Miniseries
In the United States, a miniseries or mini-series is a television show that tells a story in a predetermined, limited number of episodes. Many miniseries can also be referred to, and shown, as a television film. "Limited series" is a more recent American term which is sometimes used interchangeably., the popularity of the miniseries format has increased in streaming, broadcast, and cable television.
The term "serial" is used in the United Kingdom and in other Commonwealth nations to describe a show that has an ongoing narrative plotline, while "series" is used for a set of episodes in a similar way that "season" is used in North America.
Definitions
A miniseries is distinguished from an ongoing television series; the latter does not usually have a predetermined number of episodes and may continue for several years. Before the term was coined in the United States in the early 1970s, the ongoing episodic form was always called a "serial", just as a novel appearing in episodes in successive editions of magazines or newspapers is called a serial. In Britain, miniseries are often still referred to as serials or series.Several commentators have offered more precise definitions of the term. In Halliwell's Television Companion, Leslie Halliwell and Philip Purser suggest that miniseries tend to "appear in four to six episodes of various lengths", while Stuart Cunningham in Textual Innovation in the Australian Historical Mini-series defined a miniseries as "a limited run program of more than two and less than the 13-part season or half season block associated with serial or series programming". With the proliferation of the format in the 1980s and 90s, television films broadcast over even two or three nights were commonly referred to as miniseries in the United States.
In Television: A History, Francis Wheen points out a difference in character development between the two: "Both soap operas and primetime series cannot afford to allow their leading characters to develop, since the shows are made with the intention of running indefinitely. In a miniseries on the other hand, there is a clearly defined beginning, middle, and end, enabling characters to change, mature, or die as the serial proceeds".
In 2015, the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences changed its guidelines on how Emmy nominees are classified, with shows with a limited run all referred to as "limited series" instead of "miniseries". This was a reversion to 1974, when the category was named "outstanding limited series". It had been changed to "outstanding miniseries" in 1986. Miniseries were put in the same category as made-for-television films from 2011 to 2014 before being given separate categories again.
21st-century definitions
The Collins English Dictionary defines a miniseries as "a television programme in several parts that is shown on consecutive days or weeks for a short period; while Webster's New World College Dictionary's definition is "a TV drama or docudrama broadcast serially in a limited number of episodes".In popular usage, by around 2020, the boundaries between miniseries and limited series have become somewhat blurred; the format has been described as a series with "a self-contained narrative – whether three or 12 episodes long".
History
United Kingdom
The British television serial is rooted in dramatic radio productions developed between the First and the Second World Wars. In the 1920s the BBC pioneered dramatic readings of books. In 1925 it broadcast A Christmas Carol, which became a holiday favourite. Later, John Reith, wanting to use radio waves to "part the clouds of ignorance", came up with the idea of a Classic Serial, based on a "classical" literary text.In 1939, the BBC adapted the romantic novel The Prisoner of Zenda for radio broadcast. Its adapter, Jack Inglis, compressed several characters into one and simplified the plotline. The production struck a chord with listeners and served as a prototype for serials that followed it.
Post-war BBC Television picked up the classic radio serial tradition by broadcasting The Warden by Anthony Trollope over six-episodes in 1951. Pride and Prejudice was serialised in 1952, Jane Eyre in 1955. In 1953, the BBC broadcast the first serial written specifically for television: the six-part The Quatermass Experiment. Its success paved the way for two more six-part serials: Quatermass II in 1955 and Quatermass and the Pit in 1958. In November 1960, the BBC televised a thirteen-episode adaptation of Charles Dickens's Barnaby Rudge. In December of that year it broadcast a four-episode dramatisation of Jane Austen's Persuasion.
To compete with commercial television, BBC launched BBC2 in 1964. It had a new time slot allocated for classic serial adaptations on Saturday evenings. The late-night broadcast allowed for more risky and sophisticated choices and for longer episodes. In 1967 The Forsyte Saga was broadcast in 26 50-minute episodes. Following its success in Britain, the series was shown in the United States on public television and broadcast all over the world, and became the first BBC television series to be sold to the Soviet Union.
