2016 RTE Drama: Rebellion - no spoilers please (mod warning in post #1)

Daenarys

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

I was thinking more of the TG4 series about The Rising that were basically documentaries with reenactments in them.

But that's just a documentary then; non- fiction, no drama or fictional characters, just a re-enactment where no factual footage is available.

A Docudrama includes fictional characters and some creative writing to make more of a "drama" out of a historical event; to hold the attention of our lazy 21st century brains

fin12

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

I was thinking more of the TG4 series about The Rising that were basically documentaries with reenactments in them.

Can you watch that on the tg4 player or is it available to watch somewhere online?

Pretzill

Daenarys wrote: »

But that's just a documentary then; non- fiction, no drama or fictional characters, just a re-enactment where no factual footage is available.

A Docudrama includes fictional characters and some creative writing to make more of a "drama" out of a historical event; to hold the attention of our lazy 21st century brains

No a docudrama is factual events/characters dramatised. Explore fiction and it's just a drama.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

fin12 wrote: »

Can you watch that on the tg4 player or is it available to watch somewhere online?

They repeated one of the series recently, so maybe.

jmcc

fin12 wrote: »

Can you watch that on the tg4 player or is it available to watch somewhere online?

http://www.tg4.ie/en/programmes/1916-2016-comoradh/

Far better than the Down Town Abbey stuff.

Regards...jmcc

3rdDegree

Daenarys wrote: »

But that's just a documentary then; non- fiction, no drama or fictional characters, just a re-enactment where no factual footage is available.

A Docudrama includes fictional characters and some creative writing to make more of a "drama" out of a historical event; to hold the attention of our lazy 21st century brains

By your definition, Inglorious Bastards would be a Docudrama

Strazdas

Daenarys wrote: »

Why wouldn't it be? The Vikings did raid and pillage England, France etc. A docudrama is a dramatised tv/film based on real events. Fits the criteria in my opinion!

A docudrama would feature real life characters and specific events that actually happened in history that were recorded and documented with dates and names of the people involved etc. It wouldn't be 'based on' real events, it would be an actual dramatised depiction of those events.

Strazdas

jmcc wrote: »

http://www.tg4.ie/en/programmes/1916-2016-comoradh/

Far better than the Down Town Abbey stuff.

Regards...jmcc

I think the TG4 stuff is decent enough but it's still clearly made on a low budget and would struggle to make it's way onto mainstream and prime time TV. We're not talking about high end documentaries here.

fisgon

jmcc wrote: »

That's why the audience, other than what now appear to be shills and fans, didn't particularly like it.

Regards...jmcc

OK, anyone who doesn't share your point of view is a "shill" or a "fan"?

You know what, you're right, I now have to admit that I am on the RTE payroll, they pay me to come on to discussion forums and defend their programmes. YOu got me, what can I say, well done, how did you see through me?

Regards

A shill

(I notice you forgot to defend your use of the word "revulsion" to describe a TV series. Convenient, that,....)

fisgon

jmcc wrote: »

http://www.tg4.ie/en/programmes/1916-2016-comoradh/

Far better than the Down Town Abbey stuff.

Regards...jmcc

Oh yeah, the old Downton comparison. So Rebellion was set in 1916, Downton Abbey was set in the same time period, they must be the same.

If you have actually watched both series with an open mind you will see that they have little in common. Whatever about the merits or defects of either series, the Downton comparison is just lazy, lazy commentary.

JohnFalstaff

Strazdas wrote: »

A docudrama would feature real life characters and specific events that actually happened in history that were recorded and documented with dates and names of the people involved etc. It wouldn't be 'based on' real events, it would be an actual dramatised depiction of those events.

Strazdas wrote: »

I think the TG4 stuff is decent enough but it's still clearly made on a low budget and would struggle to make it's way onto mainstream and prime time TV. We're not talking about high end documentaries here.

Docudrama is a strange hybrid alright. The term is sometimes used to cover historical dramas but more commonly associated with documentaries that feature dramatic re-enactments intercut with interviews from historians and other contributors.

And I don't think it's correct to lump all the 'TG4 stuff' in together. They have made a variety of historical documentary series over the years, of varying quality. The Seachtar Na Cásca series stands out in my opinion and would qualify as a high end documentary series.

Strazdas

JohnFalstaff wrote: »

Docudrama is a strange hybrid alright. The term is sometimes used to cover historical dramas but more commonly associated with documentaries that feature dramatic re-enactments intercut with interviews from historians and other contributors.

It seems people (including the TV critics) wanted a TV series that dramatised the Rising through the eyes of it's leaders such as Pearse, Connolly and Clarke etc and were annoyed with the fictionalised version which they were presented.

But there have been relatively few successful drama series of this type. It seems programme makers don't like having to make an entire drama series where the script is already written for them and we know how the story pans out. Such dramatic re-enactments often come in the form of one off TV movies instead.

