ABSTRACT
This chapter investigates fiction television and film in terms of their primary narrative differences. It examines approaches for criticizing design against Jeremy Butler's conception of television style and the aesthetic complexities which television presents. The chapter argues that if the Charles and Mirella Affron were to be applied to a television text, then every set should be considered a narrative set, simply by its returning usage, and every character must be read anew each episode because of the changes in their character perceptions created by their costumes. C. S. Tashiro and the Affrons offer an understanding about narrative or fiction film, but their theories become cumbersome and problematic when faced with fiction television. A key expectation for any genre is set up visually through the style and the setting; some aspects of the style, such as cinematography, are beyond the scope, but mise-en-scene and its connection with the settings are not.
