Angel as a milestone in television horror: Wayne State's TV Milestone Series

在《吸血鬼猎人巴菲》前三季大获成功之后，该剧的制片人决定为该剧的主角之一——有灵魂的吸血鬼安吉尔——制作一部衍生剧。虽然这对原版和新系列来说都是一个风险，但这个决定成功地创造了一个全新的节目，专门针对越来越多被巴菲吸引的成人观众。2004年，华纳兄弟电视网决定不再续订这部剧，尽管遭到了粉丝们的强烈抗议，这部剧还是完结了（1999-2004）。因此，该系列的结尾创造了一个理想的机会来反思它的五年运行和它的生产背景。根据最近学术界关于美国高质量电视的讨论，安吉尔展示了衍生剧的商业惯例，旨在利用一个成功的公式，被《变种敌人》的编剧团队所利用，以允许更复杂的电视体验，而不是简单地重复《吸血鬼猎人巴菲》的公式，而是为这个系列赋予了自己独特的身份。本研究项目的目的是探讨《天使》系列如何由于其叙事、类型、风格和主题的复杂性而成为电视的里程碑。特别是，我将探索这部剧在恐怖和奇幻电视剧史上的地位，以及这部剧对现代吸血鬼神话的影响。我将把这个系列放在作者的讨论中，但我不会把功劳归功于该系列的制作人乔斯·韦登，我将审视《变种人的敌人》编剧团队的贡献，他们在五年多的时间里合作开发了这个系列，并将它推向了越来越具有挑战性和超越极限的方向。在此过程中，我将研究他们的叙事结构方法，在情节和更大的叙事弧线之间创造平衡，同时也将讨论如何将不同作者的不同影响和方法结合在一起以创造叙事连贯性。最后，当《吸血鬼猎人巴菲》被誉为女权主义偶像和复杂的后女权主义文本时，我将探索安吉尔如何通过探索当代男性气质的问题来扭转这一焦点，这是一个在电影和电视研究中日益重要的主题。这项研究是作为电视研究中更广泛论述的一部分进行的，讨论美国电视作为质量，实验，特别是类型电视的当代发展。

Following the phenomenal success of the first three seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the series' producers decided to create a spin-off series for one of the show's main characters, Angel, the vampire with a soul. While this was a risk for both the original and the new series, the decision successfully created a radically new show, specifically aimed at the adult audiences who were increasingly being drawn to Buffy. In 2004, the Warner Brothers network decided not to renew the series and, despite a phenomenal protest by fans, the series ended (1999-2004). The end of the series, therefore, creates an ideal opportunity to reflect upon its five year run and the context of its production. In the light of recent discussions within academia about American Quality Television, Angel demonstrates how the commercial convention of the spin-off, designed to capitalise upon a successful formula, has been appropriated by the Mutant Enemy writing team to allow for an even more complex televisual experience that does not simply repeat the formula of Buffy the Vampire Slayer but imbues the series with its own distinct identity. The aim of this research project is to explore how the series Angel is a milestone in television due to the complexity of its narrative, genre, style and theme. In particular I will be exploring the series' place within a history of horror and fantasy television, as well as how the series has contributed to a modern vampire mythology. I will place the series within discussions of authorship, but rather than attribute credit to the series' producer Joss Whedon, I will examine the contribution of the Mutant Enemy writing team who worked collaboratively over five years to develop the series and push it towards increasingly challenging and transgressed limits. In so doing, I will examine their approach to narrative structure, creating a balance between the episodic and greater narrative arcs, while also addressing how the different influences and approaches of a range of different authors are brought together to create a narrative coherency. Finally, while Buffy the Vampire Slayer has been hailed as a feminist icon and a complex post-feminist text, I will explore how Angel reverses this focus by exploring issues of contemporary masculinity, a subject of increasing significance within both film and television studies. This research is being undertaken as part of a broader discourse within television studies, addressing contemporary developments within American Television as a cite for quality, experimentation and, in genre television in particular, transgression.