So I can totally see why RTE went the route of fictionalised drama for Rebellion. Not to mention the fact that a dramatised re-enactment of the Rising might simply have been criticised or completely ignored by the viewers.

Shurimgreat

Really don't get why people would want a drama featuring Pearse, Connolly, etc as the main characters.

I know something like that might appeal to folks like jmcc who seem to hate period dramas full stop and imagine that if two dramas are both made around the same era, this must be exactly the same. However, the fact remains that we know what happened Pearse, Connolly and so on. The whole point of a drama is leaving the ending unknown.

Really glad people like jmcc are not writing dramas for RTE!

Shurimgreat

JohnFalstaff wrote: »

Docudrama is a strange hybrid alright. The term is sometimes used to cover historical dramas but more commonly associated with documentaries that feature dramatic re-enactments intercut with interviews from historians and other contributors.

And I don't think it's correct to lump all the 'TG4 stuff' in together. They have made a variety of historical documentary series over the years, of varying quality. The Seachtar Na Cásca series stands out in my opinion and would qualify as a high end documentary series.

As soon as you deviate in the slightest from the hard facts about the 1916 Rising or the main narrative (Pearse and co raiding the GPO, executions etc), you begin to raise the ire of the history buffs who believe anything other than a fateful recounting of the facts amounts to a form of sacrilege.

Rebellion was never ever flagged as a docu-drama. And yet you still have people asking why didn't they just make a docu-drama? Like we really need another docu-drama about 1916 to go with the dozens of others.

Rebellion will not be liked by all that's clear. Some will hate most of what RTE produce. I'm thinking of the likes of Jmcc here (I have a suspicion jmcc is working for TV3 by the way. Its the only way to explain his hatred for Rebellion).

JohnFalstaff

Strazdas wrote: »

It seems people (including the TV critics) wanted a TV series that dramatised the Rising through the eyes of it's leaders such as Pearse, Connolly and Clarke etc and were annoyed with the fictionalised version which they were presented.

But there have been relatively few successful drama series of this type. It seems programme makers don't like having to make an entire drama series where the script is already written for them and we know how the story pans out. Such dramatic re-enactments often come in the form of one off TV movies instead.

So I can totally see why RTE went the route of fictionalised drama for Rebellion. Not to mention the fact that a dramatised re-enactment of the Rising might simply have been criticised or completely ignored by the viewers.

It's a tricky thing to get right but nearly every historical drama will be a depiction of actual events as seen through the prism of the writer and director's interpretation. It's a tried and tested method, worked well for Shakespeare, but difficult to get right and I agree that you'll never satisfy everyone.

Even something like HBO's Conspiracy (2001), where much of the script was taken from the actual minutes of the Wannsee conference, was criticised for creating scenes which showed the characters taking breaks from the meeting table. But these scenes were necessary in terms of making an engaging drama.

I think viewers and critics are annoyed at RTE because they chose not to even try and create a drama where the historical characters were front and centre. And I think this comes back to RTE wanting to create a storyline that could be carried over into a second and third series. They might have thought that making characters like Tom Clarke and Seán MacDiarmada the focus of Rebellion wouldn't allow for a sequel when they are all going to be shot at the end of Series 1. This also would explain why historical characters like Dev & Collins were given proportionally more screen time than some of the more important figures from the Rising - they are both naturally going to feature in any follow up.

P. Breathnach

Shurimgreat wrote: »

Really don't get why people would want a drama featuring Pearse, Connolly, etc as the main characters....

I do get it.

Much of the demand comes from people who see the rebels as heroes, preferably flawless heroes. They probably want a hagiography. They also see the "true facts" of 1916 as unquestioned and unquestionable.

They got such a programme in 1966. I thought it was fairly well done, but I was a young lad at the time, and understood things a lot less well than I do now. And I didn't have the internet to tell me what to think.

It would be interesting to see it again. It would be a great exercise in historicity.

jmcc

Strazdas wrote: »

I think the TG4 stuff is decent enough but it's still clearly made on a low budget and would struggle to make it's way onto mainstream and prime time TV. We're not talking about high end documentaries here.

They are well made and actually have some emotional impact. They humanise their subjects. This is something that Rebellion fails to do because the writing was so poor. Though people may consider them low-brow, good soap operas manage to develop characters that hold the interests of the audience and with which the audience begins to emotionally relate. Rebellion's writing is so poor that this kind of emotional buy-in doesn't happen.

Regard...jmcc

jmcc

fisgon wrote: »

OK, anyone who doesn't share your point of view is a "shill" or a "fan"?

It would be easy to say 'yes'. But there does seem to be quite a bit of fanboyism (or fangirlism) on the thread.

(I notice you forgot to defend your use of the word "revulsion" to describe a TV series. Convenient, that,....)

