With the growing viewership of HBO's Westworld and the upcoming premiere of The Walking Dead's Season 7, it's clear that television has its audiences hooked with the promises of twists and turns that'll drastically change how the story is going. A correlation between television's most popular shows and this narrative device of turning a story on its head contributes to the idea of a "shock culture."
When I say shock culture, I'm referring to a few things. First, there's a trend for how shows are advertised and structured. If I were to just start a list of the most recent shows, there would be some that you could identify with as shows that hooked you with the promise of some shocking truth being revealed. Take the latest season of American Horror Story, for example. Any talk of what Season 6 was going to be about was shushed by its studios, which led to a surge in exposure to the public. Once the season started, the mystery has only seemed to deepen, and with a promise of a huge twist come Episode 6, people won't stop talking about it.
It's because of shows like this where the idea of fan theories is becoming more and more popular. Nowadays, people who do extensive research and craft conspiracies that potentially ruin the rest of the show are seemingly praised more than chastised. It shows that there are a lot of audiences that anxiously crave the answers, even if it means knowing before anything plays out on TV.
The 7th season of The Walking Dead has been heavily anticipated because of the preceding season's cliffhanger promising the death of at least one major character. Although the show's producers said that they didn't delay the reveal to tease viewers (a problem that plagued that season 6), the choice to show who dies in the season premiere meant that it was still engaging in this form of shock entertainment.
A similar situation happened with Game of Thrones, yet another very popular show. Those who are fans or know fans of the show can probably recall the name Jon Snow and the conversation surrounding his death at the end of Season 5. With the arrival of Westworld, HBO seems to be doubling-down and hoping that another show filled with shocking moments will become just as popular as Game of Thrones. So far, it's proven successful, boasting an increase in ratings since its second episode. And it's hard not to see why. With its first episode, there were already huge twists, such as the reveal that not everyone in Westworld is entirely human. For those who have seen it, the reveal that centers around James Marsden and Evan Rachel Wood is very striking.
Shows like Westworld, Game of Thrones, The Walking Dead, American Horror Story, and countless, countless others follow this formula not only because of the writers' visions, but also because of audience culture. Based on how we respond to what we watch, producers see what works and what doesn't.
We live in an age where more and more shows are coming out that try to top one another with these forms of twists. It's a way to keep us hooked, and when the narrative seems to be moving too smoothly along a certain path, a new twist is thrown in to recapture our attentions.
The question, ultimately, is what this means and how we should reflect upon this. What is this to say about who we are as human beings? It seems to show us that, although we like to have that safe feeling of relief that things aren't going to change, sometimes, a little shift in how things are going is also comforting knowing that, in the end, no matter what's thrown at us or the characters that we love so dearly, things may or may not always work out.
