleep. The
next panel shows Rick in bed next to his wife Lori and son Carl, wide-awake with
his features expressing sheer terror. The following day, Lori finds Rick filling up
a motorcycle to leave the prison that their group has found refuge in. He tells her:
I haven’t slept. I laid up awake last night, thinking about Julie and Chris. If they revived
without a bite – that means we’re ALL infected – or could be. That means we’re just
waiting to die before we come back as one of those things. The more I think about it – I
realized there’s something I have to do. I think it is best you not know. I promise you
wouldn’t want to. (8)

12 Cf. Max Brooks’ Zombie Survival Guide (2003) or the “Zombie Research Society” (http://
zombieresearchsociety.com/).
13 Release/publication dates of the scene: January to November 2005 (comic); 18 March 2012
(TV); 27 June 2012 (game).

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Rick travels back to the grave of his former best friend Shane who had betrayed his
trust, slept with Lori, and challenged the position as leader that Rick had quickly
acquired upon joining their group of survivors. When Rick calls out at the grave, the
reanimated Zombie-Shane claws itself through the earth. Rick remains calm and utters:
So I guess it’s not an isolated thing – coming back without being bitten. I thought it
might be. Julie turned pretty quick. But it took us hours to get you into the ground. So
many damn questions. When I realized you might be at the bottom of that hole, alive – or
whatever – I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I couldn’t sleep – knowing you were down
there. Would you have left me? (19)

Because Shane had never been bitten, Rick’s suspicion is confirmed. Characters in
the series carry whatever it is that turns the dead into reanimated zombies in their
own bodies. In the subsequent issues, characters find more evidence for this new
narrative rule (and readers expressed their surprise, hesitation but also admiration
of this development in the comic’s letter column). Nine issues later, in comic book
24, Rick wakes up from a coma as a consequence of a brutal fight with his close
friend Tyreese in which both men had tragically confronted one another about the
atrocities they had committed in order to survive and supposedly protect the group.
The violence of their past deeds had joined with the physical violence against each
other, while the members of their group were too shocked to intervene. Rick awakes
to be told that because his dark secrets had been revealed, his sole leadership position
has been compromised. Instead, the group of survivors wishes to be governed by
a committee of which Rick would still be a part. Rick agrees with this decision
but confronts the group about their mistrust of him. In this scene, Rick who is
heavily injured, his face covered with several bandages and one eye bruised shut,
aggressively pleads his case. He insists that the world around them has changed and
his cruel choices had been necessary for their survival. When Tyreese, who again
functions as his adversary, tries to emphasize that morality is what distinguishes
human from the zombie, Rick picks up on this:
We’re surrounded by the Dead. We’re AMONG them – and when we finally give up we
become them! We’re living on borrowed time here. Every minute of our life is a minute we
steal from them! You see them out there. You KNOW that when we die – we BECOME
them. You think we hide behind walls to protect us from the walking dead! Don’t you
get it? WE ARE THE WALKING DEAD! (18-21)

The last exclamation is then repeated less aggressively (indicated by a smaller font)
and with Rick facing the ground while all other characters stare at him in shock.
In this last panel, which encompasses one page and ends the issue, the focus is on
the other characters and how they (together with the readers) take in the extent of
this revelation while Rick’s figure is covered in shade (Fig. 1).
In the television series, the reveal is part of several surprising plot develop-
ments of the second season’s finale (“Besides the Dying Fire”). This season had
almost exclusively been set on the Greene family’s farm which characters stumble
upon in a moment of crisis and where they remain until they are forced to flee
when the farm is overrun by an enormous herd of zombies. During their escape,
several characters are killed and the survivors are on the road again. The “We
are the walking dead” sequence starts with the characters stopping their vehicles
and getting together on an abandoned street that is covered in autumn leaves.
The conversation is tense, several characters hold on to their weapons and look

135
 Figure 1: Variations of a scene – groups of c­ haracters
gather to hear the narrative revelation.

around for possible threats. They are clearly shaken up and struggle to come to
terms with what has happened to them. While especially the female characters
seem panicked and prioritize getting the things they need for survival, Rick
(Andrew Lincoln) refuses to let the group split up in order to run errands: “We’re
together. We keep it that way.” Rick clearly functions as the narrative center of
this conversation. Other characters directly address him and ask him what to do,
with male characters like Hershel (Scott Wilson) and Daryl (Norman Reedus)
stepping in to confirm his decisions. The scene establishes Rick as the leader: He
makes binding decisions for everyone. Yet, it also illustrates how other characters
start to speak up and question his authority.
DARYL: You know I found Randall, right? He turned. But he wasn’t bit.
BETH (directly addresses Rick): How is that possible?
LORI: Like what the hell happened?
DARYL: Shane killed Randall. Just like he always wanted to.
LORI (asks RICK): And then the herd [of walkers] got him?
RICK: We’re all infected.
DARYL: What?
RICK: At the CDC, Jenner told me. Whatever it is, we all carry it.
CAROL: And you never said anything?
RICK: Would it have made a difference?
GLENN: You knew this the whole time!
RICK: How could I have known for sure. You saw how crazy that …
GLENN: That is not your call! Okay, when I found out about the walkers in the barn,
I told, for the good of everyone.
RICK: I thought it best that people didn’t know.

136
In the following scenes, the camera lingers on the other characters’ shocked, confused
and angry faces in close-ups and then captures how Rick aggressively counters the
other characters’ stare. His face is not as severely injured as his comic counterpart’s
is, but smeared with blood. Similar to the comic, Rick’s interaction with the group is
marked by hostility and the questioning of his decisions and leadership capabilities.
Especially the female characters – Beth (Emily Kinney), Carol (Melissa McBride),
Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies), in a later scene Maggie (Lauren Conrad) – are critical
of Rick, while characters like Hershel or Daryl will go on to express their trust in
his leadership for the remainder of the episode. The only character of color, T-Dog
(IronE Singleton), stares at Rick in disbelief after the revelation, yet does not express
any opinion. Glenn’s (Steven Yeun) exclamation (“You knew this whole time!”)
gains special importance because it works like a meta-comment, a character is
expressing the audiences’ reaction. Like the characters, viewers are surprised to find
a plot they had thought abandoned after the first season, picked up and explained
in the second season’s finale.14 Like the characters, the audience may be wondering
why Rick was never shown giving thought to such a major piece of information
and what else he might possibly withhold from them.
In the DVD audio commentary, executive producer and showrunner Glen
Mazzara adds that Rick, while not being entirely sure if he could believe scientist
Jenner’s (Noah Emmerich) claim, revealed this knowledge because the group was
getting too close to asking questions about Shane’s (Jon Bernthal) death whom
Rick had murdered him in self-defense. By means of this information he hopes
to focus the group’s attention on something else and then walks off by himself
to leave everyone standing in shock (Fig. 1). The second season of the television
series, had been criticized (but also praised by some) for its slow-paced narration,
focus on character development and character interaction that primarily consisted
of one-on-one dialogs. This also makes that sequence stand out in the context of
the overall season because the entire group of survivors is seldom shown in the
same scene or even in the same camera frame.
The company Telltale Games has extended the franchise, when it started de-
veloping a commercially successful video game series in association with Robert
Kirkman’s company Skybound Entertainment. 15 The “We are the Walking Dead”
scene in the game series is part of the first season’s second installment “Starved
for Help.”16 The character (avatar) to be navigated by gamers, Lee Everett, and his
protégé Clementine camp at a fortified and barricaded motel together with a group
of survivors they have met in the previous episode. So far, all the characters of
the video game series are original creations and do not appear in either comic or
television with two notable exceptions: Hershel and Glenn. In this episode, food
scarcity and hunger quickly become the central themes. After two new characters

14 Chris Hardwick, host of the after-show talk show Talking Dead that features cast, crew, and
celebrity fans who discuss the latest episode, asked producer and showrunner Glen Mazzara:
“So why was it important for Rick to hold this information all season?” Note how the television
series, through this paratextual talk show, influences how its episodes are being interpreted.
Within the franchise, the talk show functions very much like the letter column in the comic
issues.
15 Cf. Sulimma for a discussion of the game series.
16 Within game studies, the question whether to consider games as narratives and which function
storytelling may have in regard to gameplay has resulted in the “ludology vs. narratology
debate.” Cf. Denson and Jahn-Sudmann (5-8).

137
join the group, tensions over leadership erupt with hothead Kenny telling leader
Lilly: “You know, you like to think you are the leader of this little group, but we
can make our own goddamn decisions! This isn’t your own personal dictatorship!”
This struggle against a single person making decisions for a larger group has also
been a significant part of the way the ‘reveal’-scene unfolds in the comic and
television series. Unlike Rick, here it is a female character claiming authority. Lilly’s
increasingly difficult and unappreciated position is portrayed as she clashes with
Kenny. By means of Lee, players have to decide whom to align with in this conflict.
One of the newcomers to the group is severely injured and dies relatively soon.
Even though this character was not bitten, he turns into a zombie and attacks Lee.
Once the player manages to get away from the zombie in a stressful quick-time-
event, the entire group turns to the other newcomer, Ben, and questions him.
KENNY: Why didn’t you tell us he was bitten?
BEN: What?
KENNY: He was bitten and you didn’t say a goddamn word!!
BEN: But he wasn’t bitten! I swear!
KENNY: Well your “not-bitten” friend here came back to life and tried to kill my wife!
BEN: What?!! Wait, you all don’t know?
KENNY: What the hell are you talking about?
BEN: It’s not the bite that does it. [pause, characters gather around him] You come
back no matter how you die. If you don’t destroy the brain, that’s just what
happens. It’s gonna happen to all of us.
LEE (dialog option): You’re lying. / We’re all infected? (my choice) / God help us. /
(Say nothing).
BEN: I … I guess so. I don’t know … All I know is that I’ve seen people turn who I
know were never bitten.

Within the larger plot of each text, the scene follows the loss of the farm in the
television series, the establishment of the prison as a safe space in the comic, and the
search for food that drives characters out of their camp in the game series. Similar to
this, the characters of the television show are also in need of shelter and resources.
In the comic, characters are no longer on the run from zombies, but are able to get
to know each other better and have to deal with what they find out about each other
(be it murder, brutality, or sexual infidelity). In the game, the scene functions as a
climax to the dire situation (no food, little resources) that kicks off the main plot of
the respective installment (the conflict with the cannibal St. John family).

Figure 2: The character Rick revealing the narrative development.

In both the television and comic series, protagonist Rick reveals to the group that
everyone carries ‘it’ in their bodies. In the game series, Ben, a minor, relatively unknown
character, is the one to explain this narrative rule. Unlike the bloody and injured Rick,
who seems so obviously transformed by the hostile surroundings of the post-apocalypse,

138
teenager Ben appears harmless and vulnerable (Fig. 2). Ben stays with the survivors after
this scene but time after time puts the members of his group at risk with his irresponsible
and naïve behavior (which also accounts for rare instances of humor in the game).
Yet, in all media the person who reveals the truth does so to secure his position within
the group, to make the others either understand his motivation for questionable
deeds (comic) or to distract from other contested issues (TV, game). While Rick
wants to remain the leader of the group, in the game series, newcomer Ben hopes
to become a member of the group, and, as he is clearly the outsider who is lowest
on the totem pole, has to defend himself against accusations.
The dialog between the different texts of the franchise becomes most prominent
in the tensions regarding leadership and decision-making. In the comic series, it is
the tension building up to a climax in this scene that results in the establishment of a
committee to govern the survivors. In the television series, this scene manifests both
the general distrust the group members (especially the female characters) have in
Rick and the extremes he is willing to go to if he feels them justified. At the end of
the second season, this realization about their leader combined with the characters’
traumatic loss of the farm creates an urgent need to find a new safe place as soon
as possible. This is foreshadowed in the last frame showing the prison as the new
location for the third season.
The comic series provides a string of different scenes in the issues 15 to 24, in
which characters discuss the impact of this new knowledge, that then climax in Rick’s
monumental declaration “We are the walking dead!” as a confirmation of the comic’s
actual interest. By comparison, neither the television series nor game series grant this
discovery as much space within their overall plots. Neither text has the characters
explicitly phrase these actual words but they build up on this information in a shorter,
yet more subtle fashion. In regard to the television show, this left audiences debating
if Rick would ever utter this exact phrase or at which moment of the television series
this would have worked best.17 In the comic series, Rick also sets out to confirm his
suspicion, while in the game and on television other characters simply accept this
literally game-changing information as truth about the world they live in. If these texts
are understood as partaking in serial conversations, it makes sense that neither television
nor game series have resorted to such a repetition. Instead, the focus of both television
show and game series is less on a thematic repositioning of the Walking Dead brand
and more about the characters and their responses. Both do not linger on the effects the
revelation has on their characters for a long time but quickly move on to other crucial
moments, such as the first appearance of the much anticipated, fan favorite character
Michonne (Danai Gurira) in the television series or the introduction of the episode’s
villains (the St. John brothers) right after Ben’s last exclamation in the game.
The responses between texts can also be detected in the scenes’ sound as well
as visuals.18 In both video game and television series, the scene is accompanied by
strings that very subtly sneak in following the reveal and that successfully blend
with the sounds of the characters’ surroundings (in all media the scene happens
outdoors) such as insects or the wind blowing leaves. In both scenes, the sound is
marked by polysemic, unsettling harmonies and not accentuated rhythms which
may leave players or viewers with feelings of sadness but also disorientation as the
sound refuses to offer any musical anchor points.
17 Cf. reddit discussions (BleedTheFreak_23).
18 The comic book series does only rarely deploy onomatopoeia.

139
 Visually, the comic series sets the scene at the end of spring with the sun burning
down and characters sweating while planting crops on a field in the prison courtyard. The
bright sun explains the heavy use of shadows and light to emphasize certain characters
(Fig. 1). Television and game series depict a location close to a forest, during or at the
beginning of fall. The falling leaves and gray, cold light of this scene anticipate winter
and serve to express the characters' disillusioned feelings of threat and anxiety.
The scene in its different iterations is central to the self-understanding of the
franchise and its reception. It breaks with conventions of the zombie horror film
because there is no escape from the apocalypse. There is no safe haven as everyone
carries the threat in his or her own body, any character could die and then turn at any
given moment. This establishes human interaction and the depths of what humans
will do to each other in order to survive as the central theme of The Walking Dead
in all connected series.
Each series takes up this notion yet re-focuses the question in order to explore
different aspects of the theme. The comic series takes its time to establish the new
knowledge of the storyworld with a plot in which Rick sets out to confirm his
suspicion and talks with other characters about the implications thereof in various
scenes. Whereas the comic is most explicit (and also chronologically first), its
narrative attention is focused on what the reveal means for the storyworld and
the characters’ survival in it. The television (and game series) can build up on
this previous exploration. In the AMC series, the scene is about the protagonist;
characters (and audiences) are left shocked about how Rick could have kept such
a secret, who he has become and whether his murder of Shane was really justified.
The game series in turn has an unknown character reveal this knowledge and due
to its media specificity, gives players the choice of uttering their own response via
the selection of different dialog options.
Conclusion
This essay prepares the groundwork for further consideration of the discussed group
of narratives (Tab. 1) as a phenomenon of simultaneous seriality. I have argued for
an understanding of the conversations, supplements, corrections, contradictions and
competitions that characterize the relationship of a connected television, comic and
game series, as enabled through their mutual, responding, simultaneous progression.
Likewise, serial conversations, similar to those I explored for The Walking Dead,
also take place for television shows and corresponding novel series. For Outlander,
the relationship of the relatively new television series and established novel series
will evolve as the serial narratives are progressing.
While any analysis will struggle to do justice to the vastness of these narratives
and their proliferating intersections, adaptation studies and transmedia storytelling
provide promising entry points. Especially Mittell’s notion of “unbalanced trans-
media storytelling,” that has informed my case study, is helpful for conceptualizing
the practices producers and audiences of these texts employ and that in turn shape
the narratives. Crossmedia serial franchises raise interesting questions about texts,
industry practices and audience dynamics that might enrich the current debates
informing the fields of adaptation studies and transmedia storytelling.

Berlin Maria Sulimma

140
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All illustrations are from the Walking Dead comic, television, or video game series.
They are solely reproduced for analytical purposes and all rights are held by Image
Comics, Skybound, AMC, or TellTale Games.

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 Binge-watching: How Netflix Original Programs
Are Changing Serial Form
What if you could radically alter the way stories get told? What if the way people
wanted to consume content actually changed what you could make?
(Ted Sarandos, chief content officer of Netflix, 2013)1

When Netflix announced in 2011 that it would be producing original programming

in order to increase subscription rates and compete with premium TV channels such
as HBO, they were counting on ‘binge-watching’ to anchor their business model. To
binge-watch – according to the Oxford Dictionaries 2013 Word of the Year website
which short-listed the term – means “to watch multiple episodes of a television pro-
gram in rapid succession, typically by means of DVDs or digital streaming.” Users
of automated digital video records such as TiVo and, long before that, of manually
programmed VHS recording devices had been bingeing on accumulated episodes of
favorite programs since the late 1970s, but binge-watching as a cultural phenomenon
has only come into view in the past few years. If binge-watching burgeoned when
it became an internet-based fan activity, the Netflix interface reinforces it with a
mechanically produced forward motion akin to what Raymond Williams identified
as the intentional “flow” of broadcast TV programs and commercials in the days
before the invention of remote controls. Starting out as a menu requiring the user
to select each individual episode for viewing, the user-interface for streaming TV
shows on Netflix has evolved into the current screen that instantly starts a countdown
as soon as one episode has ended: “next episode begins in 14, 13, 12, 11 seconds.”
The viewer – who might have chosen to pause for a more substantial break between
traditionally produced TV episodes that were, after all, created to air at least a week
apart – hardly has enough time to decide to stop the video stream before the next
installment has begun.
Binge-watching and primetime TV serials are intimately connected.2 To be
sure, fans can binge on favorite old-school sitcoms and procedurals where every
episode moves from static situation through complications to closure, but the
forward narrative pull of long-form serial television programs is profoundly suited
to binge-watching. The ability to move instantly from one season’s cliffhanger
to the next season premiere’s Big Reveal has altered the emotional dynamics
of watching serialized television. Netflix founder Reed Hastings has spoken of
traditional televised serials’ dependence on “managed dissatisfaction” as a strategy
for bringing viewers back every week (qtd. in Hass). Because it does not depend
on motivating viewers to remember to tune in again next week, the Netflix model
allows a departure from the conventional serial pattern of recaps and cliffhangers,
taking advantage of the viewer’s ability to stream episodes in rapid succession
rather than having to experience the dissatisfaction of waiting seven days for the

1 Sarandos qtd. in Hass.

2 A note on terminology: in U.S. usage a television ‘series’ is a set of programs linked by brand-
ing, cast, setting, genre and production, typically aired weekly for the first run, and – when
successful – renewed beyond a single season, or programming year. A ‘serial’ is a series that
incorporates a larger story-arc across installments. All television serials are series, but not all
series are serials.

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next installment. Just as viewing patterns have changed, so might the narrative
structure of serials be changing to reflect the formal innovations made possible
by DVDs and streaming.
This essay looks at the basic narrative structure of three Netflix original
series – Arrested Development (2013), House of Cards (2013-), and Orange is the
New Black (2013-) – to identify the differences between these serials and those that
are produced to be watched episodically before they circulate in ‘bingeable’ form.
Both House of Cards and Orange is the New Black are recognizably episodic in
their structures: their episodes imitate the pattern of rising intensities and suspended
resolutions long familiar from serialized primetime shows going all the way back
to Dallas (CBS, 1978-1991). Each has its idiosyncrasies born of the streaming
format (for example, House of Cards offers next to no recapitulation of previous
plot points, and Orange is the New Black subordinates forward-moving chronology
to episodic structure as it reveals the backstories of each of the secondary characters
throughout the season), but neither is fundamentally different in structure from the
serials that have preceded it in the genre that has come to be called ‘quality TV.’3
Netflix’s version of Arrested Development, however, departs radically from the
typical serial form. Having begun with the concept that the episodes could be
watched in any order, the writers of Arrested Development’s fourth season shuffled
and revisited plot points from the perspectives of all its characters, explaining in one
episode what was only obscurely glimpsed in an earlier one.4 Although the producers
eventually settled on an order in which to present the series for maximum comic
effect, the constant looping back through time within and between the episodes
establishes a new way to structure serial narrative. Before discussing the narrative
innovations that Arrested Development introduces, I will consider in more detail
the phenomenon of binge-watching, then analyze the effects that binge-ability
has on the more apparently conventional House of Cards and Orange Is the New
Black. Though the first two seasons of each of these series are admittedly more
formally familiar than Arrested Development Season 4, they answer Sarandos’s
questions more subtly. All three series use serial form in unusual ways that the
direct-to-streaming format makes possible.
1. Serials and Binge-ability
From Victorian novels to HBO classics of quality TV, serials have been “broken on
purpose,” to use Sean O’Sullivan’s resonant phrase. O’Sullivan has been developing
a sophisticated poetics of serial breaks, demonstrating that the arrangement of
episodes in a serialized television drama like Deadwood (HBO, 2004-2006) or The
Sopranos (HBO, 1999-2007) follows a pattern nearly as conventionalized as sonnet
form. Just as sonnets can be Shakespearean, Spenserian, or Petrarchan, there are
variations on the plot patterns of serialized shows, but even the variations can be
predicted as any given series follows an established progression through exposition,
complication, and partial resolution to the cliffhanger that ends a typical season
and brings viewers back the next year. With serial form comes serialized viewing,

3 See Blanchet for a useful summary of Robert J. Thompson’s formulation of what makes
‘quality TV.’
4 The creator of Arrested Development, Mitchell Hurwitz, explains the decision to make the
series sequential after having planned to let it follow a “choose your own adventure” format.
See Martin.

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a practice that has by now been extensively studied. Television studies as a field
has elaborated the effects of serial reception, from the emergence of ‘water-cooler
conversations’ among coworkers rehashing the previous night’s episode and making
predictions about future installments; to the formation of interpretive communities
both real and virtual; to the activities of fans who gather online not just to talk about
what is happening on their favorite shows but sometimes to compose alternate
versions of serial storyworlds; to the advent of ‘spoiler alerts’ in online and print
publication, in-person conversation, and conference presentations alike.5 When
available technology required everyone to watch episodes at the same time on the
nights they were originally broadcast and/or re-run, the experience of watching
serials and of communicating with others about TV-watching was significantly
different from what it is today.6
Most published scholarship still assumes the experience of an episodic break
as the norm for watching television serials. In their introduction to the excellent
2005 collection Narrative Strategies in Television Series, Gaby Allrath, Marion
Gymnich, and Carola Surkamp acknowledge that the availability of streaming video
and DVDs allow viewers to watch series without interruptions for commercials or
breaks between episodes, “which to a certain extent counteracts the segmentation
of the series” (8). They conclude that “one can, however, assume that watching the
episodes of a series at their original broadcasting time remains the default mode
of reception” (8). If that was the case in 2005, it is no longer true, mainly because
of wildly successful marketing attempts on the part of services like iTunes and
Amazon (where viewers can buy episodes or seasons of series at will), of cable com-
panies marketing series ‘On Demand,’ of Netflix, and now of Amazon Prime, which
has begun offering free streaming of its own original programs like Transparent
(Amazon, 2014-) – as well as the entire back-catalogue of the HBO quality-TV
classics – to its subscribers. Jason Mittell’s important new poetics of “complex
television” acknowledges the binge-viewing experience that was originally enabled
by boxed sets of DVDs, though he explains that episodic viewing is still the norm
for television scholarship’s conception of the TV experience. As he puts it, “while
the broadcast original is what makes a program an example of ‘television’ as it is
traditionally understood, the DVD version serves as the long-term record of a series
as it will be consumed and remembered in the future” (39).
Mittell compares bingeing on cliffhanger-driven series such as 24 (Fox,
2001-2010) to “a mad rush for narrative payoff, prompting a binge mentality
comparable to the compulsive ‘eatability’ of a bag of salty snacks” (39). Not just for
Mittell, but for scholars and media commentators alike, the negative connotations
of ‘bingeing’ connect continuous TV serial-watching with damaging behaviors
like compulsive overeating, bulimia, alcoholism, and drug addiction.7 Viewers of

5 This work goes back at least as far as feminist analysis of soap-opera viewership in the early
1980s, research into the ‘slash fiction’ fad for producing Kirk/Spock or Starsky/Hutch stories
that queered popular television series in 1970s ‘zines, and important pop-culture theories of
fan culture such as Henry Jenkins’s 1992 Textual Poachers, recently updated and released in
a 20th anniversary edition.
6 See the very funny episode of Portlandia (Season 3, Episode 2) in which a dinner-party
conversation becomes paralyzed by the four participants’ wish to avoid spoiler alerts while
discussing the TV series they have been watching at different paces.
7 Anne Moore’s Tufts University dissertation offers a sophisticated and non-judgmental approach
to understanding the links between serial-bingeing, addiction, and recovery.