A countdown to the six nations rugby matches on what was supposed to be the execution of James Connolly -- something that was supposed to be a dramatic high point of the episode. I would ask if you thought that it was appropriate but you probably never even noticed.

Regards...jmcc

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

jmcc wrote: »

It would be easy to say 'yes'. But there does seem to be quite a bit of fanboyism (or fangirlism) on the thread.

The "fanboy" "fangirl" argument is the modern equivalent of comparing someone to Hitler. If that's the best you can do you should probably stop.

Strazdas

JohnFalstaff wrote: »

It's a tricky thing to get right but nearly every historical drama will be a depiction of actual events as seen through the prism of the writer and director's interpretation. It's a tried and tested method, worked well for Shakespeare, but difficult to get right and I agree that you'll never satisfy everyone.

Even something like HBO's Conspiracy (2001), where much of the script was taken from the actual minutes of the Wannsee conference, was criticised for creating scenes which showed the characters taking breaks from the meeting table. But these scenes were necessary in terms of making an engaging drama.

I think viewers and critics are annoyed at RTE because they chose not to even try and create a drama where the historical characters were front and centre. And I think this comes back to RTE wanting to create a storyline that could be carried over into a second and third series. They might have thought that making characters like Tom Clarke and Seán MacDiarmada the focus of Rebellion wouldn't allow for a sequel when they are all going to be shot at the end of Series 1. This also would explain why historical characters like Dev & Collins were given proportionally more screen time than some of the more important figures from the Rising - they are both naturally going to feature in any follow up.

I've seen Conspiracy myself and that was a brilliant piece of work but even that was a one off TV movie. I'm not sure this format transfers at all well to a TV series.

We saw what happened when RTE tried the docudrama route with Charlie. That should have been a fascinating subject matter with people like Haughey, Lenihan and O'Malley brought to life but viewers took one look at the series and were bored stiff. I've a sneaking feeling a docudrama type Rebellion would have ended up being slated by the same snooty TV critics saying "They couldn't even get men like Pearse and Connolly right, these characterisations are just laughable".

And as you've pointed out, a drama about the leaders of the Rising would have made a second and third series impossible.

jmcc

fisgon wrote: »

The fact is, whatever RTE did with this was going to receive criticism. It is still a touchy subject, for Shinners it was never going to be republican enough, because they don't want drama, they want propaganda. And for many other Irish people we are just waiting for RTE to take a chance and do something creative so we can criticise it.

And here we have another simpleton strawman: Everyone who criticises the poor writing, and other flaws, of Rebellion is a nasty, dastardly "Shinner". Pathetic!

But, based on your posts on the thread, what could one expect? A learned treatise on the merits of Rebellion as a drama? No. That would require ability, knowledge and effort. Though as the media at the time considered it as the "Sinn Fein Rebellion", one can see why someone with a limited knowledge of events might try to drag Sinn Fein into the argument even though Sinn Fein had little to do with the Rising.

RTE hasn't a good record on some kinds of drama and Rebellion did nothing to change that.

Regards...jmcc

jmcc

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

The "fanboy" "fangirl" argument is the modern equivalent of comparing someone to Hitler. If that's the best you can do you should probably stop.

No. That would be Godwin's law. Basically the longer a thread lasts on the internet, the higher the chances are that someone will bring up Hitler or the Nazis.

Regards...jmcc

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

jmcc wrote: »

No. That would be Godwin's law. Basically the longer a thread lasts on the internet, the higher the chance are that someone will bring up Hitler or the Nazis.

Regards...jmcc

I know what it is. I'm saying accusing someone of being a fanboy/girl is the modern equivalent. You're not even reading the posts now, you're just firing out random responses.

jmcc

Strazdas wrote: »

We saw what happened when RTE tried the docudrama route with Charlie. That should have been a fascinating subject matter with people like Haughey, Lenihan and O'Malley brought to life but viewers took one look at the series and were bored stiff.

And who wrote the Charlie mini-series?

Regards...jmcc

jmcc

JohnFalstaff wrote: »

Even something like HBO's Conspiracy (2001), where much of the script was taken from the actual minutes of the Wannsee conference, was criticised for creating scenes which showed the characters taking breaks from the meeting table. But these scenes were necessary in terms of making an engaging drama.

It was, I think, meant to draw on the banality of evil (part of the title of a book on the Eichmann trial). The way in which the main characters discussed the elimination of millions of people and then casually moved to chatting outside of the main discussions worked well. Rebellion just isn't in the same class of writing.

Regards...jmcc

Strazdas

jmcc wrote: »

And who wrote the Charlie mini-series?

