Core Response #1 by Mike Goemaat

When referring to the distribution of films through television, Williams and McLuhan both use language of restriction or deficiency. Williams talks about how the technological limitations of television reduce the image quality, specifically when broadcasting a film, so much so that television is a less enjoyable experience: “I found it significant that the least satisfactory experience was that of viewing on the ordinary set” (Williams, 56). McLuhan, too, sees a high-low distinction between film and television. In “Television: The Timid Giant” he says “to contrast it with the film shot, many directors refer to the TV image as one of ‘low definition,’ in the sense that it offers little detail and a low degree of information, much like the cartoon” (McLuhan, 347). According to both scholars, it is television’s inability to render film in its original, theatrical quality that is a current (in their time) weakness of the medium. That being said, Williams and McLuhan could not have anticipated the technological evolutions that have exponentially increased the quality of at-home television presentation. Williams predicts that these “disadvantages are unlikely to be overcome,” and yet supporters of our Golden Age of Television (aka Prestige TV) would beg to differ (Williams, 55). 

I won’t fully define Prestige TV for I believe that, by now, many of us know it when we see it. Rather, I am interested in exploring the technological improvements that may have contributed to its rise. Television imagery in McLuhan’s time was “of low intensity or definition” but screens have gotten larger, sleeker, and capable of projecting images in Ultra High Definition and with improved sound (McLuhan, 350). As the technical limitations of the medium that Williams and McLuhan point out permanently disappear, have the medium’s mechanical improvements given rise to a more cinematic version of television? 

Obviously it is more complicated than simply saying that better television tech has improved television program quality, but I think there is a connection that is worth exploring. For instance, I’ve decided to rewatch Severance this week, a show that I adored last winter. Formally, it is full of “cinematic” signifiers. From its wide establishing shots of the Lumon Headquarters, to its high-angle tracking shots displaying the complexity of the office, and its variety of shot types to enhance the characters’ emotions, the show feels filmic. When McLuhan writes that “the TV image…does not afford detailed information about objects” and “the close-up that in the movie is used for shock is, on TV, quite a casual thing,” I think about how Severance deploys close-ups, most notably in its elevator scenes. Severance focuses on the elevator rides to depict not only a character’s physical transition from the outside world to the work world, but also a psychological transition from their true self to their severed self. To visualize this difference, the directors use a dolly zoom effect to widen or narrow their facial features and the background depending on which state they are entering and exiting. This technique has been in use for decades, most notably by Hitchcock in Vertigo. This makes it, by definition, a cinematic technique. This example blurs the distinction between film and television in ways that Williams and McLuhan could not have anticipated in the 60’s and 70’s, but it was their observations about the quality of television and its re-developed and newly invented forms that got me thinking in this way.