A bunch of folks have been discussing the difference between the book and TV versions of Game of Thrones. I started one response by saying that television had to be more obvious because there wasn’t time or a narrator (usually) to fill in the kind of detail and back story that is possible in a book. And the TV viewer can’t go back to the previous chapter and look at it again to glean a better understanding of its meaning after watching subsequent scenes. But I realized I was thinking old man thoughts. That’s how we watched TV when I was a kid. No VCRs, no DVRs, DVDs, etc., to go back and look again.
But now, most everyone can do this, and I wonder whether this technology has changed the way that television and movies are written or produced. Are the programs more subtle, more detailed? Do they expect the viewers to go back and look at scenes again to catch something they missed the first time.
The only explicit evidence of that that I see are actor/director commentary soundtracks on DVD, which generally try to give the viewer a better insight. But these are generally added later, and aren’t really part of the program’s production.
But I don’t know what such changes to the production process would even look like, or what would be evidence that it was happening.
Anyone have thoughts on this?