The Hunger Games: Will the odds be ever in your favor?

Primarily, The Hunger Games trilogy, began its journey as a set of novels creating a dystopian world, shortly after they were released into a series of films, following behind these films were soundtracks and several video games that gave the fans a sense of this new and fictional universe. According to Janet H. Murray this would be an example of Multiform story, meaning that The Hunger Games is presented in “… a single situation or plot line in multiple versions, versions that would be mutually exclusive in our ordinary experience (Murray 30).” This is only one source that not only helps fans unfold the story that is being told but also lets the fans engage in this world as if it were real. The Hunger Game franchise is a great example of Transmedia Storytelling, the two extensions that I would like to highlight on is the process of world-building and the idea of additive comprehension.

A screenshot of the official capitol website. Capitol TV allows fans to watch capitol video content, which played a huge role in the narrative.

The homepage of the capitol website.

The Website, thecapitol.pn, lets fans become a part of this new world. Henry Jerkins expands on the idea of world-buliding, he explains it to a process in which it “encourages an encyclopedic impulse in both readers and writers (par. 5)”. It allows fans to retrieve a deeper meaning, being able to understand this dystopian world more clearly rather than just reading the novels or watching the films. For example, In the top right corner of the website it list the weather in each district one by one allowing the viewer to associate this information to the narrative being shown in other forms of media.

A picture from the virtual tour of the capitol.

Lions gate also teamed up with Microsoft Office in creating a 3D world of the capitol. The capitol was built to be viewed as a virtual tour and allows fans to access never before seen locations that were in the capitol. This is also an example of additive comprehension referring “to ways that each new text adds a new piece of information which forces us to revise our understanding of the fiction as a whole (Jerkins par. 8)”. In experiencing this virtual world of the capitol and seeing places that were not showed in the films or talked about in the novels helps the fans build a narrative of their own. In engaging in these additional narratives it helps them link one story to another and in the process of doing so changes the whole outlook of the story. These extensions give fans a deeper meaning and interaction to this stories as if they were real places and people.

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Sources:

Collins, Suzanne. The Capitol. Lions Gate Entertainment Inc., 2014. Web. 21 Feb. 2015.

Jenkins, Henry. “Transmedia Storytelling 101.” Confessions of an Aca-Fan. Henry Jenkins, 22 Mar. 2007. Web. 21 Feb. 2015.

Murray, Janet H. Hamlet on the Holodeck. New York City: The Free Press, A Division of Simon and Schuster Inc., 1997. PDF.

Buffy Gif

The gif that is represented above is the one I created from the original series of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The purpose of this gif is to show the audience the importance of the series as a whole. Throughout this series, Sarah Michelle Gellar, played as Buffy is portrayed as a typical dumb blonde that can’t even open a peanut butter jar by herself. Although this portrayal of the slayer quickly goes away when she shows that she has super powers that can take down anyone that comes in her way.

Gifs and Memes are a source of the idea of a shared social phenomenon. This is related to Buffy the Vampire Slayer because it is very hard to convince someone to watch a show such as Buffy due to the supernatural activity. Normally people quickly associate the movie Twilight with every other supernatural show that has been made recently because the viewer thinks it is the same as Twilight. In this case the signifier would be the simple word vampire but the signified correlates to our culture and because of Twilight everyone associates all vampires from all series and movies to Twilight, even the shows that were made before. The idea that every vampire in every show or movie sparkles in the sun is what our culture associates with every supernatural show.

A couple of examples from Memes would be the ones shown below. The first one is Dean from Supernatuarl making fun of the reference towards twilight that, once again, all vampires sparkle. These examples are shared between each other in order to set off a particular emotion about a particular concept. In this case it is mimicking Twilight, while some people might find these memes funny others, such as twilight fans, might find them to be rude and unnecessary.

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http://fvckthecullens.tumblr.com

The gif I created and the example of the Memes are examples of repacking Memes. The gif I created had nothing to do with the time or place it was aired. Spike, the Vampire that is being punched, did not say you’re just a girl in this scene but the use of text helps the audience decode this particular gif in that way. The supernatural meme is a great example of remixing and mimicking Twilight because in this scene that the screen shot is taken from Dean is not talking about killing vampires but the set up of the screenshot helps the veiwer decode this meme in a way that makes you think that is what’s going on.