Serial Narratives

I have written about “The Walking Dead” in this blog before. But this time, I will be discussing this show as how it relates to serial narratives in television. The elements of serial narratives that I will use to discuss last week’s episode, “Judge, Jury, Executioner” are: “open narrative structure, community of characters rather than few protagonists, and the relationship between strategic interruption and heightened enjoyment” (Lecture, March 6, 2011).

The show has an open narrative. There is no actual ending for the episodes. Viewers are left with several questions and other new problems that arrive at the end of every episode. Last week’s episode showed that the level of conflict between the members of the group has increased. Dale was against the execution of a boy that came to know where the farm is. At first, no one agreed with him. However, Andrea changed her mind and agreed that they should find another solution. Ironically, Dale has to be executed because he got attacked by a walker. Now, we are left to find out, in the next episodes, if Andrea is going to take Dale’s position being the humanitarian in the group, especially since she has been quite aggressive lately.

The walker that attacked Dale ended up at the farm because Carl found him and did not tell anyone. Now, we are wondering if he is going to tell someone that it is partially his fault that Dale is dead.

A few important characters have died in the show. However, the show still works because there is a community of characters. Although there a couple of main characters, I would argue that all of the characters within the main group are very important for the development of the story.

Lastly, the show does an excellent job in stopping each episode with the most tension filled scene. Last week’s episode ended when Daryl pointed the gun to Dale’s head and shot it. This makes us want more of the show. We want to find out what is going to happen next.

Taciani D.