Timed Essay Question 3

Timed Essay question 3 Why do long form television dramas from different countries offer different representations? In an attempt to answer how different long form television dramas (LFTD) from different countries offer different representations, I will discuss and compare Stranger Things and Deutschland 83. Both of these long form television dramas were set in the 1980s, whilst Stranger Things is set in the US and Deutschland is set in Germany. Stranger things is a LFTD, produced and streamed on Netflix. To access this product and to watch Stranger Things, the consumers must pay a fee to subscribe to the platform. Netflix will ‘play it safe’ in the industry and will create LFTD’s such as Stranger Things, which target a mass audience and have the potential to access a global reach. In order to do this, Netflix will identify a suitable primary and secondary audience for their LFTD. Stranger Things primary audience are teenagers/young adults aged from 13-21, this is due to the audience being able to identify with the characters of those that are a similar age. On the other hand, the secondary audience are middle aged adults, who will understand the intertextual references within the LFTD, such as the ET reference in the first episode. By having a wide demographic and target audience, Stranger Things has the potential to achieve a global reach. Furthermore, traditional representations are repeatedly portrayed in the LFTD, these representations are recognised globally. This will further enable Stranger things to acquire a global reach, as everyone understands the representations and ideologies. On the other hand; the company who produced Deutschland (Walter Productions) did not have ambitions to achieve a global reach, due to them being a much smaller company than Netflix. However, Deutschland was still a very successful series, especially considering it is a foreign language LFTD. The first episode reached 2.2 million viewers when it first aired on channel 4. The target audience for the LFTD are middle aged people, who have an understanding on the events in the 1980s such as the cold war, and how the east and west opposed each other. Deutschland is based on true events which happened in the 1980s, therefore for the audience to understand the full story, they will need an understanding on real events which took place. The representations used in the LFTD are accurate to how people lived in them times, for example the east were portrayed with restricted rights, and had restricted freedom in comparison to the west. Both LFTD’s portray different ideologies, Stranger Things portrays a traditional/conservative ideology. For example, women are shown as the gender which carry out the domestic work such as cooking and have low paid jobs, this is linked to gender theory, as the women are being represented in a domestic way. Furthermore, Will’s mum is the only carer for her children and must work long night shifts to provide for them, whereas Hopper, who doesn’t seem to have much interest in working still has a much higher paid, respected job. Therefore, Stranger Things promotes a western ideology. In contrast to this, Deutschland 83 promotes a socialist ideology. This is achieved due to the audience being positioned on the side of the east, and by the producers portraying those from the east as heroic, the narrative suggests that Martin needs to save the East. Martin is a character which represents the ideology of the east and has stereotypical attributes regarding the east. For example, in the scene where he interrogates two east Germans, but accuses them of being capitalists, regarding the Shakespeare books, he asks them who will win, this implies that Martin opposes the capitalists and is a stereotype that every socialist hate capitalists. Furthermore, a socialist ideology is also portrayed using gender roles, and by challenging the traditional ideology (feminist theory). Lenora challenges the traditional ideology due to her place in society. In the 1980s, females would typically have less power than men, and would mostly do domestic work, however she is portrayed as much more powerful than most men, including Martin. Martin tends to follow any commands given to him by Lenora, and shows she is superior to him. The reasoning behind the east and west being portrayed in the way they are, is due to the identity of the producers. Their upbringing would most likely have been in the east, and they may have had past experiences where they have been afraid of the west. Furthermore, in the 1980s there was a large amount of propaganda on posters and newspapers, therefore those from the east would genuinely believe their way of living was correct, and that they were in danger from the west, hence why they have portrayed the west in a negative way. Although the west is portrayed in a negative way, some of the audience will still side with them. Deutschland portrays a binary opposition between the east and west, and some of the audience will see the east as the ‘good’ side, whilst some will see the west as the ‘good’ side. Which side the audience chooses is based on their identity. They will also take either a preferred, negotiated or oppositional reading to the representations of the east (reception theory). Those that take an oppositional reading to the representations of the east will most likely have grown up in the west. They would have believed in the 1980s that the east was a threat to them, and would have believed in their ideology, which differed from the east’s, this is due to their upbringing and their past experiences, which as a result had formed their identity. The representations on of the east, in Deutschland are used to make those form the west question whether they were really the problem. In conclusion, both LFTD’s from different countries, offer different representations. This is primarily due to the different identities people have in these countries, due to their past experiences, upbringing and the media in those countries. Due to these identities, the producers represent characters in ways which the audience will identify with, and to promote ideologies which these audiences will agree with.