In the beginning, we only had HBO. The American cable TV network has revolutionized the way of producing fiction for domestic entertainment since the ’90s, creating lavish productions with the participation of movie actors and directors, and a continually structured storyline for long narrative sagas.
From Sex and the City and The Sopranos to the recent phenomenon Game of Thrones, milestones in the history of TV that became popular and continue to win over fans. Diffusion takes on an even more detailed dimension with the advent of streaming on-demand, which divides the market and allows uninterrupted use.
TV series are popular with everyone, and our Generation Z (post-millennials, born during the mid-1990s to the early-2000s) is no exception. Teenagers devour standard terabytes, share images, video extracts, and phrases on social media. They identify themselves with them and let themselves be influenced.
They avoid all else and remain hypnotized for hours on the small screen “binge watching” (watching multiple episodes of a television program in rapid succession) their favorite shows. The series become iconic and keep their lifeblood beyond the projection cycle. This is the case of Breaking Bad, hugely popular at the time of the cable screenings and re-launched by Netflix (not for children under 14).
The resonance effect of Netflix has favored the creation of a videogame inspired by the abovementioned series, but there’s more. The phenomenon has had such a strong impact on viewers as to convince the author, Vince Gilligan, to make a sequel, an episodic film, which will be transmitted by the streaming giant.
The relationship between the very young and these TV series transcends the boundary of the medium, pouring into a thousand commercial streams of a dynamic market in continuous evolution.
There are positive and negative sides of getting hooked on these TV series. It can affect other aspects of life like concentration on one’s studies, sleeping patterns, and one’s health. It can also influence our children’s behavior because of the amount of pornography and violence in some of these series.
In some ways, it makes our children more creative, becoming good storytellers. One enters into other worlds and understands many perspectives in life. As parents, we can moderate their hours of TV viewing and put some balance in the schedule of our children, especially if they are still minors. Creativity is the word. We can have more time with our children through indoor games and accompany them in their homework and studies.
The example of parents and what they prioritize in life can still be a factor in striking a balance…. Time… investment in relationships… is still the best remedy rather than investing a lot of time in the use of gadgets like TV and the computer…
It is also good to make our children aware that the best story or series to follow is one’s own life which happens in every relationship in each present moment…
