A lot of people forget that U.S. television during the 1970s was a very, very different animal than U.S. television today. Everything had to be pretty contained and story arcs were weak to nonexistent.
That really changed with the introduction of "night time soaps" (i.e., Dallas and Dynasty) where there was proof that people would follow a story arc across multiple episodes. I was not at all a fan of the night time soaps myself, but it translated in some very real ways to higher quality television in the late 80s. Without the night time soaps, and the advent of VCR which changed the way people watched television, you would not have something like 24 or the current Battlestar incarnation today.
no subject
A lot of people forget that U.S. television during the 1970s was a very, very different animal than U.S. television today. Everything had to be pretty contained and story arcs were weak to nonexistent.
That really changed with the introduction of "night time soaps" (i.e., Dallas and Dynasty) where there was proof that people would follow a story arc across multiple episodes. I was not at all a fan of the night time soaps myself, but it translated in some very real ways to higher quality television in the late 80s. Without the night time soaps, and the advent of VCR which changed the way people watched television, you would not have something like 24 or the current Battlestar incarnation today.