Author: CSTonline

Television. So often derided or adored for its alleged properties of distraction or pleasure. Blamed by pediatricians for making children weigh more than is fashionable in evidence-based public policy. Criticized by some...

Horror is not a genre often traditionally associated with television, although as Helen Wheatley, Stacey Abbott and Lorna Jowett have pointed out television has a long history of telling horrific tales. It’s also not a genre...

Outside a cold wind is blowing; the rain batters my window pane, and the shades of night are falling fast. All of which can mean but one thing: autumn has arrived, and with it the Saturday tea-time schedule. Yes, I’m aware that...

It was the recent conference at Hastings, ‘Raymond Williams and John Logie Baird – Television, Technology and Cultural Form’, organized by Professor Deborah Philips of the University of Brighton, which sent me back to Bill Brand...

It turns out that Washington isn’t the only place where ideas go to die  .  .  .  Watching the derivative and uninspiring fare served up last week by the networks to woo advertisers, I was flummoxed at the lack of creativity and...

I have a confession to make.  Recently, on a rare day with the house to myself and nothing to do, I watched Supernatural, Season One.  The entire season.  All twenty-two episodes in one day.  This is not the first time I’ve...

I read with interest Christine Geraghty’s blog ‘Reappraising the Television Heroine’ from 6 September. Geraghty notes the prevalence in recent TV drama of the female detective, and she discusses various contemporary television...

On Monday 30 September at 9pm Sky Living launched The Face, a talent-training format based on modelling. One of the three mentors, Naomi Campbell was in New York on launch night. So what is a poor s’leb to do? She books her...

As a plethora of PhD comics available for browsing will show, there are common themes that PhD candidates express about the thesis research and writing process. Largely, I am sure I don’t have to inform anyone, these focus on...

When Miley Cyrus appeared on the Alan Carr ChattyMan show (13th September, 2013), the narrative and representational markers that define her as a particular star were in obvious play. Miley is immediately sexualised and...

This week I watched the first episode of Bates Motel, the television spin-off from Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960) which began its UK broadcast on the 12th September.  Of course the show is more accurately described as a...

I was initially thinking of calling this post “Is the Age of Quality Television Over?” or even something more ominous like “Is This The End?” but I don’t think that it is, and I’m not ready to play TV-Nostradamus just yet, in...

In my first blog after the summer hiatus I was going to write about some of the television I’d been enjoying over the first half of 2013 and in particular the glorious glut of zombies that seemed to be gracing my PVR for the...

Greenpeace organized an Ice Ride on September 15 2013 to rally support for protecting de-territorialized sections of the Arctic from mineral exploitation. The Torygraph has surprisingly good video coverage of the UK-based...

Aside of devising plotlines engaging enough to both maintain core audiences and entice new viewers, there can be few greater challenges to a television production team than the unexpected departure of regular cast members. The...

Scott and Bailey, The Politician’s Husband, The Fall, Top of the Lake, The Americans Over the past few months I’ve found myself engaged with television heroines once again.1 The ‘Television for Women’ conference at...

D-Day: As it Happens (Channel 4) was part of the spate of programming that, as usual, accompanied the anniversary of the Allied landings in Normandy on 6th June, 1944.  Described on its website as a ‘completely new way’ to tell...

As I wind up and evaluate classes from the academic year just gone by, and start to prepare for the coming year, my thoughts turn to teaching, and in particular to teaching television. It’s always interesting in these blogs to...