Poll: Character Development: TV vs. Film

[WhiteFangofWhoa]

There are plenty of bizarre criticisms levelled at movies, but one argument I see popping up surprisingly often is over the comment 'no character development', to which the common response is 'they can't elaborate on every character in 2.5 hours and still have room for action scenes'.

Now, I have taken some film classes so I know there are lots of more subtle ways to indicate character and background (literally any action that character takes, camera angle, clothes...) that many audiences will miss, but it got me thinking about all the characters in long-running TV shows with extensive fan followings such as The Doctor, Buffy Summers or Heisenberg. Could any of those be captured in the same way in a film, even a 3-hour? More personally, do you prefer TV series' over film for character drama since they naturally have less funding for action?

 

[Queen Michael]

TV. There's less risk that the development will be rushed.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

Could any of those be captured in the same way in a film, even a 3-hour? More personally, do you prefer TV series' over film for character drama since they naturally have less funding for action?

Both work in their specific ways. Film is good for the contained arc it offers, we get to see the full character arc played out and tied up neatly. We get to see the rise to fame story or the absentee dad figuring out what he's been doing wrong prior to the start of the film or what have you and by the end of the movie the arc is resolved and done. The story is told and all is fine.

Series are often hinged on longer arcs and this can be both good and bad. Often the first season character development is tied into the premise of the plot and going on for more seasons means either shifting the premise or tacking on more character development. Chuck, for example, could not sustain 5 seasons of "geek becomes secret agent" and ended up making Chuck the very thing the first two seasons spoofed. Buffy had a good arc up until her death and the last two seasons are painful to watch as the showrunners try to come up with more ways to keep the character development running, despite the obvious fact that most of the characters had run their arcs. On the other hand, Breaking Bad did it right with Walther White, showing his gradual descent into crime and how it affected him.

My answer? Both. Some times I don't want to invest more than a few hours in a character and want to watch a fully contained story in that time. At other times I want something that will keep me occupied for weeks, for which series are better.

 

[FalloutJack]

Either-or. There's a format for either one that can tell a story and develop the people in it without much issue. It's just that not everyone knows how to work it, and we cannot blame the format itself for that.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Definitely tv for obvious reason (they have a whole season to develop the character and not restrain in under 2 or 3 hours which is even less due to fitting in other stuff in the film like comedy or action).

 

[Canadamus Prime]

Well I won't say that characters in movies can't be well developed, but TV offers much more room to fully flush out a character.

 

[FPLOON]

When it comes to character development, TV has a sharper double-edge sword than film in terms of overall length... It can go on for too long to the point that it can sometimes feel more like unwanted filler than anything else... Then again, for either mediums, it all depends on how the people working on the show or movie to handle character development, if even that's something important to think about in terms of the overall story...

Overall, either forms of viewing entertainment can pull off character development... However, it all depends on the crew handling said character development, let alone if it's even needed to be a part of the story that's being told in general... For me, I can go either way as long as I can feel satisfy with its overall execution...

 

[Cyncial_Huggy]

The problem with fictional characters is that you can develope them well, but that does not necessarily make them good or better characters because even their complex personality can become an overused trope or gag. House, MD anyone?

 

[kasperbbs]

TV. Movies have very limited time in comparison, not much else to it. Of course some do it better than others, but it's hard to feel for a character that you have only known for a couple of hours or less, but there are exceptions.

 

[Fox12]

Excluding anime? Film. Always film. Television is a barren wasteland in comparison, especially in America, where they just make things up as they go. I've studied the industry, and script writing, and it's one of the most creatively bankrupt mediums in the world.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I think TV has an obvious advantage, but I prefer to watch a well developed film than a well developed TV show.

 

[JimB]

Movies. Television character arcs, in my experience, are too likely to be inconsistent, for whatever reasons.

 

[viscomica]

Both can have character development. And it doesn't have to be rushed just because it's a film. A lots of films are character driven, whereas most TV shows are. At any rate I appretiate more character development in films rather than TV shows, that's for sure.

 

[bartholen_v1legacy]

Well I won't say that characters in movies can't be well developed, but TV offers much more room to fully flush out a character.

That misspelling (or mistaken word) makes this post quite hilarious. Game of Thrones, for example, has used its space to flush out characters quite plentifully.

OT: I don't see why the characters you mentioned couldn't be developed over the course of a single movie. Problem is, that means the movie has to put a lot of focus on that single character, leaving less room for others. Have you ever heard a TV series being referred to as a "character study"? That's because TV series have much larger casts than movies, and more time to flesh each of them out. Making an entire series based on and defined by a single character would have a hell of a character to sustain itself, whereas the film format offers more flexibility for going under the skin of individuals than groups of people.

I guess my bottom line is TV for casts, films for individuals. That said, the most convincing and memorable characters I've seen in either have been in TV series, so that's what I'm going to vote on the poll.

 

[Vicarious Reality]

Which of these two characters do you know better?