Retrospectively Reading The Sopranos : Rethinking Complex Television for New Cultural Contexts

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dc.contributor.advisorPhillipov, Michelle
dc.contributor.advisorBudarick, John
dc.contributor.authorBeare, Alexander Hudson
dc.contributor.schoolSchool of Humanities : Mediaen
dc.date.issued2022
dc.description.abstractIn 2020, HBO series, The Sopranos (1999-2007), experienced an unexpected surge in popularity among young viewers. Outlets like The Guardian (Kambasha 2020) and GQ (Unterberger 2020) were quick to label it the ‘hottest show lockdown.’ New audience members were encountering the show for the first time in a very different mediascape to when it originally aired. It was surrounded by new paratexts (like memes, YouTube videos and journalistic think-pieces) and cultural contexts (such as the covid-19 pandemic and the #me Too movement). Viewers were also able to access the show on streaming platforms (like HBO Max and Netflix) that previously did not exist. Despite this, there has been little scholarship concerned with how audiences might experience a resurgent show like The Sopranos differently in such a new setting. This research is interested in the unique experience of these viewers—does watching The Sopranos in the 2020s bring something different about the show into focus? To what extent can this change the meaning and cultural work of the show? To investigate this, I took a mixed-method approach that combines textual analysis with 11 semi-structed interviews of self-identified fans of the show. I term this approach a “retrospective reading”—it places emphasis on the new cultural and mediascape that surround the show and the potential it has to recalibrate audience expectations and interpretations. I argue that the participants used The Sopranos as a conduit for current culture and politics in ways that were often oppositional to the televisual logic of The Sopranos and at odds with conventional understandings of the show. These findings have ramifications for how we approach resurgent television texts like The Sopranos. This interaction between cultural contexts and old programs amounts to somewhat of a ‘new’ text that must be understood in a distinct way. This goes double for ‘complex TV’ texts like The Sopranos that might already encourage multiple and individually varied readings. Television is a public site where ideas are negotiated, recuperated, and reimagined. I conclude that we must recognise the possibility for resurgent television like The Sopranos to be interpreted differently and the possibility for them to do new forms of impactful cultural work.en
dc.description.dissertationThesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Humanities, 2022en
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/2440/138351
dc.language.isoenen
dc.provenanceThis electronic version is made publicly available by the University of Adelaide in accordance with its open access policy for student theses. Copyright in this thesis remains with the author. This thesis may incorporate third party material which has been used by the author pursuant to Fair Dealing exceptions. If you are the owner of any included third party copyright material you wish to be removed from this electronic version, please complete the take down form located at: http://www.adelaide.edu.au/legalsen
dc.subjectComplex TVen
dc.subjectThe Sopranosen
dc.subjectCOVID-19en
dc.subjectResurgent televisionen
dc.subjectAudience studiesen
dc.titleRetrospectively Reading The Sopranos : Rethinking Complex Television for New Cultural Contextsen
dc.typeThesisen

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