Meta for Month-of-Meta: Watching a series in realtime versus marathoning

[sholio]

(Thank you very much to my flist for the last-minute feedback and handholding! You were most helpful!)

This was a topic suggestion by michelel72 over at month_of_meta, and it snagged my interest immediately.

But what I realized when I started trying to write a detailed post is how unique and individual all of my viewing experiences have been. Mostly, when I look back on it, I can't come up with a good example of a show, book, comic or anime that I think would have been better viewed or read in a different way. My lingering warm fuzzies (or viewer frustration) is a composite of all the different aspects that went into the viewing experience. Do I know that I would have liked Avatar: The Last Airbender just as much if I'd watched the episodes over the course of years rather than in a couple of weeks? I have no idea -- it would be different! So it's hard to analyze the similarities and differences -- every viewing experience is unique.

So these are not so much conclusions as, I suppose, general rambling on the topic. It's also very specific to my own experiences, not really meant to apply to fandom as a whole -- though, of course, I'm definitely interested in hearing how this works for other people.

Also, most of this applies similarly, I think, to any kind of long-format series -- books, TV, comics, anime, manga, etc. I'm going to generally use TV examples because, among other reasons, it's easier to type "viewer" every time rather than "viewer/reader/comics fan". *g* But when it comes to serials, I think that books, comics, or manga are not really all that different.)

I guess that if I could draw one broad, general conclusion, it's that (in my experience, anyway) when you get one installment at a time, you end up savoring it. Poring over it, looking for clues to the ongoing plot. Rewatching or rereading to enjoy the details that you missed the first time. Speculating about where it's going. If you're involved in media fandom, there's a social element to this, too -- writing episode tags, discussing it with other fans, spinning wild theories about where the season is going. And there is something really delightful about being there in the moment. You're riding the crest of the squee wave, watching the show at the height of its popularity. If you're in a fandom with other people, then you get the heady experience of watching it with others who are exactly as unspoiled as you are -- no one knows about the sudden!surprise!character death in season four yet, and no one has any idea that half their ships are about to be blown apart two seasons later. You get some really vibrant, immediate interaction with other fans, with fannish creativity, with show meta and discussion that often isn't quite the same when you're picking up an older series.

Even if you're not in a particular fandom and don't have the social-interaction element, though, there's an immediacy to watching the show when it's current. All the technology and pop-culture references are up-to-date, and you don't have the dislocation of time and place that comes from watching a few years or two decades later. You don't find yourself getting distracted with dated hairstyles, technology or plot tropes, for example. (This is starting to become an increasing problem for me with anything set farther back than about 15 years, because cell phones and email are so ubiquitous now that it's a little jarring for me to deal with plots that don't acknowledge those things. It's not impossible, it's just that it makes it feel dated, very much a period piece. And I grew up in that world! It must be even stranger for people who grew up with cell phones and never actually experienced the world without them ...)

But then there's the down side -- having that much time to think about each new piece of canon gives the viewer a whole lot more opportunity to pick it apart. I really start to notice flaws, editing goofs, continuity errors and the like. And what's even worse, perhaps, is that I find myself building up huge expectations for the next installment (especially if there's a long time gap, as between books in a series, or a cliffhanger season ending and the next season's premiere). I'm fairly sure that my disappointment in the most recent Dresden Files book is almost entirely down to having had a year and a half to anticipate it and imagine what might happen in it, and then being frustrated with the book for not being what I'd imagined it to be.

So ... what about marathoning? These days, I find that's how I'm watching most things. Back when I was a young proto-fan (*g*), and right up to the early 2000s, marathoning shows wasn't really a thing like it is now. I mean, it was certainly possible -- even back in the late 80s, it was possible to buy or rent some popular series on VHS tapes, and you could have friends tape them for you, or trade tapes with people. But it wasn't that common, and usually you wouldn't do it for a series that you knew nothing about. It wasn't possible to get cheap seasons of TV shows on sale, or get them from Netflix for a nominal monthly fee, or download large, high-quality files from any of the umpty-zillion sources of legal and illicit downloads that are around today. In fact, you didn't usually get to see anything from the beginning -- unless you stumbled onto a good series at the start, you'd usually pick up a show in mid-run and then just have to catch the reruns or never know what happened in the first couple of seasons at all.

