# The evolution of the "long form" TV series **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 7, 2013, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596 "2013-10-07T16:22:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/1 "2013-10-07T16:22:22Z")
Do you know of a timeline for the beginning(s) and development(s) of the TV series where “previously on \_\_\_\_\_\_” had to be included in case you missed an episode (or more) so you could follow the story line? I’d like to know how early such shows came along and how they have evolved into the _Breaking Bad_ genre, where it’s more like a long movie instead of isolated and more or less completed in the time slot episodes. Continuing characters would not be the main criterion since that feature goes pretty much all the way back to the earliest dramas and sitcoms. But continuing storylines and plot arcs would be a major factor. What’s the earliest show you can remember that had to have a “previously on” lead-in? Was HBO or Showtime a major player in that progress? If not, which network(s) paved the way? ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/2 "2013-10-07T16:26:45Z")
Does Soap count? ETA, that “previously on” stuff goes way back. I mean, Sopranos and Six Feet Under had it, but it probably started 10 years before that (and I’m talking about every single episode doing it, not just the occasionally ‘remember last week’ once or twice a season stuff). ---
**Author:** ![Cayuga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@Cayuga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cayuga)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/3 "2013-10-07T16:29:13Z")
I don’t know about “Previously on ….” Seems like I’ve been hearing it forever (or at least since I started watching TV in the early 60s). But the first show I can remember having story arcs is _Hill Street Blues_. Now that I think about it, _St. Elsewhere_ might have qualified as well. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/4 "2013-10-07T16:31:06Z")
Twin Peaks! They did it. Though I don’t think you should count it because it was a mini-series (not on purpose, but it was none the less). ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/5 "2013-10-07T16:35:32Z")
_Babylon 5_ broke new ground in almost every respect by using coherent, continuous story arcs that spanned multiple episodes, entire seasons and eventually the entire run of the show. Whatever its other flaws, it was a landmark production in this respect and set a bar few subsequent shows have reached. The _Battlestar Galactica_ reboot tried, and failed. Even _The Sopranos, The Wire_ and _The Shield_ went off the rails in some respects trying to maintain completely consistency on long story arcs. While _Breaking Bad_ ended up with a coherent and satisfying arc from beginning to end, evidence is that it was due more to luck and skill than preplanning. (Gilligan and the writers have admitted they have no idea what Walt was going to do with the M60 when they shot the season 5 opener, for example.) ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/6 "2013-10-07T16:37:14Z")
Are you including things like daytime soap operas? Or does a show have to have a definite ending to count? ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/7 "2013-10-07T16:38:24Z")
Dammit, getting blank quotes again. Cayuga, the Bochco productiosn were among the first to have multi-episode arcs, but I don’t think any ran more than 2-3 episodes each. Joey P, I’d discount Twin Peaks not because it was a limited-run show but because I don’t think it can be seen to have a complete story arc - and Lynch was forced to make many changes in the second season that changed the story progress. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/8 "2013-10-07T16:39:42Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > (Gilligan and the writers have admitted they have no idea what Walt was going to do with the M60 when they shot the season 5 opener, for example.) If you listen to the podcasts, though, they did that on a very regular basis. They constantly painted characters into a corner with no idea what they were going to do until they started writing the next episode. Vince said the tension was more realistic that way. If the writers didn’t know what was going to happen next, the actor wouldn’t know and the character wouldn’t know which made it a lot more believable. The M60 was just another example of doing something and not knowing what was going to happen next with it. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/9 "2013-10-07T16:44:41Z")
Jeez, I think it pretty much goes back to the Saturday morning matinees of the 1930s (and maybe even '20s): _ **Flash Gordon** _, _ **Zorro** _, _ **Fighting Devil Dogs** _, etc. Maybe even to the great radio shows of the era: _ **Lone Ranger** _, _ **Green Hornet** _, _ **Gangbusters** _, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Jim\_s\_Son](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19adc/32.png) [@Jim\_s\_Son](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_s_Son)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/10 "2013-10-07T16:52:19Z")
