Ichabod Crane (Tom Mison) is a soldier from the Revolutionary War who is resurrected in present day due to a spell cast by his wife Katrina (Katia Winter), who happens to be a witch and is currently trapped in purgatory. Unfortunately, Ichabod's revival is triggered by the return of the Headless Horseman, also known as the Horseman of Death from the Book of Revelations. Now, Ichabod is joined by Lieutenant Abbie Mills (Nicole Beharie) and others to continue the battle started by America's founding fathers against the coming Apocalypse.
A modern day twist on Washington Irving's classic story, Sleepy Hollow (2013-) has been described as a “sleeper hit,” no pun intended I'm sure, and for good reason; With an error rate of over 63% on its forecasted rating, Fox's latest success was the most underestimated new prime-time show for Fall 2013* and is currently in the running for fourteen Primetime Emmys (“Sleepy Hollow on FOX”). Sleepy Hollow managed a respectable season average of 7.46 million viewers and was renewed for a second season just four episodes into its run, despite a crazy premise and decaying lead-in (Levin). The show's success stems from combining aspects of two popular genres – horror and police procedural – as well as being shown in a limited run format.
Shows dealing with the supernatural, like Sleepy Hollow, fall under the broad category of genre show. They are targeted at a niche audience and typically slant towards science fiction or fantasy (Carrier). This type of programming has been gaining ground since the 1990s thanks to Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003) and The X-files (1993-2002), and has seen an increase in popularity over the last few years.
All prime time serials structure their episodes in four acts,...
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... York UP, 2009. Print
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Slavery’s Constitution by David Waldstreicher can be identified as a very important piece of political analytical literature as it was the first book to recognize slavery 's place at the heart of the U.S. Constitution. Waldstreicher successfully highlights a number of silences which most of the general public are unaware of, for example, the lack of the word “slavery” in the Constitution of the United States of America. Also, the overwhelming presence and lack of explicit mention of the debate of slavery during the construction of the document.
Sander, Gordon F. Serling: The Rise and Twilight of Television's Last Angry Man. New York: Dutton/The Penguin Group, 1992.
Craig talks about how in John Fiske’s book, Television culture (1987, Chs. 10,11), Fiske discusses “gend...
Irving, Washington. "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." The Heath Anthology of American Literature. 3rd ed. Vol. 1. Ed. Jayne M. Fargnoli. New York: Houghton, 1998. 1354-1373.
Irving, Washington. “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” The American Tradition in Literature. Vol 1. Eds. George Perkins, et al. 7th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1990: 544-563. 2 vols.
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in creating his vision of the town of Sleepy Hollow and the headless horseman, Katrina,
Irving's main character, Icabod Crane, causes a stir and disrupts the female order in the Hollow when he arrives from Connecticut. Crane is not only a representative of bustling, practical New England who threatens rural America with his many talents and fortune of knowledge; he is also an intrusive male who threatens the stability of a decidedly female place. By taking a closer look at the stories that circulate though Sleepy Hollow, one can see that Crane's expulsion follows directly from women's cultivation of local folklore. Female-centered Sleepy Hollow, by means of tales revolving around the emasculated, headless "dominant spirit" of region, figuratively neuters threatening masculine invaders like Crane to restore order and ensure the continuance of the old Dutch domesticity and their old wives' tales.
Goodale, Gloria. "TV in black and white." 20 November 1998. Christian Science Monitor. Web. 15 Jan. 2015.
In this parargaph, Ichabod Crane and Brom Bones have their same ways like. The two men had fell in love with a girl name Katrina it was like love at first sight because in paragraph 6, it says, “She soon found fewor in inchabods eyes, not mereley for her beauty but for her vasl inheritance.” In paragraph 8 , it explains how Brom Bone fell in love with Katrina aslo it states, “ When Brom Bones began wooing Katrina,
Washington Irving’s short story, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” was adapted into a movie titled “Sleepy Hollow” directed by Tim Burton nearly two centuries after the original publication. When the story was adapted as a film, several extensive changes were made. A short story easily read in one sitting was turned into a nearly two-hour thriller, mystery, and horror movie by incorporating new details and modifying the original version of the story. The short story relates the failed courtship of Katrina Van Tassel by Ichabod Crane. His courtship is cut short by the classic romance antagonist-the bigger, stronger, and better looking Broom Bones. Ichabod wishes to marry Katrina because of her beauty but also because of the wealthy inheritance she will receive when her father, Baltus Van Tassel and stepmother, Lady Van Tassel die. However, the film tells the story of Ichabod Crane as an investigator who is sent to Sleepy Hollow to investigate the recent decapitations that are occurring. These modifications alter the original story entirely, thus failing to capture the Irving’s true interpretation of “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” The film and the original story have similarities and differences in the plot, characters, and setting.
Steven Johnson wrote an article for the New York Times in which he argues that back in the days, television shows use to have a very simple plot which was easy to follow without too much attention. It was just an other way to sit back and relax. However, throughout the years, viewers grew tired of this situation and demanded more complex plot lines with multiple story lines that related to recent news topics. He takes the example of the television show “24”. “24” is known for being the first show which its plot occurs in “real-time”, it is also known for not censuring the violence of its topics. It is a drastic change from what Johnson states as an example “Starsky and Hutch” where basically each episodes was only a repetition of the last one. Johnson also believes that there is a misconception of the mass culture nowadays where people think the television viewer wants dumb shows which in response makes them dumber. Johnson does not agree, for him, television shows such as “24” are “nutritional”. He also states that sm...
Buffy the vampire slayer is a television show that aired in the 1990s. it summers the life of a teenage girl with super power that withstands the hardships of society. Although women are overly sexualized in modern television, Buffy the vampire slayer stands up for feminism as Hill says in her article: “Feminism is central to the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997–2003)” (Hill, 2012).
Fans can have strong responses to both narrative and production events effecting their favorite television shows. A wall used to mourn Ianto Jones after he is killed off Tortchwood:Children of the Earth. 50,000 pounds of peanuts mailed to CBS's New York office to show support of Jericho when it was canceled (Elber 2007). Hate and threats directed to writers, producers, actors, and their families protesting the importance of Castiel in Supernatural. These reactions are tied to fans' emotional investment and connections they have created by expanding past what is seen on screen. A sense of justification for the actions taken stem from the broken promise of shared production in a participatory culture.
11 Ellen Seiter and Mary Jeanne Wilson, “Soap Opera Survival Tactics”, in Thinking Outside the Box: A Contemporary Television Genre Reader (Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2005), 138.