These days, though, I've been falling increasingly into the mindset of "wait and watch it on DVD". We marathoned Heroes recently (a show which I'm actually quite glad I didn't watch in realtime, since the disappointment would have been even more crushing if I'd had three years to build up my expectations rather than two weeks), and now we're starting on Burn Notice (six seasons!), which I've meant to watch forever but am just now getting around to. For me, I think, this is the new normal. I like to wait a couple of seasons to see if a show is going to stick around, or at least to see if the general buzz is good enough to be worth picking up a short, cancelled show (Firefly comes to mind here). So I'm marathoning more shows, and watching fewer shows in realtime. The only ones we're currently catching in slow time are White Collar and Fringe -- well, also Community, when it starts back up. But mostly it's marathons via Netflix.

(This is also somewhat true of books, though for different reasons -- I get a lot of my book recommendations from my flist these days, and usually these are series that have several books out already, rather than picking them up at the beginning.)

Which is not to say that "available on DVD" = "automatic marathon" in all cases. In the responses to michelel72's original topic suggestion, ar linked to this: In Defense of Slow TV, which is basically an argument for marathoning slowly: an episode a night, say, rather than consuming a whole DVD in one sitting and picking up the next one the following evening. I think there's definitely something to this -- if nothing else, I burn out really easily when I try to gulp down too much of a show at once -- but one thing I found really interesting is that one of his points is, basically, the opposite of my experience. Talking about The Sopranos, he suggests that the more depth and detail a series has, the more it benefits from being viewed in installments, so that you can savor it:

Watching one episode at a time, it’s much easier to see the attention lavished on the individual episodes of this series. By and large, The Sopranos structured its seasons as a series of short stories around similar themes that begin to cohere in the last handful of episodes, usually concluding with a few acts of shocking physical or psychological violence. Watching on DVD, where the temptation is to keep rolling along to see what happens next, has a tendency to wash away the distinctions between episodes, leaving many hours that muddle into seasons vaguely defined by who gets killed at the end.

But my own experience is actually somewhat the opposite. I find that I appreciate a detail-rich, ongoing plot a great deal more if it's marathoned, where I don't have time to forget all the little details between episodes. I've found this is true of several different series -- Fringe and Lost, in particular, come to mind. As much as I enjoyed looking forward to new episodes, I enjoyed the shows more when I was marathoning whole seasons than when I was watching them in weekly installments. With Fringe, I've found myself forgetting plot details (it's much easier to remember a throwaway plot point from a season ago when you only watched the episode last week), thus getting less appreciation out of the little story callbacks than I used to. And pacing that seemed tighter and more seamless when I was watching a bunch of episodes back-to-back starts to drag when it's spread out over a number of weeks.

Meanwhile, shows that are composed of stand-alone episodes -- like, say, most '80s cop shows and most sitcoms -- start to wear on me when I watch a bunch of them back-to-back. Getting a nice little weekly dose is about right for me, but viewing the episodes in a block starts to make their self-similarity very tiring.

... Though I also think that one episode per night (which is what he's advocating) does constitute marathoning to me. Generally speaking, when we're watching shows marathon-style, we're getting a DVD from Netflix every 3-4 days, and then watching it in a sitting or at most over two nights. Then we have a couple of days to digest that viewing experience before moving on to the next one. The times I can think of that I've lost all control and watched a gigantic chunk of episodes at once -- I watched the 8-episode second series of the UK Life on Mars in one afternoon, for example -- I've found myself feeling vaguely oversaturated. I get the same feeling from reading an entire book in a sitting ... not that I can stop myself, but I used to think of it when I was a teenager as having swallowed a book whole. There's no time to stop and digest; it's just this giant lump of book lodged in my brain. (I'm pretty sure this metaphor is getting disgusting, and I need to stop. That's what it feels like, though!)

This Wired article in praise of marathoning TV (hat tip to livrelibre for the link!) is a little bit tongue-in-cheek (not to mention describing a level of immersion in TV that I can't sustain for very long without being possessed by a powerful urge to go do something else, ANYTHING else), but I think it nailed the essence of the experience:

Seen on a laptop screen at 4 am, microprocessor superheating the bedsheets, shows like Deadwood and Dexter become portals right into the heads of their creators and the characters they’ve so painstakingly crafted. “You’re mimicking the main character’s experience, because they’re not getting breaks from their lives and you’re not either,” says Daniel Zelman, creator of Damages. “Their problems become your problems.”

