CATEGORY

CHARACTERS

NARRATIVE

THEMES

REPRESENTATION

TECHNICAL CODES / LANGUAGE OF MOVING IMAGE (music, setting, props, lighting, use of camera, editing etc)

SIMILARITIES

The detective who has a ‘natural’ instinct for law and order

One of the detectives is of course a genius and has heightened knowledge and instincts to solve the case

The first episode often introduces a lot of different characters

Everything starts off equilibrium

The use of binary oppositions around familiar themes: family, community, law and order, justice. 

have elements of urban and rural landscapes

reactionary representations of police, family, law and order, urban/rural

the killers were all outsiders who you wouldn’t have suspected to be the killer from first interaction

opening montage sequence that often gives clues as to the whole series – themes, locations, characters, events etc.

DIFFERENCES

The Killing, The missing has the main detective as female (radical ideology)

THEORY

PROPP

TODOROV

LEVI-STRAUSS

SEMIOTICS

pathetic fallacy