Half Term Homework

"Discuss the audience appeal of your three main texts"

Peaky blinders is set in Birmingham in 1919, just after the war. It is a crime drama which follows former world war one soldiers who have returned home and formed a criminal gang. The broadcaster of Peaky Blinders is BBC2, aiming to target the arts, culture, drama and some comedy. This text should be appealing to audiences already served by BBC1 or ITV, the two main channels on British TV which serve majority of the population. BBC 2 is highly praised for the development of prestigious 'high brow' drama series. However, the text Mad Men is a programme which was created by AMC for a niche audience, an audience which pays to view the programmes in which they show. the programmes shown are targeted for a specific audience, for example usually people who are middle aged working people who can afford to pay for extra channels.  Man Med is a programme which was created by AMC for a niche audience, an audience which pays to view the programmes in which they show. the programmes shown are targeted for a specific audience, for example usually people who are middle aged working people who can afford to pay for extra channels.  The TV show Lost is an American television series that originally aired on the American Broadcasting Company (ABC). Lost is a primarily character development based drama series containing elements of science fiction and the supernatural that follows the survivors of the crash of a commercial passenger jet flying between Sydney and Los Angeles, on a mysterious tropical island somewhere in the South Pacific Ocean.
A reason that's these three texts may appeal to an audience is the location in which the programme is set. for example Peaky Blinders is set in Birmingham (UK) so this would be of appeal to those who live in Birmingham or around the midlands. This may attract an audience because they would be interested to know historical information about the area and how Birmingham had developed since after the first world war finished. People who may be interested in Birmingham as a city also may like to watch this programme as it gives historical information about the place.

Audiences may be appealed to a text due to the social-historical context, Mad Men is a good example of this, as it looks back at the 60's. This would appeal to people who have fascinations with the 1960's. These people like the idea of looking back at the past, so by presenting Mad Men with typical clothing with suits and hats for males and floral dresses for women do have an appeal for people who like to look back at certain decades. This also is relevant to Peaky Blinders also, as it was set just after the second world war, so people who are interested in this time period of post-war activity and how the country coped would particularly want to watch this programme. Again, it would also interest an audience who wanted know about the 1910 era, so it would show some historical facts which would please an audience as they would gain knowledge.

Lost attracts an audience via its characters, The use of the ensemble cast is a way in which lost targets a range of different and broader audience, by using mixed gender and different ethnicity's, it allows the audience to connect with the character that reminds them of themselves. it also is a good idea to use to attract a mainstream audience so that everyone has the same amount of 'screen time' so that everyone feels important and recognised. Peaky Blinders uses characters also to attract an audience, in this programme they use well recognised actors like Cillian Murphy and Helen McCrory. By doing this it allows them to gain audience interest by those who follow/admire the actor/actress. The use of having well know stars encourages an audience to watch a text as by having these it automatically indicates that it is a high budget show that will be good due to the actors/actress' that have been selected.

 Lost is a hybrid genre, the producers mix genres to make a wider audience be interested in the programme. We see that in the short scene that we viewed we recognised the elements of 'good and bad' which usually attracts a female audience as it represents the idea of a fairy tale. Other genres that we see within this short clip were the element of action with the guns and drama that appear, this usually would attract a male audience to the programme. Another element within this hybrid genre is the use of the Sci-Fi, we see elements of this by the surroundings and what is in the surroundings, i.e. animals and plants. The idea of a Hybrid genre is to attract a wider audience so that the story lines will appeal to more people. We see that peaky Blinders is not a Hybrid text, but noticeably a highbrow text. Highbrow texts are generally aimed for people who can be an active audience with texts that include intellectual and culturally rich narrative. This text in particular can be polysemic due to the elements of mainstream text narrative which is portrayed throughout. This would suggest that higher class would  tend to be more engaged with the topic of Peaky Blinders, due to evidence in the programme of events and issues that is ported within this. Mad Men is created for a particular audience, due to the show being on cable television, people have to pay to get the channel, it is shown on AMC, usually targeted for middle-class, intellectual people who can afford to pay for the extra channels. We see that Mad Men is primarily aimed at a niche audience, do the amount of limited information given in the narrative which requires an intellectual person to understand complicated story lines and narrative used. 

the music within the programmes may also be an audience appeal, for example in Peaky Blinders, the use of modern music in contrast to the era that it is set in, this may attract a younger audience as it shows the idea of modernism. The non-diegetic sound that is used in this is modern, for instance in the first opening scene in creates a different mood to the audience, as the cinematic influences of the director are shown throughout. Lost is the opposite to this, we see that Lost is set in a more modern futuristic style, but uses the classical music as non-diegetic sound to create an atmosphere, the use of the classical music also may influence an audience appeal to the programme as most mainstream texts use music that is recently produced or famous, the use of classical music shows how the text uses the Hybrid genre to its advantage. 

Finally the themes that are used in the programmes may have audience appeal. Mad men is a good example of a text that contains a lot of reoccurring themes throughout, like adultery and sexism, alcoholism, counterculture, identity, racism and smoking, these themes are all very serious, so may relate to may viewers which will allow them to connect with the characters. Lost shows the idea of being able to connect with the programme through the characters rather than the themes as they appeal unrealistic. However, Peaky Blinders shows the same kind of themes throughout, showing serious themes like gambling addictions, abortions and post-war trauma. The idea of having a theme that may appeal to an audience will increase the appeal to watch the show as many people can relate to issues being shown. Themes are have a strong audience appeal also by the topic itself, it would attract an audience who have an interest in the theme or are suffering with one of the topics/themes that are covered.    

Overall I feel that all three of my texts that I had chosen to study have strong audience appeal due to the amount of rating that they had. Even though the programmes had completely different topics and were meant to appeal to different audience, it shows in each narrative can be portrayed by the use of editing and story lines to encourage an audience to connect and engage with a text.