“Heroes have to be all or most of the following: intelligent, strong, resilient, selfless, caring, charismatic, reliable, and inspiring. A hero is the person who can be bothered, who does get off the sofa, who will save the day.”
These are characteristics that can be applied to the protagonist from ‘The Mentalist’. The protagonist has these qualities throughout each episode. For example, he shows to be resilient when attempting to solve the case and he is constantly modest about his work. He feels uncomfortable with people thanking him for solving a crime and he is a reliable person that is always asked for help for something and he seems to always pull through for them.
"However there has been a shift toward investigative crime series, where the protagonist must think instead of fight"
This is something that needs to be taken into account when producing the linked production piece. The protagonist would have to be more intellectual and more similar to the narrative hero in the Mentalist as this is something that applies to him. It is the key factor which makes this character so unique in his own way and to differentiate from other texts such as Dexter. He is rather the brains of operations instead of the ‘muscle’ which his special crimes unit may be referred to as.
“All dialogue is lies”
This quote then suggests that characters in television drama should never be seen to say what they mean. It’s all about subtext and how dialogue is shaped by personality and context. This is the method in which the protagonist should be able to clearly portray a message without the use of dialogue.
“Our main protagonist endures a love/hate relationship with himself”
This is something that the main protagonist in The Mentalist endures and therefore this needs to be portrayed through the linked production piece if I decide to produce a trailer/opening. The only way that he will be seen is to show his feelings within himself that are represented on-screen and the audience will be able to understand these without dialogue because this makes it more effective and possible. It also allows for a significant meaning to be met through the uses and gratifications theory and therefore you will be able to see both sides of the character.
“However, this is not the only narrative function that the crime drama partnership performs; such partnerships also play an important role in the construction and exploration of binary oppositions. It is these oppositions, according to Claude Lévi-Strauss, that provide narratives with their meaning and cultural significance”.
This quote from an extract relating to the collaboration between TV crime and drama explains that this partnership is something that allows readings of thee texts to differ and therefore this should be used to ensure that these two readings are read by the audience to show that there are meant to be different meanings to things.
“The Uses and Gratifications theory assists us here, with its emphasis on the cognitive and emotional abilities of the audience that are used to think, rethink, and reinterpret a text and its wider contextual significance”
This is significant to my study because it allows the audience to become aware of the ways in which they are gratified through the uses of texts and people can have their own interpretation of it and therefore find something more appealing to them. This is the hypothesis that I have set, and this is something that can apply to everything in the media and in people’s everyday lives. For example, the way someone views Obama’s presidential recent win can differ extremely from one person saying that it is good for America to be supported by such a person with the intelligence of Obama; however, someone could argue that there are things that Obama has promised to complete which he has not done in the past four years that he has been the president of the USA and as a result of this they oppose the values and beliefs that Obama stands for. Thus this therefore simply comes down to the interpretation and thinking about something.
“Unanswered questions that still circulate in the subconscious resurface and encourage a two-step recommendation in the hope of a ‘let’s see what they think’ response”
This is important for the study of the Mentalist because most episodes include cliff-hangers which is the most important part of the series to ensure that the audience is constantly wondering what is going to happen next. Furthermore, it could allow people to discuss these things that allow the directors/creators of a text to become aware of what their audience think about their text and work to improve or to further meet their needs if they enjoy the suspense and the opportunity that they have to voice their opinions. Moreover, the audience are able to create their own theories which encourage creativity and their intelligence to evolve.
“Representations provide models of how we see gender, social group’s individuals and aspects of the world we all inhabit. They are ideological in that they are constructed witching a framework of representations therefore, mediated and reflect the values system of their sources. No representation is ever real, only a version of the real”
This is something that is important for the uses of representation so that the audience sees what they think is real and this can also relate to some form of mediation. The main character in The Mentalist can be applied to this because the audience will be able to identify the fact that some of the things that he does are only a version of the truth which means that there is an element of truth within them. It also relates to mediation and how the creator changes the way something is represented to put across their own personal opinion or a particular message about the subject.
“Barthes considered the meaning of the finished text – a book, song, film or advertisement – is to be created by the audience, therefore a text always remains open”
This is something that the audience should have and will be given to the audience instead of forcing a message about the subject onto them, it allows them to think and therefore become more involved with the subject and could possible find something potentially more appealing.
“Let's say you're a soulful, brooding male hero, living a sheltered, emotionless existence."
This can relate to my study because the protagonist in the Mentalist has his own psychological battle with himself that captivates audiences and causes them to become more intrigued with the plot and the show itself. He always seems to be sheltered from the ‘bad guys’ by his team that works with him and hardly shows personal emotion something relating to his deceased family.
“In media, male characters are defined more by what they do rather than who they are."
This can be applied to Patrick Jane because he is judged by both what he does and who he is. You are able to see his personality throughout the series and understand the sort of man that he is and also the work that he does is always like none other and therefore becomes the most valued member of the whole unit within the CBI.
"The 'whodunit' makes its dramatic question absolutely explicit, and the quest to find the answer is lead by the protagonist."
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