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Portlandia (IFC, 2011-) will recall the episode (Season 2, Episode 2) in which Fred
(Armisen) and Carrie (Brownstein) become so addicted to bingeing on Battlestar
Galactica (SciFi, 2004-2009) they stop working, socializing, cooking, and bathing.
When their withdrawals from the series’ finale become unbearable, Fred and Carrie
assemble a ragtag cast and crew to produce more episodes, extending the satire
from a spoof of addictive binge-watching to a parody of the way fans produce
online extensions of favorite storyworlds. Portlandia’s satiric take on the idea
that binge-watching and addiction are identically problematic makes the same
joke as a mock-public service announcement on the Entertainment Weekly web-
site (McHenry). Visually presented as a real PSA, this video recruits actors from
‘binge-worthy’ serials like Parks and Recreation (NBC, 2009-), Orange Is the
New Black, and Pretty Little Liars (ABC Family, 2010-) to deliver straight-faced
warnings against “an epidemic sweeping the country that we need to talk about.”
Earnest-looking celebrities itemize supposed dangers like accidentally binge-watch-
ing CNN (“You’ll never finish” because “it is not something that has an ending
nor a beginning”), or “cross-contaminating” your binge-watching by alternating
episodes between shows and thus confusing the brain “and also overtax[ing] the
tiny gnomes inside the streaming services who are queuing up the episodes just for
you.” The makers of TV serials have a vested interest in viewers’ enthusiasm for
bingeing, not to mention in ridiculing commentators who portray binge-watching
as genuinely harmful.
Not all mass-media critiques of binge-watching are satirical. A 2012 Slate essay
by Jim Pagels decries the binge-watching “pandemic,” arguing that TV’s intrinsic
formal properties cannot be appreciated unless episodes are consumed intermit-
tently. According to Pagels (who appears to be perfectly sincere), the integrity of
individual episodes must be respected, the effects of cliffhangers and suspense
must be maintained, and episode recaps and online communities must be consult-
ed in order for viewers to experience the full impact of the TV form. Evidently
the notion of television-as-art has now moved out of the academy and into the
mainstream. The fact of binge-watching appears to threaten the principles of a
now-conservative television aesthetic, although some mass-media commentators
do appear to recognize the parallels between what is happening to television and
what happened to the popular fiction that was serialized in the nineteenth century.
Time magazine remarks that “one reason television has become so powerful as a
medium is that serial dramas – The Wire [HBO, 2002-2008], Breaking Bad [AMC,
2008-2013] – have taken advantage of its linear nature. The ability to binge-watch
them on DVD or streaming sites emphasizes their novelistic qualities, which in turn
has given them the kind of cultural respect once accorded to novels” (Poniewozik
56). Of course, novels did not always receive cultural respect; like television,
their cultural capital rose in proportion to the critical and scholarly attention they
eventually came to attract.
Time’s attributing the prestige and binge-ability of quality TV to “its linear
nature” oversimplifies the possibilities that binge-watching presents for televisual
form. What binge-watching enables is a kind of formal complexity and innovation
that represents a radical break with traditional linear narratives. In the spirit of
Mittell’s recognition of the “boxed aesthetic’s [...] drive toward unity and complex-
ity” perceivable only through bingeing on a serial, I will turn to Netflix’s original
programming for illustrations of what binge-watching makes possible.

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 2. House of Cards: Eliminating the Recap
Of the three originally programmed series that Netflix produced in 2011, House of
Cards possessed the most cultural capital at the outset. Directed by David Fincher
of Fight Club (1999) and The Social Network (2010) fame; starring Kevin Spacey
(who not only is a major movie star but has also been for the past decade the Creative
Director of London’s Old Vic Theatre); and based on a classic BBC miniseries that
began in 1990, House of Cards seemed likely to warrant the huge financial outlay
required for the Netflix serial-TV model.8 A Netflix series like House of Cards gets
greenlighted for a whole season (or in this case, two seasons) without having to
produce a pilot or being subjected to mid-season ratings, which means there are no
opportunities to fine-tune the concept or the execution to respond to advertisers’ or
viewers’ reactions. In terms of production, this is a significant departure from the way
television serials have hitherto been written, because the writers and show-runners
have no access to the audience’s responses until after a complete season has aired.
The feedback loop – which has been central to serial narrative form since the days
of Victorian periodical and part-issue publication of novels – is significantly delayed,
putting the success of the first season at considerable risk. Netflix’s chief content
officer Ted Sarandos based the programming gamble on information he gleaned from
Netflix’s customer preference database, counting on the collective fans of Fincher,
Spacey, the BBC original series, and The West Wing (NBC, 1999-2006) to make up
the audience for House of Cards. Unlike the business model of broadcast TV and
premium cable channels, which respectively depend on advertisers and subscribers
for the revenue to pay for original programming, Netflix was not likely in the short
term to recoup the investment in House of Cards by increasing or even retaining
its somewhat fickle subscriber base.9 The Netflix strategy is not so much to sell an
individual show as to build an exclusive library of high-quality original content
unavailable on any other streaming or broadcast service, or as Sarandos has put it,
“to become HBO faster than HBO can become Netflix.”10 It ought to take many
years and billions of dollars for Netflix to become the service audiences feel they
must subscribe to in the way that cable became de rigueur for TV viewers during
the 1980s, but if Netflix does everything possible to maximize the addictive nature
of its series, the potential for longer-term profits could be realized.
If one of serial form’s hallmarks is its perceived addictiveness, then quality-TV
serials are the ideal vehicle for Netflix’s business model. And if a viewer’s ability to
binge on all episodes of a serial upon its first release means Netflix can capitalize on
the addictiveness of its programming, it also means Netflix can experiment with the
kind of radical changes in storytelling Sarandos has talked about envisioning. For
House of Cards, the main formal departure from traditional serialized programs is the
complete lack of recapping, exposition, and contextualization. Not only does House
of Cards eschew the usual ‘previously on’ montage that story-arc-based programs
typically include in order to remind viewers about previous plot details, the dialogue
also includes very little of the expository conversation that serials have traditionally

8 The Washington Post reported that two seasons of House of Cards cost Netflix $100 million
to produce. See Keating.
9 For an analysis of why Netflix original programming is unlikely to pay for itself by retaining
subscribers, see “Arrested Economics.”
10 See Salmon.

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depended upon to help audiences catch up.11 This is the case not just between indi-
vidual segments of the seasons, but also in the original gap between Season 1 and
Season 2. The premiere episode of the second season picks up immediately after the
action of the first season’s finale, with no ‘previously on’ attached to the individual
episode. Since the second season was initially released, Netflix has added a separate
recap of Season 1 that works in the usual way to remind viewers about the most salient
details of the story-so-far. When the second season was first released, however, House
of Cards came without that customary transition, requiring viewers with imperfect
memories either to re-watch Season 1 or to consult plot summaries online, in order to
comprehend the continuation of a complicated story whose telling had been interrupted
by a year. Season recaps are part of the package for most serials available through
streaming, from Downton Abbey (PBS, 2011-) to The Good Wife (CBS, 2009-), but
those shows also include ‘previously on’ montages to introduce each individual
episode. For the binge viewer, the ‘previously on’ is not so much a review of what
might have been forgotten as it is a set of clues as to what might happen next, given that
the details recounted in the montage will have a specific connection to what follows
in the individual episode. House of Cards gives the binge viewer no such guidance,
leaving viewers guessing about the direction of the story arc.
Because House of Cards was based on material that had been circulating since the
BBC’s serial began in 1990 (and, for that matter, since Michael Dobbs had published
his 1989 novel that was the source material for the BBC show), viewers familiar with
the original production already knew the outlines of the story.12 The Netflix version
updates and Americanizes the tale of the scheming legislative Whip who manages,
through backroom machinations and even murder, to rise to the highest position of
political power in the land. To keep the Netflix version from becoming too predictable
for fans of the earlier trilogy, the writers of the new series altered the pacing of many
important plot points. Significant events that occurred during the first installment of
the BBC version don’t happen until the second season of the Netflix version, creating
a double effect that will require a plot spoiler to explain. When, in the first episode
of Season 2 of the Netflix version, Frank Underwood (Kevin Spacey) suddenly
pushes Zoe Barnes (Kate Mara) off a subway platform in front of an oncoming
train, his murderous act registered among fans on the internet as a complete shock.
The shock originated both inside the storyworld (because the idea that someone in
Frank’s exalted position of political power could behave in this openly violent way
is distressing, even to viewers for whom shows like Scandal (ABC, 2012-) have
established the notion that corruption in the Executive Branch of government routinely
extends as far as plotting murder) and outside (because Kate Mara was popular and
her character had been well established in the first season as central to the storyline).
For those who had watched the original series, however, the shock came when Frank
did not kill Zoe during Season 1, because his British predecessor, Francis Urquhart
(Ian Richardson), had pushed the Zoe-character (Mattie Storin, played by Susannah
Harker) off a rooftop to her death before the 1990 season of the trilogy ended. In
this way, the Netflix writers, counting on viewers to be able to remember details of
episodes watched back-to-back, can also play with the memories of that subset of the
audience who believe they already know what will happen next.

11 For TV Tropes’ definition of ‘previously on’ and many examples, see the website tvtropes.org.
12 The BBC version is a trilogy of four-episode seasons: House of Cards (1990), To Play the King
(1993), and The Final Cut (1995).

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 In contrast with the convention established on daytime soaps, where characters
endlessly tell other characters about something that has happened in the recent or
distant past of the storyworld, the conversations on House of Cards consistently
advance the action without looking back. In serialized Victorian novels as well
as primetime TV, characters’ recounting of previous actions can serve to inform
those audience members who join the serial in the middle without requiring an
extradiegetic narrator to retell what has been told before. The writers of Netflix’s
House of Cards composed a script that looks less like a serial fiction than it looks
like a 13-hour feature film in that its exposition moves constantly forward. As with
the British House of Cards and its two sequels, the Netflix version does play with
narration by having Frank address the camera in soliloquies of self-justification
strongly reminiscent of Shakespeare’s Richard III. In performing these soliloquies,
Kevin Spacey has been directed to turn toward the camera as if speaking to someone
sitting or standing just next to him, dropping his voice to a confidential pitch. The
anti-hero’s address to the audience does not exactly win sympathy for the narcissistic
and unscrupulous main character in any of these three dramas, though it does put the
implied viewer in the position of being a reluctant co-conspirator of the speaker’s.
As narrators, Frank, Francis, and King Richard III are not there to remind the viewer
of what has happened before, but rather to spin the present moment and predict the
future in the most self-serving ways possible. Fan discussions online suggest that
viewers who were at first put off by the direct address came to appreciate it over
the course of the Netflix series, especially because much of the show’s trademark
dark humor comes across through Frank’s turning aside to roll his eyes and raise
his eyebrows at the expense of his many hapless victims. The binge-ability of a
series released all at once gives the audience a chance to get used to this unusual
trope, making the direct address to the camera another of the formal innovations
afforded House of Cards by its mode of production.
3. Orange is the New Black: Different the Second Time Around
Regina Spektor wrote “You’ve Got Time” as the theme song for Orange Is the New
Black. It plays at the beginning of every episode over a rapid montage of the eyes
and mouths of women’s faces intercut with images of the prison where the show is
set. Like House of Cards, Orange Is the New Black never begins with a ‘previously
on.’ Though House of Cards sometimes starts the action before the credits, Orange
Is the New Black’s credits – with their eye-catching images, rapid pace, and catchy
tune – always come first. Spektor’s punk-pop rock song starts with an invocation
of the imprisoned women: “The animals, the animals/ trapped, trapped, trapped
‘til the cage is full.” The next lines address a “you” who is in the trap: “The cage
is full/ stay awake/ in the dark, count mistakes./ The sun is out, the day is new/ and
everyone is waiting, waiting on you/ And you’ve got time/ And you’ve got time.”
The lines pertain to anyone in prison, but particularly the protagonist of the series,
Piper Chapman (played by Taylor Spilling), the self-centered upper-middle-class
blonde whose fiancé, friends, and family are waiting for her to finish a prison
sentence no one expected her to have to serve. Piper is in a minimum-security
women’s prison for trafficking drug money ten years earlier, a crime she committed
to help out Alex Vause (Laura Prepon), a former lover she will meet again in prison.
During her incarceration she will “stay awake, in the dark, count mistakes” while
“everyone is waiting, waiting on [her]” both outside and inside the prison, where

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the daily schedule makes incessant demands on her time. But, as the song goes,
she’s got time: a year, to be precise, at least until a violent outburst extends her
sentence into the second season.
The theme song’s second verse shifts its address from the woman prisoner to
the viewer of the series. It begins with a dual address: “Think of all the roads,/
think of all their crossings/ Taking steps is easy/ Standing still is hard./ Remember
all their faces/ Remember all their voices.” The message directed to Piper is one
of the more overt themes of the first season, that is, while she has to survey her
history of bad choices in order to benefit from being forced to let time stand still
while she is in prison, she must also overcome her knee-jerk fear of the diverse
women around her. She has to learn to stop seeing them as a generic mass of
Others and think of their faces, think of their voices. The eyes, the mouths of the
Latina, African-American, Asian, and Caucasian women flashing by on the screen
are reminders of their distinct individuality as marked by the moles and freckles,
the presence or absence of makeup, the facial expressions that belong uniquely to
them. The faces and voices to be remembered are also, of course, those of the people
waiting for Piper to come out of prison, but the vivid graphics of the title sequence
insist that the inmates’ faces and voices matter, too – for the time being, they
actually matter more. The admonition applies to the viewer, as well. To follow this
serial, one needs to “remember all their faces, remember all their voices” and take
the inmates seriously as people – an effect the narrative structure cleverly enforces
in a manner I will discuss below. The subsequent lines make the shift in address
from the protagonist to the audience, in that they do not apply to Piper’s situation.
“Everything is different/ the second time around.” Piper is not a repeat offender,
and in the only subplot that follows an inmate’s release and re-imprisonment, the
experience of Tasha ‘Taystee’ Jefferson (Danielle Brooks) “the second time around”
is pretty much the same as it had been before she left. For the viewer who watches
the series more than once, however, everything is completely different the second
time around, because the narrative structure ensures a dramatically altered sense
of the plot and characters if the show is re-read. “And you’ve got time,” the song
reminds the viewer – time to watch the series and watch it over again, since Netflix’s
format makes it infinitely and conveniently available in a way that was not the case
with broadcast or premium cable TV.
What makes the difference upon second viewing is the triple temporality of Orange
is the New Black, a structure that continually juxtaposes the present story-time with
flashbacks to the inmates’ pasts. This allows a profound shift in narrative perspective
that moves Piper out of the position of focalizer and places a succession of other
women in the narrative center as the season progresses. Series creator Jenji Kohan
has called Piper “my Trojan horse,” explaining that as a writer she could overcome
the difficulty of selling a show “on really fascinating tales of black women, and
Latina women, and old women, and criminals” by following “the girl next door,
the cool blonde” into the prison. Piper is “relatable for a lot of audiences and a
lot of networks looking for a certain demographic,” Kohan has said. As the series
progresses, Piper nevertheless becomes increasingly less sympathetic because her
sense of entitlement is so strongly contrasted with the life stories of the women
around her. Their lives come across in flashbacks, one character’s per episode,
in the manner of Lost (ABC, 2004-2010). Season 1’s three timelines occur in
(1) the story-present, a chronological telling of Piper’s time in prison; (2) the

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story-past of individual inmates who are incarcerated alongside Piper, also told
chronologically; and (3) episodes from the story-past of Piper in her relationships
with her present fiancé Larry and her former lover and co-conspirator Alex, told out
of chronological order to achieve maximum irony or pathos in their juxtaposition
with Piper’s present.13
Piper is the only character central to the story-present and flashbacks of Season 1
Episode 1, but the second episode begins the pattern of alternate flashbacks through
Red Reznikov (Kate Mulgrew, unrecognizable as Star Trek’s Captain Kathryn
Janeway from the CBS series that ran from 1995-2001, Star Trek Voyager), the
inmate who is chief cook and Piper’s first antagonist in the prison. Offended by
Piper’s having insulted the prison food, Red starves Piper for days, refusing Piper’s
facile apology and remaining implacable until Piper shows proper deference to Red’s
unofficial but undeniable authority. Cross-cut with scenes of the story-present are
brief flashbacks, one to three minutes long, representing past moments not just in
Piper’s life, but in Red’s, too. The episode includes four flashbacks to Red’s past,
recounting chronologically the sequence of events that landed her in prison. There
are also three flashbacks to Piper’s past, concentrating on her happy life just before
her arrest. In flashback, Red – so daunting a figure in the story-present – comes
across as unsure of herself, anxious to please, and out of her element among the
wealthy wives of a gang of Russian mobsters who have pressured her immigrant
husband into illegal activity. More details of Red’s past are revealed in Season 1,
Episode 8, which contains just one flashback centered on Piper and three centered
on Red, reflecting the series’ gradual shift of narrative focus away from “the girl
next door, the cool blonde” to the older, heavy-set woman with the Russian accent.
By this point in the story-present, Piper and Red have reached détente, and Red has
become a more sympathetic figure, just like each of the other inmates who feature
in flashbacks, once their pasts have become an open book to the viewer.
The “really fascinating tales” Kohan set out to tell about “black women, Latina
women, old women, and criminals” come through the pattern of flashbacks. Each
woman’s backstory reveals the degree to which she lives up to the stereotype Piper
(and by extension, the audience) sees on first meeting her, and the degree to which
she is altogether different from her ‘type.’ There are the black women: angry, sullen
Janae Watson (Vicky Jeudy) was a hopeful, happy college-bound track star trying to
impress a boy when she got arrested in an uncharacteristic robbery attempt; volatile
Suzanne ‘Crazy Eyes’ Warren (Uzo Aduba), with her Bantu knotted hair and pro-
clivity for peeing on the floor when angry, is the adopted daughter of a well-meaning
white middle-class family; tough-talking Poussey Washington (Samira Wiley),
whose affect is pure ghetto, turns out to speak perfect conversational German she
learned while living abroad with her military-officer father; Sophia Burset, the trans
woman (brilliantly played by Laverne Cox in the story-present and by her twin
brother M. Lamar in flashbacks to her pre-transitioning past) purveys femininity
in the prison beauty salon though she used to be a firefighter named Marcus. There
are the Latina women: Dayanara and Aleida Diaz, (Dascha Polanco and Elizabeth

13 The second season adds another level of story-past to account for relationships between Yvonne
‘Vee’ Parker (Lorraine Toussaint), the only truly malevolent person in the prison, and fellow
inmates Red (a former ally whom Vee had ordered her posse to beat up) and Taystee (a foster
child of Vee’s who had come to see how her pseudo-mother’s narcissism and drug trade were
responsible for the deaths of other young people she had taken in and exploited).

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Rodriguez), the feuding daughter and mother who both fell victim to the same
seductive man’s drug operation; or Gloria Mendoza (Selenis Leyva), a powerful
leader among the Latina inmates whose emotional subordination to an abusive man
landed her in prison. There are old women: Yoga Jones (Constance Shulman), now
a ‘very spiritual’ recovering alcoholic, who turns out to be a child-killer; Sister Jane
Ingalls (Beth Fowler), the radical-activist nun who is more sanctimonious than she
is saintly; or Red Reznikov herself. No one among them is perfectly sympathetic,
and no one among them lives up to her stereotype. Altogether there are sixteen
characters whose backstories are represented within individual episodes in the first
two seasons. Their stories add up to a profoundly anti-racist, anti-classist, anti-sexist,
anti-homophobic whole, presenting a politics of social justice and inclusion that is
unprecedented among primetime serials.
Whether the content of Orange Is the New Black could ever have made it onto
the air without Netflix’s willingness to buy and produce the whole package, sight
unseen, cannot be known. Whether viewers might have responded less positively to
the series if it had been released a week at a time is equally imponderable. What can
be known, however, is the effect of binge-watching the series a second time, after
having gone through both seasons once, following a protocol that Netflix streaming
makes easy. Characters who seemed ominous, frightening, and threatening on an
initial viewing are transformed once their backstories have been established. Though
viewers may have identified throughout a first watching with Piper, the ‘relatable’
Trojan Horse who focalizes the story-present of the series, those who have learned
the other characters’ backstories can see past Piper’s prejudices when they watch
the series again. Once we know that Red’s terrorizing Piper reflects Red’s own
history of having been forced to harden herself when she got to prison, for example,
Red’s treatment of Piper takes on a different meaning, looking more like tough
love than torture. Not every character’s backstory makes her less scary: Piper’s
bunkmate, Miss Claudette (Michelle Hurst) turns out to have committed a far more
bloodthirsty crime than the one she has been convicted of, and Vee Parker (Lorraine
Toussaint) has a history that confirms her apparent psychopathology. Nevertheless,
de-centering the narrative perspective through the accumulated backstories changes
more than a viewer’s understanding of the characters’ personalities and motives: it
changes the story. A similar effect might have been achieved in a series produced
on a weekly basis, but the binge-ability promoted by Netflix’s simultaneous release
of 13 episodes at a time certainly enhances it.
4. Arrested Development: Beyond Serial Form – and Back Again
Even more than Orange Is the New Black, Season 4 of Arrested Development
requires re-watching for the story to make narrative sense. Part of the point of
Arrested Development’s resurrection as a Netflix original was that it came with a
built-in fan base who had avidly watched and re-watched the Fox series since its
cancellation in 2006. Critical praise for the Fox series had been strong but ratings
were not; many of the show’s fans did not discover the original series until it
began streaming on Netflix. Often referred to as a ‘cult hit,’ the original Arrested
Development revels in inside jokes, self-referentiality, and intertextual allusions
to other shows and to the business of Hollywood television production. With its
large ensemble cast (many of whom enjoyed increasing popularity between the
show’s cancellation and its rebirth as a Netflix original, including Jason Bateman as

154
Michael Bluth, Michael Cera as his son George Michael, Will Arnett as his brother
‘Gob’ – a name based on his initials and pronounced ‘Job’ – Portia DiRossi as his
sister Lindsay Fünke, and Jeffrey Tambor as his father George Sr.), its rapid-fire
dialogue, its narration by Ron Howard (whose persona as a former child actor and
current director comes into play both in his voice-over narration and within the
storyline), and its often obscure humor, Arrested Development may not have drawn
a broad demographic when it appeared on the air, but its appeal to Netflix viewers
was manifest in the data on which Netflix bases its business decisions. Netflix has
an advantage never before held by a television network, because it knows exactly
who watches what shows and how often any given viewer re-watches any particular
show. Given this information, Netflix could be certain not only that a new season
of Arrested Development would reach an already-existing fan base, but also that
those fans would be eager to watch new episodes and then watch them again, in
the manner that streaming content makes possible.
Writers for the new Arrested Development composed the individual episodes
accordingly, depending as they could on a built-in audience of potential binge-watch-
ers, many of whom would feel the need to buy or renew Netflix subscriptions to feed
their interest in the series. While each of the original three seasons on Fox followed
a typical chronological serial arc, the Netflix-produced fourth season breaks with
most of the established conventions of serial form. Rather than proceeding chrono-
logically, the season loops back continually throughout a six-year period, covering
the time that is supposed to have elapsed since the original series was canceled in
2006. Because the ensemble cast was evidently too busy (and would presumably
have been very expensive) to reunite for a full 13-installment series, only a subset
of the nine Bluth family members appears in any one of the fourth-season episodes.
Each episode focuses on the point of view of a single character, with other family
members passing through the foreground or background of the action. Much of
what is happening in the background does not make sense until the same action gets
repeated from the points of view of other characters in other episodes, letting the
viewer in on circumstances that were obscured by the first character’s point of view.
None of the Bluths knows what is happening with all the others (nor does anyone
know everything that is happening to any other single character), but the viewer
can eventually put together a reasonably coherent timeline of all the action. Indeed,
fans have done so, to varying degrees of success, online.14 Some fans actually made
chronological cuts of the entire fourth season, and series creator Mitchell Hurwitz is
rumored to be doing the same.15 This desire to straighten the story out, to experience
it chronologically, suggests that the writers’ experiment with temporality might not
have been entirely successful, but it also underlines how profoundly different this
Arrested Development is from anything else on television.
That Hurwitz wants to make a chronological cut of his own show reflects the
spirit of experimentation with which he went into the creation of the series’ fourth
season. Widely reported as intending for the episodes to be watched in no particular

14 The Arrested Development wiki has a verbal timeline at <http://arresteddevelopment.wikia.

com/wiki/Season_Four_timeline>. Other, more imaginative graphic versions still visible on
Google Image at this writing are no longer connected to live links.
15 See Zuckerman; the October 26, 2014 interview in which Mitchell Hurwitz mentioned making
his own chronological cut of Season 4 is available on YouTube at <https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=5448baj0M30>.

