One way TV and movies differ must be our attentiveness as viewers to what we perceive may be salient details about how the plot conflicts will resolve.
In LOST, for instance, I was ready to call the island purgatory by the end of season three, but then new characters and situations (time/space travel, etc.) kept appearing at breakneck speed. I missed all of the indications Chief Webber is an alcoholic on Grey's Anatomy, requiring the flashback sequence to put it together for me.
In a movie, on the other hand, I feel more alert to figure out what is coming by the clues given. Of course, in the case of the spinning ring and Bruce Willis's realization he is the dead person Haley Joel Osment sees in The Sixth Sense, I got it all wrong. My wife, however, had caught on but mercifully stayed silent until I erupted, "NO WAY!"
Last night's Redbox-of-choice was Homeland. The director beat us over the head with small horses as a motif (no spoiler: a red herring). The other plot twist became much more obvious to me in the scene that shows in the trailer of all places: Jon Krazinski's lighting a Hollywood-built Fisher Price-esque model farm in front of a class of fourth graders. Really?! That moment had me on alert for the way the movie turned out, although I still was somewhat surprised.
Perhaps, again, the long trajectory of a show's writing allows for the sprinkling of a bread crumb trail of clues that we, like Hansel and Gretel, pick up over weeks and months, instead of minutes. As well, the work of multiple writers in collaboration may result in the foreshadowing being more illusive.
I realize these are generalizations, but I think herein lies a fundamental difference. What say y'all?
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