Article:

Border crossings: Serial figures and the evolution of media

This article identifies an important nexus in the serialised evolution of modern media, which we locate in the plurimedial beings that we term ‘serial figures’. Figures such as Frankenstein’s monster, Dracula, Sherlock Holmes, Tarzan, Fu Manchu, and others migrate across a variety of media, in the process becoming self-reflexive border-crossers that document the ongoing evolution of media. Ultimately, serial figures do more than simply thematise the formal logics of serialised media; they also enact, embody, and problematise the industrial and political logics of seriality that become pervasive in a globalising world.