The plot of this first idea is a teen drama about a young black boy who is subject to family issues and racism throughout his life where he ends up having to become the man of the house. This idea is interesting and will easily be in line with BBC 3 ethos since it relates to real world issues and struggles that people will relate with.
This story follows a detective in a murder mystery who finds out that one of the most powerful families in the UK have a dark past and present relating to cannibalism. However, once he unveils this truth to the world, the family attempt to silence him by giving him drugs to make him seem crazy in a shutter island similar plot. This idea will relate to BBC 3 ethos since it has a deeper meaning about power and capitalism that the young target audience of BBC 3 will relate to.
This idea has a plot about a group of young teens who go camping for the summer when they are hunted down and killed off by an unknown monster. This horror drama will be good for BBC 3 since it will be very relatable to the young target audience since the characters are young which gives a feel of nostalgia to the TV show for the slightly older audience.
Why is your villain here and what does it actually want?
In episode 1 it will explain a bit of insight that will later be explained in the finale where each person has a connection to the villain through their ancestors. The fact that the characters have relations with the villain will be slowly teased throughout the show and then revealed in the final episode to show the motivation of the villain
I would recommend you have a motivation for the villain.
I will make sure the story is clear to give the villain motivation by having the motivation be about territory where the characters are trespassing
Normally in horror there is a means of a escape and a false hope for the characters.
I will put this into my narrative by having no phone signal meaning the characters are stranded with no way home
Make it clear that the villain is alien.
To ensure my audience are aware of the origins of the villain, I will make sure to include a scene early on in the show that shows that the villain is alien such as a spaceship coming down to earth
Advice- Make it clear to the audience that the villain is alien
Making sure the audience understand the villain will be crucial in building drama in my series since it gives the audience insight into the threat present thus increasing the stakes and presenting the danger that the characters are in. The client recommended including a scene as simple as having a spaceship landing on earth in the location that the drama is set. This will be useful to the plot of my show in somewhat explaining the mystery behind the villain. Having this scene early on, in the first episode of the show will be beneficial to my show by increasing the fear during tense moments. Allowing the audience to know the danger involved before the reveal of the villain means that that the audience become fearful for the protagonists of the show since they are aware of the danger involved. Instead of having the audience figure out the mystery of the villain along with the characters, making the audience have more knowledge into the story allows them to retain attention as they are aware of the potential consequences of the protagonists actions when they become involved with the villain making the show more exciting.
Advice- Give the villain a clear motivation for why he is killing
The villain having a clear motivation in my TV drama will be very helpful in helping the story flow and portraying the message of the show. The client recommend that I could go down the line of having the protagonist and antagonist having a relationship with each other due to similar feeling and lifestyle. The character of Jane will be from an Asian immigrant family meaning Jane's character is timid and humble rather than some of the other characters who show no empathy towards others in a subtle way. The backstory of this character will be related to the villain since the villain in the finale will be shown to actually be caring. I plan on having a scene in my show where even the kindest members of the group such as Daniel and Bill (who have experienced hardship and therefore have empathy for others) all gang up on younger kids in a form of bullying as Jane stands and watches. This scene and others as such gives the audience subtle hints as to why the villain is hunting them. This idea of the protagonists sinning is relatively conventional of horror drams and it gives the villain a motivation for killing. As well as this in the finale of my show, it will be revealed that the villain is a mother in a scene in the 4th episode where one of the characters comes across the villains child and is instantly killed by the villain in a show of maternal protection. This will prove to be good for my drama since it pulls the audience in multiple directions since they understand why they are being killed and yet they still want them to survive since, at heart the characters are likeable. The client suggested a narrative where the villain's motivation is based on territory and the teenagers enter into that territory in a scene where the protagonist Jane is the only one who is cautious and does not want to do it. This will have a strong narrative by showing how the protagonist and antagonist are similar which gives a lot of meaning to the show by conforming to Blumler and Katz's uses and gratification theory by giving an insight into personal identity since it dives into the theme of how people treat others and the importance of respect.
Deepening the narrative
Normally in horror there is a means of a escape and a false hope for the characters.
