ABSTRACT

This book constitutes the first major exploration of HBO's current programming, examined in the context of the transformation of American television and global society. With studies of well-known shows such as Game of Thrones, Girls, Insecure, Looking, Silicon Valley, The Comeback, The Leftovers, True Detective and Veep and Vinyl, the authors examine the trends in current programming, including the rise of queer characters, era-defining comedy, reinvented fantasy series, and the content’s new awareness of gender, sexuality and family dysfunction.

Interdisciplinary and international in scope, HBO’s New and Original Voices explores the sociocultural and political role and impact that HBO's current programmes have held and the ways in which it has translated and reinterpreted social discourses into its own televisual language. A significant intervention in television studies, media studies and cultural studies, this book illuminates the emergence of a new era of culturally relevant television that fans, students, and researchers will find lively, accessible and fascinating.

chapter |14 pages

Introduction

part I|56 pages

Authorship, gender, reception

chapter 161|13 pages

Our bodies, our self(ies)

Mediating and mitigating social media and selfveillance in Girls

chapter 2|16 pages

The rise and fall of the HBO empire

Vinyl and the gender of TV legitimation

chapter 3|12 pages

Queer fantasies, queer echoes

The post-closet world of Looking

chapter 4|14 pages

Feminism, ‘dick’ jokes, & (re)defining masculinity

Satirising the tech world in Silicon Valley

part II|54 pages

Race, place, power, risk

chapter 725|15 pages

The personal and political

Exploring comedic masculinity and femininity in Veep

chapter 6|12 pages

Race and place in black and white

The false dichotomy in True Detective

chapter 7|16 pages

Praising, erasing, replacing and race-ing Girls

Intersectional online critiques and the ascent of Insecure

chapter 8|10 pages

Forced devotion vs. acceptable doubt

The Leftovers as a paradigm shift for religion in popular culture

part III|58 pages

Consumption, criticism, fandom

chapter 1269|15 pages

HBO’s hall of mirrors

The Comeback as meta-commentary on television and celebrity culture

chapter 10|14 pages

Marnie is the worst

Antipathetic characters in contemporary HBO programmes

chapter 12|14 pages

Tone deaf?

Game of Thrones, showrunners and criticism