North America
dominated American dramatic programming during the Golden Age of Television, when "every night was opening night; one never knew when a flick of the knob would spark the birth of great theatrical literature". A different story and a different set of characters were presented in each episode. Very rarely the stories were split into several episodes, like 1955 Mr. Lincoln from Omnibus series, which was presented in two parts, or 1959 adaptation of For Whom the Bell Tolls from Playhouse 90 series, which was initially planned by the director John Frankenheimer to consist of three parts, but ultimately was broadcast as two 90-minute installments. The high cost and technical difficulties of staging a new play every week, which would cost as much as—or more than—an episode of a filmed television series, led to the demise of anthology programming by the end of the 1950s. The void was filled with less expensive series like Gunsmoke or Wagon Train, which featured the same characters every week and had higher potential for lucrative rebroadcast and syndication rights. It was the American success in 1969–1970 of the British 26-episode serial The Forsyte Saga that made TV executives realize that finite multi-episode stories based on novels could be popular and could provide a boost to weekly viewing figures.According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the earliest known use of the word miniseries was in 1963, when it was employed by the Connellsville Daily Courier to describe a limited five-week run of the CBS music show Your Hit Parade.
The Blue Knight, a four-hour made-for-television movie broadcast in one-hour segments over four nights in November 1973, has elsewhere been credited as the first miniseries on American television. It starred William Holden as a Los Angeles beat cop about to retire. The miniseries form continued in earnest in the spring of 1974 with the CBC's eight-part serial The National Dream, based on Pierre Berton's nonfiction book of the same name about the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and ABC's two-part QB VII, based on the novel by Leon Uris. Following these initial forays, broadcasters used miniseries to bring other books to the screen.
Rich Man, Poor Man, based on the novel by Irwin Shaw, was broadcast in 12 one-hour episodes in 1976 by ABC. It popularized the miniseries format and started a decade-long golden age of television miniseries versions of popular books featuring stars above television class. Alex Haley's Roots in 1977 can fairly be called the first blockbuster success of the format. Its success in the USA was partly due to its schedule: the 12-hour duration was split into eight episodes broadcast on consecutive nights, resulting in a finale with a 71 percent share of the audience and 130 million viewers, which at the time was the highest rated TV program ever. TV Guide called 1977's Jesus of Nazareth "the best miniseries of all time" and "unparalleled television". North and South, the 1985 adaptation of a 1982 novel by John Jakes, remains one of the 10 highest rated miniseries in TV history.
Japan
Japanese serialized television production can be traced back to the Sunday Diary of My Home, which was aired by NTV in 1953 and consisted of 25 half-hour episodes. This "home drama" focused on generational differences and the contradictions of being a loving family in a confined space, outlining a style of drama that lives on to this day. In the same year NHK tried its own variation of the home drama format in the Ups and Downs Toward Happiness, which comprised thirteen episodes. Its protagonists, a formerly wealthy family fallen on hard times, is forced to struggle for its own existence. Since then, Japanese television drama, also called dorama, became a staple of Japanese television.Evening dramas air weekly and usually comprise ten to fourteen one-hour long episodes. Typically, instead of being episodic there is one story running throughout the episodes. Since they are of a fixed length, dramas have a definite ending, and since they are relatively long, they can explore character, situation, and interesting dialogue in a way not possible in movies. Doramas are never canceled mid-season, but they also do not continue into the next season even if extremely popular. Popular dramas do often give rise to "specials" made after the final episode, if the show has been a huge success.
South Korea
started to broadcast television series in the 1960s. Since then, the shows became popular worldwide, partially due to the spread of the Korean Wave, with streaming services that offer multiple language subtitles.Korean dramas are usually helmed by one director and written by one screenwriter, thus having a distinct directing style and language, unlike American television series, where often several directors and writers work together. Series set in contemporary times usually run for one season, for 12–24 episodes of 60 minutes each.
Historical series may be longer, with 50 to 200 episodes, and are either based on historical figures, incorporate historical events, or use a historical backdrop. While technically the word sageuk literally translates to "historical drama", the term is typically reserved for dramas taking place during Korean history. Popular subjects of sageuks have traditionally included famous battles, royalty, famous military leaders and political intrigues.
Korean dramas are usually shot within a very tight schedule, often a few hours before actual broadcast. Screenplays are flexible and may change anytime during production, depending on viewers' feedback.