Abstract
Previous scholarship, namely Will Brooker’s (2001) “Overflow”, Matt Hills’s (2002) “Hyperdiegesis” and Henry Jenkins’s (2006) “Transmedia Storytelling”, has demonstrated that media texts are increasingly spread across a number of different platforms (TV, film, games, online). In Television and New Media: Must-Click TV Jennifer Gillan adds to such frameworks by exploring how television programming is now conceived in terms of a franchise or co-creation of on-air, online and on-mobile content. However, unlike previous scholarship, Gillan focuses on the proliferation and simultaneity of production, exhibition and consumption sites that act as narrative extension, promotional strategy and facilitator of concurrent interactions between content and commercial interests. In doing so, she highlights the economic and industrial reasoning for broadcast media to co-opt audience practices in response to the challenges posed by progressions in consumer technology (notably timeshifting platforms such as downloading and Digital Video Recorders).
Each of the book’s four detailed chapters explores a range of concerns and discusses several American television programmes. Following the introduction, which provides an overview of recent U.S television and its operating models, the first chapter focuses on fan online activities and the replication, cooption and institutionalisation of such practices. Using numerous illustrative textual examples such as The X Files (1993-2002), Dawson’s Creek (1998-2003), Smallville (2001-2011), Veronica Mars (2004-2007) and Gossip Girl (2007-), Chapter 1 particularly focuses on the differences between (organic) fan activities and those encouraged by the commercial interests of media conglomerates. The former, Gillan argues, is an intelligent, participatory community while the latter functions as corporate signposting whereby the networks attempt to monetize audience engagement.
Chapter 2 looks at the effects of timeshift technologies through which “viewsers” (viewers/users) can watch programming outside of its original broadcast and, in doing so, circumvent network flow and skip advertisements or branding strategies. By analysing 24 (2001-2010), Gillan demonstrates that a disconnection of programme and its original broadcast enables the show to expand its audience to include those who may be hostile to FOX in other contexts, such as FOX News. Subsequently, by integrating their branded identity and politics into the diegesis of 24, its story segments, mise-en-scène and DVD supplementary features, the network can reach viewers who may not watch FOX due to its republican and conservative disposition.
Following the previous look at platform and timeshifting, Chapter 3 discusses placeshifting: “a new media term that refers to the ability of viewers to shift programming off their television sets and onto hard drives and mobile devices” (p. 135). Particularly interesting is Gillan’s comparison of the differing economic models of the consumerist, add-sponsored reality show (the traditional model of broadcast TV) and an emerging strategy of transmedia storytelling as exemplified by ABC’s Lost (2004-2010). Traditionally, in order to be considered a viable space for advertising (and therefore a successful show), a programme must retain loyal fans while attracting casual viewers. However, Gillan persuasively asserts, Lost’s complex structure and serialisation encouraged binge viewing via alternative platforms and, therefore, viewers bypassed network flow, its scheduling strategies and challenged existing sponsorship models of network television. In order to maximise its audience, Gillan claims, ABC utilised online resources to encourage the immersive experience coveted by loyal fans while the on-air broadcast minimised such complexities to attract casual viewers.
In response to the effects of timeshifting on advertising rates, Chapter 4 looks at NBC and, among other programmes, 30 Rock (2006-) for its integration of brand synergy. Gillan proposes that 30 Rock foregrounds NBC’s corporate identity and recalls previous NBC hits at a time when its catalogue of programming was being made available to download or purchase on DVD. Subsequently, in an era of timeshifting, where the viewer bypasses the network’s strategies of on-air branding, 30 Rock demonstrates the ways in which programming has been transformed “into potential circulation platforms for network brand assets as well as sponsors’ goods” (p. 180). Finally, the book’s conclusion discusses the promotional opportunities afforded by social networking sites and the strategies deployed by the online blogging community of Grey’s Anatomy (2005-). Here, Gillan considers the fluctuating (and at times illusionary) power structures of a fan/ producers hierarchy whereby the networks “leverage multiple platforms for their own ends, while still making viewsers feel as if they are part of the production and decision-making process” (p. 220).
Methodologically, this book presents a number of different case studies from several genres and networks. In doing so, Gillan builds upon a brief historiography of recent U.S television and amalgamates numerous paradigmatic frameworks such as institutional and narrative contexts with production, broadcast and consumption practices. By employing textual analysis to support her wider industrial investigations, Gillan is able to explore broader shifts in media cultures, economics and technologies to demonstrate how audience activities have been co-opted by commercial interests. Subsequently, Gillan suggests that cross-platform storytelling functions as creative narrative expansion in addition to an extension of marketing and promotional strategies. In such a paradigm, viewers’ opportunities to interact with content are also opportunities for product makers to interact with potential customers. Regrettably, Gillan marginalises considerations for how such evolving frameworks have affected the ways in which television is considered academically. For example, I would have preferred a more detailed discussion on “flow” (as conceptualised by Raymond Williams in 1974) and its negation/reinforcement by the development of consumer technologies. Similarly, the book would have benefited from a more detailed juxtaposition of the differing strategies deployed by network television and cable stations, especially the impact of syndication whereby cable channels air programming previously broadcast on the larger networks which, in Gillan’s view, would pose the question: How do network branding strategies integrated into a show’s diegesis complicate or promote the cable network’s identity and affiliations upon re-broadcast?
An additional criticism would be the book’s occasional digression from its central theme of the strategies deployed to combat the challenges of timeshift technologies. However, each diversion eventually provides further insight into the chapters’ primary investigation. For example, Chapter 2’s extended discussion of the use of torture in 24 or the political framing of the show’s DVD featurettes evidences the conservatism of the FOX network and introduces an insightful political context to the platform of DVD extras.
These slight misgivings aside, Television and New Media: Must-Click TV explores a diverse range of illustrative textual examples to provide an engaging and insightful discussion which foregrounds the economic or industrial considerations of product/brand integration within an era of timeshift technology (something largely neglected by previous scholarship on cultural convergence). Subsequently, Gillan offers a rich insight into contemporary television production and exhibition, new media storytelling and cross-platform marketing which will prove to be an illuminating resource for those interested in traditional broadcasting, multimedia economic strategies and transmedia models. In particular, because of Gillan’s convincing assertions that current broadcasting practices are extensions of fan activities, this book will be invaluable for those interested in fan cultures (an approach in media theory that has been a fertile ground for exploration for over two decades). Not only will this be an enlightening read for media academics, students and researchers, but casual readers will also find it informative and engrossing.