And this idea of immersing yourself in canon really speaks to me, because that is basically what I get out of mainlining a series all in a row, whether it's two episodes a night of a 6-season TV show, or reading a 12-book series all in a row without pausing to read something else for variety. Characters and storylines take up residence in my head, and it's hard to divert myself onto something else. I think that's another reason why it's a little harder for me to follow a show on its regular weekly schedule. Unless I'm really obsessing on it, other stuff gets in the way, not just real life, but other plots and characters clamoring for attention in my brain. (Due to a Netflix queue mixup, we accidentally dropped the first disc of Life into our Burn Notice -- it's a fabulous show, and stylistically very different, but plotwise, rather similar: wronged man and his misfit friends trying to find out who wronged him. And my brain is really struggling to keep straight which characters, storylines and clues have happened on which show!)

My perfect viewing experience (my platonic ideal if you will *g*, i.e. the viewing experience that I would like to have if I could always have my way) has always been this kind of immersive thing. I want to experience a story from the beginning, completely unspoiled -- to follow all the bread crumb trails with no idea where they lead, to be led astray by the red herrings and be surprised by plot twists, to guess and anticipate and eventually settle into the conclusion. When I get a new book in a series I like, I don't read the back (actually, I take off the dust jacket just to make sure that I don't accidentally spoil something). I don't watch the "next week" trailers on TV shows. I love to just dive in, completely unspoiled, and immerse myself in it.

I'm not saying this is the best way to view something, just that it's what works best for me.

And one thing about the ready availability of media now, and the ability to watch it as fast or slow as we want, is that it lets me have my purely ideal viewing experience more easily. Back in the old days, the pre-2000s, I couldn't get this ideal viewing experience very often, because I used to be more at the mercy of availability. I'd start watching a show in the second season and have to infer what went before from context. I'd have to miss episodes due to other commitments or preemptions or rescheduling. Now I can just pick up the fresh DVD and dive right in, finding a time when the house is quiet so that I can pay attention to everything, pausing and going back to rewatch a scene and catch more details.

But I also feel like I've lost a little of the serendipity of the old days, where it wasn't quite as perfect, and I wasn't quite as in control -- but the actual obtaining of the show (or book, movie, comic) was part of the warm, fuzzy, nostalgic memory of the whole thing. You couldn't just find it in a big long list of TV shows; you almost had to stumble across it by accident, and then obtain new bits of canon in dribs and drabs, whether on the schedule of a weekly TV show, or when you could find someone to give you tapes, or whatever. I still remember discovering Ranma 1/2 through grainy VHS tapes at anime-viewing parties in my dorm, circa 1995. I had no idea what was going on -- actually, Ranma 1/2 being what it is, I'm not sure if watching from the beginning would have necessarily helped with that *g* -- but I knew that I liked it. Or, as a teenager, watching the Due South episode "Victoria's Secret" with my mom and sister -- having no idea that this goofy show was about to take a sudden left turn into WAIT NO WTF AAAAAAAAAAA, and then being at the total mercy of the television to deliver the next episode on its schedule, not ours. (I think there was a two-week gap, though maybe it just felt like it *g*.) No spoilers in those days!

I'm not saying the old days were better -- I love my readily available TV shows! It's just a little different. I still really love the experience of waiting on new installments of canon (the anticipation! the guessing! the soon-to-be-jossed futurefic!). But I also love being able to get into a new show by bingeing a season or two, rather than limping along through an uncertain first season, never being sure where it's going to go or if it's going to stick around long enough to be worth falling in love with.


So what about you? Are you a binge viewer, settling in for an uninterrupted marathon, or do you like to parcel out shows (or anime, books, comics) and mix them up with other series? Do you have any thoughts on the pros and cons of either method? I've generally conflated different media in this post, assuming that the similarities outweight the differences, but do you agree, or do you think TV actually does work differently from books or comics, or Western TV bingeing is a different thing from bingeing on anime? Talk to me!

Comments

I ramble. A lot.

[ambyr]

::perks ears:: Burn Notice? I think I missed that you're watching that, but I would love to see your thoughts and fic!

I am not a marathon viewer because I simply don't have the patience; sitting in front of a screen that I'm not typing into makes me fidgety. I can't even manage an hour a day consistently. The only two times in my life I've marathoned a show were both times when I was living in isolation: Buffy, the summer I spent working an internship in a strange town where I knew no one (and where, incidentally, I lacked any Internet access at home to distract me), and A:TLA, the autumn I spent on 50% travel for work, spending night after night alone in hotel rooms in little tiny Midwestern towns that shut down at sunset. Oh, and Dexter, I suppose--I marathoned the first season and a half of that on a pair of 14-hour flights that happened to have it on their in-flight entertainment system. But otherwise, a couple hours of TV and I'm done for the week. There's too much to do, too many people to talk to, too much to read on the Internet.

