Chinese television dramas (simplified Chinese: 电视连续剧) are similar to television dramas in North America, but are often longer, and portray a story too lengthy to be made into a movie.
A large number of series end all episodes in cliffhangers. CCTV-8 is a channel that airs TV series around the clock. Series are divided into several rough categories: historical (subdivided into historical fiction, nationalist-rallying, historical re-enactment and wuxia), police and politics, comedy, and a more modern family conflicts drama. The beginning of each episode is by prologued an opening theme music with credits and at the end there is some ending theme music, with more credits than the opening music.
The series of episodes runs on together to depict a series of events that happen one after another in relevance to the main plot of the drama. Like a novel, the drama contains characters, conflict, plot, climax, and resolution that intrigue the audience’s interest. The large number of episodes allows the plot to be carried in much more detail than in a short movie. A particular aspect of life such as high school, college, or work life of a person, or a specific job is shown with much greater details that allows the audience to acknowledge that particular area in detail. This gives the audience a better understanding of the characters and their perspectives as well as the entirety of the storyline.
Long-form Chinese television series vary in quality, although in recent years, observers have noted a sharp increase in production values and script quality in some series. Also, a number of Chinese television series used music from Hollywood movies as incidental music.
Dramas are generated with a specific genre like romance, comedy, horror, family drama, sports, or a mixture of these in the form of ancient, historical, or modern to highlight the theme and suits the audience’s interest. Chinese dramas are often classified by where they were produced, such as mainland dramas, Taiwanese dramas, and Hong Kong dramas. Each differs in the style of filming and editing format. Most consist of romance, family and friends with the combination of pop cultural themes.
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“Only by the form, the pattern,
Can words or music reach
The stillness, as a Chinese jar still
Moves perpetually in its stillness.”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)
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“Only in the problem play is there any real drama, because drama is no mere setting up of the camera to nature: it is the presentation in parable of the conflict between Man’s will and his environment: in a word, of problem.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)