One of the advantages of doing a slasher film (or murder mystery) as a long-form miniseries is that by the end of the run, if the writers have done their jobs, the corpses aren't just disposable stereotypes, they're well-rounded characters whose deaths might actually mean something to the viewers. After the first couple hours of CBS' "Harper's Island," the odds of viewers becoming emotionally invested in the deaths of Chloe (Cameron Richardson) or Cal (Adam Campbell) would have been low. Network promotion had categorized Chloe as The Flirt and she looked prepared to cuckold her British boyfriend at a moment's notice....
Daniel Fienberg

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