Episodic or Serial

Whether you prefer your TV shows to be episodic or serial seems almost religiously divided between people. Where do you fall? I tend to think there are a ton of examples of greatness and horribleness at both extremes. I think the serial format has greater potential for greatness, but it's harder to make a serial show even good than it is to make an episodic show good, because if you make a mistake in an episodic show only one episode is ruined.

Also, here are some categories I'd like to hear people's opinion on.

Show that is serial that should have been serial: Breaking Bad
Show that is episodic that should have been episodic: Colombo
Show that is serial that should have been more episodic: Empire
Show that is episodic that should have been more serial: Voyager

 

I like both kinds. (Country and western. )

 

If a show is intended as a serial from the get-go, it needs to have a regular time and channel if people are to have any chance of following it. That's why I never saw Babylon 5 for several years after it came out. It was never on at the same time two weeks in a row and I just gave up.

Believe it or not, not everyone has the means to record shows, and not all shows are available on Netflix. Canadians do not have access to Hulu and our Netflix content is quite limited in comparison to the U.S.

But if it is on Netflix, it would be nice if the seasons could be added as they're finished on TV. Netflix Canada only has the first 3 seasons of Downton Abbey, for example.

 

Oh, you had that problem too? After the pilot aired in 1993, I could never find the show until TNT picked it up five years later.

To answer the thread, I like both, but prefer episodic stories that have minor serialized elements to them like TNG and VOYAGER. Episodic format is easier to follow.

 

Episodic can be good if the format suits the show, but all other things being equal, serial will take it every time.

I'm a Niner...

 

I like a mix of both. I find it easier to rewatch episodic programs, like TNG. That said, however, the shows that I seem to really, reallyobsess over tend to be more serial, more story-arc based: LOST, Game of Thrones, Supernatural, Walking Dead, etc. I think Doctor Who does a good job of finding the right balance in mixing up stand-alones and serial story-telling, for example. So, yeah, I'd have to go with serial.

 

Yep. It wasn't until years later, when J. Michael Straczynski was one of the Guests of Honor at Con-Version (the annual science fiction convention that used to be held in Calgary every summer) and brought the blooper reel, that I seriously thought about trying to find the show again and watch it. The bloopers were hilarious, and it turned out that the actor playing the crazy Centauri emperor had been on One Life to Live (same soap where Nathan Fillion got his start in acting, but before he joined the cast). So I finally found the show on the Space Channel, and watched it from start to finish. Now I have the DVDs.

I don't even have the Star Trek DVDs.

 

Bob's Country Bunker plays both.

I prefer my shows to be good. Serial or episodic doesn't factor.

 

I agree with that but some ideas are better suited for episodic format and some are better suited for serial.

I find episodic shows are easier to follow live and serial shows are easier to watch on Netflix. Because for episodic shows you don't care if you miss an episode, and for serial shows, exactly when the show is the most exciting is exactly when you realize there are nine months until the next episode.

 

There is a place for both styles and every in between the two. Isn't the issue when the premise leans more towards one end but you are delivered the other end. i.e VOY the premise leans more towards a serialised format but what we got was more episodic.

 

I prefer a balance (an episodic show with 'continuity elements'), but if I was pushed to choose one or the other, then I'd sway more towards episodic. Nothing against serials, but I just think they sometimes shoot themselves in the foot in their need to constantly create a sense of 'escalation' in their ongoing storylines, which means in the long run they often become completely silly, and lose some of the core qualities that made them good in the first place. 'Serialization' can be a self-deating format in the long run, whereas 'Episodic' can always change and survive without losing it's integrity along the way.

 

But isn't that where episodic can fail, a lack of continuity? You have to find the right balance in both episodic and serialised formats. Not saying continuity has to be in your face in episodic but you certainly need to strike a balance.

 

^ Aye, that's exactly what I was saying. A balance between the extremes is the best way. A show that is too serialized only ends up losing itself in the need to constantly keep "upping the ante" to eventually ridiculous proportions. Think of how many soaps started out their life as genteel slice-of-life-kitchen-sink dramas, but which (due to a need to continually inject 'drama' into the show) eventually devolved into melodrama, and usually of the very worst kind.

Sure, most shows aren't soaps. But even your serialized genre shows, like nuBSG and Buffy, fell into the "soap opera trap" of losing their credibility because ultimately their serialized nature ended up biting off a little more than it could chew.

Episodic TV, or at least a show with an episodic base, can put the brakes on that before it happens.

 

That's true, serial shows can suffer from a need to top themselves.

Episodic shows have their pitfalls too. Like, it's obvious that the main character and his new girlfriend will date for a few months then find some reason to break up, because we know the girlfriend is not a main character. Or, if a character learns an important life lesson in one episode you know he will completely forget it in the next episode.

Episodic shows can also suffer from a need to top themselves. Like the famous 'Jump the shark' episode. Or in Drew Carey when the rivalry between Drew and Mimi went from 'Cutely adversarial' to 'Openly criminal'.

Mimi kidnapped Drew and transported him against his will to China, then leaves a taped confession and openly boasts about it to his friends and coworkers. This happens in real life: Mimi gets 20 to life. This happens on TV: Drew burns up her desk, and they never speak of it again.

 

I miss the episodic shows nowadays.

 

As I get older I prefer episodic television more and more. I don't mean that I want a reset button every episode but I do want a complete story that starts and concludes. Sometimes I just want to want watch an hour of TV and not have to worry about not finishing the story. Even worse, so many serialized stories don't even get to finish, or more often, they do but you realize it was all set up and the writers had no idea how to finish it.

I think the X-Files had the best balance for my tastes. There were arcs and progression of the big story but basically every episode can be watched more or less on its own.

 

Burn Notice does that thing really well also.

 

I agree that a lot of shows find a good balance having arcs but having the action of an episode wrapped up in that episode. Parks & Recreation pulled that off really well.

 

I like a combination of both. Shows that I love (Farscape, DS9, for example) can mix in both. Both can co-exist and I wish TV embraced that rather than going to one extreme over the other.