155
order, he set out to make a serial that was anti-chronological, occurring completely
outside the forward-moving timeline that has been one of the defining features of
serial form. Watching the first few episodes can be an exercise in frustration, because
so much of what is happening goes unexplained. Characters make comments that
remain non-sequiturs until their own episodes, watched later in the series, explain
the context for what they are saying. Actions are nonsensical, unless the focal
character for a particular episode knows something about what is happening. As
the viewer works through the series, explanations begin to take shape, giving
the true fan the same kind of insider-knowledge payoff Arrested Development
has always trafficked in. As I have mentioned above, more than most sitcoms,
Arrested Development is powered by in-jokes and meta-references to itself and
to the institutions of Hollywood. The looping-back in each episode of Season 4
allows the devotee to experience the repeated pleasure of ‘Oh, now I get it,’ with
the emphasis on ‘I’ that marks true insider status.
Binge-watching the fourth season of Arrested Development makes it much
easier to catch the cross-references and inside jokes than watching it at week-long
intervals would be; re-watching the whole series produces a different sort of text
whose timeline and interconnected actions make a new kind of comical sense.
Ironically, Hurwitz went on record around the time the season was released to
advise against binge-watching it. In post-production he found that watching the
show in no particular order, or watching too much of it at once, actually militated
against its being funny. The jokes turned out to depend on an element of surprise
that Hurwitz concluded was crucial for comedy:
I pretty quickly realized that everything here is about the order of telling the stories, that
there will be shows where you find out a little bit of information and then later shows where
you revisit the scene and you find out more information – and that’s not fun in reverse.
To get more information first and then less isn’t as interesting [...]. In good storytelling,
you’re surprised by the information. (qtd. in Martin)

Another term for Hurwitz’s insight here would be comic irony. While binge-watch-
ing would not interfere with the workings of comic irony, Hurwitz observes in the
same interview that “comedy takes a lot out of you,” and watching too much of his
show in one sitting can tire a viewer out. If binge-watching is like addiction, bingeing
on Arrested Development can result in an overdose. As anyone who has gone too
far with food, drugs, or alcohol can attest, that takes all the fun out of the binge.

Columbus, OH Robyn Warhol

156
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 The Professional Practice of Serial Audio Drama
Production in the Age of Digitization
The detective series The Three Investigators, created by American author Robert
Arthur in the early 1960s, lives on in Germany years after its demise in the United
States. It is especially popular in the form of a serial audio play with the German
title Die drei ??? (literally: The Three Question Marks). The audio drama adaptation
of the children’s book series, which started in 1979, soon had and still has loyal
and dedicated fan communities, as the vivid communication on various websites
and online social networks, containing acclamations, wishes and suggestions for
improvement as well as sophisticated reviews and obliterating judgments, shows.1
Today the audio play, starring the three teenaged amateur sleuths Justus Jonas, Peter
Shaw, and Bob Andrews, attracts not only children and youngsters. In 2002, the
heterogeneous fan communities, consisting of aged fans of the first hour and new
generations of the target audiences of children and teenagers, became visible as they
gathered in crowded stadiums and concert halls to watch the live appearances of the
three leading speakers, Oliver Rohrbeck, Jens Wawrczeck, and Andreas Fröhlich
(Bastian 22-23). They have been lending their voices to the three detectives since
they were first casted at the age of 13 to 15 and continue to record new episodes
for the series to this day (Bärmann, Radtke and Tölle 39, 64, 80). The fact that the
speakers – and with them the voices of their roles – have aged in the course of time,
results in a comical coexistence of acoustic and visual impressions throughout their
stage performances (Wöhlke; Bastian 22). The plot of those stage shows consists of
condensed allusions to the numerous acoustic adventures of The Three Investigators
(Bärmann, Radtke and Tölle 13), but always stays within the narrative frame of
the detective series.
The protagonists Justus Jonas, Peter Shaw, and Bob Andrews live in the fic-
tional small town of Rocky Beach, close to Santa Barbara in Los Angeles County,
California. In a trailer hidden between trash and treasure at the wrecking yard of
Justus’ uncle, they set up their own detective’s office where they keep self-made,
repaired or new technical gadgets for their investigations. They usually come upon
a new mystery by reading the local newspaper or by observing mysterious events in
their free time. At the beginning of their criminological career, Hollywood director
Alfred Hitchcock, their mentor and friend, supports and recommends the young
detectives. Under their business name The Three Investigators/Die drei ???, and
loyal to their motto “We investigate anything” (Arthur 7), the three boys solve
each case, whether it includes riddles or seemingly supernatural phenomena, such
as ghosts, talking skulls, whispering mummies, or haunted mirrors. By the end of
each episode, they lift the veil of mystery and prove the criminal perpetrators’ guilt
with the help of the police.
Based on theories and methods of cultural anthropology, this essay examines
the engagement between fan culture and serial audio drama production in the age
of digitization. How does the digitized fan culture influence the production of the
1 This article is based on my Master thesis which I concluded at the University of Göttingen in
2013. Parts of it have already been published in German. For supervision and constant feedback,
I want to thank Regina Bendix, Michaela Fenske, as well as my fellow students participating
in the masters’ colloquium.

159
long running series? Does the increasing use of web platforms and social networks
like Facebook, official and fan-made websites even involve a potential for the
democratization of the production process and towards a “participatory culture,” as
it is proclaimed, for example, by media scholars Henry Jenkins and Axel Bruns?2
Will the next adventures of the three teenage investigators Justus, Peter, and Bob be
co-created by the fans and their creative output? In the course of my research, I have
addressed those questions through the empirical method of narrative interviews with
the producers of the audio drama series.3 Furthermore, I have approached the online
communication between recipients as well as between recipients and producers with
the methodological tools of the ethnography of communication (Hymes). Before
I turn to these queries, I will present previous research on the detective series and
describe its development from a not particularly successful U. S. book series to a
popular German book and audio drama series. In addition, I will outline the different
steps of the production process of an audio drama episode.
The Unusual Career of a Children’s Detective Story
Most of the current research in cultural studies concerning The Three Investigators
are master’s theses that examine the continuous popularity of the serial audio drama
and its adult fans.4 According to the descriptions of the record label EUROPA, the
so called Kassettenkinder (cassette kids), born between 1968 and 1975, make up
three quarters of today’s listeners (Bastian 6-7, 14; “Serienhistorie”). These listeners
recommenced to or still consume the audio plays which accompanied them through-
out their childhood in the form of records and mostly audio cassettes. Invented by
the electronic enterprise Philips in the 1960s, this recording medium soon became
the dominant form of distribution for audio plays (Neumann-Braun and Schmidt).
On the (West-)German market of children’s entertainment, the audio play flourished
during the 1970s and 1980s since television, video and computer games did not
reach German households until the 1990s (Heidtmann, “Kindermedien in den 1990er
Jahren”; Peters 144).5 On the one hand, the popularity of The Three Investigators
in (West-)Germany can thus be explained with a unique combination of technical
and economic opportunities. On the other hand, the detective series was perceived
to be of high quality by German consumers, especially in comparison to the more
common audio plays that basically consisted of commented film soundtracks at
that time (Vaupel 152-54).
In the United States, Robert Arthur’s book series was not nearly as popular as in
(West-)Germany (Peters 144, 146, 152). And so the detective series with the three
youngsters, Jupiter Jones, Peter Crenshaw, and Bob Andrews, was abandoned by
American publishers in the early 1990s after several unsuccessful attempts to change
its concept (Peters 144-45). According to Ingo Peters article on the transcultural

2 While Jenkins suggests the term “participatory culture” (3), Bruns has coined the term “pro-
dusage” (2) in order to explain that audiences nowadays are not only consumers but also
producers who creatively use, alter, and contribute to media content through web platforms.
3 Interviews and observations in the recording studio were documented in form of transcriptions
and observational protocols. All statements from the interviews are my translations.
4 See for example Hopf; Rodermond; Scholl, and Vaupel.
5 Children who lived in the GDR also listened to audio dramas, be it on the radio, as records or
cassettes, but one can assume that most of the serial audio plays produced in West Germany
were not necessarily available there until the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989 (Heidtmann,
“Kindermedien” 15-151, 164).

160
aspects of the series’ reception, its unprecedented success in Germany becomes
comprehensible if one takes a closer look at the translation processes: The German
publishing company did not only change the layout of the books but also aspects of
the detective stories’ content and structure (152). The lack of success in the United
States stemmed from the fact that the series was not quite what American readers
expected from mystery fiction (148). The heroes of the stories feature characteris-
tics that were dismissed by American readers – Jupiter’s tendency to show off his
intelligence, for instance, and Peter’s distinct fear (151). But at the same time they
also incorporate values, such as cooperativeness, a sense of responsibility, respect
for authority, helpfulness, thoughtfulness and patience, compliant to the virtues of
the German educated middle-class (148-52). Through the process of translation
the German publishing company managed to emphasize the intellectual appeal of
the series, for example, by changing the name of the first detective Jupiter Jones to
Justus Jonas, with the result that he was accepted as a likeable, sophisticated genius
by German readers (Peters 152-53).
Another important difference between the U.S. and the German version of the
book series were the cover illustrations. While the American covers depict the three
boys in breathless suspense, the German covers, designed by graphic designer Aiga
Rasch, show an intriguing, modern and minimalistic picture of one aspect or scene of
the story, which catches the reader’s attention for the new case that waits to be solved
(Akstinat 11).6 Those illustrations, which are also used as covers for the audio play
adaptations, can, in fact, be varied endlessly but always stay recognizable by their
unusual black backdrop and the catchy logo with the three different-colored question
marks – the trademark of The Three Investigators (Bärmann, Radtke and Tölle 126).
Translator Leonore Puschert did not only change the names of the main char-
acters, she also foregrounded the importance of Alfred Hitchcock in the German
translations (Akstinat 18). Robert Arthur, who had worked for Hitchcock as a story
editor and script writer, did not only include the Hollywood director as mentoring
character in his detective series for children and ghostwrote an introductory notice
to the reader at the beginning of each book in the director’s name, but also used
it in the title of the series – a typical marketing ploy during the 1960s (Peters
144).7 Puschert added small interruptions into the translated manuscripts in which
Hitchcock animates readers to solve riddles and finally the case itself, together
with the three detectives (Hopf 35). In doing so, she enhanced the impression that
Hitchcock was also the author and editor of the books that were actually written by
various authors aside from Robert Arthur. The reader was also given the opportunity
to start with a random episode, as the books published in German were not numbered
(Peters 144). When the real Hitchcock died in 1980, he was primarily replaced by a
fictional character within the American book series. But the disappointment of the
German readers induced the German publisher to keep the name of the Hollywood
director temporarily as a trademark until he finally vanished from the series in 2005
(Hopf 35). The producers of the audio drama adaptations gave up on Hitchcock as
personalized narrator after his impersonator Peter Pasetti died in 1996 (Beurmann
12, 110). The speakers following Pasetti lent their voice to a now nameless narrator
who no longer addresses listeners with hints or comments.

6 For an overview of covers see “Die drei ??? und ihr Coverarchiv.”
7 See, for example, Alfred Hitchcock and The Three Investigators in the Secret of Terror Castle
(Arthur).

161
 When the U.S. book series ended in the 1990s, the German publisher signed
the Austrian journalist and author Brigitte Johanna Henkel-Waidhofer to continue
Die drei ??? (Akstinat 9-10). Together they decided to relaunch some of the series’
aspects based on the formerly unsuccessful traits of the American publisher to attract
an older readership. The cases written by Henkel-Waidhofer between 1993 and
1996 were now based on more trivial crimes, and the three main characters aged
about two years: They own cars, a drivers’ license, have side jobs, a computer, and
their first girlfriends (Peters 155). After Henkel-Waidhofer gave up writing for the
series, André Marx’ talent as a writer was discovered by the publisher thanks to the
fan-fiction he wrote as a birthday present for a friend (155). Later, two more writers
were signed on to continue the series. One of them was André Minninger, the script
writer of the audio drama adaptations, who also knew the series since childhood
(Akstinat 19-24). The new writers slowly returned to the original concept of the
series according to their expertise as recipients, letting the changes continuously fade
from the spotlight (Scholl 48; Hopf 39-42).8 Though the continuation of the series
by German-speaking authors caused what Peters calls the “Karl May effect” – “the
series becomes a platform for German social commentary” (154) by depicting
America as socio-cultural Other – the blending of cultural boundaries and values
mostly fits the original mix of American and German elements within the concept
of Robert Arthur.
Looking back at the publishing history of the book series, one can see that the
merchandizing strategy of styling Hitchcock as fictive authorial narrator was given
up in the long run (Vaupel 44-45). Additionally, the German publishing company
Kosmos built up a group of German writers in the 2000s whose expertise partly
stems from their former or continuous reception of the book series (“Die Autoren
der Serie”). Although one might sense a tendency towards a democratization of the
production process here, one should keep in mind that those writers had to prove
their writing skills to the German publisher before they were selected to join the
staff. Moreover, the current staff writers do not undergo frequent turnovers. But
before I take a closer look at the permeability between producers and recipients, I
will explore how the detective stories became a scenic audio drama, followed by
an outline of its general production processes.
The Three Investigators Turn into “Cinema for the Ears”:
Continuities and Disruptions
For the producers, conceiving a new audio drama series usually includes not
only finding a suitable subject matter, defining a target audience, hiring a script
writer, but also designing covers, planning the release frequency, and developing
distribution and marketing strategies. All this happens in line with the available
production means and the product’s unique selling proposition, as Corinna Wodrich,
present-day product manager, explains. Heikedine Körting-Beurmann, the producer
and director of the audio dramas, did not know that the first few episodes of the
detective series would be the beginning of a popular, long-running series when
she first proposed an audio adaptation. She found the adventures of the three boys
thrilling and intellectually stimulating, but, most importantly, she considered them

8 Fans differentiate the books following the original concept from those based on the relaunch
as ‘classics.’ On the coherences between canonization and popular culture see Kelleter, “Pop-
ulärkultur und Kanonisierung.”

162
to be suitable for an acoustic narration (Akstinat 58-59). Hence, the first nine audio
plays released in October 1979 challenged the consistency of the series since the
audio cassettes came with their own consecutive numbering that concurred neither
with the numbering of the American books nor with the publishing order of the
German translations (“Serienhistorie”). Despite the inconsistencies in the order
of episodes, the concept of a scenic audio drama competed rather successfully
with less elaborate adaptations of children’s movies or recorded readings of chil-
dren’s books during the 1980s (Beurmann 141). Hence, Körting-Beurmann and
her husband Andreas Beurmann, the musicologist and co-founder of the record
label EUROPA, continued their production of the detective series, as well as
fairytale-audio dramas, and further adaptations of children’s and juvenile book
series (141).9 Their artistic aspiration to create “cinema for the ears” implied
that each story needed to be dramaturgically edited to meet the requirements of
a good audio play (Bärmann, Radtke and Tölle 86). Listeners enjoy the double
experience of relaxation and entertainment which is created by stimulating the
listener’s visual imagination through acoustic narration with dialogues, sound
and music – an insight the prize-winning audio drama director describes in one
of the accompanying books on the German audio drama series and its producers
(Beurmann 141).
The task of dramaturgical adaptation in the form of an audio drama script was
initially fulfilled by writer Hans Gerhard Franciskowsky until André Minninger,
a devoted fan of Körting-Beurmann’s audio dramas, took over in the mid-1990s.
The preparation of an audio drama script can be a special challenge since the
literary descriptions of visual phenomena need to be transformed into acoustic
experiences – be it in the form of a dialogue in which the talking characters
describe what they see, in the form of an explanatory description by the narrator
or in the form of sounds, background noise, and music (Fischer 7-8, 127-28). The
script writer decides which parts of the 130 pages book are suitable for spoken
scenes and which parts can be even left out or summarized by the narrator. By
discarding, summarizing, amplifying or rearranging the story, Minninger creates
a script of about 30 pages in two to four weeks’ time. Whilst writing the script
and during all the other production steps, he tries to create an audio drama which
he would approve of as a hearer. He also enjoys adapting his own books but
does not regard this as a conflict. Through years of experience in listening to
and producing audio drama series, Minninger has developed a certain routine,
which he described as a gut instinct or intuition throughout the interview: “While
I am reading the book, I already know how this sounds as a record.” Though the
length of the audio plays has grown with the increasing density of the stories,
the script writer needs to adhere to the defined length of 45 to 60 minutes per
episode. Otherwise the production would strain the budget, Minninger explained.
Obviously, the reduction and adaptation of the literary material for the audio drama
script gets more and more difficult with the growing lifespan of the series. This
conforms to the evolutionary dynamics of the development of a series; series
get more and more complex in the course of time as Americanist Frank Kelleter
states (“Populäre Serialität” 21, 31).

9 Körting-Beurmann and her staff also produce audio drama adaptations of the German detective
book series TKKG as well as of Enid Blyton’s The Famous Five (Fünf Freunde) and St. Clare’s
(Hanni und Nanni).

163
 Another important aspect of continuity within the production process of the
audio drama series – apart from its high personnel continuity – is the maintenance
of the analog production techniques. In contrast to other recording studios working
for the record label EUROPA, Heikedine Körting-Beurmann and her team still use
magnet tape recording devices for production. On the one hand, this corresponds
to the staff’s capabilities and, on the other hand, it allows the concurrent editing of
one audio play at different workstations. Moreover, the analog recording process
helps keeping the charm of a more natural, warm sound without diminishing the
efficiency or quality of the production argues cutter Hella von der Osten-Sacken
in a handout on the reasons for maintaining the original production techniques. It
might be inferred from this that the maintenance of the analog production tech-
niques for all audio plays produced at Studio Körting has developed not only into
a stylistic feature but into a mode of distinction (Kelleter, “Populäre Serialität”
32-33). This also indicates that the authenticity of the series emerges through the
negotiation of the needs, capabilities, experiences, expectations and aspirations of
the producers and the recipients in interaction with the series itself (Cohen 380;
Kelleter, “Populäre Serialität”), as will also be highlighted through the analysis of
the online communication below.10
At Studio Körting, the division of labor is clearly structured. The producer books
and directs the speakers, coordinates the dates for recordings, sets up and edits cast
lists, and covers together with her employee André Minninger. Walking into the studio,
one initially enters the control room. Here, the director and the script writer work at
mixing consoles and different player devices, such as tape drivers, cassette recorders
or digital sound systems. Over the loudspeakers, Heikedine Körting-Beurmann gives
directions concerning speed, pitch and intonation of the dialogues to make them
sound realistic and highlight the emotional aspects of the plot through the characters’
speech. The speakers sit around a table that is covered in a noise-absorbing fabric
and act their dialogues in front of the microphones that are hanging from the ceiling
of the recording room (Bärmann, Radtke and Tölle 98-99). With the help of various
aids, like for example empty soda cans, alarm clocks, a picture frame, a dial-operated
telephone, and the grid of a portable ventilator, they perform their roles, including
gestures and movements illustrating the actions of their characters through sounds

Figure 1: Shelf in the sound archive with aids for record sessions. Photo: Nathalie
Knöhr, Dec. 2013. With kind permission of Heikedine-Körting Beurmann.

10 Based on the theoretical premise of actor-network-theory (Bruno Latour), Kelleter argues that
the series as a cultural artefact also has a determining influence on its own continuation and
proliferation aside from human actors (cf. “Populäre Serialität,” esp. 15-16; Knöhr 60-62).

164
(Fig. 1). Since Oliver Rohrbeck, Jens Wawrczeck, and Andreas Fröhlich have come to
know their roles very well, they do only short rehearsals, and work quite autonomously
most of the time. Sometimes they even slightly change the wording of their parts to
make them more suitable for their characters. All in all, the recordings for an episode
can take about two to three days, since not all the actors record their parts together.
For the recording of the background sounds and the music, cutter Hella von der
Osten-Sacken deletes bloopers from the tape and prepares a rough cut of the episode.
In the cutting room, she winds the tape to find the adjoining parts, cuts them off,
and fixes the two loose ends of the tape. Though she does not consider cutting a
complex process, she needs a high level of concentration and a trained ear to figure
out the right cuts. But even though the studio still works with the analog recording
techniques the current distribution of the audio plays as CD or as MP3-files also
affords digital recording and mixing devices (Beurmann 20-21, 162).
The instructions for the insertion of music and sound are already implied in
the script which the director uses as an orientation during the mixing. Music and
sound have a supporting dramaturgical function in scenic audio dramas; rhythm and
tonality emphasize the emotional meanings and effects of the story that is primarily
told through the words of the narrator and the dialogues of the characters (Weber
59-61). A selection of sounds for each episode is already prepared by the cutter, but
the huge archive of sounds and noises can be searched for the right tone at any time.
Grown over the years, the sound archive consists of a huge variety of magnetic tapes,
audio cassettes, CDs, or digitally recorded sounds, noises, and music. Keeping in
mind the temporal and spatial attributes of the scene, the producer and her assistant
try to create a certain mood or atmosphere through the acoustic instruments of
sound and music. To simulate a forest at nighttime, for example, they would use
the sounds of an owl or a crow, and the noise of the wind that rushes through the
trees, André Minninger explains. To create a scarier atmosphere and to simulate the
width and the dimension of the space, they add effects of reverberation, change the
volume and the speed of rhythms, or distort the speaker’s voice. Additionally, they
set different stereo positions for the diverging sources of noise. While mixing the
sounds and the music at their mixing console, the director and her assistant can also
control and smooth the transitions between different sounds, scenes, and localities.
Difficult or complex scenes can take up to three hours of work because of the high
artistic standards which the director and her staff try to accomplish.

Figure 2: André Minninger and Heikedine Körting-Beurmann in the con-

trol room during a mixing session. Photo: Nathalie Knöhr, Dec. 2013. With
kind permission of Heikedine-Körting Beurmann and André Minninger.

