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misc Why do TV shows keep attention better?

sfoster

sfoster

Staff Member
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Why is it 180 minute movies seem long as hell and in dire need of editing, but I can spend an entire week watching 180 hours of 24 and then want another season?
What exactly is going on that a movie has way more thought, time and money put into it and yet is boring and long with 1/10th of the running time of a show?

Anyone have any good resources or opinions on structuring of a TV show - not just episodes but seasons as well...
Like is every single episode hitting the same notes at the same time if I were to go back and mark everything down for a season of 24?

Big moment at 12 minutes, 30 minutes and the end of the episode?
What about season after season after season, do they all just keep repeating the heroes journey?
 
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indietalk said:
@sfoster I found this.
screenrant.com

15 Reasons Shows Have Become Better Than Movies

Some argue that TV has now become better than movies. True or false? Well, we've got 15 reasons why shows have become superior to cinema.
screenrant.com screenrant.com
Click to expand...
I went through the list and think they missed the mark.
basically all over their points revolve around series having MORE TIME but this effect I'm talking about is apparent even watching 4 episodes of a series vs a 4 hour movie. So if you restrict the comparison like that to have identical running times, all of the 15 points in this list become invalidated, and yet the TV remains more compelling....

Except for the point about commitment.. but I think you can toss that aside, there are some nights when a new show comes on and I am ready to commit 3 hours or a new movie comes out and im ready to commit 3 hours, the experience still feels very different
 
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I think part of the problem might be all the suspense drains out the last part of a movie..
Like RETURN OF THE KING, the movie ends like 4-5 times and youre like damn end already, but if there was a 4th movie and they were still introduce new characters and threads that needed to be unraveled you'd keep paying attention more
 
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sfoster said:
I think part of the problem might be all the suspense drains out the last part of a movie..
Like RETURN OF THE KING, the movie ends like 4-5 times and youre like damn end already, but if there was a 4th movie and they were still introduce new characters and threads that needed to be unraveled you'd keep paying attention more
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I think since advertising has no actual income benefit as a standard, that you should purpose no advertising at all for any show, content only, just to see how the money rolls:)
 
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As far as advertising revenue, that's like debating whether cars need roads. You don't have to have a road to drive a car, but they work way better with roads, a car shouldn't be designed around driving on a specific road, and a film shouldn't be designed for a specific advertiser. The two things have independent utility but are most effective when paired. Cars tend to break down way more often if they don't use roads, and movie studios break down more often if they don't work with advertisers. Films need money, advertisers provide it. People used to buy movies directly, back in previous decades. Now advertising revenue is the majority of content income. Simple concept, Soap Operas are not called Drama Operas.

For tv vs movies, it breaks down to the beat patterns as I think was already discussed. An ultra simple formula comparison would look like this

Movie -

introduce tension
introduce more tension
middle part
resolve tension
resolve more tension
arc complete

Television -

Introduce tension 1
introduce tension 2
middle part
introduce tension 3
resolve tension 2
maintain tension 1
escalate tension 3 and cliffhang

at the end of the tv episode for serial types, you have the master tension strand "1" maintained, while substrands wax and wane in route to the resolution of strand 1.

In "Lost" strand 1 would have been being stranded on the island and the goal to escape via rescue of otherwise
anything from a love triangle to a mysterious discovery to a new enemy can be those secondary tension lines, typically encountered as obstacles while the protagonist group pursues tension line 1, escape from the island.
 
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sleepy pooping GIF by PEEKASSO
 
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Ok, I should share more wisdom (if you call it that) so the attention span decreased majorly, I would say around 1992 or so. MTV eventually figured out the attention span to the second. But as you see MTV isn’t around anymore lol so yeah I am a Dinasour
 
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Nate North said:
Introduce tension 1
introduce tension 2
middle part
introduce tension 3
resolve tension 2
maintain tension 1
escalate tension 3 and cliffhang

at the end of the tv episode for serial types, you have the master tension strand "1" maintained, while substrands wax and wane in route to the resolution of strand 1.
Click to expand...

So if this is a 3 act structure, the pilot episode is act 1 and the series finale is act 3.
And then like... dozens of hours of episodes are act 2, with basically no structural requirements, other than introducing a revolving door of tensions ? I'm thinking more likely its something simplified and then made RECURSIVE.. the way every scene is it's own short story, with a beginning middle and end.

I'd like to use my intuition and short story experience to just write episodes that I think that interesting with suspense but theres all these rules I'm sure I'm gonna run afoul of that I don't even know exist. It's a shame that you can't just write stuff you think is fun and expect to make any money. Everything is work :censored:
 
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