HELLO, SETTING.
I'm a sucker for setting. Show me a story with a strong, authentic setting and I can forgive just about anything else. Unfortunately, setting isn't exactly easy to write. We forget how important it can be, what an impact it can have on the feeling of the story. And while in a novel it's easy to forget about the setting, let it slide to the back of our minds or fall by the wayside, this is rarely the case in television shows, where the setting is often at the forefront. And in a good way. With the help of four of the best shows of ever, I'm going to tell you why setting is so important and why it can be so incredibly awesome. (And as great as these shows are, I'm betting that maybe you haven't seen all four of them? That's okay. The lessons still apply. Maybe hit up Hulu/Netflix/1967 to check them out?) Also, there is so much more I could talk about with setting, so many other great television shows that have great examples, but for today...
As far as this show is concerned, the small, football-obsessed town colors every other aspect of the show from its storylines to the characters. You really need to watch the show to get the full effect, but I can honestly say that I can't think of anything that happens on the show that isn't true to the setting and that isn't, in large part, controlled by the setting. When football is your life, when you've lived in the same town with the same people forever (as most of these characters have), things that to many people are no big deal become huge. A loss on game day. A high school principal who enforces the No Pass, No Play rule when it comes to the school's football stars. In Texas, as they say, everything is bigger, and that's definitely true when it comes to this show. Friday Night Lights takes stories involving high school fights, sports, classes, and teenage relationships and elevates them to new heights. Everything matters in this show not only because of the great writing and characters, but also because of the backdrop it's set against: high school football in Texas.
ESTABLISH THE WHERE.
This setting works so well because they take the time to establish it from the very beginning. Instead of diving headlong into the story, the pilot episode of Friday Night Lights opens slowly, showing us the flat land of Texas, the stadium lights, and the team's new coach walking out across the football field just as the sun is peaking. Playing over this slow opening is the radio announcer, talking about the new season and the new coach, taking calls from listeners, and establishing not only the show's backstory but also, and more importantly for us, the setting. Just by these few opening moments the viewer knows things about the where of Friday Night Lights. We know this is Texas. We know it's a small town. And we know that high school football is the most important thing. Though first-page infodumps are a bad idea, there are ways to take a page out of the FNL playbook and establish the setting at the outset.
Alright, I know I'm losing a lot of you by using a show that's almost fifty years old, but bear with me here because all you really need to know is that Get Smart is about spies. If you want to get technical about it this is a "workplace sitcom," but the important difference between this and, say, The Office is that being a paper salesman doesn't define Jim Halpert the way being a spy defines Maxwell Smart. These characters don't have lives outside of work because they are the job. And the job is the setting. This is shown a million little ways, from the fact that the main character reads a book called Bedtime Stories for Spies to the fact that one main character doesn't have a name, only a number.
PAY ATTENTION TO IMPACT.
Setting is not only the where of your story, it's often also the culture that permeates the story and characters. We do not and cannot exist independent of our environment and neither can characters. The point here is that oftentimes the setting or culture will, realistically, have a huge impact on your character's identity and this, in turn, will impact who the character is. Or, to put it another way:
Setting = Culture --> Identity --> Character.
As much as setting can make stories bigger, as in the case of Friday Night Lights, it often also limits what you can do with your story. Take the case of Community, which is set in a study group at community college. One of the reasons this show is so great is because it obeys the boundaries of its setting. Sure, the episodes' storylines are wacky and sometimes all over the place, but at the root of each episode is the Plausibility Factor: yes, this could actually happen in a community college. Whether they're putting on a drug awareness skit for middle schoolers or trying to cheat their way into classes that don't actually exist, these are things that could, conceivably, happen in the show's setting.
STAY IN THE LINES.
Creative is good. Weird is, depending on what you're writing, good. But the second you go beyond the boundaries of what could possibly happen, your setting loses credibility. Not only that, but the entire story itself loses credibility; it ceases to be realistic and you've just created another hurdle you have to overcome. Either color inside the lines of your setting, or ignore the setting altogether. Though setting is important, disregarding it is often worse than ignoring it altogether.
So far all the shows I've mentioned have had settings that more or less stay the same throughout the series' run. But what about shows like Gilmore Girls, where the setting changes. Partway through the series one of the title characters goes off to college and the show follows her as she leaves her small and super-quaint hometown for Yale University. And guess what? It works. The show changes, but because this change goes along with the development of the show it ends up working to the advantage. Characters don't always stay in the same place. Stories don't always happen in the same place. Switching things up partway through presents a difficult challenge, but if handled right it can be incredibly useful.
STAY TRUE TO YOUR ROOTS.
One thing Gilmore Girls does absolutely right is to keep the backbone of its show even while changing the setting. The strong mother-daughter relationship is still at play and the charming town of Stars Hollow is still a part of the show because one main character still lives there. By keeping the root of the show very much alive it not only gives the series stability but also serves to show how much the daughter's character has changed. It works for contrast and familiarity. If you do change the setting in your story, do it deliberately, do it carefully, and be sure to stay true to the roots because that original setting is at the core of your story.
To sum up:
- Establish the setting early on. This can be done through dialogue, important details, and internal monologue; just make sure it's not an infodump.
- Remember that, in stories where the setting is at the forefront, it should color everything.
- Realize the ways that the setting or culture of your story has shaped your characters and show that your characters are, at least in some ways, a reflection of their environment.
- Know that with a setting comes certain boundaries. Make sure your plot works within these boundaries.
- It's better to ignore setting altogether than to implement it only for it to be disregarded later.
- If you must change the setting of your story, make sure it works with the development of either character or plot. And always, always be careful in switching things up, realizing how much it will impact the story.
What television shows do you think writers can learn from? What helps you with building a great setting?
This is a great post! Thinking about setting in terms of these TV shows is helpful. Setting is something I need to work on in my WIP.
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