Reading CSI: Crime TV Under the Microscope

by Allen Michael

Overview

This is what we know, this is the truth: CSI is a global television phenomenon. It began in 2000 with "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation", a dark procedural drama about forensic science set within the neon escapism of Las Vegas, in which Grissom and his team search within the very vitals of the murder victims they investigate. Nearly 17 million viewers tuned in each week and "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" fast became America's number one show. The success of the series moved it into franchise territory, continuing in 2002 with the body beautifuls and dismembereds of "CSI: Miami" (now the world's biggest television show) and again in 2004 extending the francise to the melancholic noir of post-9/11 New York with "CSI: NY". "Reading 'CSI'" pieces together the evidence in order to understand what the CSI shows mean to contemporary television culture, both in America and beyond.
The varied, intellectually curious and often polemic responses to CSI from critics, jourbanalists and industry professionals focus on a range of issues from the pornographic quality of the CGI effects, the relationship of characters to their narratives, and the reaction of the fans, to the semiotics of Horatio Caine's sunglasses. This in depth, compulsive read also includes a full episode guide.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781845114282
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	08/20/2007
Series:	Reading Contemporary Television
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	5.37(w) x 8.66(h) x 0.82(d)

About the Author

Mike Allen is Lecturer in Film and Electronic Media, Birkbeck College, University of London. His books include 'Family Secrets', a study of D.W. Griffith's feature films, and 'Contemporary U.S. Cinema'. His new book, 'Live from the Moon: Film, Television and the Space Race will be published by I.B. Tauris in 2007.

Table of Contents

Contents * Acknowledgements * Contributors * Regular cast list * This Much We Know. introductions and contexts * This Much I Know …: Introduction, Michael Allen * 1. The Hook and the Look: CSI and the aesthetics of the television crime series , Sue Turbanbull * 2. No Need to Pathologise…,Andrew Anthony * Part 1: INTERROGATION. narrative and narration * 3. Anatomising Gilbert Grissom: the structure and function of the televisual character, Roberta Pearson * 4. So Many Different Ways to Look At It: CSI as multi-platform story-world, Michael Allen * 5. CSI at the bfi …, Kim Akass * Part 2: TRACE. aesthetics, style and form * 6. Body Matters: realism, spectacle and the corpse in CSI, Deborah Jermyn * 7. Evidence of Things Unseen: the pornographic aesthetic and the search for truth in CSI, Elke Weissmann and Karen Boyle * 8.Who Are They? style codes of the CSI investigators, Anna König * 9. CSI and Sound, Karen Lury * 10. The Quintessence of Con: the Las Vegas of CSI, Lucia Rahilly * Part 3: FORENSICS. theoretical positions * 11. Reading the Traces, Charlie Gere * 12. Horatio Caine's Sunglasses and the Criminalist Viewer: 'looking' and 'being looked at' in CSI: Miami, Patrick West * 13. The Bullet Confirms the Story told by the Potato': materials without motives in C.S.I.: Crime Scene Investigation, Silke Panse * 14. Mac's Melancholia: scripting trauma, 9/11 and bodily absence in CSI:NY, Janet McCabe * Part 4: DNA. industry and reception * 15. Five's Finest: the import of CSI to British terrestrial television, Simone Knox * 16. RTE and the CSI Franchise, Dermot Horan * 17. Dissecting CSI: the View from the Trainee and the Professional CSI on the (Real-life) Pathology Table, Shelley Robinson * CSI For the New Forensics Guy, Daryl Vinall * 18. Investigating 'CSI Television Fandom' and Fans' Textual Paths through the Franchise, Matt Hills and Amy Luther * 19. The CSI Phenomenon * David Bianculli * Episode Guide * Film and TV Guide * Bibliography * Index