Being in the place of someone: a process of negotiation between spectator and character from “experientiality”

Abstract

The article discusses the relationship between character and narrative in serial fiction. The argument is that, in the series, a game for the reader/ spectator is formulated, weakening the notion of end, and at the same time strengthening the notion of character. Thus, what is hypothesized is that in the narrative of the series the centrality of the plot is weakened due to the negotiation process of the audience, that from the “experientiality” puts itself in the game of repeating someone’s path. Such arguments are intended to answer the following question: is the consumption of series an attempt of aesthetic experiment much more related to an invitation to experience the place of the character in the present than to be guided by the narrative in which events are already foreseen? The starting point is a theoretical discussion about the growth of serial fiction consumption, the structure of the narrative text and the relation between this type of consumption and the aesthetic experience – in other words, a specific mode of temporality and enjoyment in which the receiver is involved.