I will put this into my narrative by having no phone signal meaning the characters are stranded with no way home
Advice: Conform to the horror genre by having a false hope moment in your show
The client recommended that I add more to the story of my TV show by having false hope for the characters. The client recommended that a false hope as simple as having no phone service could be useful in my show. To do this, I will firstly add a scene in the 2nd episode where the audience is introduced to the idea of the characters having no service in a scene where the characters attempt to call the police after finding the dead body of Ethan. Throughout the TV show as well, there will be other references to the fact that the characters have no signal to reinforce the idea and remind the audience. I think this will be useful since it fills in the gap that was missing in the narrative of my TV show, this fundamental flaw was that there was no reason that the characters could simply not just escape. The addition of this detail into my plot makes the show exponentially more believable since it adds stakes to my TV show which were not there before.
After these changes are made, I will still have to abide to the legal and ethical issues of adhering to the BBFC rating of 15. For example, the changes I have made to the motivations of my villain must not be rooted in any unacceptable topics such as endorsing discriminating as a motivation. The changes I have made in adding a false moment of hope, for example the scene of false moment after the characters find a dead body must still adhere to the BBFCs limits on strong gore and sadistic violence. My whole show, after the changes have been made, must keep language that is not overly strong and frequent as well as no endorsement of drugs. As well as this, I must continue to keep legal and ethical issues in check such as consent forms, risk assessments, permission to film and copyright. As well as this, I must make sure the changes are not negatively stereotypical to the characters in my show to keep in line with the ethos of BBC 3.
A:The plots are typically in films rather than TV shows as well as this the characters are younger and more relatable.
Some changes I will make in order to answer this question is to change the plot of my drama in order to make it different to similar products as a way to differentiate my drama from others. To change the plot, I will add in details to the story that make it more rounded such as a scene where the teens stumble upon the layer of the monster
Q:Do you think 30 minutes is long enough for each episode
A: Not really however I though it would be good to keep the episodes short to keep attention
Some changes I will make to answer this question is to make each episode longer and have 6 episodes instead of 5 to make it more conventional. To make these changes I will add more to the plot of each episode to be able to stretch them longer and have another episode
Q: Will the second episode retract from the excitement
A:Hopefully it will still be entertaining however it is mainly used as an introduction of characters
A change I will make to my idea is to change the episode order around to make this second episode the first episode. The second episode in my original idea was the first chronologically. To change this I will have that episode as the first in order to properly introduce the characters before the story starts to hopefully make it more exciting
Q: How will you market and advertise
A:I will use social media specifically Instagram and YouTube because this is targeted at my TA
To answer this question, I will make sure that this information is present in my presentation as well as plan the marketing so it is easier to do.
Q:With the narrative, do they camp for the whole series and get killed off one by one
A: The 3rd episode starts the killing and then they follow on from there
This question shows that my narrative is unclear meaning I will have to re think it. To make it more clear, I will re order the episodes so that the story is easier to follow.
Advice
Work on the narrative to give it some clarity
Think about character roles
Research into British Horror dramas
Pitch evaluation
For my pitch I was relatively confident that I could present my idea and answer any questions posed to me. For the question that were asked me, I had mixed answers. For most of them, I could effectively give an answer to the question and learn how I can improve my idea. However, some questions I struggled to find an answer to since of example my narrative was not strong enough. As well as this, I could have understood my idea in a bit more depth, this would have made it easier to answer questions I was asked. My presentation also could have been stronger due to it missing a slide on Marketing and Distribution which meant that I had to be asked about it.
Planned improvements
Some improvements I plan on making to my final pitch are to include a Marketing section, re thinking my narrative and making the episodes longer. Making a section on my brief about Marketing will be useful as I did not include this originally. This section will include information on how I will use YouTube and Instagram to market above the line which I have saved money to do so. To re think my narrative, I will alter it so that the episodes flow better and more chronologically, this will strengthen the narrative by making it easier to follow. The final change I will make is to add another episode to my drama and make each episode longer. This will be beneficial to my music video since it is more conventional to the drama genre.
Potential questions
How will you make your show more transgressive?
To make my show more transgressive I will make sure the characters in my show represent real world struggles. To do this, I will demonstrate topics such as racism and sexism happening to my characters to point out real world issues
Where are you planning to film?
