Narrative in TV Drama

A couple wake up and go downstairs to breakfast. They do not realise that they are being watched by terrorists. They carry out their daily business and go to work. The Terrorists capture the woman and her collegue and hold them as hostages. They demand that troops have to be withdrawn from Iraq if they are to be safe. The man is hears about his wifes capture and meets with one of the terrorists who tells him to do exactly as she says. Later on we find out she is a suicide bomber who doesn't truly believe in the cause she is fighting for. Her target is the Prime Minister and his government officials. He obtains the detonator and learns where his wife is being held. She is recused just in time with all terrorist threats being neutralised.

Narrative Convention
The classic three part narrative structure - BEGINNING / MIDDLE / END

- Everything starts off as any other day for the couple which is EQUILIBRIUM.
- The woman is captured by terrorists which DISRUPTS the equilibrium.
- The husband saves the PM and his wife which is a rebalance of EQUILIBRIUM.

Other events have happened in between this structure which are called sub-plots. Although they do relate to the main story they have an effect on the outcome. E.G. The husband convinces the terrorist woman he is with to give up the fight. It is crucial to the narrative structure and is a product of the resolution.

The ending is a positive ending as everything returned to equilibrum at the end. However, equilibrum is not EXACTLY the same as events such as the agent being shot means he cannot return to the series.

Most stories end with a happy ending as a lot of people watch TV as an act of escaping for their everyday lives. Having a positive ending all the time may not be realistic but it is what people want to see on TV. If a narrative is truly believable the audience will be to suspend their disbelief. For example, in 7 seasons of 24 Jack Bauer has always stopped the threat of a country which isn't entirely realistic, however, we suspend our disbelief as his character is protrayed to us as someone who really is THAT GOOD. It's believable because he's the one who saves the day, it wouldn't be if another character did it.

In Spooks S3E10 the beginning of the narrative is threatened so that a disruption can happen at a later date. More importantly it gives the audience the hint that something bad is going to happen which draws them in as they want to know what happens. Through this idea the audience is automatically being given Levi Strauss's narrative theory of GOOD vs EVIL. We have to pick a side as the effect of binary opposites has been created. Other binary opposites in the episode come from what the terrorists are fighting for. The episode gives us the opportunity to pick a side of morality on the Iraq war and our choice on this is greatly influenced by the characters and what they say or do.