Regards...jmcc

Yes, the same guy as Rebellion. But Rebellion seems to have been more successful overall than Charlie. The latter started out with a huge TV audience and then saw a quite dramatic fall off in viewers for the second and third episodes. Funnily enough, the same TV critics who slated Rebellion appeared to love Charlie and never described the latter as a "flop" nor commented on the major fall off in viewers.

jmcc

Strazdas wrote: »

Funnily enough, the same TV critics who slated Rebellion appeared to love Charlie and never described the latter as a "flop" nor commented on the major fall off in viewers.

Most people still had some living memory of Haughey and may have been familiar with the events in the series. There was some discussion of the series but it would have been on political discussion forums. That living memory thing makes the difference when it comes to doing historical drama because there's always the risk of someone in the audience saying that things did not happen as portrayed.

Regards...jmcc

Shurimgreat

War and Peace on the BBC dropped a million viewers from episode 1 to episode 2. Yet it has been critically acclaimed by critics and many viewers alike.

Deutschand 83, also acclaimed by many, lost almost half its viewers within a forthnight on Channel 4!

On Channel 4 at 9pm, Deutschland 83 also dropped audience members, slipping below the 1 million mark for the first time.

Its overnight number of 900,000 is down on the 1.1 million who tuned in last week and a far cry from the 1.5 million who were on board the week before.

http://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/635694/War-And-Peace-Call-The-Midwife-ratings

As regards Rebellion, many people watched it online who missed it on tv. Some people usually make a point of watching the first episode of dramas like Rebellion, War and Peace and Deutschland 83 but often give up after that probably because they don't have the patience to follow it through to the end.

Episode three dropped to 538,900 viewers. However, RTE add that "the third episode of Rebellion gained an additional 164,300 viewers over the past week through RTÉ One +1, time shifted viewing and additional Player streams and we expect that viewing figures for episode four will continue to grow over the coming days as viewers catch-up with the episode ahead of the series finale next Sunday January 31st."

http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/television/tv-news/rte-not-ruling-out-rebellion-spinoff-despite-plunging-ratings-34397398.html

It doesn't really matter if people watched Rebellion at the time of the original transmission or watched it on the player later. What matters is they watched it.

Its quite amazing with regards some of the arguments about historical accuracy that some people criticise Rebellion for historical inaccuracies yet laud Lincoln, Michael Collins and Braveheart each of which have many more historical inaccuracies.

It seems some people were determined to criticise Rebellion regardless of how good or bad it was. It was bandwagon jumping of the worst kind.

Strazdas

Shurimgreat wrote: »

War and Peace on the BBC dropped a million viewers from episode 1 to episode 2. Yet it has been critically acclaimed by critics and many viewers alike.

Deutschand 83, also acclaimed by many, lost almost half its viewers within a forthnight on Channel 4!



http://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/635694/War-And-Peace-Call-The-Midwife-ratings

As regards Rebellion, many people watched it online who missed it on tv. Some people usually make a point of watching the first episode of dramas like Rebellion, War and Peace and Deutschland 83 but often give up after that probably because they don't have the patience to follow it through to the end.



http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/television/tv-news/rte-not-ruling-out-rebellion-spinoff-despite-plunging-ratings-34397398.html

It doesn't really matter if people watched Rebellion at the time of the original transmission or watched it on the player later. What matters is they watched it.

Its quite amazing with regards some of the arguments about historical accuracy that some people criticise Rebellion for historical inaccuracies yet laud Lincoln, Michael Collins and Braveheart each of which have many more historical inaccuracies.

It seems some people were determined to criticise Rebellion regardless of how good or bad it was. It was bandwagon jumping of the worst kind.

Deutschland '83 dropped a large number of viewers in Germany as well. What seems to be lost on the Irish TV critics is that falling ratings for TV drama series are extremely common. People will watch the first episode or two and decide it's not for them which is perfectly natural whilst others will stick with it. Rebellion lost only 150k viewers over it's entire run and yet this prompted the Irish media to label it a "flop" and a dud.

The Rape of Lucretia

Lt Dan wrote: »

TV entertainment? What a ghastly comment to make. Nothing entertaining about the Irish Civil War. Oh, but, let us forget about other people so long as you all are entertained.

What a bizarre statement. I wasn't entertaining myself with the Irish civil war (cant afford one of those time travel things).
Of course is was entertainment. I chose to watch for the pleasure, of my own volition, ahead of other entertainments I might choose on a Sunday evening: other TV, listen to a good radio station, read a book, listen to music, etc, etc.
I wasn't out to educate myself, consider my political views on the terrorism that diverted our countries course of history, or check on the value for money of my licence fee.
I just wanted to enjoy a bit of drama before hitting the hay. And I got it. Not to the level of 'Great TV', or even to the level of War and Peace which I was watching with it for the last month. But to a good enough level. If I hadnt, I would have quit out at any time I felt it was boring me.
There was lots to be entertained by in the Irish Civil War.