Episode 4, Spiral

The Shawshank Redemption is a redemption plot. This is a genre of film that looks back over life events in flashback with a voice-over and, of course, ends with a redemption. This is similar to story structures often used in L&D –when something goes wrong,and a characterreflects on it in flashback. I bring out the tropes so we can credibly work in this genre.

In L&D there is a widespread misconception that if you make a character bland, uncharacterised,or even not there, (by dint of putting the camera in the position of the protagonist), this willmaximise empathy. That isjust wrong. In this analysis I show how the Breaking Bad pilot episode creates a drug-dealing killer who isa sympathetic human being.