165
 Two or three days, after the background noises are recorded, the director and
her assistant blend the music into the prepared master tape (Fig. 2). The music
of an audio drama series is not only an instrument to emphasize or lower the
suspense of a plot, like an acoustic curtain that opens and closes between the acts
(Rodermond 32-33). It is also an important feature furthering the recognizability, and
distinctiveness of the audio series. After the first 39 audio cassettes were released, a
copyright lawsuit between composer Carsten Bohn and the record label prohibited
and still prohibits the use of the original soundtrack for the current productions
which many adult fans deplore (Bärmann, Radtke, and Tölle 146). The jazz-fusion
sound of the original music was replaced by a more electronic sound, featuring a
new title melody with a singing vocoder voice that actually proved to be popular
among younger fans (Beurmann 158). A new mix with the new melodies was
produced only for the best-selling episodes, until product manager Corinna Wodrich
started working for the record label in 1993. She initiated the reproduction of all
episodes, which stroke a chord with a broad mass of consumers, the by now aged
audience of the first hour (Bärmann, Radtke and Tölle 141-42). Since 2008, the
musical compositions are more oriented towards the original jazz-fusion sound.
Digitization, Fan Culture, and the Impact on the
Audio Drama Production Process
As a consequence of the overwhelming response to the re-release of all former
episodes in 1997, product manager Corinna Wodrich discovered the generation
of “cassette kids” as a target audience through her own market research (Bastian
6-7, 14). Childhood memories were their central motivation for re-listening to this
detective series designed for children and teenagers; positive feelings of comfort
and familiarity proved to be appealing to listeners between twenty and forty years of
age. The nostalgic need of the ‘cassette kids’ is also evident in the constant demand
for cassettes by collectors. In this particular case the record label decided to hold
on to the traditional recording medium, though the audio drama series can also be
purchased as CD or downloaded as MP3-file (Probst). But satisfying nostalgia is
only one of the motivations for the ‘cassette kids.’ An illustrative analysis of the
actual usage of the most frequented fan website rocky-beach.com, points to further
needs such as social belonging to a community, self-promotion as well as the creative
appropriation of the series (Hopf 54-56). The initiators and users of the fan page do
not only appreciate the possibility to make contact with peers, but the possibilities to
promote themselves, their preferences and sense of taste, as well as their knowledge
about the series, and their creative appropriations in the form of fan fiction and
fan art of all sorts (cf. Hopf 98, 115-58). Hopf found that fans generally enjoy the
participatory aspects of the audio drama series, which lie in its genre, the detective
story: It stimulates the detecting skills of the listener, and has a predictable storyline
(cf. 8-13, 47-48). The series format with recurring and recognizable characters,
locations, and literary or acoustic stylistic features presents a further attraction (cf.
8-31, 47-48). Hopf concludes that the ambiguity and inconsistency of the series’
narrative universe trigger the fans’ productivity (107-9).
In order to answer the question of whether or not the fans are actually involved
in the production process of the audio drama series, I will now take a closer look
at the website rocky-beach.com as well as at the official Facebook page promoted
by the record label EUROPA that today is part of the U.S. music corporation

166
Sony Music Entertainment. Methodologically, the analysis of the two digital
communication platforms uses the tools of the ethnography of communication; a
classic research field of cultural anthropology whose potential for the analysis of
online communication and evaluation practices surrounding artefacts of popular
culture still remains to be fully explored (Hymes; Bendix 32-33; Maase et al. 14).
In the following paragraph, I analyze and compare the user-generated contents of
the platforms as well as the frameworks in which the communication takes place.
The editorial board of rocky-beach.com that is formed by self-proclaimed ‘cassette
kids,’ has set up a communication platform that allows not only chats between fans
of the detective series but also feedback to writers and producers of the books and
the audio plays (Scholl 60-61). Taking a closer look at the communication inside
the individual chat rooms of the different authors, especially inside the by now
inactive but still accessible chat room of audio drama script writer and author André
Minninger, one observes that users’ comments mainly consist of compliments or
complaints about the authors’ diverging writing styles, requests for future topics,
settings, and for the return of characters, or the revival of former storylines, as well
as indications of plot errors. The latter put the producers of the audio drama series
into the position to delete the plot errors within the audio drama scripts because
the episodes are based on the books and are released with a lapse of time. In this
way, the audio drama adaptations profit from the encyclopedic knowledge of the
fan community and their careful reading. Besides, fans posted complaints about or
requests and suggestions for sounds, music or the cast of speakers, which André
Minninger tried to incorporate into the production process until he stopped hosting
his chat room in 2006 (Knöhr 71).
Another section of the websites allows for reviewing the running book and
audio drama series. An analysis of the published audio drama reviews between
August 2012 and March 2013 illustrates that categories for evaluation included the
adaptation’s quality in the form of comparisons between the book and the audio
drama version of an episode, the logic and the coherence of a story’s plot, as well as
the selection of the music, the cast, its performance, the overall sound of the audio
drama, and the quality of the mix. Besides, the quality of the current episode was
sometimes compared to that of former episodes or to that of the underlying book
and was awarded with grades ranging from one for the best to six for the worst.
The diverging evaluations and interpretations of the community members stand side
by side in the forum, but are summarized within rankings of the different episodes
with the book and the audio drama series listed separately. Sometimes, discussions
unfold inside the review category of the forum, such as the discussion surrounding
the increasing self-referential and intermedial connections inside the audio drama
episodes. While some fans really approved of the allusions to some of the speakers
career in dubbing of foreign-language movies for German cinema and television,
others criticized this development (Knöhr 72).
The website, made by fans for fans, has the ambition to stay autonomous and
critical, which they do not only state in their legal notice; it is also emphasized in
the critique of other web pages such as the official Facebook page or the review
function of the online sales platform Amazon.de. These commercial and non-fan
based platforms as well as the comments posted there are discredited as marketing
oriented, biased, non-critical, and less informative by some users of rocky-beach.com
(Hopf 61, 100).

167
 A comparison of the relatively short comments posted by Facebook users beneath
the teasers of the newly released audio drama episodes shows that those reviews and
evaluations are also based on former reception experiences, the impression from
the teaser, or the already bought and consumed episode, and other reviews posted
elsewhere. In contrast to the postings at rocky-beach.com, the suggestions and
wishes for actual changes in the audio drama series are rare. Instead, competition
between users concerning the depiction of their consumers’ behavior occurs, as
well as conversations about the most comfortable sales channel. Comments that
are actually addressed to the producers of the series mostly include requests for
certain merchandizing products, but some also thematize the production process.
The spectrum of those comments ranges from the demand for a revival or return to
former elements of the audio series, to the request for an overall switch to digital
recording and production techniques (Knöhr 72).11
It is worthwhile noting that the negotiation of new and old technical elements
does not only show on the level of production, but also within the series content,
says André Minninger. He illustrates the heterogeneity of opinions and tastes in
our interview when describing the diverging reactions to one of his books12 which
he reads in front of pupils of elementary schools: While most of the adult readers
do not like the heroes of their childhood to use new technical devices like cell
phones instead of walkie-talkies, some of the pupils were wondering why the boys
do not already use smartphones which are by now a part of the children’s daily
routine.13 This broad range of preferences and opinions elucidates the challenge
such a differentiated fan community presents to the producers. The compatibility
of the diverging needs of the adult and the young parts of the audience lies in their
hands – how do they deal with it?
Minninger says he enjoys the direct feedback of the younger target audience
which he and producer Heikedine Körting-Beurmann perceive as under represented
on the common digital platforms. Nevertheless, he is happy to see that adults still
maintain a devoted interest and delight in the series. Concerning the online feedback,
he states that he follows the sometimes heated discussions on the internet only
infrequently because “[i]t’s not like it was once, when you needed to sit down and
write a letter and had to bring it to the post office .... There are so many critics now.
Everyone is destined to write a review.”
They still get carefully drafted fan mail, producer Heikedine Körting-Beur-
mann adds, but considerably less than in the 1980s. They feel that the sometimes
unreflected or even polemic and unfair critique anonymously posted online can be
demotivating from time to time, whereas positive reactions and fair criticism as well
as the sustaining success of the series continue to motivate their work. Despite all
that, they do know that the digital communication platforms are an important feature
for the further development of the series. But at the same time, they have to screen
carefully which criticism and requests are more than individual preference, explains
product manager Corinna Wodrich. Together with her colleagues, she manages the

11 Contents of the Facebook page can be read without registering, users are free to decide if they
use nicknames or even clear names.
12 Minninger, Die drei ??? und das Hexenhandy.
13 Smartphones made their first appearance in Episode No. 156 (2012), which is relatively late
in comparison to other technological innovations such as the computer , the internet or the cell
phone that are used as research tools by the detectives since the 1990s (Schrape 3-10).

168
official websites such as the Facebook page. Problems and questions concerning the
distribution of a product are answered immediately through the comment function,
new offers inside online shops, quizzes or lotteries revolving around the audio
drama series are linked here. Postings of photographs, videos or anecdotes from the
recording sessions leave the impression that Facebook users can directly witness
and participate in the production process of a new episode (Knöhr 72).
Together with marketing manager Elisa Linneweg, Corinna Wodrich concep-
tualizes marketing campaigns and promotions. With the help of periodic market
researches and data from the online distribution, they keep track of the continuous
changes within their audience groups. However, over the last years, the distribution
of consumers has rarely changed. Consumers of both sexes fall into two age groups:
an adult audience between 20 to 40 and a younger audience of 8 to 14 year-olds.
Recently, a small growth was registered in the younger age group, since the ‘cassette
kids’ pass their passion on to their own children. This can also be inferred from the
comments online, as the product manager says.
Nevertheless, the tasks of the product manager also include meeting the needs
of the product and the artists involved. She needs to choose the appropriate sales
channels – online and offline – and has to defend the artists’ copyrights towards
providers of illegal download services. Moreover, she decides how to deal with
the creative output of the fans, which is a sensitive decision to make, she notes, as
some of the content produced by fans clearly violates copyrights. In this case, they
have to be deleted from the internet. But sometimes those homages can also be
an unofficial sales promotion for the series (Scholl 60). A prominent example for
this is the fan based theater project “Vollplaybacktheater” which also inspired the
live shows of the three leading speakers who started touring stages, stadiums and
concert halls only in 2002 (Bastian 23). The playback theater was founded in 1997
by a group of actors and audio play-fans from Wuppertal who reenact various audio
dramas on stage to the playback of the original recordings (vollplaybacktheater.de).
They even satirize them by overacting with costumes and props. Initially, the project
had no legal allowance to use the original recordings of the audio drama series for
their performances. The record label EUROPA therefore approached the projects
initiators and helped them to provide the necessary legal basis for their creative
compilations. Following this, they also set up a joint advertising campaign for the
release of the one hundredth episode (Scholl 61).
Conclusion
In Germany, the long running detective series Die drei ??? has celebrated its
35th anniversary in 2014. The series is characterized by certain elements of dis-
ruption, adaptation and continuity as an overview over its development from an
unsuccessful U.S. book series to a highly successful German book and audio play
series has shown. What is more, continuities within the production staff of the
audio drama series and analog production techniques are part of an “emergent
authenticity” (Cohen 380) that is continuously negotiated between the recipients
and producers, involving their needs, experiences, expectations as well as their
aspirations, and the series itself (Kelleter, “Populäre Serialität,” 15-16). One
effect of the long-term continuity of the series is the growing difficulty to reduce
and rewrite the books as scripts for the audio drama series, as the complexity of
the stories increases.

169
 The analysis of the online communication complemented by further information
from interviews with the producers of the audio plays, suggests that one can indeed
observe a convergent and participatory media use by recipients of the series: They
do not simply listen to the audio plays or read the books, but engage in divergent
modes of online communication and creative appropriation with the series’ contents.
One cannot, however, observe a democratization of the production processes here,
even though some of the current writers’ staff was recruited from the fan community.
Fans generally enjoy the participatory aspects of the children’s detective series
(Hopf 8-31, 47-48). They appreciate it because of its possibilities to search for hints
and clues; they do not mind that the voices of their heroes have aged in the course
of time, since they have aged as well. The maintenance of the analog recording
techniques and the adaptation of modern communication technology within the
stories’ plot as well as the tendency for intermedial references are, however, subjects
of debate among the members of the two target audience groups. The heterogeneity
of the fan communities thus puts limits on the participation of the fans in the
production process of the audio drama series, as do copyright laws. However, the
online communication of the fans through online platforms like Facebook or fan
pages can be seen as acts of community building that help to construct an “imagined
community” (Benedict Anderson) of adult listeners (Bendix 35).14 The ‘cassette
kids’ have built a virtual fan community by using the spreading technological and
communicative capacities of the Internet, but they also gather to watch the fan-based
playback theater or the live tours of the leading speakers. Meanwhile the record label
has started to integrate those new modes of reception into the production processes.
Feedback effects are specifically orchestrated today to meet the taste and needs of the
audiences. In doing so, sales channels can be optimized, plot errors can be deleted,
requests and selected ideas can be included in the production process. At the same
time the pressure to legitimize decision making increases, as producer and director
Heikedine Körting-Beurmann notes: “When we now produce the series, we have
to keep the old in mind. Sure, we have our own style, but nevertheless we have
to develop. So we naturally pay attention to criticism and focus our efforts on the
present.” Ultimately, including the needs and requests of the two target audiences
seems to be an effective strategy, if one regards the long-standing, still persisting
success of the German audio drama series The Three Investigators.

Göttingen Nathalie Knöhr

14 The community is merely based on the idea of shared experiences, values, and world views
since not all of its individual members know each other personally (Anderson).

170
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 The Medium Is the Audience:
Successive Talk as Narrative Pleasure
According to German sociologist Alfred Schütz, our everyday reality is counter-bal-
anced by many “other,” complementary realities as provinces of meaning. Schütz
does not mention media entertainment as such, but clearly includes it in his list of
“fancies or imageries” (cf. Schütz 565) that refers particularly to “the realms of
day-dreams, of play, of fiction, of fairy-tales, of myths, of jokes.” For this essay, I
borrow the sociological perspective from Schütz in order to claim that entertaining
communication is experienced as dream-like, playful, fictitious, magical, myth-
ical, funny and/or in some other way gratifying, in terms of narrative or, more
specifically, narrative conversation. Continuous observations in the field of online
communication as well as my own active participation in electronically supported
fan and gossiping circles have pointed me to my argument which is sustained by
James Carey’s notes on communication as culture,1 by Niklas Luhmann’s basic claim
whereas only “communication can communicate,”2 and by two recent volumes on
topic internet discourse that identify activities within online discussion groups as
“narrative” by default.3
Two particular subjects of narrative conversation are looked at more closely:
popular television on the one hand (serial fiction and non-scripted reality), and
celebrity gossip on the other. The third – and more extensively scrutinized – item
in question is the (here: explicitly entertainment-oriented) bulletin board that allows
interested audiences to take part in ongoing follow-up conversation on TV programs
and other mediated content via so-called second screen activities. By this is usually
meant any kind of reading, posting and commenting of what other users have to
say while simultaneously watching some favorite show on a primary screen and/
or compiling subject-related material from various online resources.
My argument is that all three forms of mediated communication (the television
series, the publicly shared celebrity gossip, and the entertainment-oriented bulletin
board in its function as collaboratively managed social medium) share important
traits of conversational narratives since they literally beg for successive talk to
happen that is shared peer-to-peer via laptop computers as well as an impressively
growing variety of mobile, handheld devices that allow for intervention from remote
places and decidedly laid-back, ‘lazy’ positions.
Let me begin with a claim that is borrowed from German media scholar Lothar
Mikos: He suggests that pleasures derived from media entertainment do not depend
so much on particular experiences that one enjoys and registers as gratifying. More
important is what people make out of the pleasurable experience when telling others
about how much fun they had, or how moving/horrifying/nail-biting (or in other

1 Cf. Carey. The author reminds us that communication in its metaphorical sense refers not just
to transmission (of newsworthy “facts,” for instance) but to the old-age gathering (for the sake
of a ritual or celebration, for instance).
2 See Luhmann, “What Is Communication?”; and Moeller, Luhmann Explained, for a pragmatic
interpretation of (Luhmann’s interpretation of) communication as basic social operation. See
also Moeller, Radical Luhmann, for a postmodernist perspective on the German systems theorist.
3 Cf. Orgad’s analysis of topical board discourse among breast cancer patients, and Booth’s
reflection on digital fandom.

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ways truly memorable) it was (cf. 139). According to Mikos’ claim, entertainment
can be described as a phenomenological category that may register within some
individual disposition (in terms of psychological change, or progress; a mood
switch, for instance), but also, and necessarily so, indicates a communicative stance.
It means that audiences are seemingly entertained when they show the typical
signs of being inclined and willing to share some experience that others might find
entertaining as well. In Mikos’ terms: “It seems that the category of entertaining
is merely used by audiences to justify some user experience which apparently
provided pleasure, and to communicate the respective fact. It means that the terms
serves a distinct, discursive goal; it renders an experience describable and therefore
anschlussfähig with regard to the dominant discourse” (139; my translation).
If Mikos is right and the urge to tell others is a constituting element in what
entertains us, we are safe to assume that the two common translations for the
German term of Unterhaltung are intrinsically linked. There is, on the one hand, this
complex communicative construct that inevitably involves one’s biased personal
opinion formed with regards to some mediated first hand input that is, in hindsight,
identified as pleasurable. On the other hand, the term Unterhaltung implies that there
is talk between peers: a conversation that instigates – or amplifies – said pleasure.
And the question is if what we consider to be entertaining is, by definition, just as
much dialogue-oriented as it is, apparently, enjoyable. Or, in short: guaranteed to
provide fodder for talk.
The argument is pursued here with regard to entertaining correspondence that is
just as much media-oriented as it is media-originated. Involved in these endeavors of
successive talk as narrative pleasure are (a) popular television series (both fictional
and reality formats) in their function as entertaining narratives, (b) the loose-tongued,
technology-savvy audiences that evolved within an “era of plenty” (John Ellis), and
(c) topical discussion boards which were set up explicitly to facilitate such talk.
My argumentation is backed up by Niklas Luhmann’s constructivist reflections
on communication in general (Luhmann, “What Is Communication”) and mass
media genres in particular (“Entertainment”). In the first part of this essay, I refer
to Anschlusskommunikation (which can be translated as follow-up communication),
Vergemeinschaftung (community-building) and the much more recent second screen
(synonymously used with the term social TV in Germany) in order to emphasize
the social dimension of successive talk. In the second and third parts, an abridged
history is offered both for television as a former leitmedium and for television series
in their social function as programmed programs (following Manfred Rühl) and
narrative narratives. The fourth part looks more closely at TV-series-as-narratives
and at discussion boards in terms of social medium. Some selected examples of
entertaining conversations follow, with a (very) short detour to celebrity gossip in
its function as (typically controversial, yet pleasurable) rumor. This should help to
broaden the argument further and delineate the boundaries as well as limitations
of this tentative reflection on entertainment as a constantly deferred (and therefore:
contagious) dialogue.4 Some final thoughts on audience fragmentation and collective
memory will open up further avenues for successive talk on narrative pleasures and
their social functionality.

4 This reflection started out from a tentative re-definition of viral videos as entertaining “fodder
for sharing.” See Ganz-Blättler, “Guckt mal, Leute!”

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 Followers, Communities, and Social Uses
of Computer Screens
We all love to talk about television. If not right there in our living room, cuddled
up on the couch with someone we cherish (and who, we hope, shares the passion
for what keeps us glued to that primary screen over there), than maybe the next
day at the water cooler or at the hairdresser’s. Or – and this will be the main
argument of this essay – in some allegedly social medium where we hang out
with our alleged friends for some leisurely shared moments of alleged privacy
on a regular basis. The phenomenon is arguably as old as television itself. And
the question is just if those very first viewing communities in public places did
already know how to break out in shouting and cheering, even if the general
rule was, arguably, respectful silence.5 My assumption is that viewer behavior
depended both on the program genre at stake – and on the reputation of the venue,
with selection of drinks an important key factor for the kind of patrons one could
expect to share the televisual experience with.
Follow-up conversation is part of every televisual experience. News programs
are the subject of everyday conversation among peers for various reasons,6 and
the same goes for ad breaks whose information value is deemed entertaining (or:
newsworthy) enough to become “word of mouth” and to be gossiped about.7 All
three genres contribute to the televisual flow as mass communication (Luhmann,
“Entertainment”), and thus to a larger project of public discourse that helps society
to understand (and thus: successfully reduce) its own complexities and even come
to terms with system-bound tensions and irritations. None of the contributing voices
to this discourse work independently, however. What results as “autopoiesis” (the
phenomenon of constant self-referentiality Luhmann addresses as constitutive for
mass media within a media-saturated society) refers to all media platforms that
allow some TV-related information to circulate and be commented upon – and that
includes the folks who talk and write, post pictures and links – or simply bother
to read and watch.
In the case of entertainment much of what dedicated followers ‘do’ and/or
circulate further is (re-)creative in its own right: Strong emotions are shared or
re-evoked, content-related knowledge is passed on (or purposefully withheld,
for various strategic reasons), outcomes debated with regards to registered ex-
pectations and alternative possibilities. Entertaining audience activities range
from singing along and the declamation of script bits to actual re-enactments and
from daydreaming to publicly shared fan fiction and creative hacks. They may
align themselves with narrative conventions established by the primary text or
deliberately go ‘against the grain,’ be it for the sake of wishful thinking or the
sake of corporate criticism, or both.

5 Abercrombie and Longhurst distinguish “simple” audiences (of the theatrical spectacle that re-
quires full attention and institutional silence) and “mass” audiences. The latter appear dispersed
and notoriously distracted and appear divided both in their attention and their admiration. A
third category is what the authors call “diffused” audiences; they shift between full attention
and distraction and result from our media-saturated performance age as media-savvy prosumers
of entertaining content.
6 Cf. Hefner.
7 Cf. Schmidt, Westerbarkey and Zurstiege; for the cult aspects of advertisement-as-narrative
Andree, and Blümelhuber.

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 As this list of pleasurable ‘things’ that are engendered by entertaining com-
munication suggests, follow-up communication can be purely hedonistic and aim
at a prolongation, or repetition of afore-going pleasurable experiences. But it can
also serve some sociable circle of onlookers or a community of devoted followers
(i.e. readers, listeners, viewers or re-enactors) to enhance those pleasures that are
collectively sought after and realized. Moreover, such conversation can be aimed
directly at the cast and crew responsible for the primary text and express both
admiration and disdain, or it can call to action.8 One may label such collaborative
follow-up phenomena as typical for minority taste cultures (or ‘scenes’) that strive
for differentiation and foster respective in-group behavior. Once such activities
become visible on a larger scale, however, their potential to enter the mainstream
of what is deemed entertaining grows significantly. Moreover, and this aspect
recalls the idea of Unterhaltung as conversation, all of what followers realize (and
constantly actualize) when following, discussing and/or forwarding entertaining
materials does communicate communication. By way of its basic function as “talk”
(or “noise,” as the notorious television abstainer Niklas Luhmann might want to
quip; cf. Hagen) these endeavors sustain society as a whole, backing up and taking
over from older forms of knowledgeable talk that referred to, say, religion, or high
art as “provinces of meaning” (Alfred Schütz). The intentions and communicative
means of all of these interventions vary. What lies at the heart of the respective
discourse remains, from a macro perspective on sustainable communication as
social glue, all the same.
The observation whereas people do seem to increasingly ‘chat’ during en-
tertaining television programs leads me to the social phenomenon of the second
screen. Research done by German public broadcaster ARD shows that so-called
multi-screening is increasingly popular among younger television audiences
(cf. Gleich). While parallel viewing and computing can of course be completely
unrelated (one follows one’s regular work, or email correspondence or some other
task that involves a computer while, coincidentally, watching television), most
interconnected uses of particular television programs and online services is said
to significantly enhance the television experience (111). The two main activities
mentioned in various surveys the author quotes are (a) the search for additional
information (that is available on some program-related website and part of the mar-
keting package or individually provided elsewhere) and (b) community-building.9
It is, not surprisingly, the younger audience (14 to 29 years) that uses second
screen applications on a regular basis. Whereas active participation in online
discussions – in the form of comment-writing in boards or blogs – is explicitly
mentioned only by a minority of TV users that admittedly multi-screen (Gleich
112), many of these social TV users do indicate that program-oriented online
communication is experienced as entertaining and therefore worthwhile. Not
taken into consideration by Gleich are discourses that are instigated by celebrities
(such as hosts, guests or other participants in entertaining television programs)
and invite for audience response via Facebook, Twitter and other social media
platforms (cf. Gormasz).

8 For instance, when television series are cancelled, and fans gather to ask for another seasonal
run.
9 See Gleich: “Apart from more utilitarian motives the social experience is […] a key factor
influencing viewer engagement” (112; my translation).

