Analysis of an episode of Neighbours

Analysing an episode will be beneficial as within my group, we have decided to put an opening to a first episode on our website. The episode will allow us to see how the soap begins and what is successful in terms of attracting the target audience and keeping them interested.

The episode I watched involved a main character who was loved by all pass away. She was wife to Declan and mother to India. Bridget is around 17 years old.

Plot:
The episode I analysed was all focused upon the one dilemma (Bridget’s death). She had been in a car accident. Whilst she is having an operation, she has a dream where she is in the park with Declan (her husband) and India (their daughter). They are having a fun time together as a family. She later has another dream after waking up from the operation. In this dream, she is all alone in the park looking for Declan. She comes across a grandfather clock. The hands on it spin to and chime on 12:00. Bridget then wakes up and asks for the time. After this dream, the audience keep seeing the clock and what time it is, the audience are fully aware that Bridget is preparing for her death to be at 12. At 5 to 12, Bridget has another dream where she and Declan tell each other they love one another and they wave goodbye. Bridget walks away from Declan who is holding India and she ‘walks into the light’ just after she blows a kiss to Declan and India. The dreams are all ‘fazey’ and ‘glowy’. It gives the impression of being heavenly, which fits into the story of Bridget dying.
During the time between the dreams, Bridget’s friends pull together to support her and Donna says a prayer for Bridget.
At 12:00 Bridget dies and when the family get told, they break down into tears.

Lifestyle:
It was hard to analyse the lifestyle of the characters in this episode as it was only set in the hospital over the one storyline. However, from what I saw, the teenagers live life together, supporting each other and generally being there for one another. Bridget’s family spent the whole time either by her side or worrying about her. This shows that family is a big thing in their lives.

Relationships:
In the episode I watched, the relationships explored included:

• Parent/child: Steve and Miranda’s daughter Bridget is in hospital due to a car accident they were involved in. Bridget’s dad begins to blame himself for the extent of Bridget’s injuries and after walking off, he talks to Toadie about the moment they first met Bridget to adopt her. He says “big blue eyes, curly brown locks of hair...fell in love with her then and there”. This shows that Bridget means a lot to them and that they love her as if she was their own.
  Another parent and child relationship is between Bridget and Declan towards their daughter India. At the start of the episode, whilst Bridget is having her operation, she has a dream where her, Declan and India are in the park together. They are having a fun. Later on in the episode, Bridget and Declan are talking and Bridget makes Declan promise to look after India if anything happens to her “love her; give her the best life you can”. This shows that Bridget is making sure her family is safe and remains together when she goes. At 11:55, Bridget tells Declan about the first of the dreams she had when they were in the park. She says they were celebrating India’s first birthday. Together they set a picturesque image of that day “the sky will be the bluest it has ever been. There’ll be birds, a warm breeze, sunshine”.
• Husband and wife: Declan worries about Bridget the whole time she is in the hospital. This shows that they are in love with each other. Bridget and Declan support each other and Bridget makes Declan promise to look after India when she dies. This shows that she trusts him, as husband and wife should.
• Friendships: Bridget and Declan’s friends stay at the hospital to support them. The friends also support each other. Donna says a prayer for Bridget “...asking you to help our friend Bridget, we need her and so does India...totally pull out all the stops to make her better...”
• Godparents: Bridget and Declan chose Donna and Ringo to be India’s godparents. She does this at 11.25. Bridget knows she will be dying soon and is making sure her family will be ok and that her daughter’s life will be the best it can.

This episode differs from the most common episodes of neighbours and other soaps because it focused over the one storyline and had the dream scenes which are not common in soaps.

Analysing the episode was useful as it allowed me to see what the positive and negative points are to it. Within our group, we have decided to base our trailer on one storyline. by analysing an episode which has been based on one storyline, i have been able to identify the ways in which the producers have managed to keep the audience attracted and the episode interesting.

Analysis of Neighbours Trailers

As a group we have decided to analyse trailers from our allocated soaps (Natalie M=Neighbours, Natalie N=Emmerdale and Coronation Street, Elena=Home and Away and Thegla=Hollyoaks). These soaps are from both the UK and abroad. We are hoping this will benefit us when we go on to deciding how we want our trailer to be. We hope to use these trailers as inspiration and as a guide as to how to make our trailer successful.

As the main part of our coursework is to create a trailer for a soap opera, we thought it would be necessary to analyse existing soap opera trailers. This would allow us to see what conventions are necessary for the trailer to be successful.

I decided to compare a recent trailer to an old trailer as the comparison would allow me to see how trailers have developed over time or whether there are aspects of them that have remained the same. Through comparing the trailers, I would also be able to see what the necessary conventions of trailers are.

