TV Drama Analysis

Zehra Dara

Research for a Moving Image film

 Task 1.a): TV Drama show Analysis

 

Full title Emmerdale episode 7953 (4^th October 2017)

The Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUBrXhvxEeU

Emmerdale is a television programme, a British soap opera and the second longest running television soap. The first episode started on 16 October 1972 and between 1972 and 1989, it used to be called Emmerdale Farm. It was created by Kevin Laffan. It is not a box set season because it is on 6 times a week since 2004 and last for an hour long. For the first 25 years, there were only 2 episodes per week. Between 1972 and up to today, there has been 7957 episodes. Emmerdale’s cast is split between the regular cast and the guest cast. Some actors have been in this soap for the last 30 years such as Ryan Hawley who plays the character of Robert Sugden and some others, the guest cast have been on it for only a month like Andrew Scarborough. The location takes place in a fictional village in the Yorkshire Dales but the studio is in Leeds and it is produced by ITV Yorkshire. In these episode 7953, the locations are as follow:

Butlers Farm - Woodland

Hotten General Hospital - Maternity room D3, corridors, waiting area, neonatal unit and ICU 3

Hotten Police Station - Interview rooms

Dale View - Downstairs rooms Unknown service station

Hotten Road

It is a narrative soap focusing on emotional relationships to the point of melodrama which is a dramatic in which the plot is typically unbelievable and designed to appeal strongly to the emotions and often characters appear stereotyped. It is not a one-off drama because it is a continuous serial. The purpose of this soap is simply to entertain viewers and attracts an average of 5 to 7 million viewers per episode. It is watched on ITV channel but can also be find on ITV Hub, UK TV Catch up, TVNZ OnDemand and can also be watched on you tube. To watch it on TV, you need to purchase a TV license but if you watch online is free but for some of the website you need to sign in to subscribe. The audience targeted is mainly 40 to 60 years people and directed at female, housewives with children but youths are also attracted to it so as some men.

Soaps operas are generally described as being more realistic than crime and fantasy-based drams. There is well established tradition towards social realism in British soap. British soaps generally place a lot of importance on community both in their set design and narrative themes as they are often set around a small residential area. Emmerdale is a melodrama and social realism soap. For example, in the early episodes of Emmerdale Farm were centred on the Sugden family’s life living and working on a Yorkshire Dales farm.  

 

Emmerdale when it was first aired on TV was called Emmerdale Farm and so all the characters were centred around farming and the stories were based on farm life and struggles. Now, Emmerdale is centred around the village as a whole and has also had changing residences and businesses for its characters including a bed and breakfast, shop and a factory.

Emmerdale has had a large number of characters since it began with its cast expanding progressively over the years –usually focussing on family groups and the characters are presented as part of their family groups. These families can be seen as quite stereotypical – for example Emma Barton is part of the Barton family who tend to get themselves into trouble. For example Ross Barton and in this episode Emma herself is accused of the murder of Finn and steals a baby. Another family that we meet in Emmerdale is the Dingles. They also quite troublesome but have been part of Emmerdale since day one and therefore the audience have a sense of them being part of Emmerdale itself and have some sort of connection with them. Cain Dingle however is a selfish and self-centered character who has a bad reputation which might even be shown by his name – Cain, who according to the bible killed his brother because he was jealous of him.

A narrative structure is the way in which the plot is structured and how is it presented in the show. A narrative in itself is the plot of the show. Soap Operas tend to be linear because it’s based on real life that is why progresses forward like life does.  Also, soap operas tend to have multi strand narratives which means having different stories or plots happening at the same time but which are relevant to each other and the plot as a whole. Episodes of soap operas usually have open endings. The reason for this is so that it leaves suspense for the next episode – a cliff hanger. For example, in the first five minutes of Emmerdale- Episode 7953, we can see that the story is all relative to Moira and the birth of the baby but also the plot changes to another strand where Emma had spent the night in her car at a service station finds out that the police wants to talk to her concerning the fire. The fact that the plot is multistrand interests the audience more as it changes perspective. The story or stories are still linear because they are running in order and moving in time with a real life situation. In this episode of Emmerdale, it ends with an open ending. Emma takes Moira’s newborn baby from the incubator and leaves the hospital.  The reason behind this is to create suspense and tension. The audience want to know what will happen to the baby, Moira and how she might react.