Maybe it’s the strength of Nathan Fillion’s performance of “Richard Castle,” or maybe it’s the scope and skill from the writers of “Castle,” but the writer at the centre of prime-time procedural “Castle” has such a distinct character voice, with such a richly detailed backstory, that it almost seems effortless to create a believable website for this character.

RichardCastle.net is the official homepage for Richard Castle, a long-time author who has found inspirado shadowing a foxy NYPD cop. His site contains a blog which sees the writer reflecting on each week’s case, from lessons he’s learned, to sharing easter eggs such as wedding programs and other photos. The rest of the site includes a self-written bio, a Q&A, and a complete listing of his books, including the “out of print” editions that may not have covers (yet), but live on in proper “Castle” chronology. 

I love that the site also links out to Richard Castle’s Hyperion books author page (which to their credit, doesn’t break the conceit) as well as his Twitter and Facebook profile. But the best part of the whole thing is that they keep Castle’s voice consistent and active through every page, so you really feel like this is his site, and that he would say/write all of these things. 

And now, after reading Frank Rose’s “Art of Illusion,” I also appreciate one aspect of “Castle” that has made the show such a true transmedia hit; The world of “Castle” is richly detailed with a very specific mythology and well thought out, which makes world-extension natural and satisfying from a fan perspective. On the surface, “Castle” is another buddy-cop police procedural with a will-they-or-won’t-they storyline at the heart of it. The NYPD cops themselves don’t have too rich of a world of their own (besides New York city itself), they function just as players in solving weekly mysteries, but Castle… Castle is the perfect vessel for multi-platform storytelling. 

It comes down to details… and with TV, we can get those details episodically, morsel by morsel, because it’s not constrained by running time like films. And as those details come out, mythology is built… and it’s up to the creators of these shows to have at least some idea of what these details mean, or else it just adds up to one big shaggy dog story, ala “Lost” or “Prison Break.”

But Castle, as a man with many passions, experiences, friends in low places, high places, memories, talents, and a career, becomes a larger-than-life foil that can’t be contained through the episodic broadcast alone! And because he has all these things, he can name drop something without having to explain it in a big way, and that allows fans to imagine what that thing he named could be. A good example are the old book titles… he doesn’t go into what each old book was about, but fans can imagine. Then, a site like RichardCastle.net takes it that much further by creating a chronology and synopsis for all these Castle titles, allowing fans to go beyond “What’s it about,” to “What could happen”? In my opinion, this is when TV sites work best, and I love “Castle” and all the platforms they branch out to in order to bring one of the best characters on TV today to life. 

(Source: richardcastle.net)

While “The River” wasn’t my favourite new series when it came out a few months ago — the “found footage” genre just isn’t for me, however, I do like the unique site it built for “The Undiscovered Country,” the show within the show. 

The unique site has all the elements of a proper TV site, with episode recaps, video, galleries, and “news” that lines up with the fictional storylines within “The River.” This is a great extension that shows how tranmedia-ish elements can pad out the world of a series. As a non-fan, I haven’t really dug into the blog posts to see if there are any clues about the big mystery within the show, but if I was, I would be all over it.  For most sites, this kind of thing would be a “nice to have,” but considering “The River” is meant to be considered “real,” then a site like this would be a must. It’s a great way to build out the story-world, and provide a little bit of an interactive easter egg for audiences.

I should also mention that “The Undiscovered Country” looks really great, as it should. For the “30 Rock” one-offs, I can get behind making them look lacklustre if it’s just related to a gag… but when a feature is much more essential to the mythology, it should be really thought out, planned and deftly designed as this one has.

(Source: beta.abc.go.com)

I’ve been a long-time fan of “Grey’s Anatomy,” though my interest has waned this season… primarily because the show forgot how to be fun, and I don’t really need to watch cliches like Teddy laughing through a grief counselling session or Cristina and Owen fighting… again. 

So when it comes to the “Medical Case File,” I’m kind of torn looking at it… on one hand, it’s a very thorough blog that details the medical cases on the series via a viewpoint from a medical professional — which is a great feature if you’re a wannabe doctor yourself… however, I feel like it doesn’t entice me to want to watch the show any more. Maybe it’s just me, but it’s only those really odd and extreme medical cases that I’d want to read about (ie being encased in concrete), versus “Necrotizing Enterocolitis.” Overall you could say this is a very educational extension, but is that entertaining enough for a prime-time drama?

