Week 1: Intro to Short-Format "TV"

It was good to meet you all today; I can see our class has an impressive range of interests and experiences to bring to the table. Should make for some excellent writing!

This week I'd like you to check out Channel 101. Every month, people like you and me send five-minute pilot episodes to be screened before a live audience, which votes 5 shows into Prime Time. Shows that make it get to enter subsequent episodes in the next screening. Thus, every month has a new lineup: some shows that were popular suddenly get cancelled, and new shows crop up all the time. Everything is archived on the site, so you can catch up on any shows you missed episodes of.

We'll talk about the shows and about short-format narrative next week in class. Enjoy!

HOMEWORK:

1. Watch Channel 101 Prime Time winners, Cancelled This Month, and Month's Top Failed Pilot (total of seven episodes).
2. Read Story Structure Tutorials 101, 103, 104, 105, 106, and 108 Million. Print these out and bring them to class so we can go over them in detail. (Copy and paste the articles into a text document rather than trying to print out the website — it just gets messy.)