Why Japanese cartoons are better

[glenra]

The best episodic series (Bebop, Neon Genesis) have an overall story arc - a beginning, a middle, and an end. People learn. They change. Some new characters appear. Others leave. Sometimes good people fail, and they might even die

Comments

[neshura]

I would argue that the same applies to all episodic scripted drama. All of my favorite semi-obscure TV shows had extremely strong story arcs -- Farscape, Firefly, Earth 2 -- and character development that took its sweet time. Star Trek in general less so, but my favorite Star Trek (Deep Space 9) more so.

Syndication is great if you are simply trying to generate content to fill the space available. No sticky scheduling issues, no computers required to solve conflicts and dependencies.

With an effectively finite amount of talent (I use the word loosely), the TV continuum simply expands via dilution and repetition of content. Unluckily for us, there's only one each of Joss and Sorkin. One might think that the addition of eleventy billion new cable channels per year would result in a massive expansion of the stable of (semi-decent vaguely-competent) writers fed and watered in Hollywood.

The only thing I'm certain of is that good TV is better now (past 10 years or so) than it has ever been before, and there is more bad TV than ever.

[glenra]

The point does apply particularly to animation because it's at least /possible/ for animation never to change. With live actors there are invariably SOME changes over time that the writers have to take into account. Actors have a nasty habit of getting pregnant, aging, getting sick, getting a too-good-to-pass-up movie offer, etcetera.

But of course you're right; the same range applies elsewhere. Babylon 5 was confusing if you missed an episode; Seinfeld wasn't. I suppose that's another benefit of the stateless protocol: if the show takes a while to find its audience, people who join in late aren't confused. There's no huge accumulation of necessary backstory.