With Chuck and Heroes in reruns, rather than a festive discussion about how St. Patrick's day is celebrated around the country around the world, or actually talking much about some stellar performances of shows on Monday night the comments shouting match du jour is a semantics debate over what's a serialized show.
And it really is semantics, and because there's a better way to qualify this than semantics: relative rank! Rank from 1-10 the ease which episodes can be watched an enjoyed without seeing the previous episodes. Zero means that for all practical purposes you can watch all of the episodes out of order and it will make no difference. A 10 means you're completely and 100% lost and can't enjoy any of it. I doubt we will see many ones or 10s.
- The Big Bang Theory (2)
- Lost (8)
- Heroes (8)
- Supernatural (5)
- CSI (2)
- Chuck (3)
- Gossip Girl (7)
- Grey's Anatomy (7)
- Fringe (4)
- The Office (3)
- Desperate Housewives (7)
- Two and a Half Men (2)
- Law & Order (2)
- Life (4)
- House (3)
- 24 (8)
I didn't give this much thought and you can pick nits with my absolute rankings, but it was just to showcase what everyone already knows. Heroes and Lost are a lot more serialized than House and Chuck. I wasn't attempting to do this justice and I am aware that there are lots of different cases, but the general case is that Lost will always be more difficult to enjoy having not seen previous episodes than Chuck and House.
There are indeed cases with some shows where it depends on the focus of the episode. Supernatural, for example, is quite often mostly a procedural, but it has certain episodes that focus mostly on the major serialized story arcs. I was torn between giving it a four and a five.
I wonder how much this effects viewer totals. For example, I have always heard how good Lost was, but I missed all of the first season and never had the time to watch it all on DVD to understand it now.
* The Big Bang Theory (0)
* Lost (10)
* Heroes (10)
* Supernatural (3)
* CSI (1)
* Chuck (2)
* Gossip Girl (6)
* Grey’s Anatomy (6)
* Fringe (4)
* The Office (2)
* Desperate Housewives (6)
* Two and a Half Men (0)
* Law & Order (1)
* Life (3)
* House (2)
* 24 (9)
* The Big Bang Theory (1)
* Lost (9)
* Heroes (9)
* Supernatural (2)
* CSI (1)
* Chuck (2)
* Gossip Girl (5)
* Grey’s Anatomy (9)
* Fringe (3)
* The Office (1)
* Desperate Housewives (8)
* Two and a Half Men (2)
* Law & Order (1)
* Life (2)
* House (1)
* 24 (10)
This is pretty much how I would sum things up. Albiet I wasn’t sure what “serial” meant before today. It’s rare that one can be educated amongst such bickering.
I flunk. I have watched more than one episode of only 2 of those shows
Law & Order (1)
House (4)
LOST is a 10. Chuck is much more than a three. You may understand the episode, but you don’t see the characters the same way or the long arc.
Ricardo, more perhaps, but much more? I do see it as more serialized than House, but not hugely so. I could be convinced to talk it up to a four or go as high as a 5 for Chuck, but not without revising House to a 4!
The Big Bang Theory (3)
Lost (10)
Heroes (9)
CSI (2)
Chuck (3)
Gossip Girl (7)
Fringe (5)
Two and a Half Men (3)
Law & Order (1)
Life (4)
House (3)
24 (9)
The others I haven’t seen. I’d rank Fringe higher if they start tieing in all the things they’ve left open-ended from previous episodes. If there’s any show that gets the 1 it’s Law & Order. It doesn’t even have personal storylines that carry over that CSI has had (Grissom’s hearing, Grissom and Sarah, etc).
This isn’t credible. A serial is a serial. Ability to understand what is going on doesn’t make anything “more serial,” it makes it more confusing and written poorly for the medium. Every show should be easy to catch on what happened without having seen a previous episode.
24 by the way would be a ZERO. It’s incredibly easy to follow no matter the hour you tune into. The panels on it said as much. Thus it’s a perfect example of how this kind of rating for whether or not something is “more serial,” is entirely pointless.
Rating a show on its level of confusion doesn’t make it more serial. It makes it more confusing.
Also, don’t get caught up in the numbers (even though this is TVbytheNumbers!) What matters in the end is the relative ranks. There can be many nit picks over the numeric assignments but likely not huge variance in how the rankings look. Law & Order will be near the top of everyone’s list, and Lost will be near the bottom.
We’re talking enjoyed, not understood the whole backstory, obviously.
Chuck (4)
Grey’s Anatomy (8)
The Office (2)
House (3)
Of the shows I actually watch:
30 Rock (3)
Scrubs (4) (Only this high because I think in order to enjoy recent seasons you need to remember how good it used to be and look at it more nostalgically.)
Breaking Bad (7)
Weeds (5)
Entourage (3)
Dexter (6)
United States of Tara (4)
Lie to Me (2)
Nick, ability to understand what’s going on does make a difference between how many people can just tune in on a lark and stick with it and enjoy it. And while the methodology used here is definitely NOT credible (and I agree, coupled with the “previously on 24″ episodes are very watchable on a standalone basis — I said I didn’t put much thought into my rankings!), it’s more useful than any semantics discussion.
There is absolutely no point in classifying anything as serial or more serial, or procedural as far as this blog goes other than what its impacts on viewing are. If you don’t think Lost is more difficult to follow without ever having seen it than the same for an episode of Chuck, I want some of what you’re smoking!
