In the inaugural keynote, John T. Caldwell (UCLA) presented an analysis of the complex media labor system, and its financial environment, based on a three-part model regime: the “Craft-World,” the “Brand-World,” and the “Spec-World.” In the “Craft-World” the aesthetic goal is to create a durable artifact, while in the “Brand-World,”  flexible reformatting and concept-iteration are fundamental. The “Spec-World”, in contrast, seems to be more disaggregated. It is based on a sharing culture and tends to offer virtual pay systems.

However, these three regimes are not detached, as they form a connected “para-industrial buffer” that scholars and producers must conciliate. For example, there is a “Corporate Spec-World” that deals with brand reformatting from a speculative point of view. Moreover, Caldwell suggested that, in the actual context, all media products seem to function as a television pilot, a prototype opened to speculation and replication. Disney is a good example of this idea. As Caldwell observed, with the ABC series Once Upon a Time, the company has found a new mode to recreate its own brand. This process becomes more evident in episodes in which we can see real actors re-enacting scenes from classic Disney animated movies.

The conference also offered space for interesting ideas about Netflix and Amazon as new operators in the television industry. Sarah Arnold, from Falmouth University, posed the provocative question: “Is Netflix really television?” The diffusion method used by the streaming platform, promoting the binge viewing of its new series, makes Arnold question the televisual aspect of the streaming platform. Can we talk about television without a regular and scheduled content?

In the same panel, Jakob Isak Nielsen, from Aarhus University, added that one challenge that Netflix must face is to find a specific target group for its new content, as premium cable networks mostly do. Besides, the company must deal with the difficult situation of dealing with other television networks to offer their content on streaming and, at the same time, be one of its competitors. According to Nielsen, the future of Netflix happens to be less dependent on licensing material.

While most discussions about quality TV or the Golden Age of TV are rooted in US programming, this conference fittingly examined the recent international appeal and acclaim of Danish series such as Borgen, The Killing, and The Bridge, the latter of which is a co-production with Sweden. Heidi Philipsen of The University of Southern Denmark and Tobias Hochscherf of The University of Applied Sciences Kiel presented “Television Dogmas of Creativity? The Cross-Fertilisation of Film and Television as a Prerequisite for Danish Television’s Recent Success,” detailing a new partnership and subsequent production culture, “television dogmas for production” that was influenced by the 1990s-era Dogma film movement. The key principles include double storytelling, crossover between film and TV for a “cinematic touch,” and the significance of the writers, who hold the final say.

Within this dogma, the National Film School that is behind the development incorporates predefined themes, actors, teams and genres. Within the industry, the reputable public service broadcaster Danmarks Radio (DR) provides easy national financing for the creators, allowing room for innovation and stating that “failure is OK,” if not often necessary, for the creative process. As Philpsen and Hochscherf have interviewed these practitioners and will soon observe onsite filming, they informed that the conditions include 20 weeks of development and 20 weeks to shoot 24 episodes. In a conversation with Caldwell, the three agreed that these modes are not unique to Denmark, but quite similar to US schedules. A version of this paper will be included in the forthcoming Danish TV dossier in the Journal of Popular Television.

In the same Danish Drama TV panel, Lynge Agger Gemzøe described the national identities associated with the Swedish-Danish production of The Bridge and later compared the original with the US adaptation on FX. A French-British version called The Tunnel has also recently been released.

Afterwards, Pia Majbritt Jensen and Anne Marit Waade dissected the pros and cons of external funding for Danish programming. While outside sources can provide an abundance of money, Danish creative control can be weakened. Likewise, public service to the nation’s audience can also be replaced for international appeal to sell series abroad. In a separate panel, Hanne Bruun described the flux of Danish broadcast journalism, highlighting the tensions between the people, media and state and providing non-Danes a context to understand future plots in the politics of Borgen, a series very specific to the country’s government, with clear universal appeal, that has been broadcast in 60 countries.

In addition to Danish programming, numerous quality papers were given on British, German, Italian, Scandinavian, and Spanish and television industry and production practices.

In the last keynote panel of the conference, questions about the next challenges of television production were posed from a European perspective. Lothar Mikos, Professor of Television Studies, Academy of Film and Television “Konrad Wolf” in Potsdam, Germany, suggested a system of transnational co-productions as a real possibility to create and finance large scale television series to compete with the US. The European film industry, as Mikos reminded us, is a good example of this kind of cooperation between different countries and agents. Additionally, the emergence of Netflix offers a new alternative of partnership for European television channels following the case of Lillyhammer, a Norwegian-American production. However, every country is different and Denmark, as was proved along the entire conference, has found its own receipt for success adapting the American television system based on the crucial figure of the showrunner.

