Key Assessment

How does this product and its marketing appeal to its target audiences? - Les Revenants

Les Revenants is a French t.v. show produced by Canal+, it is a hybrid, and makes up the different genres of crime, drama, mystery, thriller, horror, zombie movies, and French poetic realism. The show, like all T.V. is split into different genres in order to categorise the show, allowing the audience to see and select what they want to watch based on what they have already seen from this genre. The genre is also important for the producers of this show, because it allows them to narrow down and target specific cult audiences, and therefore create profit. Alongside this, genre conventions and generic paradigms are very prevalent within genre, and this allows for accurate targeting on the audience based on their prior knowledge of genre.

Les Revenants uses our preconceived notions of genre, as well as different marketing techniques based on what we as an audience know about different media texts already, as well as the ideas of polysemy and genre hybridity in order to appeal to as wide of a range of different cult audiences as possible, cult audiences being one of the main targets for this show as the smaller yet more dedicated fans bring in a lot of revenue. Within this response, I will be examining the different approaches that Les Revenants takes to marketing, and how these are developed in order to target select audiences.

Les Revenants is a Postmodern French television series, produced by Canal+ and released in 2012 (2013 for audiences in Britain). The show was created by Fabrice Gobert, and adapted from ‘They Came Back’, a 2004 zombie film. Overall, the series was successful, spawning two series, yet was ultimately cancelled. This, however, did not stop the show from achieving cult status, and also winning an International Emmy award for Best Drama, as well as a Peabody award.

Les Revenants appeals to many different audiences by encoding different genre codes and conventions that audiences are familiar with and can therefore relate to and negotiate with strongly. The text does this by showcasing different genres, again demonstrating its polysemic nature. This is first seen within the trailer with the slow, non-diegetic piano music (Provided by Mogwai - already drawing in a cult fandom through fans of the band, the soundtrack target fans of Mogwai and negotiates with them to entice them to watch the rest of the show). The eerie piano music itself negotiates with horror fans, as it has typical conventions tied to ominous and horror themed media, showing intertextuality from Les Revenants. This music repeats throughout the entire trailer, leading to a crescendo near the end in which the horror elements and conventions begin to kick in. This soundtrack makes use of Roland Barthe’s semiotic codes, using a symbolic code (from the sombre piano) in order to remind us of the meaning and use of the piano - to provide sadness and fear, two themes very relevant throughout both the trailer and the show. This again targets audiences, negotiating with their emotions to provide a strong dominant reading to those who are a fan of drama and mystery television, I think that this is effective in targeting and appealing to audience due to our preconceived notions about genre. This, playing into Steve Neale’s theory about genre, shows the repetition and difference throughout the show, which sustains the show’s hybridity of genres both preventing it from becoming stale, and introducing new ideas to reach new potential audiences.

The potential audience is appealed to and targeted through the use of traditional and conventional genre conventions (Harkening back to Steve Neale’s genre theory once again) through Les Revenants’ unique blend of genres. Mass appeal is gained by using classic genre conventions that are seen throughout different media texts, we are used to these and therefore recognise them and can categorise them when we see them used. This is used to great effect in Les Revenants with the editing used. For example, in the trailer, one of the first shots (to capture the audience’s attention with another hermeneutic code) is a wide shot of the bus falling off of the cliff. This in and of itself has a lot of horror and thriller connotations, yet it is enhanced by the editing when fast, choppy cuts are used (paired with diegetic screaming) in order to fully show the audience that this show contains horror elements, the action code of the bus falling off of the cliff is enough to show us some of the content of the show, as well as engage with the audience. This, coming at the start of the trailer, sets a solemn tone for the rest of the trailer by having the scene’s preferred reading as quite macabre and melancholic.

Notably, Les Revenants appeals and targets its target audiences through having a wide range of representations throughout both the show and its marketing. The tagline for this show is ‘Your Deceased Loved Ones Are Back. What Are You Going To Do?’. The show, once again demonstrating its genre fluidity, can also be considered a character drama, as well as French poetic realism. Both of these genres, popular in France due to their love of their own cinema, attract French audiences, but the most important part of this is how the genre is used to apply to characters that are relevant for us. Within the show are characters such as the young child Victor (who embodies a lot of horror tropes), the teens Lena and Camille, and adults such as Simon, Adele, Serge, Mms Costa, Julie, and Claire. All of these characters have entangled plotlines which often cope with issues that are relatable to modern day issues. To us as an audience, a lot of these characters are relatable, and this draws in an audience because of how they are targeted. Different ideological perspectives are used in order to present the different characters and groups, and these are often ideologies that we can relate too, making the show a lot more accessible to the audience.

Les Revenants also appeals to a cult target audience. This is through the use of non-linear storytelling through the plot devices of flashbacks and the use of the past. This Postmodern and complex method of storytelling is often quite complex, and this attracts a dedicated audience who want to unravel the mystery, producing an audience much like other television such as Twin Peaks. Throughout the entire show, characters die and come back to life, this while sharing conventions to zombie films, weaves a complex narrative which the audience is left to figure out. A great example of this is the story of Simon in the show. Simon is first shown ‘returning’ and immediately heading for his ‘wife’, Adele, while he does not know what happened, she does. This scene uses hermeneutic codes, and is very enthralling to the audience, after Simon has come back after a few years the audience wants to know what happens next. The technical elements used in this scene also help, he appears outside the glass, standing there like a ghostly apparition, and the cinematography also displays him this way. The scene is slow and tense, and shows Adele’s slow realisation and breakdown. This also reflects the conventions of the French poetic realism and drama genres, producing a polysemic scene which can be interpreted and negotiated by the audience. The show is full with scenes similar to this, and this creates a dedicated cult audience dead set on figuring out the mystery of The Returned.