“Season” vs. “series”

Question

TV shows, other than ones that have new episodes year-round (e.g. news, soaps), typically group episodes in batches — most often per year, although not necessarily calendar years, and sometimes there will be multiple batches in a single year.

The term I am familiar with for these batches is "season", and the term to refer to the entire set of episodes that have ever been made of the show is "series". For example, there are 24 episodes of the TV show 24 each season, but there are 192 episodes in the entire series.

I've been told that in the UK the correct (perhaps "most commonly used"?) term for a batch of episodes is "series".

Is "series" indeed the correct¹ term in the UK?

If it is the term for a batch, what is the UK term for the entire set of episodes? (I.e. what I would call a "series".)

Finally, assuming that a "season" is a "series" in the UK, if I am referring to a UK TV show, is it more correct (e.g. if I was writing academically) to refer to a "season" as a "series", even if the rest of the writing does not use UK English?

¹ "correct": most likely to be understood correctly by a UK native.

Answer 1

Series was the term for both a batch of episodes of a programme, and the entire collection of episodes, in the UK.

Over the last ten years or so I have noticed that season is replacing series to mean a batch, but series is still being used.

I do not have a television, so I'm probably a bit out of touch with TV jargon, but certainly season is used with increasing prevalence online by the British, especially when referring to American shows.

Examples of use of series and season can be found in the following thread about Doctor Who?. For example: use of season, use of series (Layden, Dark Jedi, Hanners and PenguinJim are all British, as are some others)

Also this UK animé site uses season (see the side bar on the top left) and series (see the article) Anime Review: World God Only Knows, The - Season 2 - Eps. 1-7

As for writing academically, I think consistency is better. If you refer to a batch as a season then it is OK to do so for British shows.

Answer 2

In the US, "series" refers to the entire collection of episodes from all years, and "season" refers to a batch of episodes broadcast in a run, usually in the same year.

In the UK, "series" usually refers to both the entire collection of episodes from all years and a batch of episodes broadcast in a run, usually in the same year.

Although, due to the influx of US programmes, the US "season" is becoming more widespread in the UK, especially when talking about American programmes.

However, it's important to note that a UK "series" is usually only six episodes long, whereas a US "season" is ususally 22 episodes. So the US takes a good half year, making "season" much more approriate for US programmes!

Here's an article by a UK comedian called Stewart Lee frustrated that the UK six-programme rule makes it very hard to sell even programmes to the US, even in multiples.

Answer 3

"Season" may be gradually replacing "series" in the UK, but historically "series" refers to a single batch of episodes, not the whole run. Both Netflix and my DVDs from the UK refer to "(title) series #" and the Brits I know say "series N" rather than "Nth series". (So Americans say "first season" or "season one", but I've only heard "series one" in British English. I don't live there, though.)

Answer 4

For a British born English speaker in Britain, "series" usually refers to that one batch of episodes and all the episodes of a particular programme is usually just referred to as "the programme" or "the whole programme". If you said "series" referring to all the episodes, a British born person is quite likely to take it to mean just the small set of episodes and ask do you mean series 1, 2 or 3. The rest of the American terms would be understood by almost anyone, and if you speak face to face in an American accent saying the "series" it would probably be quickly understood to mean the "programme". For an Irish English-speaker, the American terms are more common: "TV series" or "TV show" for all the episodes, and "season" for the small set of episodes.

This is my knowledge from being a dual national - Irish-British. I have lived in both, and feel I belong in both.

Answer 5

I just wanted to chip in to say that in British English 'season' also has a meaning different to American English, being a group of programmes on a theme. For instance, there may be a Dad's Army season on BBC2, which could encompass selected episodes of Dad's Army itself, documentaries about WW2 and the Home Front, a biography or two of some of the actors, and so on.