Meta in Film and Television Series
- Works discussed include: Sunset Blvd., Fellini Roma, Twin Peaks, Scream, Community, and NO
- Explores the theory and history of meta
- Provides methodology for the analysis of meta-phenomena
“That’s so meta!” The emergence of the prefix-turned-adjective “meta” to describe media productions is, no doubt, symptomatic of an increasingly media-savvy audience; it has also drawn attention to the lack of scholarship on meta-phenomena in film and television studies.
AcknowledgementsForeword
Part I: The Theory and History of Meta
1. What Is Meta and Who Uses the Term?
2. How Does Meta Work?
3. When, Where and Possibly Why Did it Appear?
Part II: The Aboutness of Meta
4. Industry and Creation
5. Apparatus and Spectatorship
6. Medium and Materiality
7. Adaptation and Remake
8. Genre
9. Seriality
10. History and Historiography
11. Politics
Conclusion
NotesGlossary of Meta-PhenomenaFilmographyBibliographyIndex
In this impressive study Roche weaves together numerous strands of thought on the ‘meta’ and reflexive in cinema, television and media culture, with admirable clarity and focus. Full of insightful analysis of a diverse corpus of moving-image works – and engaging with important non-English language scholarship – this timely, indeed long overdue, book will no doubt be a standard point of reference on a perennially fascinating topic.
The depth and breadth of Roche’s analysis of meta, the work around it, and the work that embodies it makes Meta in Film and Television Series a valuable work as both a study and a foundational text for future research. Roche’s command of a massive body of both the literature around metatext and the film and television series that employ it is impressive and an excellent resource for historical, production, and textual scholars in both film and television disciplines.
David Roche is one of the best film theorists. His Meta in Film and Television Series is the most comprehensive study dedicated to metacinema and metafilms. It is a crowning achievement dwelling with a considerable number of examples, always lightened by David Roche's free ruminative thought.