New trailer (2009): http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/soaps/a176195/trailer-death-of-a-neighbour.html#article_continue

• Song played throughout – ‘Beloved’ by Wendy Matthews.
  This is a slow sad song which links to the trailer as the viewer guesses there will be a death of one of the characters, someone who was loved by all.
• The trailer begins with people hugging. It looks like they are saying goodbye to each other or using each other for support. The characters are crying and generally seem sad.
• The trailer then cuts to a rescue scene with police and ambulance. The audience know something bad has happened.
• Words appear on screen. For example; “the show we grew up with...will lose someone we love.”The words fade onto the screen with an image of a character looking sad. The words then fade out.Various letters remain on screen to form a new set of words.
• The trailer gives possibilities of 4 characters who could be the ones leaving. ‘Libby’, ‘Bridget’, ‘Toadie’ or ‘Paul’.
• “A moment you’ll never forget” appears on screen.
  Cuts to a character at a graveyard laying flowers. Powerful moment.
• Blank screen showing channel (5), time (5:30pm), sponsors (Ladbrokesbingo.com) and the website written in white – this stands out. This is a good way of advertising the soap.

Old trailer: http://www.perfectblend-media.co.uk/troyuploads/1986-2.wmv

• 7pm tomorrow written on screen
• ‘Tomorrow on neighbours’ narrated
• Scene from show
• Narration – “but he’s fighting losing battle on both sides of the fence”
• Scene linking to narration – man looking through a hole in the fence at his neighbour.
• Words ‘7pm tomorrow’ remain on the bottom of the screen throughout the trailer.
• Monkey peering through curtain and window ends the trailer. The way the monkey looks through the curtain is how people look through their windows at their neighbours,
• Theme tune of neighbours played quietly in background throughout.
• ‘Neighbours 7’o clock tomorrow on 10” is narrated at the end of trailer.
  

Comparing trailers:

• Definite differences, 2009 trailer much more modern. Trailers are according to their time periods.
• Both trailers have non-diegetic music. 2009 trailer has a song matching the mood of the trailer, old trailer neighbours soundtrack.
• Old trailer – block letters on screen throughout. Very basic.
• 2009 trailer – words fade in and out
• 2009 trailer advertises the show more. It shows the channel, the sponsors and the time it is played.

By doing this, I have realised that trailers need to advertise when the show will be aired, at the end. I believe that the 2009 trailer did this in a better way. However, this may be because it is more modern and this is what we are used to when watching trailers. Trailers need to have scenes from the show and a soundtrack that fits in to the mood of the trailer. However, if the trailer is advertising a new soap, then I think the soundtrack for the opening credits will be more successful to use as it will allow the viewers to hear it and they will eventually begin to recognise it when hearing the trailer and then when hearing the show itself.

Written by Natalie Michael

Analysis of Questionnaire responses

Questionnaire

1) What is your gender?
Male female

2) What age group are you in?
10-14 15-19 20-24 25+

3) Do you watch soap operas? If so, which ones?

4) How often do you watch soap operas?

5) Where do you watch these soaps?
TV Internet

6) When do you watch these soaps?
During the week omnibus on the Internet

7) What do you think makes a good soap opera?

8) What type of characters appeal to you?

This is an example of the questionnaire we sent out to a randomly selected group of people.
The results showed that:

• Mostly females of all ages tend to watch soap operas.
• The most watched soap was Eastenders which was viewed on TV during the week.
• Most people wanted to see good storylines and appealing characters they could relate to.

We are going to use these findings to make sure we include what audiences want from soap operas in order to make to our work as successful as it can be.

Group effort: written by Natalie Michael and Thegla Savvides

Minutes for 1st Group Meeting

Discussing general ideas, pitch and treatment
Tuesday 15th September
Start Time: 11:37am
People Present: Elena Christodoulou, Thegla Savvides, Natalie Michael, Natalie Nicolaides

• As a group we decided to involve our soap around a teenage lifestyle, involving school, relationships and typical teenage problems.
• We discussed various locations and central meeting points like school, home and cafes.
  Characters we decided are based around a stereotypical teenager. leaving the audience the ability to relate to them.
• Heirachy:
  -Popularity Vs Geeks
  -Rich Vs Poor
• Popularity/Rich/Education
• Relationships/Jealousy/Revenge
• We also discussed targets for the week and allocated each other different assignments to complete. e.g research (questionnaires, TV soap analysis, trailer analysis evaluation of questionnaire etc.)

Finish Time: 12:26pm
Group effort: by Elena Christodoulou

Analysis of opening credits for Neighbours

As a group we have decided to analyse opening title sequences from a few popular soaps, both UK and abroad. We feel this will benefit us when deciding on our own opening sequence. We hope to take ideas both positive and negative and apply them to ours to make it the best it can be. Things like music type, colours, pictures and even the length of it.

Analysing the opening credits for soaps is helpful as it allows us to see which types of openings are successful and what of them is necessary in order for them to be successful.

• Images of the characters


• Theme song with ‘neighbours’ in lyrics
  “that’s when good neighbours become good friends”
  shows that it is a tight community where everyone gets along and supports each other. They are all friends.


• Audience watch and remember previous episodes and possibly what happened to specific characters as they see their pictures.


• Theme song is well known which allows people to recognise it.


• Bright colours are used and characters in images have smiles on their faces and they are having a good time. Shows that life on Ramsey Street is fun.


• Images are in a photo booth. Could show that life is picture perfect. But is this reality?

This analysis allows us to take the good points from the opening credits and use them to influence the decisions we make as to what music and layout we want for our opening credits.