Introduction

This introduction presents the conceptual, methodological, and empirical framework of the PRIN project Narrative Ecosystem Analysis and Development Framework (NEAD), devoted to the study of contemporary television seriality through the case of medical drama. Starting from the limits of retrospective narrative analysis, the project develops a dynamic approach to serial narratives as evolving processes shaped by creative, productive, technological, and sociocultural factors. Medical drama is examined as a privileged genre for investigating the relationship between serial storytelling and social discourse, due to its capacity to embed ethical, institutional, professional, and political issues within recurring characters, story arcs, and hospital-based narrative worlds. The introduction outlines the four main analytical dimensions of the NEAD framework—story arcs, narrative memory, alignment, and embedding—and discusses their application across American, Italian, and Chinese medical dramas. It also reflects on the role of large language models in expanding the scale and precision of serial narrative analysis. The volume’s contributions extend these perspectives through diverse case studies, showing how medical drama and adjacent media forms participate in the production, negotiation, and circulation of social meanings. Rather than marking the conclusion of the project, the introduction frames the research as an opening toward broader investigations of serial media, narrative dynamics, and social discursiveness.