These four Crime Dramas seemed to follow a linear narrative order, which can be based on Todorov’s narrative model, consisting of Equilibrium, disruption of equilibrium, recognition of equilibrium, attempt to repair equilibrium and new equilibrium.
Crime dramas tend to use a lot of enigmatic codes as well which helps build tension and mystery, this helps to create cause and effect relationships throughout a narrative plot to keep its target audience watching. Most crime dramas tend to start off with a murder which is linked with the enigma and keeps revealing more clues throughout its story.
I decided to use a lot of enigmatic codes in my storyboard, by first of all starting off with the main enigma, which would be the murder itself and then linking it to an unknown suspect, eventually leading up to the investigation lab results with the torn skin found on the murder scene, slowly revealing the answer to the enigma from the beginning.
Then looking at each of the four crime dramas from my research in more depth I managed to create an idea of what my main stories plot would be about. And with this information I pulled together I successfully came up with my own crime drama storyboard based on a number of individual characteristics. I took the idea of a leading role from Morse, Frost and Miss Marple, the idea of a side kick from Morse and Frost and a type of murder scene for the opening, taken from an episode on Silent Witness. This helped me create the main characters as well as their names, their roles, their jobs and a type of bad guy involved with the murder, as well as referential codes such as the destination for the murder.
When creating the characters for my storyboard, I took onboard the idea of binary oppositions such as the male and female roles in a crime drama, and the stereotypical aspects of this particular genre. Referring back to my research, only a few at the very least consist of women as being a main character, and if anything, the leading role to the story. Noticing this alongside the four crime dramas I researched, I decided to give the leading role to a woman, and my star for this would be Ali Larter from Heroes and giving her a male sidekick, who would star, David Jason, from Inspector Frost.
The main character starred, Ali Larter is called Agent Debbie Doubtful, the reason for this because what makes her character what it is, is her sassy wit and intelligent charm to get to the bottom of the case, and so her decisions involve alot of doubtful move making, which is why her side kick Matthew Mathias is by her side. Matthew’s character, being a genius at maths and an ex professor at oxford is the brains in the case, and the binary oppositions show greater than anywhere else here, showing how the man still leads even though he is second in line.
More of my research, involved in creating a questionnaire to gather information on the type of crime dramas that people like to watch on TV and when they like to watch them. With this information in mind I was able to create a more accurate, legitimate genre and showing time for this crime drama to fit in with my specific target audience. The results show that favoured mostly is definitely the British crime dramas as opposed to American, and that more people that watch crime dramas would usually watch them after the watershed which is the normal scheduled times for these sort of programmes besides crime dramas such as murder she wrote, which is usually shown after twelve o’clock mid-day.
Concluding the research I have undertaken so far and thinking about my audience expectations, I have considered what would be needed to target the right type of audience, as well as including all the right criteria to meet this and successfully I was able to produce the right type of storyboard for the right target audience.
In consideration to the correct target audience when producing my DVD cover, I had to first of all research the typical DVD cover and its contents such as its appearance, its target audience, the actors and the style. These generic identifiers helped me to create my DVD covers, which are aimed at the Silent Witness categories of a crime drama in terms of its genre type. A similar example to mine was the Silent Witness and CSI: Crime Drama front covers from the first and fifth seasons, which were dark, spooky and authority looking. For example, the authority figures, such as policemen and women or FBI agents standing behind a police banner with the words “The first ever season” across it or the characters names above the titles, emphasises the reason for the crime drama, its characters lives, which is the main signifier for my cover, the actors themselves, David Jason and Emilia Fox.
I have decided not use colour in my DVD front cover because of the target audience that I am producing my crime drama towards, which is the older generation and maybe a small minority of younger adults, and this alone is the main enigma. My front cover and poster is focusing mainly on its characters, because unlike most other crime genre types which taking into account of the audience again, I would say this is the type of drama that would be seeked out by the individual as it would not be loudly publicised or advertised on a broad scale, but, this one is based a lot more on the characters relationships and personal lives, which entwine with the murder mysteries, making the twist in the narrative a lot more exciting.
