Book Review of Osservatorio TV di Barbara Maio

Osservatorio TV, Barbara Maio (2014), Creative Commons Public License (http://www.osservatoriotv.it/Benvenuto.html), 228 pp.

Reviewed by Julia Heim, CUNY Graduate Center

The idea for Barbara Maio's Osservatorio TV began in 2012. The goal of her yearly project, as she shares on the website, is for scholars to contribute papers that deal with contemporary television series and serials that have yet to garner much critical attention. The second edition of Osservatorio TV, and the one being reviewed here, went live in October 2014, under the Creative Commons Public License, offering Italian speakers critical insight into recent television programmes. Maio's decision to put the project online and make it free of charge is quite in keeping with a new trend in television scholarship, which authors like Jason Mittell had begun to do shortly before her (Complex TV: The Poetics of Contemporary Television Storytelling 2013). Even more relevant, and a point that is reflected in many of the contributions compiled in Osservatorio TV, is that the project quite fluidly becomes part of the televisual paratextual landscape; interested parties can seamlessly float (or click) from streaming a show, to a Twitter feed about it, to fan fiction, to the critical investigations offered in Maio's project. In a way, we might consider this reflection in keeping with the idea of seriality itself, and Maio's interest in format. Seriality is changing, is growing out and in simultaneously, and formats, much like Osservatorio TV itself, are changing based on viewing patterns, network trends and technology changes. Just as the format of this work offers us insight into such a mercurial landscape, so too does its content, which Guglielmo Pescatore, in his introduction, refers to as taking on 'an arduous task… because offering a snapshot of a phenomenon in movement, and at the same time being a participant in it, is no easy task' (v).
Of the seventeen shows discussed in this work, thirteen originated in the United States, three are from the United Kingdom and one is from France. From singing high school students, to prison dynamics, to murder mysteries, to alternative realities, the subjects of these shows are as varied as their duration. Despite this seemingly extreme variation, however, they all fit within the permutable category of seriality, and in large part, the continuity of style and theme in the articles of this volume create an ease and consistency that makes these differences often feel beside the point.
The similarities of theme and approach that span the book provide the reader with a tangible sense of the issues and topics at the heart of contemporary television. In addition to narrative summaries and character breakdowns, stylistic and narrative choices like flashbacks and the importance of location seem to be particularly prominent in contemporary seriality. As Martina Baratta notes in her chapter about Orange is the New Black (2013), flashbacks serve not only as a stylistic choice but as a 'common denominator' that tells the life of each prisoner before her entrance into Leitchfield, and as such creates parallels between Piper, the main character, and the lives of the other detainees. Similarly in both Peaky Blinders (2013) and The Confession (2011), as Barbara Maio and Giacomo Tagliani, respectively, have pointed out, the flashbacks are used to illustrate the feelings, reflections and traumatic or criminal experiences, which provide a deeper understanding of narrative present of each show. Space and location also consistently appear to be more than superficial aesthetic choices, as Attilio Palmieri mentions, citing Chris Chibnall, the author of Broadchurch (2013): 'I wanted to make the landscape a real character…' (45). The same sentiment is repeated in the chapters about Top of the Lake (2013) and Les Revenants (2013), and perhaps it is no coincidence that the subjects of these three shows in some way deal with crime and terror. The same importance of place, in fact, is emphasized in the chapters on The Bridge (2013) and Under the Dome (2013), though more subtly.
Another consistently common thread in these chapters, which speaks to the content of these programmes, is the focus on the theme of identity. In the chapter on The Bridge (2013), Gabriele De Luca offers readers some understanding of this trend: 'It is the so-called Third Golden Age of Television above all, to boast an innovative ability to interpret conflicts between different cultures and identities' (177). And, indeed, from Orange is the New Black (2013), to Glee (2009), to The Bridge (2013), to Switched at Birth (2011), to secondary narratives in Mistresses (2013) and Ray Donovan (2013), themes of identity that specifically deal with marginalized groups – such as the deaf, the Asperger's, the LGBTQ and the black communities – seem to take centre stage in contemporary serial programming.
In addition to discussions about the content of these shows, similarities between the ways of reading and areas of focus of the authors of these chapters bring to light the possible trends and lenses used in contemporary television criticism. References to other films and television shows, and discussions about the authors and/or creators of the programmes – particularly with regard to their other works, or speculations about their aesthetic and narrative intentions – dominate the majority of the writings compiled in Osservatorio TV. On the one hand, these filmic and televisual references serve as markers of cultural understanding, which allow readers to position these programmes within a broader contextual framework, and this technique showcases very clearly the ways in which television continues to be the most self-referential media form. On the other hand, we may wonder whether these references to past television shows, and to films in particular, are an act of justification serving to prove the qualitative value of television itself, just as cinema, in its time, sought to build its foundations by creating connections to other already established art forms. The focus on authorship, which is dominant throughout this book, might support this second hypothesis, as Mittell, in his previously mentioned work Complex TV, notes, 'Authorship… [is] linked both to the literary notion of the creative genius working in solitude… and its notions of authority that assure that work's interpretive frame and cultural validation' (2012-13). Television's continual adaptability and the kinds of genre hybridities explored in Osservatorio TV may, however, speak to a need to move beyond the kinds of industrial analyses of critics like Adorno who looked at televisual content as a mere product for consumption.
Barbara Maio's project thus offers various insights into the narrative and stylistic concerns and choices in contemporary television. And perhaps more significantly, in its free format, multi-authored construction, and in the choices of the individual authors themselves, the work highlights important current trends and concerns in television criticism while simultaneously offering its readers the lenses and language to talk about shows they love or love to hate.

References
Broadchurch (2013, UK: ITV).
Glee (2009, USA: Fox).
Les Revenants (2013, France: Canal+).
Mistresses (2013, USA: ABC).
Orange is the New Black (2013, USA: Netflix).
Peaky Blinders (2013, UK: BBC).
Ray Donovan (2013, USA: Showtime).
Switched at Birth (2011, USA: ABC Family).
The Bridge (2013, USA: FX).
The Confession (2011, USA: DGB).
Top of the Lake (2013, USA: Sundance).
Under the Dome (2013, USA: CBS).

Note


All translations from the original Italian are mine.
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