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 Television Periods, Targetization,
and Audience Activities
If I define successive talk as essential for enjoying television entertainment, such
talk did arguably take place long before it became instigated, pursued – and just as
importantly followed by silent lurkers – via social media.10 This is why I include a
section on the periodization of television history here, which I compile from John
Ellis’ Seeing Things: Television in the Age of Uncertainty (2000), Umberto Eco’s
Guide to Neo-Television of the 1980s (1988), and Jean Louis Missika’s La fin de la
télévision (2006). While Ellis argues for a distinction of television eras based on the
quantity and variety of content available, Eco and Missika suggest to distinguish said
eras according to audience address (and: audience attention) and the relationship
established between television texts and their – more or less loyal – followers.11
When Umberto Eco wrote on the differences between “old” and “new” TV, back
in the early 1980s, he did so in a satirical footnote on the last page of the Italian review
L’Espresso to which Eco regularly contributed (cf. “TV”). His remarks soon took flight
as a somewhat dystopic observation on broadcasting yielding to narrowcasting and
ended as an indispensable footnote in TV studies textbooks all across Europe.12 Eco’s
distinction between paleo and neo TV targets television systems (the authoritarian “TV
of the State” versus the smooth commercialism of Berlusconi’s Mediaset empire) but
also scrutinizes the rise of popular TV shows which appeal to viewer instincts rather
than viewer intellect and invite audiences to join chatty hosts and scantily dressed
showgirls, right up there on the scene. An important observation of Eco refers to the
studio audience that became suddenly visible, was invited to clap along and cheer,
and immediately began to scan the monitors for its own appearance on the screen, in
order to savor the moment of recognition, and wave back.
In Jean Louis Missika’s follow-up reflection to the same article the key term is
“contemporary post TV”; it refers to what is supposed to emerge once paleo and
neo TV have faded. The focus here lies on the relationship that particular programs
(reality formats, in the first place) establish with their respective, loyal audiences.
Missika states that TV’s recourse to using ordinary people as protagonists sealed
the medium’s fate in terms of secularisation (or: profanation) from leitmedium to
whatever (“n’importe quoi,” Missika 27). With the arrival of reality programs not
only was the “common man allowed to speak up freely; he was indeed allowed
to speak freely about whatever,” including the “ordinary and uninteresting” (27).
At this point, John Ellis’ periodization of TV eras helps to frame Eco’s and Missi-
ka’s somewhat sarcastic remarks in a more economically driven logic. He claims that
paleo TV as a distinctive era of scarcity was fully offer-led since audience structure
and respective expectations remained fully opaque. Providers offered a selection of
few programs featuring renowned experts and covering a vast area of interests to a
broad, general audience whose actual composition could only be guessed. This shot-
in-the-dark principle was replaced by strategic planning during the age of availability

10 Serial literature depended on loyal followers and critics from its start; see Hayward for examples.
11 Periodization attempts for ‘TV eras’ can also be found with regard to the U.S. American
TV market. Consult Reeves, Rogers, and Epstein (various essays on TV I, II and III); Lotz
(network/transitional/post-network era); Marc and Thompson as well as Edgerton (network/
cable/digital era).
12 His ideas were brought to Germany by Casetti and Odin. For an abridged English version, see
Eco, “A Guide.”

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when competition grew. The big question became what audiences desired and wished
for (instead of: needed). With content availability came the paradox of content uni-
formity because what people arguably wanted (and competitive providers were fast
to deliver) was “more of the same.” The era of plenty, finally, saw narrowed-down
target audiences confronted with not only more choices from a significantly longer
list of offers but also many more choices of access, with screens multiplying and the
possibilities for remote consultation, for seeking information and interacting (with
persons ‘on’ and ‘off’ the screen) becoming more and more frequently used.
For the subject matter of this essay targetization is key: When few programs were
watched by a majority of viewers (within strictly limited, “regional” or “national”
territories) talking about what nearly everybody saw was simple enough – if not
mandatory, a kind of civic duty (see Newcomb and Hirsch). The narrower the
audience for specific types of program grew (narrower according to social charac-
teristics but also lifestyle choices and generic preferences) and the more variable,
adaptable to individual viewer habits the respective access modes became, the
more effort was required of viewers to establish pleasurable companies and remain
integrated within. With the mobilization of screens via (first) portable computers,
(later) laptops and (more recently) hand-held devices the search for suitable partners
for co-watching – and discussing – one’s favorite programs became even more
challenging. On the other hand the same access technologies also permitted the
formation of thematically structured outlets in the form of electronic platforms that
ranged from strictly text-based Usenet discussion forums back in the 1990s13 to the
hypertext-based, multimodal discussion boards that soon became complemented
(and in more than one instance replaced) by corporate social media and a myriad
of access-facilitating and community-oriented apps of today.
This is just to say that the second screen did not evolve over night but had
many functional predecessors that all helped to establish electronic talk between
widely dispersed ‘viewers,’ in terms of (here: TV-related) pleasurable conversation
among peers. The same goes for talk back functions (via Twitter, for instance)
that are considered only remotely here. And the question remains whether what is
commonly labelled audience activity in an era of abundance may not be, in fact,
as old as the medium of television itself. If the term refers to all of what audiences
do when (and: while) watching some favorite program it is safe to assume that the
respective endeavors do not just consist in feedback attempts addressed directly
at the primary screen (and the marketing forces right behind it) but encompass an
impressive range of viewer-initiated attempts at actively searching suitable partners
in crime. Be it for some significantly enhanced pleasure with regards to the mutually
envisioned entertainment at stake – or simply for the pleasures one can expect when
participating in this particular company at that particular moment in time.
So far, I referred to media-induced talk as a form of collective enjoyment that
can be similarly envisioned with regards to cinema-induced collective pleasures or
activities shared among, say, music lovers and fans of popular culture in general.
Successive talk is nothing new, or so it seems. In the following, I will focus on
serial narratives and how ‘text’ and ‘talk’ do overlap and inspire one another in the
case of contemporary second screen applications that refer to ongoing series and
reality formats of the digital (or: post) TV era.
13 See alt.tv.[+show] for examples. The Usenet archive is part of Google, Inc. and thus a searchable
web database.

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 Narrative Fiction, Enhanced Visibility,
and Uses of Feedback
I start the discussion of entertaining content worthy of what Mikos describes
as perpetuated discourse or Anschlusskommunikation with the kind of serial
narrative that was labeled quality TV from the mid-1980s onward and is more
recently known as audiovisual novel because of its growing status as literary
work of art and the decreasing dependencies from programming schedules and
generic restrictions in what Ellis labelled “digital era.” As I have argued elsewhere
(cf. Ganz-Blättler, “Sometimes”), the TV series developed its current status as
open, imagination-spinning, per default participatory program strand not over
the last decennium when it grew more distinctive, and respected. The TV series
functioned as open text from its very beginning. This kind of narrative fiction
evolved from a curious blend of structural features that used to distinguish the
daytime serial on the one hand (open-ended episodes starring ensemble casts
with overlapping storylines that typically centred on everyday problems) and the
prime time series on the other (fewer protagonists tackling adventure-oriented
tasks and challenges within fewer storylines, with clean-cut resolutions provided
episode per episode and the option to abandon ship at any given moment, with no
harm done to continuity and audience involvement). The generic conventions as
well as the subsequent release over time were essential ingredients for fostering
audience anticipation, with the system-bound waiting periods inviting viewers
week for week and season for season to silently imagine – or, as we have seen,
loudly wonder – what would, possibly, come next. Public venues for such talk
were provided early on for the daily soaps, and there is ample proof for the
various social functions of the respective follow-up conversations pertaining to
social exchange and community-building.14 Similar forms of talk can be found in
fan-produced series’ letterzines of the 1980s that were shared among loyal viewers,
complete with episode guides, recaps and copies of series-related material that
was published elsewhere.
It is interesting to note that the arrival of the Internet did not affect, or change,
the content and style of the respective correspondence among interested viewers.
It did, however, enhance the visibility of this kind of audience interaction and
invited the respective series’ producers to interact right back – in their own way.15
In hindsight, these tentative attempts at establishing contact between providers and
users of serial fiction seem to anticipate more recent strategies of call-backs that
range from series-centered conversation between showrunners and subscripted
viewers on Twitter right to the narrative strategies of program services like Netflix
that channel viewer expectations via exhaustive data mining.16
If traditional television worked as programmed program, in terms of a view-
er-friendly scheduled “social project” (as Manfred Rühl proposes), I am tempted
to label such audience-savvy serial projections as narrative narratives. What I
mean by this is an ongoing and possibly endless tale featuring not just protagonists

14 See Bielby and Harrington; Brown; and Baym for testimonies.

15 For example: In an early episode of the U.S. American series The X-Files (Fox, 1993-2002),
the female protagonist can be seen resting in her bedroom. The books behind her back feature
the names of several fans that posted regularly on alt.tv.x-files at the time. Needless to say that
the community reacted with sheer excitement to this initial and unforeseen reference to them.
16 Cf. Uncle Guido’s blog entry regarding Netflix’ House of Cards (2013-).

181
and respective storylines but also audience expectations that are triggered by
what ‘happened before’ and are, simultaneously, fed back into what is about to,
eventually or hopefully, ‘happen next’ yet to be seen in the Netflix age.
If all stories demand an audience’s imaginative investment in order to find their
end and be completed (and serial narratives more explicitly so) these narrative
narratives depend on an active, talkative audience that is not only ready to go on but
also ready to collectively pull the plug and provide an ending, at some point in the
shared media adventure. How this is achieved by way of successive talk as narrative
pleasure – that is inclined to opt for more pleasurable narrative communication to
follow – remains yet to be seen.
Open-ended Conversations: Bulletin Boards, Celebrity Gossip,
and the Narrative Pleasures of Trash
Reality shows are arguably the most typical narrative genre for post TV enter-
tainment. Whereas the fictional novel-to-be is about to abandon the tight corset
of the programmed schedule in favor of more flexible arrangements and freely
accessible content libraries (cf. Missika; Newcomb), reality programming seems
to have abandoned television’s original, strictly educational “social project.” From
their very start as thinly veiled social experiments (with shows like Big Brother
and Survivor), these open-ended, multi-strand narratives featuring ordinary people
being trapped in extraordinary settings, facing both their wildest dreams and worst
nightmares, were simply meant to be talked and gossiped about. This is all there
is – apart from that remarkable continuity these shows developed over the years,
with the stars of the genre being conveniently recycled, over and over, in other
reality shows, celebrity specials and game shows.
When taking a closer look, however, reality narratives do share crucial traits
with narrative fiction: They are obviously riddled with story holes and literally ‘full
of secrets,’ in terms of strategically withheld background information regarding
editorial master-plans and scripted bits. This is probably why knowledgeable readers
have become so addicted to them over time. Not only was this self-declared trash
fun to watch. It was also fun to belong to some self-declared elite, in terms of
internet-savvy audience curious enough to constantly watch and verbosely comment;
and it was inquisitive enough to not believe one bit of what one saw and witnessed
on the television screen.17
When reality formats arrived on the global TV market and television enter-
tainment began to verge towards the “ordinary” (Missika 27), the interaction with
viewers-as-users became an essential marketing device. Successive talk was not
limited to official websites and respective forums, however: With every new re-
ality show, season, episode – and candidate – becoming the subject of meticulous
audience scrutiny, more independent arenas appeared in the form of user-generated
boards such as Fans of Reality TV in the U.S. (since 2002; owned by the BRAVO
network since 2007) and the slightly older I.O.F.F. in Germany (since 2000).18 As the
names clearly indicate (the I.O.F.F. evolved from a Big Brother-centered discussion

17 For a discussion of the casting show as multi-strand narrative featuring real-life protagonists as
candidates and their dedicated followers as long-term team support even beyond the program’s
ending see Ganz-Blättler, “DSDS.”
18 On the history of I.O.F.F. see the interview with board founder and administrator Ingo Sauer
(aka scotty) in a blog entry posted by Bianca.

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board called IOBBF), these web applications were meant to cater to critical reality
fans and invited for heated debates within the protected realm of a discussion forum
with the explicit license for its expert users to doubt, to mock and to get angry – all
for the sake of community-shared narrative pleasure.
As for the genre’s much-ridiculed protagonists, many took advantage of their
‘fifteen minutes of fame’ to become reality stars, and some of their alleged home
stories have spun out into remarkably long-lasting television legacies of their own.
This is the case with the Kardashians (E! online), or the Osbournes (MTV): Their
heavily publicized family narratives are sustained not only by continuous mass
media coverage in various channels but also, and before anything else, by lively
audiences-as-media coverage that spans from genuine interest in these public
persons’ fates to the incredulous rage vented in celebrity gossip columns, social
media outlets – and those TV reality-oriented discussion boards I just mentioned.
Internet discussion boards are web applications that store and manage user-gen-
erated content. They evolved from electronic discussion groups and analog bulletin
boards and appeared around the turn of the century. Most discussion boards are
structured along subjects, with forums and sub-forums holding thematic ‘threads,’
and threads holding ‘posts’ that are assembled in chronological order. Most boards
are strictly thematic, moderated and semi-public: general audiences can read in
some areas while writing is restricted to subscripted members. As a consequence,
there are ‘members only’ areas that remain invisible to the open public and do not
register with search engines.
Such boards serve as platforms for the online debate of various topics. Genres
range from existential Q&A (therapeutic discourses, self-help groups) to news
services, offers of expert advice, agony columns, and leisure activities. Boards can
work independently or as part of a corporate or organizational website. Upon the
arrival of corporate social media such as MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter, many
boards became obliterate and ceased operation, while others were bought by media
conglomerates and continued under the new respective flag.
As for talk centered on television fiction, I would like to mention two more
board examples. One is Television Without Pity, or TWoP in short: The forum was
founded in 1998 by fans of Beverly Hills 90210 (Fox, 1990-2000) in an attempt to
mock another teen show called Dawson’s Creek (The WB, 1998-2003). Later, the
range of topics broadened and included reality shows as well as movies while the
sarcastic style remained. The most characteristic trait of the board were the recaps
provided by registered users for each and every show on U.S. television. In 2007,
the Bravo network acquired the board, and its founders left shortly after. The forum
subsequently lost members, and operations ceased in May 2014, but the archive of
threads, recaps and posts remains accessible under www.televisionwithoutpity.com.
In Germany, the Serienjunkies website (www.serienjunkies.org) is very similar
to TWoP, in terms of fan-initiated forum. Founded in 2003 by IT specialist Mariano
Glas, the site resisted vertical incorporation and developed into a professionally
run, series-related news portal instead. Over the last years, streaming services
came to dominate its main activity, for evident reasons since user interest verges
towards immediate access to episodes that are made available online, soon after (or:
simultaneously with) their original screening in some original broadcast or cable TV
context. But there is still a small forum for ongoing discussions with regards to TV
series and selected other topics such as electronics, everyday problems, and music.

183
 Common to all four boards is, not surprisingly, a particular discussion style
that can only be acquired by reading other users’ posts. This style is adapted to the
topic at stake: In our case, it appears well-suited to the ambivalent and transgressive
pleasures offered by post TV entertainment programs, with their strong emphasis
on competition, drama and those recurring Gänsehaut (goose bump) moments that
signify ‘true’ and ‘authentic’ emotion.
Between Medium and Program: Entertaining Talk among
Regular User-as-Participants in the I.O.F.F.
In this short round-up of examples taken from I.O.F.F. board discourse regarding
The Walking Dead (AMC, 2010-), The Voice of Germany (ProSieben/Sat.1, 2011-),
and celebrity gossip that is compiled from various (online) sources,19 I rely on
Joachim Höflich’s distinction between user behavior as “sociable” or “communi-
ty-oriented,”20 and I follow Höflich’s suggestion to view the particular dynamics
of web-based communication as tied in with their “electronicity” rather than some
alleged “virtuality.”
My approach to board discourse analysis is ethnographic and auto-ethnographic:
As a mere observer of mediated board user talk I remain a sympathetic onlooker,
avoid to interrupt – and similarly avoid any kind of direct quote that might point to
particular users which I did not (have the chance to) explicitly ask for permission.
This is the case with the I.O.F.F. discussions on Walking Dead and The Voice that I
have followed randomly, as an interested yet non-involved lurker (e.g. onlooker).21
The respective transparency, displayed in the example of the Promilästerthread
(PLT), provided unsuspecting board users with the opportunity to give (or: refuse)
their permission to be quoted – an occasion that was grasped by many and led to
insightful instances of meta-Anschlusskommunikation behind the curtains of the
board. The risk I willingly ran was that skeptical users may have refrained from
posting altogether while I remained ‘on’ as an investigator.
In general, entertaining board discourse can be differentiated along two axes:
One refers to the moment of posting with regard to some newsworthy event that
can be simultaneous with the event (a comment is posted immediately after) or
express some reflexive distance in hindsight (a comment is posted the next morning,
or days after the event in question). The other axis expresses referentiality. This is
the case with regard to other users’ posts that are explicitly quoted (Fig. 1) or with

19 For examples of typical second screen discourse, I refer to the publicly accessible German
I.O.F.F., and in particular to the ongoing ‘threads’ (i.e. temporarily active storylines) regarding
(a) the original broadcast of The Walking Dead on the U.S. cable network AMC, (b) the 4th
season of The Voice of Germany on Pro Sieben and Sat.1, and (c) I.O.F.F.’s own gossiping
column in its 97th edition, “PLT 97: Nominiert trotz 365 Tagen Vollmond.”
20 Cf. Höflich. His definition of sociability follows Georg Simmel as well as Jürgen Habermas and
addresses a form of social contact that is by default loosely structured and refrains from asking
too much investment from interested participants. Discussants look upon each other as equals
but remain mostly anonymous; their relationship may develop into some formal acquaintance,
but hardly more than this. Communities require considerably greater investments of labour than
a social circle; members come to share a genuine interest not just in the topic at hand, but also
in each other – which is why conflict is avoided, and losses of membership affect the group as
a whole.
21 In discussion rooms that I visit on a regular basis, however, I see it as my duty to disclaim – and
patiently explain – my role as researcher to my colleagues who know me in another, more
informal role as discussant/gossiper/entertainer.

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 Figure 1: #3040 Crossmedia cross-referenced: celebrity discourse as
everyday talk; avatar blurred; user names anonymized.

Figure 2: #3249 Gossiping about gossipers: Paparazzi talk in the PLT;

avatar blurred; user names anonymized.

regard to nontopical issues that refer back to one’s own everyday reality (Fig. 2).
Extensive quoting is common in discussion threads that have mixed subjects, but
just as much in ‘slow’ threads that feature well-reflected posts verging on formality.
As for Höflich’s distinction between sociability and community, the difference can
easily be spotted when comparing threads that feature many different users and
threads that are visited by “the usual suspects” meeting on a more familiar basis.
A good indicator for “familiarity” (with a particular entertaining subject, and with
each other) is the excessive use of smileys in skillful, highly nuanced combinations.
The two threads I have observed feature, on the one hand, postings that clearly
accompany some actual viewing and represent paraverbal reactions (of amusement,
wonder, or shock) rather than user comments. The more ‘distant’ the viewer’s stance
(in a temporal and/or metaphorical sense), the longer the comment and the greater
the chance to ‘grasp’ what is going on from a non-viewer perspective. An important
observation concerns the actual ‘screens’ consulted by viewers-as-board-users: For
many expert commenters it makes no difference if the primary program is watched
on a TV screen (ergo: two screens, altogether) or watched via livestream in one of
many open windows on a computer screen. However: While livestream access is
optional with programs that are publicly available via free TV and cable TV, the
computer access is mandatory in cases of (legal or illegal) downloads.
As for the gossiping activities of users in the Promilästerthread, there may
be no primary screen at all (and thus, no second screen to complement some
collective viewing). But the process of information-gathering remains all the
same, with a minority of users taking on the role of experts, or opinion leaders
(e.g. the posters of images and video-links) while a majority of posters consider

185
themselves to be ‘viewers’ that are content to receive, enjoy, comment (in order
to become visible) – and express their gratitude for the entertaining ‘program’
at stake. One might argue that all board discussion relying heavily on online
sources (just as gossip columns and celebrity blogs do) depends on audiences
becoming the medium. Or at least – and this is, what the example of the PLT
clearly illustrates – audiences becoming the program.
Conclusion
Following Lothar Mikos, who claims that the entertaining experience as such
is importantly contextualized as communicative construct, the phenomenon of
pleasurable talk among peers has been established here as an indispensable ingre-
dient of mediated (and particularly: broadcast) entertainment. This is not to say
that everything that is supposed to please needs to be verbally digested in order
to reach its target. Audience reactions to entertainment are – and remain – just
as individual and variable as the respectively developed tastes. My point is that
user communities opt for collectively enjoyable entertainment (as is the case with
second screen applications provided by topical discussion boards) for the sake of
being with others. In order to achieve that goal they will necessarily adapt in style
to what they themselves (or: others that are valued as good company) choose as
primary text on some primary screen, and vice versa. On the other hand, I have
tried to show that the conversations evolving around narrative entertainment have
a distinctive narrative quality of their own and contribute to what is primarily told
in a television series or reality show. It is exactly what Neal R. Norrick as well as
Elinor Ochs and Lisa Capps refer to as “everyday storytelling”: Questions are asked
and commentaries provided, storylines are further elaborated and heartfelt desires
expressed just as much as vividly described fears and irritations with regard to the
narrative-so-far. It is a kind of narrative communication that may seem ephemeral,
if not eccentric, at first sight. But it is there to fulfill an elementary social desire:
the need to connect, and remain connected.
In an era of increased audience fragmentation, these forms of apparently
heightened, significantly enhanced participatory pleasures that are engendered
by successive talk seem to me important enough to be further examined. And not
just for their transgressive intention and, yes, their entertaining quality: These
leisurely endeavors of cooperative and controversial co-telling of mediated stories
do contribute significantly to the formation of a collective memory (or, here, ‘serial
memory’) with regard to popular culture.
It may be just talk, and it may just concern those that do the talking (and: listening).
But it is talk that can help to re-connect members of dispersed and/or diffused audi-
ences years and decades after some collective reading, listening and/or viewing took
place.22 Just as the television programs of the paleo and neo era did. Just as narrative
conversation always does, by default. Following Abercrombie and Longhurst, a “dif-
fused” audience will grab every given opportunity to perform on the multimedia stage.
I would like to add that such audiences grab every given opportunity to talk. About
media, of course. And via media, as a consequence. The audience is the medium.

St. Gallen Ursula Ganz-Blättler

22 See de Leeuw, for a similar reflection on national documentaries as “sites of memory.”

186
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 Fan Fiction and Soap Operas:
On the Seriality of Vast Narratives
The piece “Life after Death and Betrayal,” written by a user with the pen name
DebsTheSlytherinSnapefan, is currently the Harry Potter and Twilight crossover
fan fiction with the most reviews on FanFiction.net, the largest fan fiction archive
online. In the narrative that is written as a sequel to Joanne K. Rowling’s Harry Potter
series, war-weary Harry Potter moves to Forks, Washington, to stay away from the
world of wizards. In Forks (the main setting of Stephenie Meyer’s vampire series
Twilight), Harry rents a building to open a bakery. When Jasper Cullen, one of the
members of the vampire coven that features prominently in Meyer’s series, catches
Harry’s scent, he realizes that Harry is his mate for life. The story plays out between
the two characters as a slash fan fiction.1 “Life after Death and Betrayal” thus picks
up one of the central themes in the Twilight narrative and explores it through the
evolving relationship between two characters from different preexisting media texts,
and in opposition to the assumed heterosexual normativity in both ‘official’ series.
In the fourth chapter of the fan fiction, Jasper uses his vampire strength to
run to Harry as fast as possible and “grab[s] a hold of his mate, imprisoning
him close. His body coming alive for the first time as he h[olds] him close”
(DebsTheSlytherinSnapefan). Until Carlisle (the vampire who serves as a father
figure) is able to pull them apart, Jasper has the chance to repeatedly whisper
“[m]ine” into Harry’s ear. DebsTheSlytherinSnapefan follows up the fourth chapter
that includes this scene with an author’s note in which she directly addresses her
readers and asks: “[W]as that possessive enough without going too far? Will harry
[sic] accept the bond or will jasper [sic] have to work for it? [...] so many possibilities
and only one can be written.” 31 chapters later, Harry is married to Jasper Cullen
and lives with him, his godson Teddy, and their adopted son Reese. At this point, the
text amounts to 100,000 words overall, and is accompanied by 2,878 reviews and
reader comments.2 Despite the author’s note on the limited narrative possibilities,
there seems to be an infinite number of ways in which the Harry Potter and Twilight
fan fiction texts can be extended beyond the authorized, official iterations of the
franchises.
There is an overwhelming amount of fan fictions archived online: On
­FanFiction.net alone, fans have posted more than 703,000 fan fictions set in the
Harry Potter universe, and more than 217,000 texts related to Twilight. Crossover
fiction is available in a separate section of the site. Here, 3,577 Harry Potter/Twi-
light crossover texts have been posted that exemplify – like “Life after Death and
Betrayal” – how serialized texts can become intertwined with each other (Fig. 1).
This archive grows constantly, chapter by chapter, day after day. The extent of these
narratives, taken together, outperforms other serialized formats with exceptional
length. Take for instance, the soap opera Guiding Lights, which aired for almost 72
years and which Robert Allen has called “the longest story ever told” (1). Even with

1 Slash is an established fan fiction genre that features homosexual or homosocial relationships
between characters that are often heterosexual in the originating media. The fan wiki fanlore.
org provides an extended definition and historical account of slash and the controversies it
triggered (“Slash”).
2 Date of writing: January 2015.