But books I marathon, sometimes. Not often, because usually I pick up ongoing series, where I'm forced to wait for the next to come out. But when I stumble on something completed--I think I practically forgot to eat while reading Fallon's Second Sons trilogy (not spectacular literature, but hits all my buttons like whoah), and I distinctly recall coming home from the library with Turner's The King of Attolia in hand, sitting down on the sofa to glance at the first page, and then blinkingly realizing I was done at nearly midnight. (I flipped right back to the beginning and started over again.) Hurley's God's War sent me running out to buy Infidel, and impatiently waiting for book 3.

I marathon books because I lack self-control, basically. But I think there is a real benefit to slower reading, and I love the fandoms that spring up around series with lengthy publication gaps. Take Turner--I was able to marathon the first three books because I came to the series late, but in real time fans waited years between them, and in the process put a ton of analysis into the characters' motivations and hidden meanings. (It helps that it's a series that lends itself to that: Turner takes "show, don't tell" to whole new levels.) I love reading back discussions at sounis, and participating in them now that I've joined everyone else in waiting years for anything--even a hint of a title--about book five.

And A Song of Ice and Fire fandom--now there's books people have had years to pick over. To develop pages and pages of evidence for elaborate fan theories that no one would have bothered to construct if they could just read the next book and find out what happens. Whatever the flaws of the fandom--and oh God are they legion--they've taken speculation to an art form beyond what I've seen in any other book fandom (Dragaera comes close, maybe). It's become a game; people propose things they know aren't true and then try to back it up for entertainment's sake. (Ask me about my "Missandei is a Child of the Forest" theory! Or, err, don't.)

Fans that come to ASoIaF late, who've had the opportunity to marathon five books in a row, are sometimes a little baffled by this. By how much effort people have put into supporting R+L=J or interpreting the House of the Undying prophesies. But when you have a decade and more to wait for new canon. . .well, what else are you going to do? Marathoning fans, I've noticed, are also much more forgiving of books 4 and 5 than long-term fans, who tend to find them a little disappointing. They've had less time to build up elaborate speculations in their head, I think, that the books can't hope to match.

It's not like you only get this kind of speculative fandom when there's forced slow reading. Lord of the Rings is a shining counter-example: it's been out for half a century and people still pick it apart. But I think you're more likely to get it, and I really love it. I wish I could make myself slow down when reading available canons and really stop and speculate, book by book, chapter by chapter, like, oh, Mark of markwatches/reads. I think I'd get a richer reading experience. But like I said, no self control--and it wouldn't be as fun without a whole fandom doing it with me.

Re: I ramble. A lot.

[attackfish]

Just wanted to say hello to another MWT fan. *waves*

Re: I ramble. A lot.

[sholio]

Burn Notice? I think I missed that you're watching that, but I would love to see your thoughts and fic!

Heh! Well, so far it hasn't really grabbed me in a fannish way -- I'm liking the show, but not really that compelled to seek out discussion/fic/vids/etc. But we'll see how I feel when we're another season or two along!

Fans that come to ASoIaF late, who've had the opportunity to marathon five books in a row, are sometimes a little baffled by this. By how much effort people have put into supporting R+L=J or interpreting the House of the Undying prophesies. But when you have a decade and more to wait for new canon. . .well, what else are you going to do? Marathoning fans, I've noticed, are also much more forgiving of books 4 and 5 than long-term fans, who tend to find them a little disappointing. They've had less time to build up elaborate speculations in their head, I think, that the books can't hope to match.

Oh, yes, to all of this! And not just books, but other fandoms too -- TV and comics and whatnot. This is one of the things that's really interesting about coming into a fandom late, because you keep discovering all of these fannish kerfluffles and ship wars and fandom tropes that make no sense to someone who didn't experience those gaps in canon, with all the attendant speculation and soon-to-be-AU fic and the other ways that fans fill the time while waiting for something new. I remember really feeling that way in Avatar: The Last Airbender fandom, after watching the entire series a year or two after it finished its run.I couldn't even enjoy most of the fic and episode discussions and so forth that went on while the show was airing -- too many things had changed, and too much of it didn't have any resonance for me anymore.

I think it's also much easier to forgive weak episodes or books when you're getting a whole lot of canon at one time. If you hit a bad one, well, there's always the next one to look forward to. It's a lot harder to pull off the same level of sanguinity when you're only getting one at a time.