I will be filming my TV show mostly in the woods and the moor in the town of Ilkley since this is nearby and free to film in which is very helpful for convenience as well as cost
How can you set your idea out from others?
To set my idea out from others similar, I will make sure to make my characters memorable unlike some other horror genre characters, I intend for my characters to be relatable which sets it out to other similar shows
I went for my 3rd idea since it clearly has the fewest set backs out of the 3 idea. One strength that this idea has that makes it the most suitable to take forward to BBC 3 is how it will satisfy the audiences needs. Using Blumler and Katz's uses and gratifications theory, this idea will clearly satisfy 3 of the audience needs. Escapism (due to the entertaining nature of the idea), Personal identity (due to the relatability of the characters) and Personal relationships (because the audience can discuss the product). This makes it appealing to BBC 3 because it shows that audiences will clearly enjoy this idea and want to watch it. As well as this, this idea is somewhat inline with the ethos of BBC 3 due to the relatability of the diverse characters. This is in line with the ethos of BBC 3 since they often look for diversity of characters to expand the target audience of the product. This makes this idea the best since it is likely that BBC 3 will appreciate the diversity of the characters. Comparing this to the other ideas makes it clear that this idea is most suitable since the other ideas do not feature such diverse casts except arguably idea 1 however this idea could be stereotypical. The opportunities that this idea gives is also much greater than the other ideas. One way this is true is that it will be much easier to film since it can be filmed almost entirely in the countryside in real life locations. This raw feel to the program will make it in line with BBC 3s ethos since it is representative of real life therefore making it more relatable. As well as this, it will be exponentially cheaper to film this way rather than the other 2 ideas which will likely need sets to be built. Another way this idea will be a lot cheaper than the others is due to the actors needed to film. This idea uses a large cast but they are young meaning they are a lot cheaper to hire. In contrast, the other ideas feature a still large cast of adults making it overall more expensive to hire. This makes the 3rd idea the most suitable because it meets the brief i was given since i only have £800,000 to make this.
The song I have chosen is Life in the Fast Lane, a classic country rock song from the 1970s. This means that the conventions of the music videos at the time were purely performance basedin order to show the artist and the band for marketing reasons. Because of this, I included some performance to conform to the genre conventions.
The typical conventions of the performance aspect of the video are closeups of the lip-syncing actor to include iconography. This described the use of close ups for marketing reasons; often in music videos the label will request for close ups of the singer to be plentiful in order topromote the song due to their high status. Because of this, I included eye level shots of the actor where he was alone in the room with warm lighting as opposed to harsh lighting, this lighting portrays the actor in a positive light therefore abiding to the genre conventions and providing the iconography.However, I purposefully subverted the conventions of the genre for most of the video and included a narrativein order to appeal to a younger audience.The narrative I used is more so a story than a narrative with no underlying meaning to avoid complication, the fun nature of having a storyline once again appeals to the younger audience as well as captivating the attention of older people who will hopefully enjoy the subversion of the genre conventions. The conventions of videos of this genre often include dark lighting to create a more edgy mood to the video especially if it is a rock song. Toconform to these conventions, when recording the actor for the lip syncing, I set up a warm light rig on one side of the actor to create a shadow on one side of his face. This conforms to the conventions by creating the dark and edgy feel to the video while also displaying the actor positively. I decided on this dark tone to the music video in order to conform to the male gaze.I chose touse dark coloursin the music videosince these appeals to the male audience that I am aiming for my video to appeal to.
For the shots of the car,I filmed in daylight while there was no rain and I aimed for it to be in as similar conditions as possible. The reason for this was that it allowed me to keep the continuity as well as making the video easy to watch instead of having harsh lighting which would annoy the viewers and make the video hard to watch. This way my video appeals to a wide audience and is easy to watch. I used Stuart Halls representation theory as a way to avoid stereotypes in my music video. One way I did this was by not including violence in my video not only to keep to the 12A rating but also to avoid the traditional stereotypes of violence in robbery storylines.
In my presentation to the client, I sold my proposal relatively well. In this performance, I managed to deliver my idea in a professional manner where the client understood the narrative of my TV show easily and quickly which meant I could deliver the rest of my points. As well as this, the final version of my power point included all of the points that it needed to have in it which meant that I could sell my idea better.