191
its more than 15,000 episodes, the show can no longer match the sprawling amount
of fan fiction that exists online (Carter; Nasaw). Nevertheless, because of their high
tendency of serialization, soap operas are a prime example to point out some of the
features of popular seriality and “vast narratives” (Harrigan 2). By means of such
a comparison, this essay will investigate fan fiction as popular serial texts, which
show strong similarities and important differences to soap operas. The aim is to point
out textual structures of the genre, and argue that a conceptualization of fan fiction
needs to include the fictional texts written by fans as well as the related communal
practices, and therefore cannot be equated with other forms of literary adaptation
and transformation.

Figure 1: Screenshot of the top of the Harry Potter crossover

fan fiction list on FanFiction.net (January 2015).

Vast Narratives and the Dynamics of Seriality

Like Sherlock Holmes or the The Wizard of Oz,3 the Harry Potter and Twilight
series evade narrative closure. Taken separately, the seven Harry Potter books that
were published between 1997 and 2007, and the Twilight Saga that appeared as a
series of four novels from 2005 to 2008 are well contained, but, like Arthur Conan
Doyle and L. Frank Baum, Meyer and Rowling themselves have returned to and
extended the fictional universes they had created. In 2010, Meyer published The
Short Second Life of Bree Tanner, a novel that tells the story of a marginal character
from the third Twilight book. Already in 2008, Meyer had posted a manuscript that
rewrites the Twilight story from the perspective of Edward, instead of Bella, on her
own website.4 Since 2010, Rowling has repeatedly hinted at the possibility of her
return to the ‘Potterverse’ in her work. In 2013, Rowling began to get involved in the
writing of a stage play, which recounts the story of Harry Potter’s childhood before
he became a student at Hogwarts (Wyatt). Also in 2013, rumors were confirmed
that Rowling was working on a movie script about the author of the Hogwarts
schoolbook Fantastic Beasts & Where to Find Them (Perry).

3 On Sherlock Holmes, see Chabon; on The Wizard of Oz, see Kelleter.

4 Meyer explained that this manuscript was meant for publication on the print market, but was
leaked to the public without her knowledge, which triggered her decision to make it accessible
for her readers for free (“Midnight”).

192
 Beyond those texts that were written by Rowling and Meyer, other authors and
producers have serialized and added to the novels through games, movies, comics or
graphic novels, theme parks or guided tours at the locations of the films. The momentum
that drives this transmedia serialization is at least in part commercially motivated.5
Because of the commercial success of serial stories, but also because audiences derive
pleasure from serial narratives, and the reception practices that accompany them,
the series is a dominant form of storytelling in popular culture that usually extends
the length of singular works. Some series tend to produce more installments, a more
intense proliferation and sprawl than others. In comparison to other serial TV shows,
for example, Guiding Lights and other soap operas can be considered “vast narratives,”
texts that exceed the expected narrative form of a genre (Harrigan 2). The format of the
soap supports ongoing serialization. Long-running soap operas create a storyworld and
character continuity over an extensive period of time as well as an enormous extent
of narrated plot, while sustaining an open-ended narrative. This continuous narration
results in and is in turn also based on several structural elements of soap operas, which
create a complex relationship between the texts and their viewers.
Beyond authors who themselves return to and expand their series, recent research
has further pointed at the agency of series and serial characters themselves (cf.
Kelleter; Mayer). The adaptation of successful young adult literature into movies,
games and other media outlets that turn these franchises into vast narratives with
diverse opportunities for consumers to enter has become a common practice.6
Further proliferation of the series has been happening through fans’ practices
online, and in the case of Harry Potter and Twilight has led to the formation of
‘megafandoms,’ which have produced and still produce, a sprawling amount of
fan fiction and other fan works that can no longer be controlled or contained by
copyright holders. Even though fan fiction is part of the dynamics of serialization in
popular culture – because it serializes the content and fictional universes of existing
media texts and most fan fiction texts appear in serial installments themselves – it
has rarely been investigated as part of this dynamic.
Fan Fiction: Adaptation, Subversion or Popular Seriality?
Abigail Derecho,7 a fan scholar who has worked on the relationship between fan
fiction and other genres, argues that scholars and fans have mainly taken two perspec-
tives on fan fiction: The first line of argument understands fan fiction as belonging to
a broad category of texts that have been retold and passed on orally, in writing and
print for ages, including fairy tales, folk stories and myths – a tradition that includes
writers that identify as fans and writers that use similar writing strategies (62). This
conceptualization does not distinguish between source texts that are the basis for
transformations and appropriations of audiences; a fairy tale that is passed on and

5 Kelleter argues that popular seriality is a “largely self-reinforcing process of narrative and
experiential proliferation. It is a process that produces its own follow-up possibilities, because
structurally, a serial narrative is always open-ended, promising to constantly renew the ever
same moment. More abstractly put, popular seriality promises to accomplish a paradox which
may well be the structural utopia of all capitalist culture: it promises a potentially infinite
innovation of reproduction” (21).
6 Apart from Harry Potter and Twilight, the Hunger Games or Percey Jackson series are prom-
inent examples. They are among the list of the 10 fandoms that have inspired the most fan
fiction on FanFiction.net.
7 Derecho has changed her name to Abigail de Kosnik and published more work on fan fiction.

193
takes on regional differences is approached in the same way as a novel series that is
turned into slash fan fiction online. Nor does this concept account for the different
ways of dissemination, e.g. oral or on online platforms. It does not consider the
mediality of the source and the transformative text, or if an author who is paid for
the work is doing the rewriting, or someone who publishes his or her fan fiction for
free. The second prominent line of argument that Derecho points out, and supports
herself, states that fan fiction is a “product of fan cultures, which began either in the
late 1960s, with Star Trek fanzines, or, at the earliest, in the 1920s, with Austen and
Holmes societies” (62).8 I agree with Derecho’s observations, but, like other scholars
who have argued for a historic development of fan fiction as a narrative form, Derecho
does not draw any conclusions from her argument, nor does she make it useful in
a structural description of fan fiction and the practices related to it. Further, most
histories and conceptualizations of fan fiction actually combine these arguments.
Sheenagh Pugh, who has published one of the first extensive investigations that
focus on fan fiction as literature, explains that fan fiction relates to diverse forms of
appropriative texts and forms of narration from myths and fairy tales to children’s
play and postcolonial adaptations. The insistence to prove similarities between fan
fiction and other, culturally and legally accepted forms of transformative writing, is
most likely inspired by the legal complications fans have encountered, especially
during the early spread of fan fiction on the internet. Pugh laments that, beside these
similarities, fan fiction has to defend itself against accusations of plagiarism and
intellectual theft.9 In her undertaking to align fan fiction with other respected forms
of writing, Pugh argues that fan fiction is “writing, whether official or unofficial,
paid or unpaid, which makes use of an accepted canon of characters, settings and
plots generated by another writer or writers” (25). Sympathetic authors like Michael
Chabon have gone as far as saying that “all literature, highbrow or low, from the
Aeneid onward, is fan fiction” (56).
Neither Pugh nor Chabon consider the self-descriptions of authors or the ways
and contexts in which texts are being published. Therefore, it remains open in how
far such a broad definition is helpful. Derecho herself proposes to establish an
understanding of fan fiction as “archontic” literature, and (much like Pugh) views
it as a subgenre of a tradition of transformative texts (63). While her considerations
foreground many features of fan fiction that are related to the serial quality of these
texts, like the drive of the “archontic principle” to enlarge itself, she does not refer
to popular forms of serialization to explain these practices. Derecho distinguishes
her concept of archontic literature from earlier theories about intertextuality, because
these texts consciously refer to other texts (64-65). All fan fictions that are published
online explicitly display their reference to a source text. Either because they are
posted in archives that serve as a platform for specific fandoms like Twilighted.net or
FictionAlley.blogspot.com or, if they are posted on blogs and multi-fandom platforms,
they identify themselves through descriptions in summaries or in the genre specific
headers that precede most fan fictions.

8 See Coppa on the change in audience practices and the specificity of the period since the 1960s.
She specifically focuses on the subversive and feminist implications of fan practices.
9 The battles over copyright infringements by fan fiction authors and the offended reactions
that many authors express following the fan fiction employment of ‘their’ materials, are the
background for Pugh’s argument. See also Jenkins, Convergence Culture 169-205, on Harry
Potter fans and their struggle with Warner Bros.

194
 Derecho focuses on the subversive potential of archontic literature, foreground-
ing the role of female writers, and “the way that archontic writing has often been
used as a technique of social, political, or cultural critique” (66). Again, Derecho
points at one of the features of seriality without naming it, when she explains
(drawing on Deleuze) that the archontic text is not a replication but “repetition
with a difference.” The archontic text always refers back to the “original,” which
remains in the memory of the audience: “The two texts resonate together in both
the new text and the old one” (73).
Derecho makes some valuable observations about the group of texts she calls
archontic literature. Nevertheless, her conceptualization approaches fan fiction as
literary texts, texts that can seemingly be separated from the surrounding context
and its constituting practices. She has nothing to say about the interactions between
authors and readers or the specific spaces where the interactions take place, or
why certain texts are reiterated and transformed many times, even over decades
while others are not. Derecho does not argue that all archontic texts are inherently
subversive, yet she makes a case for this as a general tendency. I believe that the
phenomenon of sprawling serialization, the driving motor of commercial interests
and the related practices of fans can only be explained when we understand fan
fiction distinctly as part of popular culture.
When we compare the descriptions of legal battles between copyright holders
and fans and the mistrust of authors against fan fiction that Pugh and Jenkins point
out and the practices of authors today, it seems that sentiments have changed. Both
Meyer and Rowling not only tolerate and acknowledge the creativity of fans, but
also facilitate a close proximity between the copyrighted or licensed versions of their
narratives and fan works.10 The structural organization of Meyer’s website actually
includes fan fiction and other fan practices as part of the series. The site provides
virtual index cards that offer a short introduction for her individual works, and when
one opens the index card for the Twilight series, it lists all authorized installments
of the series written by herself, including the manuscript she has published on her
website and a licensed graphic novel. But beyond her own texts, the last entry on
this list provides links to more than 100 “Fansites” that host fan fiction and other
fan works, like drawings or videos, set in the Twilight universe.11 Recently, Meyer,
together with Lionsgate, the company that produced the Twilight movies, started
to mentor young female directors that will produce short films set in the Twilight
universe, which will then be shown on Facebook (McNary). Rowling has gone even
further and created her own online platform Pottermore,12 where she sells e-book
versions of her novels, and fans can engage in different activities linked to the
Potterverse. Since she started working on further commercial serializations of the
narrative, Rowling herself has used the site to publish new short Harry Potter texts.
Beyond the proximity that Rowling and Meyer create between their own texts
and fan writing, the attempts of other copyright holders to sell fan fiction as part
of a franchise – for example in the case of The Vampire Diaries’ fan fiction that
can be bought on Amazon, and the success of the former Twilight fan fiction that

10 Rowling has been involved in at least one legal action against a fan who wanted to write a
Harry Potter lexicon (Leonard). The sympathetic tolerance seems geared towards fans who
produce non-commercial extensions only.
11 See http://stepheniemeyer.com/ts_fansites.html.
12 See https://www.pottermore.com/en-us.

195
was turned into the novel Fifty Shades of Grey13 – demonstrates the change in
status that fan fiction has recently undergone. This change has probably been
effected by many factors: the proliferation of fandom and its visibility online, the
academic engagement with fandom, but likely most strongly by the potential to
exploit fan works commercially. Rowling’s platform Pottermore is a case in point
that exemplifies how fan participation is not per se oppositional and subversive but
might as well be incorporated in marketing strategies. The creation of “more of”
(Pugh 20) the same by fans is thus not a threat to further commercial success of the
licensed products, but a potential catalyst, and online sites can be used to monitor
the interests and preferences of fans. It seems as if copyright holders understand
that internet platforms make it almost impossible for them to control or contain
the production of fan fiction and other fan works, but also that the activities of fans
might be profitable, and a way to keep audiences emotionally engaged with the
franchise. These audiences then might go on to buy merchandise, or visit theme
parks. The fact that fan fiction can coexist with commercial texts without reducing
the desires of audiences to buy or consume texts written by the original authors
of the media source further hints at the complex hierarchies of authorship at play.
Structures, Rituals, Public Spheres of the Imagination
We need to examine fan fiction not only as a form of literary adaptation, but also
understand it in its context, as a part of popular seriality, and as an audience practice
that is predominantly taking place online nowadays. Both Jennifer Hayward and
Nancy Baym have commented on the specific materiality of the soap opera that
enhances some of the features of seriality. Once more, they serve as illustrating
points of comparison: The repeated consumption of both soap operas and fan fiction
is not restricted by financial means. Access to the shows does not create extra cost
in households that own a TV set and receive network TV. Readers who have access
to a computer and the internet can read fan fiction on most platforms free of charge.
Soap operas are, like most fan fiction platforms, financed through advertisement.
Always available and with a constant stream of new episodes, the soap is “cre-
ated to vanish” (Hayward 135); each episode is just one in an open-ended series.
Even though devoted fans can collect installments, the genre was created before
VCRs allowed for the recording and preservation of episodes, and the amount of
continuously growing material makes it almost impossible to collect and be familiar
with all parts of the shows even today. Fan fiction texts differ from soap operas
in so far as there is an immense archive of texts available online, which allows a
return to specific installments. The migratory behavior of fans, who delete their
accounts or stories for good or move their ‘home’ to other platforms, and the unstable
existence of archives,14 specifically of fan-run sites, make these texts ephemeral as
well. The vastness of the fantext of a fandom, like the vastness of a long running
soap, prohibits a state where one fan would be able to have read or collected all
serial instantiations.

13 Fifty Shades of Grey has spurred its own serialization. On FanFiction.net, more than 2,000 Fifty
Shades of Grey fan fictions are archived. E.L. James wrote Fifty Shades of Grey as a fan fiction
that was published on FanFiction.net first. In 2012, Fifty Shades of Grey was the best-selling
book of all time in Britain (Jones).
14 In 2002, FanFiction.net has deleted many stories as they did not comply to the newly installed
community standards (Ellison).

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 Serials that appear in regular temporal installments and in the same medial guise
create the ever same experience that they are “frozen in the now” (Hayward 136)
involving the same spaces where the text is consumed, familiar characters and most
likely the same time in the daily or weekly schedule. A state of being that is further
pushed by serials as vast as the fan fiction of Harry Potter or Twilight which exist
as digital files online, as these texts are always available and because of their sheer
number could provide as many repetitions with a difference as one individual fan
is able to read. Hayward explains that in juxtaposition to the ephemerality of the
texts as objects, serials create “a long-term stability [...]: all provide steady, reliable,
unchanging communities of both characters and viewers” (136). Hayward describes
the pleasures of serial narratives in the ritualistic, often community-based, reading
or viewing, the reassurance of the familiar and the enjoyments of the rhythm of
seriality, which we can assume for readers and authors of fan fiction as well.
Soap operas, like most TV shows, are written by multiple authors, and have been
produced in “factory style” and by division of labor since the 1930s (Baym, Tune In
49). Thousands of authors are involved in the writing of the fantext of any fandom
as large as the Harry Potter or Twilight community. In contrast to the authors of
a soap opera, who are paid for their work and regulated by contracts, there is no
form of organization except those rules established by specific communities and the
etiquette or rules of specific sites.15 Some sites, like Twilighted.net, ask authors to
show their texts to beta readers, who function as lectors, before texts get published,
on other sites, like FanFiction.net, beta reading is optional.16 On FanFiction.net,
every user can open an account and post fan fiction and comment on fictions by
others. Because of the lack of organization in the fan fiction publishing process,
there is no guarantee that authors who start a fan fiction text finish or continue the
text they have begun. Instead, fan fiction authors frequently abandon projects or start
new fictions. Further, there are no regulated time sequences in which installments
appear. DebsTheSlytherinSnapefan has published 84 stories on FanFiction.net.
Nine of them were updated this month; at least one of them was discontinued.
Some of these nine stories were started earlier this year; two of them have been
running since 2007.
While fan fiction writing existed before the internet spread to private households,
the online environment has distinctly shaped and changed fan cultures. Kristina
Busse and Karen Hellekson explain that, even though there are still hard copy zines
that fans use to publish their texts, which were the common media tool to publish
fan fiction before the 1990s,17 the majority of the texts are available online today.
Fan activities that preceded online communication were usually based on face-to-
face activities in fan clubs or at conventions.18 This also meant that the barriers to
enter fandom were higher in the pre-internet era, as becoming a member afforded

15 Even though fan fiction is available without costs online it still exists in dynamics of exchange.
On fandom’s gift economy, see Hellekson; Turk.
16 On FanFiction.net, users can create a beta reading profile in addition to their general profile.
The site allows writers to search among those members who volunteer to beta read and their
preferred fandoms. On these profiles, beta readers describe their strengths and weaknesses and
which stories they prefer to edit and proofread.
17 Some university libraries have started to archive science fiction fanzines. See, for example, http://
www.lib.uiowa.edu/sc/resources/fandomresources/; http://library.ucr.edu/?view=collections/
spcol/fanzines.html.
18 See Bacon-Smith; Jenkins, Textual Poachers.

197
mobility, money and connections. Busse and Hellekson explain that “fandom was
transmitted from person to person through enculturation. Fan artifacts were physical,
and geographical boundaries were often an issue” (13). Today, fans can write,
post and find readership for their fan fiction online without an introduction into
the existing traditions and conventions of fan fiction communities by other fans.
The virtual environment has added new positions to the fan spectrum, as fans can
remain lurkers and consume fan fiction and online discussions without leaving
visible traces or interacting with other members of the community. Busse and
Hellekson observe that rules of the offline culture have lost their importance in the
online culture, and that the demographics have distinctly changed,19 as younger
fans without financial resources can engage in fandoms and fandoms are becoming
increasingly international “because access to a computer is the only prerequisite; and
national boundaries and time zones have ceased to limit fannish interaction” (13).20
The continuous form of the soap opera makes intricate character development
possible beyond the means of a film or shorter series, which allows audiences
to become involved both in loving and hating these characters over an extended
time period (Baym, Tune In 49). Fan fictions and crossover fan fictions also allow
a continuous engagement with familiar characters. Often, the representations
fans employ refer back to the character developments in the previously existing
media texts, and allow for a prolonging of the pleasure fans are familiar with.
This is specifically true for fan-written prequels and sequels that focus on one
specific fandom. In many cases, fan fiction texts allow for a decisive change in
the characters or a total reinvention, as for example when authors like DebsThe­
SlytherinSnapefan fuse different universes, their narrative rules and characters
by portraying alternative sexual orientations. In soap operas, characters develop
over time, and often change profoundly. In contrast to the linear development
of characters in soap operas, a fantext is more like a mosaic in which different
versions of a character are tried out by different authors. Often, fan fiction writers
leave out parts of the canon of the originating media. In the case of the Jasper
and Harry fan fiction, DebsTheSlytherinSnapefan neglects the happy-ever-after
relationships that Rowling and Meyer had invented for their characters. Jasper
and Harry exist not only as extensions of the official media texts, but also in the
context of fan traditions, in which genre conventions for slash stories have been
established over decades.
Baym argues that soap operas “glorify and exaggerate emotions” (Tune In 55).
Intense positive and negative emotions, especially related to romantic relation-
ships, are also central to fan fiction as the scene of the first encounter between
Jasper and Harry, I described earlier, shows. Like the soap opera as a genre, fan
fiction is equally interested in the depiction of the mundane and domestic everyday
life of their characters, while often incorporating fantastic elements and battles
between creatures with supernatural powers (as is the case in the Harry Potter
and Twilight fiction).

19 They specifically refer to “real person slash fiction” like fiction about musicians, specifically
boy groups that have become more common.
20 The language filter on fanfiction.net allows to choose from 41 languages. English is the most
frequently used language with about 535,000 thousand texts. But there are still an impressive
number of 13,400 German fan fictions in the Harry Potter universe, and close to 1,000 in
Swedish.

198
 The close relationships between characters and the extended display of evolving
lives in combination with the need to show new plotlines in soap operas “allow the
characters to be richly interconnected in complex (and downright incestuous) com-
munities” (57). In the extended fantext, ‘shipping,’ the description of relationships
between different characters, is one of the main ways for fans to distinguish fan fiction
texts from each other and to choose those they want to read. In the vast amount of
fan fiction available, every major character, and most of the minor characters, of
Twilight and Harry Potter have been coupled with each other, at times in literally
incestuous relationships, for example between the twins George and Fred Weasley.
FanFiction.net provides a complex search engine for Twilight and Harry Potter fan
fiction. The filter allows readers to search for length, status, genre and/or characters
of a fiction. They can find “Life after Death and Betrayal” with a search for a fan
fiction text that features both Jasper and Harry. All fan fiction texts further provide a
header with a short summary that often includes information about the main romantic
relationship. In the case of “Life after Death and Betrayal,” DebsTheSlytherinSnape-
fan informs readers that her text is a “Jasper/Harry Slash” (Fig. 2).

Life After Death and Betrayal

By: DebsTheSlytherinSnapefan
Harry is twenty two years old, moving to Forks to settle down and open a bakery. He’s seen death and suffered betrayal at the hands of those he trusted. He
also has a secret he hasn’ told another living soul. He is the Master of death. Things change for Harry, giving him a reason to live other than his godson for the
first time. Jasper/Harry SLASH.
Rated: Fiction M - English - Harry P., Jasper - Chapters: 25 - Words 109,128 - Reviews: 2,870 - Favs: 2,849 - Follows: 2,784 - Updated: Dec 8, 2013 -
Published: Mar 9, 2013 - Status: Complete - id: 9081080

Figure 2: Header of the fan fiction “Life after Death and Betrayal”
by DebsTheSlytherinSnapefan.

