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Serial

This article is about serials in fiction. You might want, instead: Serial communications for information about computer communication technologies that use a single stream of data; Serialism (music) or Cliffhanger (plot device).

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Serial in fiction is a term used to describe any story which is told over a number of separate instalments. This can be different chapters of a prose story published in each weekly issue of a magazine, a series of films with a continuing story or - in its most common contemporary form - a television production with a continuing story made up of several episodes.

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During the 19th century, many popular writers earned a living from writing stories in serial form for popular magazines of the day. Many of Charles Dickens' novels were originally published in this manner, for example, and this is the reason many of them are so long - the more chapters he wrote, the longer the serial continued in the magazine and the more money he was paid. Other famous writers who wrote serial literature for popular magazines include Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who created the Sherlock Holmes stories originally for serialisation in The Strand magazine.

Film

A serial, or cliffhanger, was a popular form of movie entertainment that dated back to the earliest days of cinema. Usually filmed with low budgets, serials were action-packed stories that usually involved a hero (or heroes) battling an evil villain and rescuing a damsel in distress. The villain would continually place the hero into inescapable deathtraps and situations, or the heroine would be placed into a deathtrap and the hero would bravely come to her rescue, usually pulling her away from certain death only instants before she met her doom. The hero and heroine would face one trap after another, battling countless thugs and lackeys, before finally defeating the villain "once and for all"...even though the villain would almost always get away at the end, to return at a future date.

Many famous cliches of action-adventure movies had their origins in the serials. The popular term "cliffhanger" is derived from the serials (though its origins have been traced by some historians to the Sherlock Holmes stories of Arthur Conan Doyle), and it comes from the many times that the hero or heroine would end up hanging over a cliff, usually as the villain gloated above and waited for them to plummet thousands of feet to their deaths. Other popular cliches included the heroine being tied to a railroad track; being lashed to a log in a sawmill, lying on a conveyor belt and approaching a gigantic whirling sawblade; or being trapped in an abandoned mine shaft, watching as the burning fuse of a nearby bundle of dynamite sparked and sputtered its way towards the deadly explosive. The popular Indiana Jones movies are a well-known, romantic pastiche of the serials' clichéd plot elements and devices.

The serials were filmed in separate parts, and each chapter (a typical serial usually had fifteen of them) would be screened at the same theater for one week. The serial would end with a cliffhanger, as the hero and heroine would find themselves in the latest perilous situation from which there could be no escape. The audience would have to return the next week (and pay admission) to find out how the hero and heroine would escape and battle the villain once again. Serials were especially popular with children, and for many youths in the first half of the 20th century, a typical Saturday at the movies included a chapter of at least one serial, along with cartoons, newsreels, and two feature films.

Famous serials of the silent era include The Perils of Pauline and The Exploits of Elaine. During the 1930s and 1940s, many famous serials turned to science fiction and fantasy for their stories. Buster Crabbe made a name for himself by starring in several science fiction serials, including Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century. Popular comic books and radio programs of the 1940s were the basis of several serials; famous superheroes to appear in serials included Superman, Batman, Captain Marvel, Captain America, and the Green Hornet. The most respected directors during this period was the team of John English and William Witney who directed an acclaimed series of serials for Republic Pictures which include The Fighting Devil Dogs, Daredevils of The Red Circle and The Adventures of Captain Marvel.

Radio & Television

With the advent of television and the decline of the moviegoing audience, production of serials ceased due to the decreasing audience (and revenues). But the serial lived on, moving instead to the small screen and the world of TV reruns.

The serial format as we know today actually originated in radio, in the form of 15-minute programs known as soap operas (so-called because many of these shows were sponsored by soap companies, such as Colgate-Palmolive and Procter & Gamble). One of the shows that helped pioneer the daytime serial was The Guiding Light, which debuted on NBC radio in 1937, and is still airing today on CBS Television (where "Guiding Light" has been since 1952). Some of the characters in serials have been portrayed as long-suffering (a common theme even in some of today's serials along with the social and economical issues of the day).

Guiding Light and such other daytime serials such as As The World Turns (premiered in 1956), General Hospital (premiered in 1963), Days Of Our Lives (premiered in 1965), One Life To Live (premiered in 1968), All My Children (premiered in 1970), and The Young And The Restless (premiered in 1973) were popular in the Golden and Silver Ages of television, and still are today.

Aside from the social issues, the style and presentation of these shows have changed...whereas in the 1950s and 1960s the drama was underscored with traditional organ music, and in the 1970s and the 1980s a full orchestra provided the score, the daytime dramas of today use cutting-edged synth-driven music (in a way, music for soaps has come full-circle, from the keyboard to the keyboard).

The nighttime serials are a different story, though the concept is also nothing new. In the 1960s, ABC aired the first real breakthrough nighttime serial, Peyton Place, inspired by the novel and theatrical film of the same name. After its cancellation, the format went somewhat dormant until the mid-1970s when ABC themselves brought it back with, of all things, a comedy soap (aptly called Soap). Although the show was controversial for its time (with a homosexual character among its cast roster), it was (and still is today) a cult classic.

The era of "primetime soaps" (as they are often called) really began to reach its peak when CBS began to air Dallas (which propelled Larry Hagman to stardom) in 1978. It was with this show that defined the end-of-season cliffhanger (with its "Who Shot J.R.?" and "Bobby In The Shower?" storylines) that is still utilized in today's series (whether it's a serial or not).

In the 1980s, you could find other nighttime soaps as Dynasty (ABC's answer to "Dallas"), Knots Landing, The Yellow Rose, and Falcon Crest. There were some serial shows such as Hill Street Blues and St. Elsewhere that did not officially fit into this category, but were nonetheless ratings hits season after season. As the 1990s came to a close, the primetime soap as an official format slowly passed into the sunset.

But the primetime serial constructure can still be seen today in such shows as E.R., The West Wing, 24, and Alias. In addition, it has been noted that the use of cliffhangers is still prevalent in adventure shows, its just that they are now typically used just before a commercial break and the viewer need only wait a few minutes to see its resolution.

In British television, the term 'serial' is usually used to cover what American audiences would more commonly call a 'miniseries'. Many British television serials tend to be high-profile dramas, either costume drama such as Pride and Prejudice (BBC ONE, 1995) or contemporary social drama such as Our Friends in the North (BBC TWO, 1996).