(Source: abc.go.com)

For ABC’s new series, “Don’t Trust the B—— in Apartment 23,” someone working on the site is having a lot of fun with the show. One example of this is the gallery of memorabilia collected by the fictional James Van Der Beek during the series. 

Offerings are a little light right now, considering that only two episodes have aired, but what they do have is perfect for something like “Apartment 23,” as it gives an expanded look at the world of the series, while also being funny! (It is a comedy after all).

For example, the two selections up right now tie directly into the first two episodes, and are fun little things that build on elements from the series. The first is a what a listing for JVDB’s curriculum would have looked like, the second is an illustration of his costume for a strange commercial.

The reason I ultimately think it “works,” is that I’m intrigued enough by what they pick out, that I’m definitely coming back to the show’s site to see what they post next. Heck, maybe I’ll even “like” it on Facebook!   

(Source: beta.abc.go.com)

ABC’s new series developed by “Grey’s Anatomy” creator, Shonda Rhimes, called “Scandal,” is a show about a Washington insider named Olivia Pope who works as a “fixer,” preventing beltway scandals. 

The series is partially based on Judy Smith, a former Bush administration press aide, who leads her own crisis communications firm, and serves as a co-executive producer on “Scandal.”

In order to give a unique real-world look at how she would solve problems that Olivia Pope is faced with on “Scandal,” ABC has provided a “What Would Judy Do?” blog, where executive producer provides a deeper looking into issues of crisis management. The blogs are pretty exhaustive, and serve to add a bit of credibility to the prime-time drama.

While not necessarily a narrative addition to the site’s offerings, this kind of content is great to build out the world that Olivia Pope works in. It would have been fun to have this kind of blog written in-character as Olivia Pope, to give her a detailed staff briefing on her decision making over the course of an episode… but then that would have been a little too out-of-character for somebody who’s job is keeping secrets, instead of sharing them on a blog.

(Source: beta.abc.go.com)

With so much going on with all the families on “Modern Family,” a photo album of highlights from the past season works as a great walk through highlight’s of the series, and makes audiences feel like distant relatives themselves by thumbing through.

While something like this could have been executed as a simple photo gallery with simple captions, ABC utilized a sponsorship to make a rich and detailed experience, highly designed with “photo album” elements. With almost every page, there’s also exclusive, never-before-seen clips from the respective episodes. 

I really like the editorial choices that went into putting the book together, as it really presents a cohesive, loving picture of the families and each character’s latest ups and downs. It’s kind of funny too, in that as the series has a faux-documentary style with no context (ie who is shooting this documentary?), the same applies to this memory book… I could see Cam putting it together, but it’s as if the same faux-documentarians built this book as well! 

In addition to the memory book, the extension also has a “Make your own family portrait” for people to send as an e-card and spread the word about the album, and a big contest involving family stories. However, this is also a great looking app on the show’s Facebook page!

(As a “Social TV” aside, interesting that while the “Modern Family” Facebook page has 6 million likes, each post has about 1,000 likes or so… I wonder why that isn’t higher?)

(Source: beta.abc.go.com)

Personally, I really like seeing small sites related to “in-world” properties for shows, and NBC delivers those in spades for much of its programming, including “The Office” and “30 Rock.” Now, I hate to sound like a broken record when it comes to NBC sitcoms, but like “The Office,” I’m not really a fan of “30 Rock,” so while I appreciate seeing these mini-sites, I don’t really get the in-show element they’re referring to.

With that in mind, it does underline a problem that mini-sites like these have as a genre, is that they “preach to the converted,” and don’t seem to be efforts to bring in new audiences to a series. Should they?

I think one of the touchstones for sites like these is the “Oceanic Airlines” site, which was paired with “Lost” on ABC, and fed into that viral rabid-ness that entering “the numbers” into a flight schedule created. However, to achieve that kind of viral-ness with a mini-site is really hit or miss.

I do also like these kinds of sites, because they are relatively easy to create for small web teams, and allow for some creative innovation. I would like to see more “original photography” involved from on-set props to give a little more of a seamless broadcast/online crossover, but for NBC, they deserve props for the breadth of sites they deliver.