In conclusion, the conference celebrated risk and transgression as a main goal for television production in this 21st century. “Audience demands originality”, declared Lotte Lindegaard, head of TV2 Denmark.
This post is part of an ongoing partnership between the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Antenna: Responses to Media & Culture and the Society for Cinema & Media Studies’ Cinema Journal.

However, I propose a change in our blanket definition of what “Save Our Show” means. While “Our” has typically stood for the collective of fans hopeful to see their favorite show continue, the expanding options for distribution in the post-network era have reordered the dynamic of these campaigns. As DirecTV, Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon emerge as players in content distribution, we are seeing evidence of active campaigning not only by fans of particular programs, but also by production studios seeking a new home for their canceled shows; while this search mostly takes place behind closed doors, recent developments suggest it has moved into a more public discourse.

Last week, TVLine’s Michael Ausiello reported that DirecTV and Netflix were in talks to rescue The Killing, which was canceled by AMC earlier this summer after dwindling ratings and a marked decrease in critical attention in its second season. However, there has been no significant fan campaign organized around the show’s renewal, with a petition at SaveTheKilling.com drawing under 500 signatures. Although Ausiello’s post directly addresses the show’s viewers through a poll asking if they would watch a third season through these outlets, the story speaks to an imagined community of The Killing fans as opposed to an organized constituency.

Traditionally, we have seen this kind of reporting as a “next step” in fan campaigns, with reporters like Ausiello and critics like Alan Sepinwall lending credibility to fans by giving them more mainstream visibility compared to the message boards or blogs where they originated. Recently, however, this kind of reporting has emerged regardless of the existence of grassroots efforts, with Amazon potentially picking up ABC’s Pan Am and Netflix considering resurrecting FOX’s Terra Nova despite a distinct lack of pilot wings and dinosaur eggs being sent to involved parties.

It is possible to view these stories as a reflection of the expanding influence of streaming services and other emerging distribution models, with new options for shows that were already canceled (Arrested Development’s return on Netflix) or compromises that may allow a show to stay on the air longer (like DirecTV’s adoption of Friday Night Lights). However, while the existence of these networks and these precedents provide the conditions necessary for these stories to emerge, the stories instead reflect the increased agency and the increased activity of production studios within this new television economy: as opposed to fans seeking legitimation through news coverage, it is now studios working to gain visibility through their relationship with journalists.

Fox Television Studios was clear from the beginning that they intended on finding a new home for The Killing. After AMC canceled the series, they sent reporters a press release to announce they would “proceed to try to find another home for the show.” Ausiello’s report has largely been received as a sign of Fox TV Studios’ success in their efforts, with most entertainment news outlets picking up the story, but I find this reading unconvincing: although Ausiello refers to multiple sources, “early talks” could mean a brief phone conversation, while Netflix offered no comment and DirecTV only suggested “we do take a look at everything available.” While I don’t doubt that the parties have had conversations about a potential renewal, nothing here suggests anything more than the earliest stage of the search Fox TV Studios embarked upon.

While acknowledging this depends on a degree of educated speculation, I want to instead read the report as a calculated effort by Fox TV Studios to influence nascent negotiations with Netflix and DirecTV by drawing media attention and audience support. In the absence of any real grassroots campaign, leaking the potential for the show’s return provides substantial visibility and could even inspire more organized fan activity, which could in turn offer them greater leverage in conversations with new distribution partners.

The studios even seem to have collaborated on who to leak the information to: the previous three examples of this type of reporting all originated with Nellie Andreeva at TVLine’s sister site Deadline Hollywood. All three exclusive reports refer to “talks” in the same vague terms, and all three even seem to form an argument in favor of the deal in question: Andreeva outlines ratings data—including Live+7 DVR numbers—for Terra Nova and The River to highlight the potential audience not reflected by traditional Nielsen metrics, while she makes an even more elaborate case for Pan Am, outlining how, “because it ran on ABC only for a brief time and because Amazon already airs Pan Am‘s produced episodes, the streaming service can embrace the series and brand it as its own.”[1]

If my speculation is correct, and these reports are the direct result of leaks from production studios to journalists at Deadline/TVLine, it raises questions about the sites’ willingness to facilitate litmus tests for ongoing negotiations—however, as it is only speculation, those questions shall remain hypothetical.

However, regardless of the circumstances involved, I highlight the role of production studios here to work against the perception that these stories indicate increased interest in canceled series among new distribution outlets. While precedents exist, DirecTV has suggested they would rather focus on original programming than on acquisitions, while I would argue Netflix’s resurrection of the beloved Arrested Development is not comparable to picking up another network’s “sloppy seconds” soon after cancellation. What these precedents offer, however, is a new distribution culture for production studios to leverage, leverage they appear to be searching for in the same space where fans have sought similar legitimation in the past.