What is an 'episode'?

What is an 'episode'?

Pamela Douglas (Screenwriter) gives expert video advice on: What is a TV 'drama'?; What are the various types of dramas?; What is a 'season' for a drama? and more...

An episode is a single telling of a story module within a TV series. For dramas, it is one hour long. An individual episode may be a step in a much longer story. You might have a story arc that's 22 episodes long, so a single episode of one hour is just one piece of a continuing drama. However, there are many shows that have closure, especially procedurals, such as CSI or even House, where that hour closes a story arc. The main characters continue, but the story told - the challenge, the question, the problem of that episode - is resolved at the end of the hour.