It’s happened to all of us. We’re watching an action TV show or movie filled with car chases, alien attacks, secret conspiracies, running gun battles, explosions, and all types of other loud, crazy things to get our blood pumping. The plot builds, we get excited about learning more, and then it happens. Our hero’s cell phone rings. It could be the wife/husband, the girlfriend/boyfriend, sister/brother, mom/dad, or the kid wondering when he/she is going to be picked up from soccer practice. The effect is like being in a Bugatti Veyron at 240 miles per hour and hitting a mountain. The hero looks off into the distance forlorn, closing the clamshell and resting the phone against his/her head. Everything grinds to a halt. The main plot gets put on hold for some character development, but a lot of the time descends into hopeless hand wringing while the hero feels sorry for him/herself. As viewers we sit there, frustrated, wondering what happened to the gun, the hostage, the missing nuclear weapon, or even the reason why we’re watching.
Then the ultimate insult presents itself: the good cry in the bathtub/shower juxtaposed against coffee house acoustic guitar with breathy solo vocals. Wasn’t there just a terrorist somewhere doing or planning something awful? Does the hero really have time for this? Do we? What else is on TV? Oh, a show about renting apartments… sounds like it moves along quicker.
Character development is extremely important, especially in today’s television where there is always some sort of multi-season arc. Back in the day the structure was plot-plot-plot-plot and more plot. Very little time was devoted to investigating the characters. Episodes were mainly self-contained and it wasn’t that big of a deal to watch them out of order. Now we want to know more about our heroes–what motivates them and why they do what they do. But too often the plot grinds to an abrupt halt while the hero deals with his/her personal problems.
The reason for this is that the character development is not integrated into the arc of the story. It’s separate, and as a result slows down the plot because we have to look away into a whole other narrative. It may run in parallel per the structure of the series, but in my opinion it all works better when the character and plot converge as one where the character deals with his/her issues through the main plot itself. It’s almost like a two for one: you get to watch the plot unfold, get resolved, and learn more about the hero.
One action TV show that does this very well is Human Target on Fox. What appears on the surface as an 80s style action show is truly a 21st century model with the character arc and weekly plots integrated together. The whole reason that Christopher Chance does what he does is because of his past. It motivates him and his actions in each and every episode. Guerrero and Winston also have skeletons in their history that brought them all to the point where they’re working together. Each of the three characters is damaged in some way and the agency is their path to redemption. The development is done through conversations with characters within each weekly plot and relate to what is happening within the episode. We don’t have to be pulled out of the story for a good cry in the shower. Anyway, neither Chance, nor Guerrero, nor Winston are the type to shed tears, but you get my point.
Human Target is an action show, so character development isn’t the main point of the series, but the writers and producers understand this. They give us exactly what is advertised: a rollicking good time with high action, interesting characters, and a hero that’s fun to watch every week. But above all that they still work in the character moments without slowing down the action, and I thank them for that. We have a lot of shows that look at character and dig into relationships, but I’m sure glad that Human Target understands that action TV should be about action, and not good cries in the shower.