[attackfish]

I came out of book fandoms, and then marathoned A:tLA, and for me the experience was similar. I like the format, and slow watching White Collar (as well as not having a closed canon) is maddening. Adjusting to watching one episode at a time (which I never really did until college. I've always had a tendency to catch shows during marathons) is like reading one chapter at a time in a longfic that someone hasn't posted. I love updates, but man, I wish I had the whole thing, even if that means it's over.

(Speaking of A:tLA, am I the only person who saw Neal on top of the tram on last night's White Collar and went "Hello Boiling Rock"?)

[sholio]

(Speaking of A:tLA, am I the only person who saw Neal on top of the tram on last night's White Collar and went "Hello Boiling Rock"?)

AHAHAHAHA! Well, not until you mentioned it, but now I do. :D

[attackfish]

Immediately afterwards, I decided that there should be a crossover somewhere in which Neal meets Ty Lee. It would be hilarious. *files it away on stack of gag bunnies never to be written*

[sqbr]

Ah, this is an interesting question to ponder!

I find it depends a bit on the show. A lot of the time if I'm really enjoying a show I will marathon it quite quickly, though I like to take some breaks (my husband, given the chance, basically just stops to eat and briefly sleep, so we can get out of sync). I spend a lot of time lying in bed ill, and will often happily swallow whole anime series whole (as you put it :)) in a day or two. (And I find anime very similar to Western TV in this respect)

But there are shows I don't like the marathon so quickly. I'm a sook about dark depressing stuff, and shows which are just barely light enough for me to deal with may get watched in little bursts so I don't get overwhelmed by them. Though the only example that comes to mind is a documentary series about the history of Indigenous Australia, which isn't quite the sort of show you're talking about. Also shows which simply aren't that good, I'm slowly working through Farscape but while I'm enjoying it enough to continue it keeps annoying me and I can take breaks for months, and then watch three in a row while drawing or sorting laundry.

Something I find interesting is the way that tv is made to be marathoned these days. I love it, I get really put off shows with a reset button and want that continuity and growth. But I read an article the other day (link alas lost) arguing that this trend has hurt tv shows, because creators don't put enough emphasis on making the individual episodes well crafted, and they get locked into pre-planned arcs that don't flow with the chemistry of the actors etc.

I know what you mean about missing random serendipity. And I never watch sitcoms any more, since I don't enjoy marathoning them but they can be fun to come across while channel surfing, and I don't channel surf much any more.

[sholio]

Something I find interesting is the way that tv is made to be marathoned these days. I love it, I get really put off shows with a reset button and want that continuity and growth. But I read an article the other day (link alas lost) arguing that this trend has hurt tv shows, because creators don't put enough emphasis on making the individual episodes well crafted, and they get locked into pre-planned arcs that don't flow with the chemistry of the actors etc.

Oh, this is interesting, because first of all, I've definitely noticed the shift that you're talking about, towards TV being written with more continuity and long plot arcs now that technology has made marathoning more of a norm. I am hugely fond of the trend myself! But I hadn't thought about the down side that you're talking about, particularly creators committing themselves to pre-planned arcs. How much of a problem do you think it is? I'm not really disagreeing -- it's something I hadn't thought about, so now I'm thinking about it *g* ... the thing is, I guess, I don't get the impression that most series are planned all that far in advance -- they seem to go season by season, rather than having a multi-season arc in mind in all but the most unusual cases -- so it seems like they would still have a lot of flex room. Actually, I think I've noticed more issues with apparently random plotting in long-arc shows than with overly meticulous plotting (JJ Abrams shows are especially bad about that).

[sqbr]

Yes, I am fond of this trend too! Which is why I found an article criticising it interesting to ponder, it was a point of view I'd never considered. And yes, I tend to think that we could still do with more long term plotting not less in most tv shows.

[shinsengumi]

This topic is has always been really interesting to me--it reminds me of a project my class did in university, where we read Bleak House true to its original form as a periodical. We were allowed to read only to a certain chapter by any given week, and then we discussed all the contents of the previous in class. It lead to a really interesting sort of experience where, I found, there was a lot more thought going into the media than usual. Most English students have so much to read we just dedicated a set several hours to any text and swallowed it whole. Actually having to slow down and read the text in bits really--I'm not ashamed to admit this--forced me to actually read and absorb the whole text.

