How soaps attract their target audience

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Media studies coursework-How soaps attract their target audience

I n this essay, I am going to compare Eastenders and Neighbours. I will identify the key ingredients shared by different soaps and examine ways in which such key ingredients differ from one soap to another. 

        The key ingredients to soaps are that they last for years. The soaps are usually serial and are set in a specific location e.g. Albert square in Eastenders. In soaps, they all have characters, which appeal to a specific audience.

        Here are some characters, which appeal to specific audience; I have chosen three characters from Eastenders and Neighbours.

The characters that I have chosen from Eastenders are Martin Kemp who plays Steve Owen, Tamsin Outhwait played by Melanie Owen and Jessie Wallace who plays Kat Slater.

Martin kemp- Martin in Eastenders has split personalities like most of the characters. Martin most of the time plays a bad person but when his in trouble people start to feel sorry for him. This attracts audiences as people that do not like him might give him sympathy and then his got the people that do like him. Martin comes off as a tough guy, his another stereotypical character. All soaps have stereotypical characters; they might be a business woman/man or the dodgy person. Steve Owen is a spiteful character and is only nice to people that he wants to be.

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The typical story line of Steve is that he uses people and cons them. Martin would appeal to women as; the soap portrays him as a sex symbol. I also think that he would be aimed at people that are interested in action and violence for example teenagers.

Tamsin Outhwait- Tamsin Outhwait is a strong female character and is probably going to take the place of Peggy Mitchell when she is gone. Tamsin has a different approach to women as all the other women on the square are housewives or are married and work. Tamsin appeals as an independent ...

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