Like soap operas, fan fiction narratives are often constructed in schematic ways,
repeating a set of themes and patterns of story development, as in the case of
Twilight fan fiction, the finding of a ‘mate’ and various resulting complications
that deter a happy resolution. Hayward argues that soap opera fans are aware of
the rules and “machinations of the genre” (154). They actually enjoy the recogni-
tion and prediction of known patterns. The same is true for readers of fan fiction:
DebsTheSlytherinSnapefan eludes to the specific ways Jasper is portrayed as a
romantic interest that fan readers are used to in the author’s note to her readers.
Jasper, and we learn little about him as a romantic partner in the Twilight series,
has become the incarnation of a possessive partner in his fan fiction extension, a
stereotype that is reinforced across the fandom. Beyond the recurring characters
and schematic plot developments, soap operas usually make repeated use of settings
that are familiar to the audiences and produce their own history. Over time, Baym
argues, soap operas create worlds “that seem to have independent existences, as if
the hour of the show were a window rather than a text” (Tune In 60). The worlds
seem “nonauthored,” an effect that is enhanced by the fact that soap operas often

199
allow the viewers to understand the perspective of each of the characters (60).21
The fact that fan fiction authors are able to extend and play in the fictive universes
created by Meyer and Rowling also points at this independent existence of these
worlds, which often is the consistent factor that is only changed in small aspects
by the fan fiction while characters are transformed in radical ways or have taken
on their own attributes in fan traditions.
The serial techniques of soap operas are designed to generate and maintain
the audiences’ interest in returning to the shows. Soap operas entertain several
ongoing storylines at the same time, so even if one plot is resolved, rarely are all
concurrent storylines brought to a conclusion simultaneously. Usually the narrative
allows for multiple perspectives on the same events, which slows down the plot
development. The deferral of a resolution is based on the content and plot level in
soap operas, in contrast to individual fan fiction texts, which might end and find
closure. But, nevertheless, the story continues as written by another author, another
re-imagination, or through the combination with another fandom. The enormous
amount of fan texts further allows a voicing of the perspectives of many characters
on the repeated plot archetypes.
Online Spaces as “Public Spheres of the Imagination”
Beyond the ongoing, ritualistic reception of soap operas, Hayward makes a strong
argument that audiences engage with these texts in communities or as communal
practices: “[S]erial fictions encourage collaborative readings of texts” and, “serial
fictions, unlike many mass texts, actually do respond more or less directly to
audience feedback” (170).22 Nancy Baym has investigated online Usenet news-
groups formed by soap opera fans in the early 1990s, and explains that soap opera
communities have used this space mainly for four communicative practices, namely
informing, speculating, criticizing, and reworking (“Talking”). Fan fiction and the
(critical) discussions that accompany it are one of the ways audiences engage with
a series of texts in a collaborative and communal way. The ways communities form
in public spaces seems to be a common feature of popular seriality. Michael Saler
has undertaken a study that points to the conclusion that communal practices have
accompanied popular serial texts that create imaginary worlds, at least since the
turn of the last century, and are a recurring feature of these texts. He explains that
new “public spheres of the imagination” appeared in the first twenty years of the
twentieth century that became spaces where audience members discussed imaginary
characters and the worlds they live in. Letter columns in newspapers and science
fiction magazines, associations, audience publications, and conventions allowed
community members to “meet” and discuss these worlds. Saler observes that the
“public spheres of the imagination” were not only used to debate “the meanings

21 In his book Fan Cultures, Matt Hills introduces the concept of “hyperdiegesis” as one of the
features of a narrative that facilitates the ongoing engagement of fans with a text. Hyperdiegesis
is “the creation of a vast and detailed narrative space, only a fraction of which is ever directly
seen or encountered within a text” (137).
22 Hayward describes that fans, through their presence near the studio or fan mail, inform the
studios of their wishes “praising particular performers and storylines, condemning others, and
suggesting possible developments or romantic pairings for the future; and threaten to stop
watching if their suggestions are ignored. [...] [S]oaps, thoroughly enmeshed in the social and
economic network, respond – in some of their manifestations and in limited ways – to the
desires of audiences” (137).

200
and mechanics of fiction, but also to enhance the ‘reality effects’ of fantasy: [...]
by probing its details, reconciling its apparent contradictions, and filling in its
lacunae” (17). Similar to Baym’s observations among the soap opera fans online,
Saler detects that these spaces allowed multiple audience members to enlarge the
imaginary world as a collective and to “bring the imaginary world to life and to
perpetuate it as an evolving territory transcending any single reader’s involvement,
transforming it thereby into a virtual reality” (17). In other words, these practices of
early fan communities investigated and enlarged imaginary worlds, as is done by
today’s serializations through fan fiction and other practices. Saler believes that the
ongoing engagement furthered the emotional attachment of the audience members
and turned the reading of stories about worlds into the encounter and participation
in world building as an “ongoing project rather than a transient, private encounter”
(17). The readers therefore become collaborators with the author of the existing
media text but also “fill in gaps, extrapolate possibilities, and imagine prequels and
sequels” (25). We need to understand the online platforms that archive and publish
fan fiction as public spheres of the imagination in Saler’s sense. Busse and Hellekson
have observed that the creation of fan fiction is a community-centered activity, and
that therefore, “the creator of meaning, the person we like to call the author, is not
a single person but rather is a collective entity” (6) – an entity that then engages in
creating a fantext that consists of all published texts and commentaries that engage
with a specific world.
The science fiction and mystery audiences Saler investigates have often been
regarded as gullible fans, who are unable to see the difference between fiction and
reality because they spend so much time with media texts, in the same way that soap
fans have been suspected to be “too close to their shows and have lost the ability to
separate them from what is real and, hence, what is important” (Baym, Tune In 36).
Even though fandom has increasingly become a part of excepted cultural behavior,
it is not free of hierarchies. Like the fans of soap operas, Harry Potter and Twilight
fans have been frowned upon for their pleasure in these specific texts, and it has
been assumed that they lack an understanding of the difference between reality
and the imaginary worlds they enjoy.23 Saler traces these tendencies back to his
corpus. He explicitly points at a dual mode, “the ironic imagination, double-minded
consciousness” (30), in which audience members engage with imaginary worlds in
these public spheres that explain the dynamics between extensive immersion and
critical reflection. Saler explains that on the one hand these worlds are “understood
to be explicitly fictional” and allow community members to critically analyze and
reflect on them, on the other hand, “they are also taken to be real, often to such an
extent that they continue to be ‘inhabited’ long after the tale has been told” (28).
Hayward writes that this process, this dual engagement, is one of the most important
aspects of the pleasure of the soap opera: Pretending to take the text for real while
puzzling out its clues and meanings. Baym has observed how beyond practices
that ascribe a status of ‘realness’ to the soap and its characters, like writing about
them, audiences took pleasures in critical discussions about these shows including
genre conventions and production strategies. The duality of the reception mode
becomes visible in the comments posted for “Life after Death and Betrayal” as well.
Here, fans communicate feelings towards the text and its characters as if they were

23 On negative stereotypes and Twilight fans, see Hills, “Twilight.”

201
gossiping about real people, as for example when a user called twilightreaderaddict
comments on Harry’s godson and the vampires: “Harry is exasperated and intrigued,
but scared more for Teddy than himself and the Cullens are in for the surprise of their
lives!” At the same time, the space is used for comments on a meta level that refer to
the construction of the story and that are informed by the readers’ knowledge about
fan fiction writing. These communications of fans with the authors of fan fictions,
as triggered through DebsTheSlytherinSnapefan’s question, leads to an exchange
between the author and the readers that feeds back into the following installments
of the narrative, much in the same way that soap fans are able to communicate with
the producers of the ongoing show. The fact that fans have engaged with the media
texts over a long period of time might also have inspired Rowling and Meyer to
return to the universes and write more themselves, for an audience that is performing
its ongoing engagement with the narrative.
Both Hayward and Baym observe that for soap opera viewers, the communal
interaction is as much part of the experience of the soap as the text itself. In the
case of fan fiction writing, the communal engagement and the extension of the
text to include communal practices becomes tangible through the author’s notes
that many writers use to address and communicate with their readers, as well as
through the digital links that connect the fictional texts with the comments of
the readers.
The comparison between structural analyses of soap operas and fan fiction
texts is a helpful way to understand fan fiction as vast narratives that are akin to
long-running soap operas and accompanied by similar communal practices. In
their attempts to categorize these texts, fan scholars have often been limited by
the desire to present fan fiction as culturally and legally legitimate works of art.
They have compared it to adaptations in high-brow or folk culture or focused on
fan fictions’ potential to subvert meanings that are prevalent in the pre-existing
media texts. We can learn more about what fan fictions actually do, when we
analyze the ways these texts are defined by the structures and dynamics of popular
seriality. Beyond understanding “Life after Death and Betrayal” as an adaptation
of Twilight and Harry Potter, the lens of popular seriality helps us to see it as part
of an imaginary world that is expanded by many authors. The comparison of fan
fiction with soap operas help us understand the structural make up of these vast
narratives and the tendencies of extended series in popular culture to reproduce
plot archetypes and focus on relationships. Understanding fan fiction as a form of
seriality contextualizes it in a tradition of communal reading and dual engagement
in “public spheres of the imagination” that are immersive as well as reflective
and cannot be separated from each other, because the engagement of fans feeds
back into the serialization of the text, participating audiences understand this
engagement as part of the text, and the understanding of the originating media is
forever altered for those that are aware of its serializations. These considerations
can then further be used for an investigation of other questions related to fan
fiction, as for example the practices of authorship and readers or an investigation
of fan fiction as labor.