I think I can say that as a rule, long books perform better in parcelled readings. They have chapters for a reason, and I can't help but feel that taking a breather between two or three of them it helpful to your brain; it lets all the information sink in and gives you time to process. I've often said that books feel 'rushed' to me, but I've come to realise that's due to my reading process. I read pocket paperbacks at an average rate of 60 pages per hour, but depending on the content--dialogue versus heavy description versus action--I can manage 100 per hour. And at that speed, no bloody wonder it feels like it's going quickly. I hardly blink at chapters divisions and rarely glance at their titles, but they're there for a reason. An author made the decision to end the preceeding scene and carry on into a new chapter, and that's something that readers really need to be more aware of, I think.

I may come back at another time with thoughts on television shows...

[sholio]

Oh, that's fascinating! Now I want to try that, reading novels chapter by chapter rather than swallowing them down (which is how I tend to read them, even on rereads). I have sometimes seen chapter-by-chapter rereads on book-fandom communities, but never participated.

[terajk]

For canons with long story arcs (AtLA, most manga) I prefer marathoning, because it helps me keep the story straight. I also don't mind spoilers at all and will go out looking for them for the same reason. I tend to think in small bits and process things better if I can put them into words. (I love TVTropes, as problematic as it is.)

I just got caught up with the manga Soul Eater (to the point of "swallowing it whole, as you say), but it's still ongoing. So I'll have the experience of marathonning it AND reading in installments like everybody else.

[sholio]

*nods* Yeah, like you, I think that I definitely prefer marathoning long-story-arc canon (otherwise it's hard to hold all the plot details in my head for very long, at least without a lot of rewatching). But I prefer watching/reading more standalone stuff in small batches or else I get bored.

Out of curiosity, what is problematic about TV Tropes? Aside from being a huge time sink, that is. *g* Or is that what you were referring to? I guess that I've never noticed anything else about it that stood out to me -- it deals with a lot of problematic tropes, but mostly to call them out.

[dossier]

I have put some thought into the phenomenon too. I'm really old school, and I recall getting my Trek in 1 hour doses for most of my life, so there's one big canon that took a very long time to digest. But, I think I really missed out on a lot of the undercurrents and subplots in everything NextGen and after, as my adult life really interfered, the reruns weren't playing incessantly, and in some case there were multiple, simultaneous canons. In that long, long drought prior to ST1, I spent a lot of time and money reading books about canon, going to conventions, building my own episode guides, spent hours poring over and discussing with friends every Trek, so much of the detail was hammered into my brain. Not to mention that I'd seen every TOS episode 10, 12, 20 times. Recently I got quite a lot of enjoyment, albeit a different experience, by mainlining TNG over the course of 2 weeks from Netflix. That's a lotta trek. However, there was very little/none of fannish sharing, dead canon.

Television is something that I enjoy far more when I can do both: get new canon in small installments and get all the squee out of it, then obtain said canon and revisit many times at leisure. Like Stargate SG1-- I saw the movie, watched the series on show time for a couple of seasons, then I lost my cable. Syndication was very iffy, and VHS tapes were my lifesavers, I could go back and get the stuff I missed while I was just immersing myself in the Joy. (I have about 110 pounds of used VHS tapes now) I will also say that there were many many times I wished I'd had a VHS/Betamax for X-Files and Twin Peaks--though honestly I am not sure that reviewing the previous episodes would have given me any illumination there. I think SGA is the only show I watched from ep 1, and got the full fannish experience, installment-wise.

Also in retrospect, I am a binger by nature. Books? Can't think of a single series that I was in from book 1. I got a little of that experience with HP, as I had to wait for 5, 6 & 7, but even then I mainlined books 1-4 in about 4 days. Piers Anthony? My sister had a billion of them and I read about 30 in a row, or until I was sick of them... I just tend to wait until there is a bit of a stack before I dive in.

Oh Wait: Life on Mars/Ashes to Ashes. I freaking LOVE them, and I regularly pull it out for a rewatch. last week, I watched LOM, then jumped right to S3 of A2A, just to see how 'what happened to Sam' played out against what happened to Sam. :) I am never disappointed.

[sholio]

I still have a lot of warm fuzzy nostalgia for the days when single episodes were all you got, but I'm, generally speaking, a binger by nature too, and it's awfully nice to be able to indulge that. *g* I still have a bunch of taped-from-TV VHS tapes, too ... all completely disorganized and probably starting to lose quality to the point of unwatchability these days, though.

For the most part, the shows that I'm really into these days, I watch as single episodes and then buy on DVD and rewatch. Best of both worlds! (Except for the slow water torture of the wait between episodes ...)

