Drama is a Greek word meaning 'action'

The audience for TV Drama grow attached emotionally to fictional characters; they empathise or relate to certain characters

TV Drama is "fictionalised action in narrative form produced for TV".  It is filmed, acted and edited in a way that will appeal to a specific target audience.

  Popular TV Dramas 

Eastenders: hovers around 8 million per episode

Coronation Street: between 8.6 & 8.9 million per episode

TV Drama covers everything from Soaps, cop dramas, hospital dramas, docu-dramas to classic literary adaptations

TV Drama also employs many different narrative structures.

TV Dramas vary in terms of their style, editing and mise-en-scene

Have a look at the opening credits of The Wire and True Blood 

Opening credits use key MICRO elements to convey information to the audience. What information is conveyed in the opening credits of either The Wire or True Blood? What can you say about:The genre of the showThe location of the showThe main themes of the showThe world the characters of the show inhabit Write up your thoughts into a 300 word response. Try to use as many technical MICRO features as possible in your write up. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1S69staui8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxINMuOgAu8

What links all of these forms of TV Drama is the way they use characters to tell a story.

The continuing popularity of TV Drama and its importance to broadcasters seems to be rooted in people's fascination with, and emotional involvement in, characters and stories

TV Drama is vital to TV. Although expensive to produce when it is good it reaches large, frequently global audiences.

The Wire has only recently been shown on terrestrial TV, however all five seasons of the HBO show are in the Amazon top 20 sellers.

Internet forums, blogs, print media and You Tube all helped to make The Wire a huge hit in the UK.

In a digitally converging environment, new platforms are providing new forms of TV Drama.

Dubplate Drama My Space

Interactive Dramas like 'Dubplate Drama' involve the audience and allow the audience to influence the narrative progression

Mobisodes are TV Dramas for your mobile; Lost offered fans a series of thirteen video clips ranging in length from one to four minutes that aired during the hiatus between the 3rd and 4th seasons.

New media technology has allowed new means of distribution for TV Drama.