This book offers various approaches to understanding the short form in television. The collection is structured in three parts, first engaging with the concept of brevity as inherent to television fiction, before going on to examine how the rapidly-changing landscape of "television" outside traditional networks might adapt this trope to new contexts made accessible by streaming platforms.
The final part of the study examines how this short form is inextricable from a larger context, either in its relation to seriality (from the crossover to the "bottle episode") and/or a larger structure, for example in the reception of a larger whole through short but evocative clips in order to better weigh their impact (from "Easter Egg" fan videos to "Analyses of"). The collection concludes with an interview with award-winning screenwriter Vincent Poymiro about his French series En therapie (an adaptation of BeTipul/In Treatment).