[amalthia]

I marathon watch a lot of TV because I tend to enjoy the shows more. There are few shows I watch as they air or save up two or three episodes and watch them all at once. I think serial shows work better when watched all at once. :)

[sholio]

*nods* Yeah, the more cohesive a long story arc is, the more I enjoy watching it in a marathon without a whole lot of other canon intruding into my brain in the meantime.

[nemonclature]

For me the main differences between marathoning and watching currently airing shows is in terms of fandom, or maybe 'community' is a better word. When I watch currently airing shows I tend to get involved in fandom, even if it's just in a lurkerish manner of reading people's recaps. When I marathon a series I almost always do it with family. In fact, I'll often marathon a show I've already watched (Firefly, BSG,) in order to get others hooked. So then the viewing experience is very different because I'm watching and commenting in real time, I'm communicating IRL etc etc. (Also I think fandom and non-fandom people critique shows differently, but that's a separate topic).

I'm hard-pressed to say which I prefer though, or if there's really any major difference in the way I react, because I have this tendency to pause watching and come back to things as and when I feel like it, whether that's mid series or mid-episode. I guess in a way I'm marathoning even when I'm watching on air? Because I download stuff, so I'm never really reliant on tv. I might have one of my off weeks, and then watch the missed ep and new ep back to back.

From a fan-creative perspective, the anticipation must play a major part in that fact that most fandoms are more active while a show is airing. Certainly it did when I was actively writing for SGU. The hiatus as well as the gaps between episodes was space to play around in the sandbox before we all got Jossed.

I totally agree with what you said about over-loading on tv or books. I know exactly what you mean. Being a bit of a pretentious teenager, I went and named the feelings - you've got the 'longing', which is the desire to be part of that world you've so recently been immersed in. And the 'lethargy', which speaks for itself really, because everything in the real world is dull and boring in comparison, so you don't want to do anything. Pretty much exactly like being in a food coma! You wish you were still eating, because the food as so good, but you can't eat any more, because you're so full. OH THE HUMANITY.

Hm, random last point, I'm better able to deal with WIPs when it comes to on-air shows (though cancellations are, of course, hellish). But I really hate reading series which are still being written. I do it sometimes, because some books are just too good to say no to, but it's much more likely to leave me frustrated. No idea why that is though.

[sholio]

Also I think fandom and non-fandom people critique shows differently, but that's a separate topic

I think so, too! I've noticed that the discussions I have watching shows with my husband, or with my mom, or with non-fannish friends are very different from the ones I have with fandom-type people.


From a fan-creative perspective, the anticipation must play a major part in that fact that most fandoms are more active while a show is airing.

*nods* Yeah, they're a lot more active. I think it's partly the anticipation and partly the fact that each new episode brings a slew of new creative input -- new discussion topics, new plot bunnies and episode tags. There's always a lot that's new to chew on. Whereas closed canons are lots of fun for an individual fan to discover, but the fandom itself doesn't have a whole lot of momentum to stay going. (Not that some haven't managed to have huge staying power.)

LOL at your food metaphor. It does feel like that!

[torachan]

I don't really ever "marathon", because I rarely have the time or patience to read or watch something that quickly. So for me, even if I download a whole season of something, it might still take me weeks or months to watch. Same with manga or books that are series (though I don't tend to read too many book series anymore these days and prefer standalones).

Unlike you, when I watch something as it airs/is published, I don't tend to mull over it or watch/read it again and again. So there's not really any benefit to that way; it just makes it harder to remember what happened when I finally get the next installment.

I vastly prefer to read or watch things when they are completed. Even if I consume them more slowly than what I would call a marathon, it's still generally faster than they were originally released (this is especially true of manga!), so it's much easier for me to remember what's happening.

[sholio]

*nods* This makes sense! And of course, everyone does it differently. I used to prefer things to be finished, but these days, I've shifted over into wanting to jump in at a point where I can marathon a few seasons, or volumes of manga, or books in a series, but still have new ones to look forward to, rather than having it all be OVER and NEVER ANY MORE when I get to the end. (Also, I'm finding myself increasingly intimidated when I wait a long time to jump into canon and then find myself confronted with 40 volumes of manga, or 8 seasons of a TV show. The end result of waiting too long tends to be that I never get started in the first place ...)

[erinptah]

Awesome post! Loving the discussion. It's like the best of old-school metafandom.

