Televisual Shared Universes

This book presents a variety of televisual shared universes to open up discussion and critically engage with the extensive storyworlds possible in the medium. Scholars of film studies, media studies, and popular culture will find this book of particular interest.

This book of empirical studies analyzes examples of televisual shared universes since the 1960s to understand how the nature of televised serial narratives and network corporate policies have long created shared storyworlds. While there has been much discussion about shared cinematic universes and comic book universes, the concept has had limited exploration in other media, such as those seen on the smaller screen. By applying convergence culture and other contemporary media studies concepts to television’s history, contributors demonstrate the common activities and practices in serial narratives that align older television with contemporary television, simultaneously bridging the gap between old media and new media studies. Scholars of film studies, media studies, and popular culture will find this book of particular interest.

Chapter 1. Introduction: Televisual Shared Universes

Vincent Tran

Chapter 2: “Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations”? LGBTQ+ Representation and Diversity Star Trek’s Shared Universe in the 21st Century

Mareike Spychala

Chapter 3: Nostalgic Intertextuality and the Television Set: Happy Days and Its Shared Universe

Raymond I. Schuck

Chapter 4: From Television to Videotape and Back Again: Intellectual Property Laws in the TSU of Doctor Who

Lisa Horton, Peter Soulen, Aaron Propes, David Beard, Clare Ford, and Jason Ford

Chapter 5: Where Everybody Stays the Same: Failures, the American Dream, and the Realism of the Boston-Nantucket-Seattle Flight Path

CarrieLynn D. Reinhard and Erin K. Burrell

Chapter 6: “What Ever Happened to the Disney Afternoon?”: Nostalgia, Remixes, and DuckTakes Shared Universe

Peter Cullen Bryan

Chapter 7: Women in the Sam Raimi and Robert Tapert Universe: Reflections on/of Feminism in History and Mythology

Princess O’Nika Auguste

Chapter 8: Mighty Morphin Continuity: Shaping a Universe through Authorship and Nostalgia

Vincent Tran

Chapter 9: The CW’s Crisis on Infinite Earths and the Shared Multiverse as (Anti)Transmedia Storytelling

Chris McGunnigle

Chapter 10. The Institutional Basis of the One Chicago Universe

Melina Meimaridis

Chapter 11: Wrestlers-as-Marks and Producers-as-Fans: BTE, AEW, and the Televisual Shared Universe of the Forbidden Door

CarrieLynn D. Reinhard, Christopher J. Olson, and Christopher Medjesky

Chapter 12: Conclusion: Extending the Shared Universe Concept

Christopher J. Olson and CarrieLynn D. Reinhard

About the Contributors