3 ms·

A bit like modern television series, isn’t it?

db48x 5y ago
Yes, a lot of modern television shows have been serial works rather than episodic ones. Babylon 5 comes to mind as one of the earliest serialized television shows, if not the earliest. Well, I suppose soap operas existed before that, but as far as I can tell they rarely had proper narrative endings; they were designed to last as many years as possible.
- eric-hu 5y ago
  I was wondering why you wrote Babylon 5 when I can think of earlier long running shows, I.e. the original Star Trek, but I guess those are more like soap operas? Hm.
  - db48x 5y ago
    It’s not about how long a show was on the air, it has more to do with how interconnected the episodes are and whether the work has a story arc that was planned in advance. In a purely episodic work, you can experience the episodes in any order and have the same enjoyment. In a purely serial work, the order of the episodes (or should we call them installments?) matters a lot. Star Trek was episodic. No matter what happens in one episode, most things remained status quo for the next. There were some slow changes to the cast, but for the most part you could watch the episodes in any order. TNG was book–ended by their dealings with Q, but that story had no closure and only took up about four or five episodes out of 7 years. There were some other stories like that as well, stories that were longer than an episode but much shorter than the show as a whole. On the other hand, Deep Space Nine was closer to a single story with a beginning, middle, and end. There were still plenty of episodes that would still make sense if you moved them to a different season, but it was much less episodic than the previous shows. Voyager was billed as a serial work, but was so badly written that most episodes could be moved around at will with no harm to the storyline. Babylon 5, in contrast, gave every episode some link to the overarching plot, even if it was just hints. (Especially in the first season, when the main antagonists were still hidden and all we had were hints.) It’s easy for episodic shows to be written at the same pace that they are filmed. With serial shows, you have to know in advance where the story is going to go even if you still write most of the dialog at the pace of filming. I didn’t watch much of Lost, but I got the impression that while it was a serial, the writers had no real plan from the start and that everything was made up as they went along. The result is that the story is incoherent. I’ve never watched any soap operas either, but I gather that they try to arrange for frequent cliffhangers and dramatic changes (making the story more serial), but that there is never a planned end to the story; they’re perpetually in the middle. The result is a work with constant churn and no resolution.
    - eric-hu 5y ago
      That makes sense. Thank you for the explanation. Lost definitely felt episodic and incoherent at times. I think they did plan out some arcs loosely that worked over the course of a few seasons. Some character progression and morality flip was clearly unplanned, and those arcs felt like a soap opera. I’ve seen the other shows you’ve mentioned, but not Babylon 5. I had read of comparisons between it and DS9 before, and now that comparison makes more sense.

Yes, a lot of modern television shows have been serial works rather than episodic ones. Babylon 5 comes to mind as one of the earliest serialized television shows, if not the earliest. Well, I suppose soap operas existed before that, but as far as I can tell they rarely had proper narrative endings; they were designed to last as many years as possible.

eric-hu 5y ago
I was wondering why you wrote Babylon 5 when I can think of earlier long running shows, I.e. the original Star Trek, but I guess those are more like soap operas? Hm.
- db48x 5y ago
  It’s not about how long a show was on the air, it has more to do with how interconnected the episodes are and whether the work has a story arc that was planned in advance. In a purely episodic work, you can experience the episodes in any order and have the same enjoyment. In a purely serial work, the order of the episodes (or should we call them installments?) matters a lot. Star Trek was episodic. No matter what happens in one episode, most things remained status quo for the next. There were some slow changes to the cast, but for the most part you could watch the episodes in any order. TNG was book–ended by their dealings with Q, but that story had no closure and only took up about four or five episodes out of 7 years. There were some other stories like that as well, stories that were longer than an episode but much shorter than the show as a whole. On the other hand, Deep Space Nine was closer to a single story with a beginning, middle, and end. There were still plenty of episodes that would still make sense if you moved them to a different season, but it was much less episodic than the previous shows. Voyager was billed as a serial work, but was so badly written that most episodes could be moved around at will with no harm to the storyline. Babylon 5, in contrast, gave every episode some link to the overarching plot, even if it was just hints. (Especially in the first season, when the main antagonists were still hidden and all we had were hints.) It’s easy for episodic shows to be written at the same pace that they are filmed. With serial shows, you have to know in advance where the story is going to go even if you still write most of the dialog at the pace of filming. I didn’t watch much of Lost, but I got the impression that while it was a serial, the writers had no real plan from the start and that everything was made up as they went along. The result is that the story is incoherent. I’ve never watched any soap operas either, but I gather that they try to arrange for frequent cliffhangers and dramatic changes (making the story more serial), but that there is never a planned end to the story; they’re perpetually in the middle. The result is a work with constant churn and no resolution.
  - eric-hu 5y ago
    That makes sense. Thank you for the explanation. Lost definitely felt episodic and incoherent at times. I think they did plan out some arcs loosely that worked over the course of a few seasons. Some character progression and morality flip was clearly unplanned, and those arcs felt like a soap opera. I’ve seen the other shows you’ve mentioned, but not Babylon 5. I had read of comparisons between it and DS9 before, and now that comparison makes more sense.