The only thing I've noticed that hasn't been mentioned is that, when marathoning a show, I'm more prone to tuning out the character arcs that don't seem interesting enough. The time between episodes only allows for processing and putting in context so much. There were major recurring fan-favorite characters in Battlestar Galactica that I was only vaguely aware of, because I marathoned it through Netflix Instant and paid attention mostly to the Roslin/Adama And Starbuck Show.

[sholio]

Thank you! :) Discussions are fun - I missed this! And everyone has had lots of good comments.

Oh, that's an excellent point about paying more attention to some arcs than others, as well. I usually have a project in my lap while I'm watching TV (knitting something, answering comments on LJ, stuff like that) and I'll work on my project during the parts that I'm not really into, with the end result that some arcs I don't remember at all because I was counting stitches or whatever during them.

[goodbyebird]

I find that when it comes to the slower-paced, more serious dramas(f.exa. Boardwalk Empire) I find mainlining it is the way to go, as it's easy to drift away and not manage to fully connect when it is spaced apart too much(later seasons are alright, as I've then forged a connection with the characters and the story by that point). In short, I need an emotional investment and that can take a while with those kinds of shows. If I had to watch it in real time on TV I would probably give up on it two or three episodes in. Yes, I do find that episodes tend to fade into one another, and I don't take the time to properly examine what I've seen, but there's up and downs to every method I guess.

Watching all the shows that I do means I don't really have time to do several re-watches anymore(I miss that), so that's one perk of real-time watching out the window, but I still relish in the excitement of waiting for the next episode to hit, and reading fellow fans' episode reactions and theories. I do find this feeds into how I feel about the source(as do fanworks), and there's always more of that around when you're viewing something as it airs. That feeling of community is what fandom's all about for me. Also, when watching a heavy show it's nice to be able to take a breather by throwing in a sitcom or two. Sometimes I just want to kick back and relax.

So I'm going by a pretty nice mix of the two at the moment. Works for me :)

Btw, I'm just like you spoiler-wise. When I was younger I discovered that when I stumbled across a movie on TV without knowing anything about it, I'd be much more immersed in the experience and the ride it took me on was much more exciting due to knowing nothing beforehand. I'd lean in towards the TV and wonder what the heck was going on instead of having someone describe to me(poorly) the first two thirds of the movie, so that I'd either know exactly what was coming, or worse yet, spend that time waiting for the movie I expected to happen, while something totally different was taking place on screen, completely distracting me and ruining the experience. Now I won't even let my friends read on the back of covers if I'm bringing the movie, and don't even ask me what I look like at the cinema when the trailers start rolling *g*

(Community on the 15th \o/)

[sholio]

(Yay new Community! \o/)

I definitely find myself getting more fannish about shows that are currently airing. At least, my fandom involvement lasts longer if there's new canon, new discussion, new fanfic and all that other shiny stuff that you get in fandoms for ongoing shows. On the other hand, I totally agree that long-plot-arc shows -- for me, at least -- are better viewed marathon-style rather than once a week. Not only is the plot easier to follow, but the cliffhangers are much less agonizing. *g*

And yeah, I enjoy things so much more when I can have them unfold in front of me, completely spoiler-free. Of course, this makes being in fandom difficult at times, because fandom is full of spoilers everywhere ...

[nike]

I think a good part of it might depend on the show itself, not unlike what you've described above. For example, when I did Les Miserables for a book report back in high school, I essentially had to mainline it because of the limited amount of time I had to read it. I kept thinking the whole time (and still whole-heartedly believe) it was probably much better way back when it was published as a serial novel. The long running anime, One Piece, however, I suspect is much better as a marathon because of the animators' needing to slow down periodically to keep from surpassing the mangaka's pace. Lot's of people complained the Skypeia arc was slow but I didn't have problem with it. I later realized that was because most of the people complaining had finally caught up with the series because I and other people had problems later on when we caught up.

[sholio]

Yeah, I've had the latter experience a lot, where I marathon the first part of a show, manga or book series, then find myself relating to it differently (and often being a little bored, confused or disappointed) when I start following it in real time.

It's less common for me to wish I'd been able to watch something slowly, but it happens ... sometimes it's mostly wishing that I'd managed to hit a fandom in its heyday, and sometimes the problem is that the sheer amount of canon overwhelms me when it's taken all as a giant lump. This is a hurdle for me getting into some of the longer comics and manga series. I still haven't read all of One Piece; there's just SO MUCH OF IT, and ditto for Naruto and Bleach and some of the other big ones. Not only am I intimidated by the sheer size of them, but after reading a couple hundred chapters it starts to all blur together and I have trouble maintaining interest.