(Source: nbc.com)

I do enjoy a good guilty pleasure series once in a while, and ever since “Desperate Housewives” spiralled out of control years ago and descended into mundane melodrama, I’ve been waiting for a good campy adult primetime soap to come along… and “GCB” fits the bill. The series has a colourful cast of southern belles and the men who love them, and the troubles they encounter in their not-so-perfect lives. 

So to discover that ABC has added an interesting transmedia element for “GCB” is a nice surprise… it still may be a little in the lighter side of transmedia engagement, but it’s an interesting development. 

What ABC has done is create “Good Christian Blogs,” where characters have been blogging about events in their life, as well as expunging upon areas where they consider themselves experts. So far, we have Gigi Stopper sharing her knowledge about etiquette and social decorum, while Blake Reilly offers up fashion tips. Blake’s blogs are particularly a treat for fans, as on the series he’s a gay man hiding his secret from the community, though his business partner and wife, Cricket, has always known and helps to conceal it. So to know that bit of plot, and reading Blake’s post adds just that bit of context and fun with these features. 

I do have a similar complaint to the one I made about Barney’s blog… it’s that why after going to the trouble of write something “in voice” for these characters would you go and use unit photography for the entries? For Blake’s blogs, they do get these right, using images that he would’ve had on hand and used like any blogger would — though his blog about Westward Hosanna should have included some photography from the photo-shoot they conducted in the episode. Unfortunately Gigi’s blogs uses standard unit photography, which in the blogs themselves doesn’t make sense. I could see using a headshot or something like that as an author thumbnail, but when you’re seeing Gigi sitting in church, it pulls you out of that little “blog world.” 

Complaints aside, this effort does showcase a different dimension to the characters on the web platform. It doesn’t necessarily feel like the best fit… I think a good opportunity here would have been to instead make the blog a “Church Bulletin” instead, which I can realistically see these characters contributing written stories, promoting their businesses and bragging about their kids.

(Source: beta.abc.go.com)

Medical drama “Body of Proof” is about a medical examiner in Philadelphia, and how her neuro background helps her solve cases. As you may pick up from my flat introduction to this show, “Body of Proof” hasn’t really grabbed me… but that doesn’t mean we can’t take a look at a rather cool transmedia offering the show is offering on their site!

“Body of Proof” have actually taken an interesting approach to creating a web series, in that they’re creating a storyline to work as a bridge between a two-part episode. In the first “part,” the medical team on the show faces a mysterious outbreak, and in part two, they will probably resolve it. 

In between those episodes is “Outbreak,” which began rolling out on March 27, and will roll out the fifth episode on April 3, the day of the second broadcast episode.

“Outbreak” follows a news reporter who is also trying to figure out what’s happening in the city when the virus hits. As of episode 4, no main cast members are involved, though it does appear to use title elements from the series.

While the production budget of this short series appears to be higher than the average “web series,” the fact that it doesn’t really “look like the show” or has any of the principals in the cast makes it more difficult to see this as mandatory viewing for fans — even if it does provide an expansion on the “Body of Proof” world.

In fact, the difference in production is very underlined in the first scene in the first webisode… as one character gives an address about the virus, it looks like it’s from the show, but as it cuts to the reporter in the audience, you can clearly see the difference in one being shot at a different time and with a different crew.

Regardless, I would be curious to see how the fifth instalment plays out, and if it’s going to be giving out any clues about the viral outbreak that aren’t given away on-air, or if online viewers are going to solve the mystery sooner. I would like to see more shows take this kind of “bridge” approach to web series, as long as it packs in some kind of narrative value to audiences. Ideally, something like this would be built into the “flagship” production of the series, as the differences in production could make it appear to be “less important” to viewers. 

The other key to the puzzle, would be a way to build in enough promotion for the web component, because judging from the # of likes on the videos themselves, I can tell they aren’t getting enough. The show has 187,000 fans on Facebook, but only 100 people like the first webisode. Could ABC be reluctant to promo the web series because the video itself isn’t up to broadcast? This could also be a case for having the mother production create these web series just like episodes of the show. Still, I do appreciate ABC’s shot at giving this a go, and I hope fans of the series are entertained and titillated by it.

(Source: abc.go.com)

Sure, when you or I share a photo or two on Instagram, it’s likely of some delicious meat, a funny looking dog or a sunset… but when you’re one of the stars of a big-time network drama, you might actually take photos of something work sharing.

