American television series are probably one of the most popular ones worldwide in the television industry. There might be many factors supporting this idea: the variety of different series, the wealth of the industry leading to non-stop production and most importantly the language, English, which is known to be a world language due to its wide spread. It also seems like America was one of the first ones to invent talk shows, TV series and news shows and was taken by many other nations as an example. Also the introduction of real life shows starring many different celebrities, who would show how they live and the issues they were confronted on a daily basis, was equally done by American producers. The theory of “the early bird catches the worm”, meaning American television series were one of the first ones, and due to their popularity a certain habit of watching American TV series evolved, could be the potential reason for the global dominance of America’s TV series.
As already mentioned above, the matter of language barriers might be the essential factor. People are used to communicate in English as soon as they visit a different-language-speaking country and this can be transferred onto our TV culture, too. In most parts of the worlds , even with little education, people have picked up some of internationalized english terms such as “cool”, “hi”, “Hello” etc. So this transfers a certain feeling of a culture and raises interest amongst everybody and – of course – it makes it much easier to try to understand american TV series than for example German or Italian ones. This wide-spread of the English language leads to high demand for foreign TV shows to learn more about a “known” culture so the easiest option would be – once again – to watch American TV shows.
America is not only known for their TV series but also for their entire movie industry, so known as “Hollywood”. Hollywood-movies are widely spread to many countries and audiotranslated due to their high popularity. This indicates that America’s techniques and quality – or more like their consumer knowledge – is highly developed. This does not mean that others are not as good, but it the combination of consumer’s habits and laziness to take the risk and try TV series from different origins, which gives American producers the advantage. This of course represents an immense barrier to TV series producers from other countries. Although they may be at the same level in terms of quality and techniques, the demand is missing hence success cannot be guaranteed. It almost seems to be already preprogrammed in most of consumer’s mind that American TV series is a warranty for good entertainment and people hardly even try to find TV series which are non- american. As Charlotte Koh points out “We’re used to sharing our stories with the rest of the world.” This has increased American TV producers’ knowledge over centuries. They truly know what the market demands, the trends and how consumers behave. They are selling the “typical American lifestyle”, which is portrayed as glamourous, dramatic and highly entertaining. This is exactly what Van Sandt points out “People love to learn about how other people live”.
Therefore if a certain attractive lifestyle is transformed, maybe in a different manner, in almost every TV series and has achieved high popularity all around the world then it is not a big surprise that we keep finding ourselves watching American TV series.
Another main factor may be the large audience that is represented by Americans, who tend to prefer their own country’s made TV shows thus not helping the international industry to settle in the US market. Even though PBS and BBC America have been importing British TV series (such as Downton abbey, attracting more than 12 million viewers) with a great success, a proper breakthrough of foreign country TV series has not been achieved yet. Many people have started to seek for alternatives for American TV series and reported highly positively. And still Americans tend to reproduce TV series, originated from other countries, by adding their own typical style and techniques. Examples include “Homeland”, which originated from the Israeli drama “Hatufim”, “The Killing”, which was reproduced from Danish production called “Forbrydelsen” or “The returned”, which was a mega hit in France as “Les Revenants”. The main reason for the vast reproduction may be fundamentally the language barriers hence having to follow subtitles while watching simply subtracts joy and comfort. An additional barrier for non-american TV series are the lack of certain rights to access the originals and particular negotiations that almost “force” Americans to watch their home country’s made series.
Below, the American version “The returned” from the French one “Les revenants”
Once again, a reproduced version of “The Killing” from the Danish production “Forbrydelsen” (literally “the crime)
The original version of the columbian telenovela “Yo soy Betty” and below the reproduced american Version “Ugly Betty”
So is it in fact possible for TV series with non-american origins to become as popular as American ones? Above I have mentioned the factors contributing either to the issue why American ones are this popular or the several barriers that exist and complicate the way to the top for international TV series producer. The essential factor may be the language barriers that require subtitles to make the viewer understand the content. And again reading subtitles might not be as comfortable and relaxing as just listening and “switching off one’s brain”. Therefore this barrier can only be solved by using audio-translations, which are most likely less desirable as (for the American industry) there is still the option to reproduce the foreign series and to keep the earnings amongst the American TV industry.
Additionally we can say that America has established a world wide high-entertainment-reputation by selling their culture and its lifestyles in the best and most glamourous way possible. This has led to highly positive feedback by consumers from all around the planet and achieved a certain solid positioning in the industry, which highly ranked. The American culture was the first to show how it has differentiated itself from other nations and this was done in a unique and desirable manner.
Hence the complexities that other non-american TV series producers might face are not too easy to eliminate. It might be a long way to overcome each and every obstacle in terms of language, style, techniques and differentiation, as competition will always exist. However nothing is impossible and positive changes are always welcomed and exciting amongst consumers.
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