Maybe mini series that started in the late 1960s such as “The Forsyte Saga” and in the American market more in the 1970s with “Roots” and “Rich Man, Poor Man”. But those were kind of a collection of movies shown each evening. “Moonlighting” had a running gag from the first to the last about “The Anselmo Case” but wasn’t really the focus of any episodes. I suppose the last couple years dealt with Maddie and David’s relationship. But that would be after “Hill Street Blues” ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/11 "2013-10-07T16:56:02Z")
You mean not counting soap operas that always had one character or another recapping for the first five minutes of the show, right? Even episodic series had continuing storylines. _The Fugitive_ was one long chase scene with a 2-part finale. _Star Trek_ had the two-parter The Menagerie. Even\* Lassie\* had a seven-part story in 1971. In the U.S. the mid-1970s saw the rise of the mini-series, e.g., Roots, Rich Man Poor Man, etc. They really were “more like a long movie instead of isolated and more or less completed in the time slot episodes” and had full-fledged recaps at the beginning of each episode. Then \*Soap \*came along in 1977 and built in the recap for situation comedies, with _Hill Street Blues_ doing the same for dramas in 1981. However, I suspect the actual “previously on. . .” recap may have started with some British series like _Upstairs Downstairs_ that came over here via PBS. \*ETA: _Someone just mentioned_ Battlestar Gallactica. \*The 1978 version may also have started with a weekly recap, although I can’t remember. ---
**Author:** ![lew\_cody](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e274bd/32.png) [@lew\_cody](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lew_cody)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/12 "2013-10-07T17:01:56Z")
_The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network and Cable TV Shows_ by Tim Brooks and Earle Marsh has this to day about “Faraway Hill” a 1946 serial drama aired on the Dumont Network: “Each subsequent episode [after the premiere] began with a recap of what had gone before (illustrated by slides from the shows) and a reminder of who was who…” (page 459, 2009 edition). ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/13 "2013-10-07T17:03:18Z")
While daytime soaps and the successful mini-series had the feature of carrying over plotlines and introducing new characters to keep the show moving along, I guess my focus would be more on the continuing prime-time efforts where an episode wasn’t all tied up neatly, but also wasn’t resolved in a “to be continued” format that would only last an additional episode or so. There was a recent replay of the _Pioneers of Television_ documentary on PBS (narrated by Ryan Seacrest) where the big time mini-series were spotlighted: _Roots_, _The Thorn Birds_ and such. There was another one on the “Prime Time Soaps” like _Dallas_ and _Dynasty_ which were a big thing in the 70’s or thereabouts. But somewhere afterwards, the “long-form” series replaced those, and I wonder if it’s just my sense that _The Sopranos_ started the ball rolling or if it just did it so well that I think of it as a pioneer. The slogan HBO had, “It’s not TV, it’s HBO” may have been what triggered (in my mind at least) that TV had turned a major corner in its format. But I’m almost certain it wasn’t that late that the move started. I just can’t identify those earlier shows – perhaps because I just didn’t watch them. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2013, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-evolution-of-the-long-form-tv-series/670596/14 "2013-10-07T17:10:47Z")
For US prime time TV, the first was probably **The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp**. It roughly followed Earp’s actual life, though most of the stories were complete fiction. IIRC the final episode had him getting ready to fight at the OK Corral. However, I don’t think it had a recap; even though the episodes had an order, seeing them out of order didn’t hurt. **Lost in Space** in the early years was technically a story arc: the end of one episode would lead into the next. But that was really just a teaser, akin to "Next week on " **Batman** always had a recap before the Thursday show. **Hill Street Blues** had arcs, but I think the longest was only 6 episodes. There was no season-long arc. **Babylon 5** has the first US series-long arc, though it was truncated at season 4, and they had to wing season 5. In the UK, **Doctor Who** had a season-long arc on their 17th season, 1978: “The Key to Time.” This was before it caught on in the US. It was very much like modern US arcs with shows like **Buffy the Vampire Slayer** , with separate adventures under an umbrella theme; each adventure advances the theme. Of course, the UK had story arcs before the US, since one person usually wrote all episodes, and wrote all the scripts before the show was aired. In addition, **Doctor Who** kept track of its continuity well: if the Daleks hadn’t seen a particular regeneration of the Doctor, they were brought up to speed quickly. It would often refer back to earlier episodes, too.