Now, I’m not really planning on getting into too much “behind-the-scenes” type content on this blog, because it’s a basic type element of a website, and doesn’t really speak to a real “transmedia” element — narrative, marketing or otherwise. However, this is really worth pointing at as a cool idea, just because it’s way more “personal” to the audience to see the show from the stars’ point-of-view, and is almost more of a “value add” than just run-of-the-mill production photos which should be a standard site component anyways.

Plus, the stars are way more likely to be candid with one of their co-stars, versus the hairy guy with the giant camera snapping away in the background… and just like you or me, Ginnifer adds cool filters to make her pictures “hip” too!  

For those unfamiliar with “Once Upon a Time,” the series takes place in a fictional town where all the residents are regular people who at one point were fairy-tale characters, now trapped in our time and unable to remember their “real” identities. One boy in particular has discovered this secret, and carries around a book with him that contains all the fairy-tales that relate to all the people in town. 

Because this book has such a central role in the series, it makes sense that “Once Upon a Time” would create a storybook of their own, and have put it up for sale for fans. While I really like this idea, I’m a little disappointed that it doesn’t “look” like the book in the series. I wish that it would appear to be the same book, so that I could see the completed stories that are mentioned in the show. It wouldn’t have to go so far as to appear to be a prop… but perhaps there were issues with an illustrated aspect of creating the book in terms of creating it quickly, and maybe running into “rights” issues concerning some representations of the characters.

Still, it does count as “transmedia,” and I would be curious to see if there’s any secrets to the show contained in the written stories in the storybook. Regardless, a good effort, and one I hope they build on in future seasons of the show. Maybe there could be a virtual flash version that rolls out with each episode of the show? Even if it shows some of the pages, and not necessarily the complete story, that would be enough to make me happy!

(Source: beta.abc.go.com)

One of the parts I miss about “Lost” in the granular experience of picking apart every little object on screen to unearth new meaning and clues and in-jokes in regards to the show. Many of the clues involved the books characters were reading, from the Others’ interest in Stephen Hawking and Stephen King to Sawyer’s beach readers, including “Watership Down” and “Bad Twin.” (“Bad Twin” is another transmedia element from “Lost,” which was a novel the series published by a fictional author. I never read it, but those who’ve seen the finale may pick up on the symbolic significance of the title.)

So because two of the many amazing writers of “Lost,” Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz, are now working on the new fairy-tale series, “Once Upon a Time,” it appears they’re sticking to some of their old habits, and continuing to hide easter eggs for fans to find. As a very casual viewer of “Once Upon a Time,” I was actually surprised to discover many of these when I found the “Storybrooke Secrets” section of their website.

“Storybrooke Secrets” gives away a few of the hidden references per each episode, but then asks fans to contribute the things which they also found in each episode. This is a far more “casual” version of what happened with “Lost,” which instead of unfolding over several forums and blogs and podcasts, is all contained in a tidy space within the show’s official website. But for “Once Upon a Time,” I think it works. Other sites and forums will trade on this information regardless of if ABC has an official outlet for it, but by having it and confirming some of their own secrets, it makes it more of a “first stop” for fans than anything else.

I think that the section could have a better design and more functional layout… as it currently seems to be a glorified photo gallery with a synopsis and user comments. Maybe there would be a way to add more photos and screen grabs pointing out what users have found? Maybe even video clips? However, I do like it a lot, and I hope that when it comes to season two of “Once Upon a Time,” that they build on this.

(Source: beta.abc.go.com)

It’s “Mad Men” mania out there right now with the premiere of the show’s fifth season… and while online the show has had a pile of really cool online marketing pushes for previous seasons (“Mad Men Yourself” was inescapable), there hasn’t been much in the way of narrative “Transmedia” extensions with the series.

However, I was poking around the “Mad Men” site today to see what they have going for season five, and I noticed that they’ve done something really awesome going on; They’ve released a 7 inch single for “Zou Bisou, Bisou” by Jessica Pare, who sang it on-screen as Megan Draper in a scene from the premiere.

While Megan isn’t an aspiring pop star with a record contract on the series, I give kudos for AMC for pushing the limits of how their hit show can be represented. It’s not really narrative — though at the time, vanity pressings of recordings were not uncommon, so it doesn’t exist outside the realm of possibility in the “Mad Men” world. It also reminds me of one of my favourite non-internet tv-related “transmedia” extensions; the best-selling “Nikki Heat” novels by Richard Castle. 

(Source: blogs.amctv.com)