Nick, I agree, this doesn’t define serial or not. It defines whether the writers know how to write for TV. (Though I think writing for cable is very different than writing for broadcast and you can get away with more confusing serials.)
* The Big Bang Theory (2)
* Lost (9)
* Heroes (9)
* Supernatural (5)
* CSI (2)
* Chuck (4)
* Gossip Girl (8)
* Grey’s Anatomy (7)
* Fringe (4)
* The Office (2)
* Desperate Housewives (8)
* Two and a Half Men (2)
* Law & Order (2)
* Life (4)
* House (2)
* 24 (7)
I think one of the main problems with heavily serialized shows like Lost or Heroes is that it is hard for them to actually gain more viewers as opposed to procedurals. Shows like House and NCIS have steadily grown in viewers whereas shows like Heroes or Lost get fewer and fewer viewers. If people haven’t been watching Heroes by now, they are not likely to start.
My ranks would be just about the same as yours, Mr. Seidman. Very good idea to explain the “serial” concept!
@Nick C, I wholeheartedly disagree that 24 is easy to follow on any hour. Well, wait…easy? Maybe. Worthwhile? Absolutely not. If I haven’t seen the show from Hour One, and if I don’t plan to watch Hours 14, 17, or 24, I feel like I’m wasting an hour watching any of it. None of the actors impress me enough, none of the plot lines impress me enough, and none of the action impresses me enough to bother if I’m not all-in for the full season.
Nick – in your absolute binary definitions, is Burn Notice serialized or not?
Robert – where would you rank Burn Notice? I’d say it started in the 3 range, but now it might be 4-ish, or even 5-ish, as you might need to know why Michael chose to lose himself at sea?
And Julia, good point. This ranking shows more of “enjoyability” versus “understandability.” Serials are different from procedurals, but the best ones are written such that they can be enjoyable as stand-alone episodes.
Still, that leaves room for a third category? What are shows like Burn Notice, seriously? It’s not serial in the soapy sense, where every episode’s a cliffhanger. Still the underlying *Michael Burn* story is ongoing.
Clutz, the intro for Burn Notice explains the premise pretty well, and when they feel the need they inject some “previously on Burn Notice”. I don’t think it would hurt a whole lot to watch Burn Notice out of order. If you watch the season two finale before anything else obviously you’ll know how that arc is resolved, but the other episodes would still be enjoyable anyway. Of course my opinion is as subjective as anyone elses!
i watch a grand total of two shows. The Office (3) and 30 Rock (3).
The only show I watch on that list is “Fringe” and I agree that it’s rating should be a bit higher. Coming in cold in the middle of the season, a viewer has to ask themselves, “Why is Walter such a nut case?”, who are “Massive Dynamics”, “Who is this ghost who keeps showing up in Olivia’s presence? and so on. Not to mention, what the hell is “The Pattern”?
The episodes themselves pretty much stand alone, except for several of the most recent as the overall story arc begins to accelerate more quickly.
TSCC (not on your list), on the other hand, has some built-in advantages since everybody pretty much knows what Terminator is about.
Which was the problem…a new viewer hitting that show for the first time mid-season might understand some of the more straight-forward standalone episodes that had “Terminator of the Week” action like “Goodbye to All That”, and MIGHT pick up that Weaver is a Terminator just by her attitude, but beyond that there’s not that much “Terminator” in TSCC other than Cromartie being the “bad Terminator” hunting John and Cameron being the “good Terminator” protecting him. What is “The Turk” and why is everybody looking for it – except they aren’t, they’re chasing “three dots”? WTF?
Coming in later in the season, after Cromartie was gunned down in Mexico, would have left viewers even more confused. No “bad Terminator” at all? Skynet didn’t send another one to take up the slack?
The problem with Terminator is that if you DON’T know what it’s about, you’re confused, and if you DO know what it’s about – TSCC is not Terminator (much, adequately, whatever).
The “previously on Terminator” leads don’t seem to adequately explain things. They’re just fast clips that I think probably don’t really help a brand new viewer, although it might help someone who missed a couple episodes. In fact, I’m not such leads really help unless they’re really well done.
I tend to agree that a serial needs to grab an audience fast and then keep them. They can’t afford to play games with pacing or radical revamps of the concept until they’ve got a solid audience more or less locked in.
This is where TSCC went wrong in season two. They had a core base of fans out of season one. They started out reasonably strong in episode one of season 2. Then Josh decided to pace the overall story arc like a glacier. You cannot do that when your numbers are uncertain. Having a shortened first season put the show at risk right away. So they needed to start strong and stay strong to both keep the viewers they had and pick up new ones early in season two. They didn’t.
I see Dollhouse trying to start reasonably strong, then get better. And Joss Whedon has said he doesn’t mind firing off his material early on since “we can always reload”. So if the predictions are right that the next few episodes get much better, I think Dollhouse is doing the right thing.
And even though the first few episodes of Dollhouse were big on the “babe factor”, hey, that can’t really hurt as long as the show doesn’t get the rep of being ONLY about that.
Mr. Hack, you kind of need your own blog. That was longer than the post, or almost any post on this blog! This was not a post about TSCC, please try to keep it on topic! Thanks.