Hannover Bettina Soller

202
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Book Reviews
Shane Denson, Postnaturalism: Franken­
stein, Film, and the Anthropotechnical
Inter­face. Bielefeld: transcript, 2014, 432
pp., pb., € 44,99.
Shane Denson’s Postnaturalism offers a highly
original and scholarly sophisticated account
of human-technological co-evolution that
re-evaluates film and media theory from the
perspective of our material interfaces with a
constantly changing environment. Extrapolat-
ing from Frankenstein films and the resonances
they establish “between a hybrid monster and
the spectator hooked into the machinery of the
cinema,” Denson engages debates in science
studies and philosophy of technology – Serres,
Latour, Kittler, and perhaps most notably, Pick-
ering’s mangel theory – to rethink histories of
cinema, media, technology, and ultimately of
the affective channels of our own embodiment.
Constantly dwelling on the question of histori-
cal contingency, media materiality, technology,
and (post-)human becoming in a series of in-
terlocking theoretical reflections and analyses,
Denson’s book is a theoretical and methodo-
logical tour de force that conceptualizes film
(with Vertov and Pudovkin but also Ihde and
Merleau-Ponty) as “Frankensteinian technol-
ogy” and by way of techno-phenomenological
inquiry, decidedly materialist genealogy, and
ontological arguments makes a bold case for
what he calls “postnaturalism” as both research
paradigm and emphatically post-postmodern
metaphysics.
The theoretical cornerstone, or key con-
cept, of the book is the keen subtitle’s “anthro-
potechnical interface,” which is developed
here with great clarity and explicit reference,
among others, to the work of Benjamin, (Mas-
sumi’s) Deleuze and Guattari, and media the-
orist Mark B.N. Hansen, whose “Foreword:
Logics of Transition” perfectly supplements
the book and reminds the theoretically-inclined
reader that she may be well advised to study
Hansen’s Embodying Technesis (2000) along-
side Denson’s project. Fortunately, Denson
succeeds in introducing and developing the
notions of “postnaturalism,” “Frankenstein
film,” and “anthropotechnical interface,” while
re-engaging the extensive body of scholarship
on both Frankenstein and (its) cinema history,
especially with regard to problems of genre and
adaption/seriality as well as (post-)second wave
feminist critiques and (post-)Lacanian and phe-
nomenological film theory with great ease and
even greater clarity. Denson’s introduction, in-
deed the whole book, displays great argumen-
tative stringency, never losing sight of its larg-
er project’s broader concerns: “Post­naturalism,
as a metaphysics of anthropotechnical change,
thus acknowledges these films’ provocations, to
which it offers in response a theory that promis-
es a sort of rapprochement between over-chal-
lenged humans and misunderstood technical
agencies” (27). The book’s well-conceived tri-
partite structure thus “locates the experiential
[ideo-affective] challenges posed by Franken-
stein films” (Part One), “theorizes embodiment,
transitionality, and mediality in an attempt to
articulate a framework – postnaturalism – that
will meet those challenges” (Part Two), and
“returns to Frankenstein films, now with post-
natural theory in hand, to demonstrate the films’
special relations to the historicity of the anthro-
potechnical interface” (Part Three).
Postnaturalism easily succeeds in moving
beyond a traditional, representationalist focus
and instead situates its analyses in a “robustly
material realm of human-technological interac-
tion, a realm of lived relations underlying and
largely unperceived in human thinking about,
and cultural images of, technology” (25). It
also seeks to push beyond both the Benjamin-
ian notion of historicity and medial disposition
of experience, understood as a kind of histor-
ical apriori – an ideo-affective constellation
that mediates perception itself – and the (post-)
Lacanian film theoretical focus on “suture,” the
“stitching-in” of the spectator into the film spec-
tacle to produce a “seamless” whole, which has
traditionally (i.e. in Western Marxism and An-
glo-American Cultural Studies) been theorized
in terms of “subject-positions” opened up by
the films themselves. To this end, Denson criti-
cally engages the decidedly post-Lacanian and
non-representational theory of Deleuze and
Guattari, in particular, as well as its re-develop-
ment in the various New Materialisms, which
finds expression in the aptly titled conclud-
ing sub-chapter, “Lines of Flight: Transitional
Thoughts by Way of Conclusion.”
Consciously focusing on “how Franken­
stein films act as a group” (29n9), Denson
defends both his method and the need for
non-representational theory as follows: “Dis-
cursive analyses, though indispensible, can-
not therefore be sufficient for understanding
the reflexive feedback loops that exist here
between spectator, technological milieu, and
the ­thematic representations on the screen.
The material conditions of the cinema and the
embodied constitution of historically situated
spectators must also be accounted for if we
207
 are to grasp Frankenstein films’ assertions of
a doubly articulated anthropotechnical inter-
face: as these movies intimate – though they
often work to repress their own recognition
– not only the filmic monster but also we as
spectators are “bio-technical” hybrids, and our
imbrication in technical networks (cinematic
and otherwise) presents an additional compli-
cation in the cultural-political negotiation of
“the human.” Hybridity, though, has a history.
Frankenstein is not a timeless tale, nor do its
filmic progenies act in a historical vacuum. In-
deed, Frankenstein films confront us with pre-
cisely the historicity of human-technological
­interfaces – at least, that is, if we confront the
films in a vigorously historicizing manner” (26).
Such quasi-Marxian call to ‘always his-
toricize’ and “confront the films in a vigor-
ously historicizing manner” may ironically
prove to be the book’s theoretical Achilles’
heel. For what is absent from Denson’s other­
wise truly vigorous and most comprehensive
historicizing – of technology, of media, of per-
ception, etc. – is the problem of the (political)
event and the revolutionary social and ideo-af-
fective transformations it may entail, includ-
ing ‘non-technological’ but no less material
reinventions of “the human.” Such omission,
though perhaps necessary, becomes problemat-
ic in view of Denson’s otherwise exceptionally
insightful reading of Shelley’s Frankenstein
(and various adaptations or spin-offs) and the
major role he rightly attributes to the industrial
revolution (and post-industrial technologies),
because he completely brackets the French
Revolution – or, for that matter, the American
Revolution, the Haitian Revolution, the ­Paris
Commune, the Russian Revolution, or the
events of May 1968 and various more recent
emancipatory struggles.
Given Densons’ extraordinary powers
of theoretical synthesis, which are rightfully
praised by Hansen in his foreword to Post­
naturalism, and the fact that his is one of the
rare enough scholarly monographs whose col-
lected footnotes alone provide an excellent ed-
ucation, it would be exciting to see the author
engage recent post-Marxist political ontologies
and metaphysics. Žižek’s notion of a “transcen-
dental materialism,” Rancière’s metaphysics of
the everyday and his notion of the “distribution
of the sensible” may come to mind. And so
does Badiou’s in many ways post-Lacanian and
post-Deleuzian Being and Event (2005) and
Logics of Worlds (2009). Denson’s project can
be said to obviously bracket but also square-
ly match many of these thinkers concerns –
their turn to an emphatically post-postmodern
208
metaphysics and the nexus between thought,
perception, feeling, and agency, in particular.
Badiou’s emphasis on the analysis of “concrete
situations,” for instance, may well be coupled
or supplemented with Denson’s sophisticated
theoretical account of the “robustly material
realm of human-technological interaction” and
insights into (the necessity to think) the contin-
gent process of anthropotechnical interfacing.
Dennis Büscher-Ulbrich, Kiel
Carlen Lavigne (ed.), Remake Television:
­ eboot, Re-use, Recycle. Lanham, MD: Lex-
R
ington Books, 2014, 256 pp., hb., $ 90.00.
As anyone who watches U.S. American tele­
vision knows, remakes are a staple of the
television schedule, their presence eliciting
strong opinions from both television critics
and ­viewers. Carlen Lavigne’s edited volume,
which addresses continuations, reboots, se-
quels, and transmedia adaptations, in addition
to conventional remakes, seeks to restore per-
spective to what has become a highly charged
and polarizing debate. The common thread
linking the fifteen essays in Remake Television
is that studying twenty-first century television
remakes yields valuable insights about the ex-
tent to which “original” television programs
and remakes alike are not only contextual ar-
tifacts, reflective of their time and place, but
also intertextual productions.
Lavigne’s is not the first academic book
to take remakes seriously – a substantial
body of scholarly criticism on film remakes
already exists – but it is one of the few texts
devoted exclusively to the television remake,
along with Janet McCabe and Kim Akass’s
TV’s Betty Goes Global: From Telenovela to
International Brand (2013), Elke Weismann’s
Transnational Television Drama: Special Re­
lations and Mutual Influence Between the U.S.
and U.K. (2012), and Lavigne and Heather
Marcovitch’s American Remakes of British Tel­
evision: Transformations and Mistranslations
(2011). Like the latter two volumes, this book
focuses chiefly on British and U.S. American
television programs.
The opening contribution by William
­Proctor provides theoretical scaffolding for the
essays that follow. Proctor contends that every
text is “already a remake of existing discourses,
tropes, quotations, and allusions alongside
narrative components and generic features” (6).
By way of illustration, Lynette Porter compares
twenty-first century televised versions of Sir
Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes short
stories to late-twentieth century adaptations,
which are themselves remakes, while Lorna
Piatti-Farnell explores how the Gothic genre
shapes both Dark Shadows (ABC, 1966-1971)
and Dark Shadows: The Revival (ABC, 1991).
One of the intriguing observations that
runs through a number of the essays is that
an original television series sometimes mani-
fests characteristics that we more readily iden-
tify with a remake. Stephen Gil, for instance,
investigates the way that The X-Files (Fox,
1993-2002) creatively recycles previous sci-
ence fiction texts (34). James Martens argues
that the ability of The Avengers (ITV/ABC/
Thames, 1961-1969) to adapt to cast turnover,
as well as to the ongoing cultural shifts of the
1960s, means that the show effectively remakes
itself over and over. Heather Marcovitch makes
similar claims for the sci-fi ­series Fringe (Fox,
2008-2013), which alters its premise with each
successive season. In the case of the long-run-
ning Doctor Who (BBC 1, 1963-1989, 2005-),
the subject of Paul Booth and Jef Burnham’s
chapter, rebooting is arguably built into the
show’s format, with its periodic changes of cast
and setting. Even the nostalgia that is the impe-
tus behind many television remakes, according
to Ryan Lizardi, can be found in an original
series like How I Met Your Mother (CBS, 2005-
2014), in which the characters remember and
misremember their shared past.
Other contributions take note of the im-
pact of contemporary socio-political attitudes
on television remakes. Thus Lavigne discuss-
es the influence of 9/11 on Beauty and the
Beast (CW, 2012-), while Matthew Paproth
considers the role of Friday Night Lights
(NBC, DirecTV 2006-2011) as a pop culture
reference in the 2012 American presidential
election, and Kimberley McMahon-Coleman
locates metaphors of disability in Teen Wolf
(MTV, 2011).
At the same time, the existence of a remake
may prompt a re-evaluation of the earlier text,
as Peter Clandfield observes of The Prisoner
(ITC, 1967-68; AMC, 2009). Comparing the
short-lived remake of Charlie’s Angels (ABC,
2011) with its iconic predecessor (ABC, 1976-
1981), Cristina Lucia Stasia concludes that
the original now seems far more feminist than
critics at the time realized. For Helen Thorn-
ham and Elke Weissmann, the re-importing
to the UK of the American remake of Jamie’s
School Dinners (ABC, 2010-2011) reveals its
popular British predecessor (Channel 4, 2005)
to be “less authentic, more hero-centered, and
more commercially interested than we would
like to admit” (197).
One wishes that the authors had includ-
ed English-language television remakes from
outside the UK and the United States, as well
as more non-English-language examples. An
­exception is Karen Hellekson’s chapter, con-
trasting the American series The Killing
(AMC, 2011-2013, Netflix 2014) with the
Danish series Forbrydelsen (DR1, 2007-
2012). That quibble aside, this volume will
appeal to media scholars, as well as to those
looking for material to generate discussion in
the undergraduate classroom. Remake Televi­
sion convincingly makes the case that the tel-
evision remake has been under-theorized and
under-appreciated, and that despite being much
maligned, it can enhance our understanding of
what makes successful serial television.
Marla Harris, Winchester, MA
Kelleter, Frank, Serial Agencies: The Wire
and Its Readers. Winchester: Zero Books,
2014, 114 pp., pb., $14.95.
This book has been around for a while now.
Alas, only in its unpublished form. Often quot-
ed in the realm of the Berlin-based Research
Unit “Popular Seriality – Aesthetics and Prac-
tice,” Frank Kelleter’s manuscript of Serial
Agencies saw previous lives as a key source to
select reference works on remakes, popular se-
riality, and as a chapter to Liam Kennedy’s and
Stephen Shapiro’s reader The Wire: Race, Class,
and Genre (2012). Even though Serial Agencies
is part of what within the author’s own corpus
appears to be “the fantasy of a more compre-
hensive work on American serialities” (ix), this
renegade reading of the HBO TV Show The
Wire (2002-2008) stands firmly on its own feet.
At the heart of Kelleter’s argument is the
sturdy belief in the necessity of reading the
series’ reception alongside the TV show’s
aesthetics. Such a view would allow to under­
stand how a television series can mobilize
“practices and values that help stabilize Amer-
ica’s conflict-ridden conceptualization of it-
self” (2). In this sense, the author applies to
David Simon’s show a yet to be formulated
theoretical framework that bridges the gaps
between Bruno Latour’s actor-network theory
and Niklas Luhmann’s social-systems theory.
The Wire as an actor-network encompasses
209
both the television narrative and the accom-
panying communicative practices (cf. 5). In
other words, the TV show generates structures
allowing it to read itself and to unleash a script
that grants its readers to do what the narrative
concedes them to do (cf. 27) – it has a serial
agency that keeps The Wire “structurally geared
toward its own return and multiplication” (29).
Kelleter’s crisp and stimulative prose
shows an intelligent audience in a further step
how American media studies become a part of
the series’ multiplication. For the sake of his
argument, Kelleter repeatedly targets Tiffany
Potter and C.W. Marshall’s edited volume The
Wire: Urban Decay and American Television
(2009) and the 2009 Leeds conference “The
Wire as Social Science Fiction” to elucidate “the
narrative dimension of sociological knowledge
production itself” (36). Here, Kelleter succeeds
in showing the trappings of academic criticism
if it is bracketing out the productive aspects of
American culture. In this way, the hetero-de-
scriptions passed on by various academic dis-
ciplines can be read as “agents of continuation”
that help to disseminate, formalize and acceler-
ate “The Wire’s cultural work” (58).
Having established the agencies of both
the TV series and academic criticism, K ­ elleter
focuses in a strongly essayistic manner on an
American Studies analysis of the ­cultural
self-enactment these agencies are involved
in (62). On his final pages, the author cannot
dodge pathos completely or even avoid The
Wire’s auto-referential topoi when employing
Dickensian allusion to A Tale of Two Cities
(69) and comparisons to The Sopranos (HBO,
1999-2007; another standard in the reception of
The Wire) in order to explicate the show’s and
its readers’ project of national reproduction.
After 180 footnotes and 80 pages of
dense but highly accessible remonstrations
and rectifications of “proper” academic dis-
course, the author is to be congratulated on
his achievements in this volume. Not only
does he manage to formulate a critical fable
for the academic public that might still be
teaching and studying The Wire. But also
Kelleter succeeds in schematically framing
his vision of American Studies in a feedback
economy-driven, post-industrial, and digital
age. In addition, these pages most painfully
remind its academic readers of how to ap-
proach popular cultural narrative texts. Next
to training scholars in the possible pitfalls
of The Wire in the university classroom, the
­reader might occasionally miss what the book
is keen on in criticizing in its sources: an
awareness about its own status as actant and
210
therefore yet as another eponymous reader of
The Wire. But apart from this, Serial Agencies
is a key textbook that should be found on any
syllabus of yet another university course on
serial narration or The Wire per se.
Marcel Hartwig, Siegen
Sarah Schaschek, Pornography and S­ eriality:
The Culture of Producing Pleasure. New
York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013, 232 pp., hb.,
£62.00.
Over and over and over again. The same spare
dialogues, the same flat characters, the same
movements, settings, facial expressions and
sounds, culminating in cum shot after cum shot.
Repetition is one, if not the, central means of
pornography, with the ever returning money
shot as its ultimate epitome. Pornography and
Seriality takes a closer look at this all too obvi-
ous but still easily overlooked feature. Focus-
ing on audiovisual pornography, Berlin-based
cultural scholar and journalist Sarah Schaschek
scrutinizes the relationship between seriality
and pornographic pleasure. In so doing, one
of her central questions is how something so
highly repetitive, and thus bare of surprise, can
still be arousing. With the aim to “reload the
discourse” (6), Schaschek has chosen a van-
tage point she finds unjustly neglected with-
in the field of porn studies: “I will approach
pornography from the perspective of its form,”
she announces (3) – that is, its serial formulas.
The book consists of five chapters, which
are, though obviously intertwined with one an-
other, self-contained and cover a wide range
of different aspects. After the 25-page “Fore-
play,” which arouses readers’ desire for a­ nswers
and gets them in the mood for things to come,
the first chapter tackles pornography from the
perspective of genre. While emphasizing the
difficulties of finding its proper place in the
genre system, Schaschek – following Linda
Williams – finally puts porn on the shelf tagged
body genre, which is characterized by both the
display of and effect on the body. The chap-
ter makes a convincing case for incorporating
the affective dimension of pornography into
discussions about its structure. Bodily ­arousal,
Schaschek proposes, is not only created through
the material actually looked at but also through
the memory of previously consumed pornogra-
phy – a phenomenon she calls the serial feed­
back loop (cf 66 ff.).
 Zooming further in, the second chapter ex-
plores the aspect of mechanical sex in pornog-
raphy. It discusses both actual human-machine
sexual encounters – as exhibited on the web-
site FuckingMachines – as well as more gen-
eral notions of porn performers as ­seemingly
automatized pleasure machines. In this way,
Schaschek exposes the fears about the mecha-
nization of sexuality triggered by pornography
as essentially being fears about modernity. Us-
ing the example of the movie Dana DeArmond
Does the Internet (Dana DeArmond, 2006),
the third chapter demonstrates how documen-
tary-style porn movies blur the line between
the on-screen porn star persona and the actual
off-screen person. Again, this merging is pre-
sented as part of a larger development. In our
Web 2.0 society, Schaschek argues, anonymity
and intimacy can no longer be considered sep-
arate categories but are often just a click apart.
The fourth and fifth chapters then focus
on two more specific phenomena. Chapter 4
investigates the narrative significance of the
money shot as a signifier of both closure and,
at the same time, endlessness. Schaschek,
strongly drawing on Susan Sontag and with
reference to the website Beautiful Agony, here
­discusses the trope of orgasm as death and
positions pornography within the discourse
of trauma. Adding another twist, chapter 5 is
particularly interested in how heterosexual
porno­scripts are imitated and rewritten for
queer porn. Schaschek argues that the struc-
tural and aesthetic formulas outlined in the
book’s previous episodes can also be found
in queer pornography, as exemplified by the
movie Nostalgia (­Courtney ­Trouble, 2009),
which is a remake of the porn classic Deep
Throat (Gerard Damanio, 1972). Detecting
these parallels and re-reading ­queer-specific
elements, such as the strap-on dildo, the chap-
ter challenges the clear-cut line between main-
stream and alternative porn.
While each chapter sheds light on a differ-
ent aspect of the topic, they are united by the
“attempt to question various dominant assump-
tions about pornography” (3). In a field that
not only works with highly-charged material
but is itself still met with prejudice, this is of
particular relevance. Pornography and Seriality
works towards overcoming remaining ­academic
bias and demonstrates the analyzability of por-
nographic artefacts. Similarly, Schaschek suc-
cessfully presents the concept of seriality as a
prolific and dynamic analytical tool. Even if
the connection at times becomes a bit loose, the
two fields prove to be mutually enlightening.
Not only does the book look at porn in novel
ways but it also rethinks seriality through the
lens of pornography. Overall, what began “as
a vague idea of postfeminist engagement with
pornography” (xi) has grown into a valuable
contribution to the still emerging field of porn
studies and promises to open up fertile ground
for further reflection in that it not only answers
many questions but also asks new ones that
remain to be explored.
Madita Oeming, Göttingen
Rob Allen and Thijs van den Berg (eds.), Seri­
alization in Popular Culture. London: Rout-
ledge, 2014. 210 pp, hb., £ 85.00.
Initially, much of the research on the serial
production and consumption of popular nar-
ratives was centered on the novel, with Charles
Dickens’s Pickwick Papers (1836) and Eugène
Sue’s Les Mystères de Paris (1842-1843) re-
spectively launching the Victorian genre of the
serial novel and the French genre of the roman
feuilleton, both by now well-researched and
widely recognized fields of literary scholar-
ship. Of course, research on serial forms and
their cultural functions has broadened over
the years, with various publications highlight-
ing the significance of serial storytelling as a
broader cultural phenomenon in story papers
and literary magazines, dime novels, comic
strips, soap operas and other television formats,
including ‘quality TV.’ What is more, recent
monographs such as Ruth Mayer’s Serial Fu
Manchu: The Chinese Supervillain and the
Spread of Yellow Peril Ideology (2013) and
Frank Kelleter’s Serial Agencies: The Wire
and Its Readers (2014) as well as essay collec-
tions such as Populäre Serialität: Narration –
Evolution – Distinktion (ed. Frank Kelleter,
2012) suggest that the study of popular serial
storytelling, or popular seriality, is coming into
its own as a field of critical inquiry.1
Serialization in Popular Culture, edited by
Rob Allen and Thijs van den Berg and pub-
lished as part of the Routledge Research in Cul-
tural and Media Studies series, is a welcome
addition to this growing field. The volume
contains twelve essays spread across four sec-
tions (Victorian Serials, Serialization on Screen,
Serialization in Comic Books and Graphic
1 All of these publications emerge from the
interdisciplinary DFG Research Unit “Pop­
ular Seriality – Aesthetics and Practice”
(www.popularseriality.de/en/).
211
 Novels, Digital Serialization), a foreword, and
a conceptual introduction by the editors. The
foreword by Christoph Lindner sets the stage
for the ensuing case studies by identifying
“[s]erialization [a]s an endemic feature of our
twenty-first century, hyper-mediated world,” as
a feature of contemporary life that has its roots
in the serial fictions of the nineteenth century
but “has achieved new levels of cultural em-
bedding and new forms of technologized ex-
pression” (ix). Linder speaks of a “logic of the
serial” as well as a “drive to serialize” (ix) as
dynamics that have shaped much of what we
now recognize as modern mass media culture.
Lindner’s foreword is followed by Allen
and van den Berg’s introduction, in which the
editors outline the rationale for and scope of
the volume. They begin by asking “What do
we understand by the term serialization and
how does it relate to the emergence of various
forms of popular media?” and posit “the in-
fluence of serialization on the development of
modern mass media” as the overarching theme
bracketing the individual contributions (1). A
few pages later, the editors identify “the trans-
medial and transhistorical complexity of the se-
rial in popular culture” as a major concern (4).
While I believe that this introduction and many
of the contributions add valuable insights to
the historiography and theory of modern mass
media, it seems to me that they add much less
of value to the field of popular culture stud-
ies. The terminological shifting back and forth
among popular media to modern mass media
to popular culture reveals what I take to be the
strong as well as the weak points of this vol-
ume: a desirable breadth in scope that allows
for the analysis of fictional and non-fictional
serial writing, cook books, film serials, tele-
vision serials, comic books, computer games,
and online encyclopedias but all too often has
much more to say about the serial workings
of these artifacts than about their relation to
and involvement with popular culture. The
majority of the contributions use the term pop-
ular culture rather indiscriminately, many of
them without considering the ways in which
the “logic of the serial” and the “drive to seri-
alize” have shaped and continue to shape the
field of cultural production and consumption
we call popular culture.
The strongest pieces in the volume c­ over
both elements of the volume’s title, serializa­
tion in popular culture: Shane Denson’s ac-
count of the serial-queen melodrama of the
1910s as both a reflection on and a self-reflex-
ive construction of modern gender roles that
are specific to the film serial is a good example,
212
as is Thijs van den Berg’s analysis of computer
hardware as an implicit motor for new trends
in game serialization. Combined with Mark
W. Turner’s and Rob Allen’s essays on serial
fiction and non-fiction narratives in Victorian
Britain, which offer important conceptual cate­
gories for seriality studies such as unruliness
(Turner) and disruption (Allen), Sean O’Sulli-
van’s four elements of seriality (iteration, mul­
tiplicity, momentum, worldbuilding), proposed
in his discussion of Ingmar Bergman’s televi-
sion mini-series, and Jason Dittmer’s notion of
a media-specific politics of seriality in comic
books, these case studies make Serialization in
Popular Culture a worthwhile and compelling
contribution to the study of popular seriality.
Daniel Stein, Siegen
Amanda D. Lotz, Cable Guys: Television and
Masculinities in the 21st Century. New York:
New York University Press, 2014. 251 pp., pb.,
$ 26.00.
Popular discourses on contemporary cable tele­
vision series surround the depiction of what
many journalists and TV critics describe as
“masculinities in crisis.” Hyped shows like
The Sopranos (HBO, 1999-2007), The Wire
(HBO, 2002-2008), The Shield (FX, 2002-
2008), Breaking Bad (AMC, 2008-2013), or
Mad Men (AMC, 2007-) have been and contin-
ue to be widely received through their flawed,
male protagonists. While a publication like
Brett Martin’s Difficult Men (2013) alludes to
the importance of masculinity, his argument
never makes the effort to explore what these
gender dynamics in cable TV series entail.
The situation in the academic field of Tele­
vision and Media Studies is strikingly similar.
Although academics acknowledge the rele-
vance of approaches of gender studies for their
objects of investigation, most analysis does
neither incorporate these nor attempt to devel-
op theories and methods to analyze gender in
a media-specific way.
Amanda Lotz’ new book Cable Guys
promises to fill that void by providing a much
needed framework to systematically consider
previously disregarded depictions of mascu-
linity in television series.2 Lotz begins with a
2 Lotz has previously worked on female-cen-
tered television series in Redesigning ­Women:
Television after the Network Era (2006). Her
analytic shift towards m ­ asculinities in TV
theoretical chapter in which she outlines the
terminology and contexts of her framework
and then proceeds to develop a model of dif-
ferent, competing and conflicting masculinities.
In the following chapters, she puts this model
to use in a convincing analysis of “male-cen-
tered serials” (chapters 2 and 3), male intimacy
within groups (chapter 4), and dyadic friend-
ships (chapter 5).
As in her previous work, Lotz’s strength is
the analytic consideration of narrative trends
within the larger institutional, industrial, social,
and cultural structures that affect them. For
instance, to account for changes in the depic-
tion of masculinity on television, Lotz refers
to the specificity of the twenty-first-century
television industry as well as the sociocultural
context impacted by second-wave feminist ac-
tivism in not only policies but also the revised
gender scripts of a generation of producers,
viewers, and characters.
Against the backdrop of this milieu, which
she calls “post-second wave,” Lotz adapts socio­
logist Raewyn Connell’s work on hegemonic
masculinity to fictional, serialized television
texts and develops a continuum of patriarchal
and feminist masculinities in the first chapter.
Patriarchal masculinities are characteristics or
performances that support the privileging of
men in social and cultural hierarchies, whereas
feminist masculinities are diametrically opposed
to these in that they question any privileging
of masculinities based on gender. Yet, as Lotz
shows in the subsequent chapters, performances
of TV masculinities rarely position themselves
at the poles of this continuum; characters rather
embody complex negotiations of patriarchal as
well as feminist attributes.
This is not to say, that narratives do not
privilege certain types of behaviors or char-
acter traits over others. Following Lotz’s ar-
gument, it is precisely the conflict over which
traits of masculinities are presented as best,
preferred or – following Connell (and Antonio
Gramsci) – as hegemonic within the narrative
universe of a television series that illustrate the
changes of gender scripts within a post-second
wave environment as well as the cultural work
that television series can perform.
series is not only completive but also aligns
itself with a larger, intersectional movement
within Critical Humanities and Social Sci-
ences that broadens the scope from analysis
of marginalized or deviant positions within
social hierarchies towards socially privi-
leged, unmarked and therefore previously
invisible positions of norm (i.e. masculinity,
whiteness).
In the second and third chapters, Lotz iden-
tifies a distinct narrative form evolving in the
early 2000s, the “male-centered serial,” and
analyzes its specific characteristics. A central
narrative theme of shows like The Sopranos,
The Shield, Nip/Tuck (FX, 2003-2010), Dexter
(Showtime, 2006-2013), Sons of Anarchy (FX,
2008-2014), Breaking Bad, Hung (HBO, 2009-
2011), or Men of a Certain Age (TNT, 2009-
2011) is the conflict of reconciling post-second
wave ideals of involved fatherhood and com-
panionate marriages with patriarchal notions
of providing. This double bind between work
and home becomes especially prominent when
protagonists turn to illegal means to accommo-
date the felt responsibilities of being a father
and husband. As Lotz unravels in her argument,
these shows narrativize anxieties and complex
negotiations of contemporary masculinity, yet
remarkably never blame female characters, the
women’s movement or feminism for the con-
testation of patriarchal masculinity and con-
nected changes of gender scripts.
In the following chapters, Lotz shifts her
focus from the single-protagonists of cable
drama series towards interactions and main-
tenance of relationships and intimacy depict-
ed in groups of male characters. Drawing on
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick but also Ron Becker
(Gay TV and Straight America, 2006) for their
work on homosexuality, heteronormativity and
homophobia in U.S. culture, Lotz illustrates
how the spaces of the “homosocial enclave”
of trusted friends or co-workers and the dyadic
friendship negotiate masculinities. While the
narratives largely exclude gay masculinities in
favor of an overwhelming heteronormativity in
the male-centered series, in these companion
chapters Lotz disentangles complex connec-
tions between the care work of relationship
maintenance, intimacy, homophobia, accept-
ance of gay identities and the possibilities of
queer readings.
This continuum and the question of which
gender identities and performances can become
hegemonic under which contexts provides TV
and media scholars with an important tool to
analyze performances of gender, but also race,
ethnicity, class, age, or sexuality within serial
texts. As Lotz unfolds different layers of her
argument, she continually detects links to other
cultural and academic discourses and points
out research deficits. As such, Cable Guys is
an important and compelling read for anyone
interested in TV Studies, Gender Studies, Fem-
inist Media Criticism, or Narratology.
Maria Sulimma, Berlin
213
 Notes on Contributors
Ilka Brasch is a PhD candidate and lecturer at Leibniz University of Hannover.
She is also a member of the DFG Research Unit “Popular Seriality – Aesthetics
and Practice.” Her research focuses on U.S. American film serials between 1910
and 1940, and it is based on archival research in Los Angeles and Rochester. She
has recently presented her work at conferences in Seattle, Harrisburg, and Berlin.

Dennis Büscher-Ulbrich is assistant professor of Anglophone cultural and media

studies at the University of Kiel. He has co-edited Innovation – Konvention:
Transdisziplinäre Beiträge zu einem kulturellen Spannungsfeld (transcript, 2014)
and published various articles on Critical Theory, French Post-Marxism, urban
cultural studies, and avant-garde poetry/poetics. Besides preparing his PhD thesis
Dissensual Operations: Bruce Andrews and the Problem of Political Subjectivity in
Avant-Garde Poetry and Aesthetics for publication, he is currently working on his
postdoctoral project “New York City as Contested Global Metropolis: Antagonism,
Articulation, Agency (1773-2011).”

Rudmer Canjels is a media historian and lecturer. He is the author of Distributing

Silent Serials (Routledge, 2011), a study on the international distribution and cultural
transformation of silent film serials. He has recently researched industry-sponsored
films of the 1950s and 1960s, focusing on the visualization of technology, progress,
and change by the international companies of Philips, Royal Dutch Shell and
Unilever. He has also collaborated on the production of several documentaries for
A History of Royal Dutch Shell (Oxford UP, 2007).

Ursula Ganz-Blättler teaches Sociology of Entertainment at the Universities of

St. Gall and Zurich (Switzerland). She is a medievalist-turned-media-scholar who
worked as a film and television critic before venturing back into academia for
a more in-depth look at serial narratives, reality shows and gaming experiences
from a cultural studies and systems theory perspective. She has published chapters
and essays on TV as storytelling medium, on institutional program strategies and
celebrity as well as fan culture, and is author of the forthcoming book Signs of
Time: Cumulative Narrative in Broadcast Television Fiction (LIT Verlag, 2015).

Marla Harris (PhD Brandeis University) is an independent scholar whose research

interests include detective fiction, children’s literature, and the graphic novel. Her
essays have appeared in African American Review, Clues, International Journal
of Comic Art, The Lion and the Unicorn, and Children’s Literature in Education.
In addition, she has contributed to several edited volumes, including The Jewish
Graphic Novel (Rutgers UP, 2008), Nancy Drew and Her Sister Sleuths (McFarland,
2008), and Rape in Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy and Beyond (Palgrave
Macmillian, 2012).

Marcel Hartwig is assistant professor at the Department of English, University of

Siegen. His main areas of research include the study of American popular culture,
theories of myth and cultural memory, media economies, and medical history.
Among his publications are Die Traumatisierte Nation: ‘Pearl Harbor’ and ‘9/11’

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als kulturelle Erinnerungen (transcript, 2011), the co-edited volume Media Econo-
mies: Perspectives on American Cultural Practices (WVT, 2014), and a co-edited
special issue of Popular Music and Society on American Rock Journalism (2017,
forthcoming).

Björn Hochschild is a student of the M.A. film studies program at the Freie
Universität Berlin. In 2014, he gave a presentation on superhero comics and the
Vietnam War at the 3rd Global Conference: The Graphic Novel in Oxford. He is
interested in the diverse cinemas of North America, Europe and Southeast Asia.
Currently his research focuses on cult movies, graphic novels and genre theory.

Nathalie Knöhr studied Cultural Anthropology/European Ethnology at the Georg

August University of Göttingen from 2007 to 2013. As a member of the DFG
Research Unit “Popular Seriality – Aesthetics and Practice,” she is currently working
on her PhD thesis that investigates the present-day occupational culture of German
television series writers.

Kathleen Loock is a research associate at the John F. Kennedy Institute for North
American Studies, Freie Universität Berlin. As a member of the DFG Research Unit
“Popular Seriality – Aesthetics and Practice” she is currently working on a book that
examines the cultural history of Hollywood remaking, from the transition to sound
and its “talker remakes” to the remakes, sequels, and prequels of the franchise era.
She is the author of Kolumbus in den USA: Vom Nationalhelden zur ethnischen
Identifikationsfigur (transcript, 2014), a study that examines the commemorative
constructions and deconstructions of Christopher Columbus in the nineteenth- and
twentieth-century United States, has co-edited Of Body Snatchers and Cyberpunks:
Student Essays on American Science Fiction Film (with Sonja Georgi; Göttingen
UP, 2011) and Film Remakes, Adaptations and Fan Productions: Remake | Remodel
(with Constantine Verevis; Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), and is currently preparing
the special issue “Exploring Film Seriality” for the relaunched Film Studies journal
(with Frank Krutnik; forthcoming 2017).

Madita Oeming is a student of the American Studies Master’s program at the

Georg August University of Göttingen. With a focus on the postmodern period, her
scholarly interests include intermediality, thing theory and a special fascination with
the genre of New Journalism. Currently, she is working on her M.A. thesis on the
sexual fantasies surrounding Moby Dick as a pop-cultural phenomenon in U.S. porn. 

Agnieszka Rasmus teaches drama, cultural studies and film at the Institute of En-
glish Studies, Department of Studies in Drama and Pre-1800 Literature, University
of Łódź (Poland). She is the author of Filming Shakespeare, from Metatheatre to
Metacinema (Peter Lang, 2008) and co-editor with Magdalena Cieślak of Images of
the City (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2009), Against and Beyond: Subversion
and Transgression in Mass Media, Popular Culture and Performance (Cambridge
Scholars Publishing, 2012), and an issue of the journal Multicultural Shakespeare
(2015). Her research interests include film history and theory, Hollywood, British
film, Shakespeare in performance studies, adaptation and remake theory, and new
media.

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Guy Risko recently received his PhD in English Literature from Binghamton
University (USA). His work focuses on American literature and serialization, par-
ticularly the trilogy form. He currently works for Bard High School Early College
in Cleveland, Ohio.

Phyll Smith is a lecturer/researcher at the University of East Anglia (UK) where he

teaches on the MA program and coordinates the To Be Continued seriality research
seminar strand. His research focuses on newsreels, shorts and serials, film fanzines
and unofficial tie-ins, film adaptations in radio, comics and pornography, propa-
ganda, journalism and gossip. He is co-author of The Last English Revolutionary:
Tom Wintringham 1898-1949 (rev. ed., Sussex Academic Press/London School of
Economics, 2012) a biography of the political writer and propagandist, and the
forthcoming Tijuana Bibles and the Pornographic Re-imagining of Hollywood on
illegal comics from the 1920s to the 1950s. His PhD research is on early Hollywood
sound serials.

Bettina Soller teaches at the American Studies department of the Leibniz University
of Hannover. She is an associated member of the DFG Research Unit “Popular
Seriality – Aesthetics and Practice” and is working on a PhD thesis that investigates
authorship concepts, and performances of authorship in relation to online crossover
fan fiction writing. Besides her work on authorship theory and fan studies, her re-
search centers on popular culture. She has recently published on female protagonists
in current U.S. American television shows.

Daniel Stein is professor of North American Literary and Cultural Studies at the
University of Siegen and a member of the DFG Research Unit “Popular Seriality –
Aesthetics and Practice.” He is the author of Music Is My Life: Louis Armstrong,
Autobiography, and American Jazz (U of Michigan P, 2012), and has co-edited the
special issues American Comics and Graphic Novels (Amerikastudien/American
Studies 56.4: 2011), and Musical Autobiographies (Popular Music & Society 38.2:
2015) as well as the essay collections Transnational Perspectives on Graphic
Narratives: Comics at the Crossroads (Bloomsbury, 2013), and From Comic Strips
to Graphic Novels: Contributions to the Theory and History of Graphic Narrative
(De Gruyter, 2013).

Maria Sulimma is the administrator of the DFG Research Unit “Popular ­Seriality –
Asthetics and Practice” and faculty member of the John F. Kennedy Institute for
North American Studies at the Freie Universität Berlin. She is the author of Die
anderen Ministerpräsidenten (LIT Verlag, 2014), an analysis of gendered repre-
sentations of German politicians. In her PhD project, she analyzes the production
of gender in and around contemporary U.S. American cable television series as
discursive knots of a larger discussion about gender and serial television.

Robyn Warhol is Arts and Humanities Distinguished Professor of English at the

Ohio State University, where she is a core faculty member of Project Narrative. Her
most recent publications include Narrative Theory Unbound: Queer and Feminist
Interventions, co-edited by Susan S. Lanser (Ohio State UP, 2015) and Love Among
the Archives: Writing the Lives of George Scharf, Victorian Bachelor, co-authored

217
by Helena Michie (Edinburgh UP, 2015). Her previous work in narrative theory
includes Having a Good Cry: Effeminate Tears and Popular-Culture Forms (Ohio
State UP, 2003) and the co-authored Narrative Theory: Core Concepts and Critical
Debates (Ohio State UP, 2012).

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