Girlboss and Puzzle-Boy: Gender in the Comic Detective TV Genre (edited collections)
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Event: edited collections
Working Title: Girlboss and Puzzle-Boy: Gender in the Comic Detective TV Genre
Series: DeGruyter Brill book series, Pop Culture in Context, series editors Liz Faber, Emily Hamilton-Honey & Judith Rauscher!
Editor: Dr. Marc A. Ouellette, Old Dominion University (mouellet@odu.edu)
Project Overview and Rationale
We often think of the police procedural as a very serious genre with rigid constraints, particularly in terms of gender, heroism, morality, character types, “pulled from the headlines” stories, and a heavy dose of forensic evidence. This edited collection, critically examines the rise of the comic variant of the detective genre and with it, the revision of the gender order in terms of physicality, puzzle-solving, and the emotional labor required to support the star. The more recent development of the hybrid comic-detective show, from the long-running Death in Paradise and The Brokenwood Mysteries, The Miss Fisher Mysteries, to newer breakout hits like Deadloch, Professor T, The Chelsea Detective, Death Valley, and Ludwig, makes several important interventions, making the genre a riddle and puzzle-based “whodunnit.” In this edited collection, we seek to examine what makes this genre an international and cross-cultural phenomenon. In particular, these shows and similar offerings from competitors, refigure the detective from being deceivingly and deliberately inept as a manipulative ploy into an actually bumbling, frequently helpless, and always awkward figure who routinely needs saving and protection, especially from women who perform more heroic roles in addition to their own detective skills. Of further interest is the fact that many of these productions are popular in countries other than the one(s) in which they are set, and others (Miss Fisher and Professor T) are adaptations, and all are available on local and streaming services. Thus, we welcome proposals addressing a wide array of topics across media, genre, and nationalities.
The book welcomes scholars from interdisciplinary fields, including media and popular culture, gender studies, television studies, cultural studies, and genre studies, to contribute to a study of the evolution of the television detective genre in a post-Sherlock Holmes, post-CSI, post-truth era, where the focus has shifted from the detective's profound heroism to a relatable, if frustrating, human fallibility. Moving beyond the traditional heroic masculinity of earlier police procedurals, this collection argues that this new detective figure is not a profound hero, but rather a savant whose primary skill is a highly specialized form of diagnostic logic and pattern recognition. His surrounding female colleagues—often a single female superior, a team of women, or a female romantic lead—serve as his emotional and social interpreters, managing his relationships, smoothing over his eccentricities, and providing the patient, holistic perspective that he lacks. This dynamic reconfigures the procedural form, creating a hybrid genre that marries the intricate plotting of the police procedural with the interpersonal humor of a character-driven comedy.
Graduate students and emerging researchers are especially welcome in this process!
Topics might include, but are not limited to
· Reflections of contemporary anxieties about gender, social competence, and labor.
· Individual case studies of series or episodes (including but not limited to those listed above)
· American exceptionalism, responses, and adaptations
· Space and place in the genre, including the small town or neighborhood trope
· Literary Adaptation and/or cross-cultural adaptation
· Defining the comic-detective genre
· Comparative considerations of The Residence (and others) among the genre
· Historical patterns in the genre
· Gender performances and gender tropes
· Heroism, femininities, and the role of wise women
· Fragile, anxious masculinities and the “prestige male”
· The quirky best friend (or relative) trope
· Racial diversity (or lack thereof) among main characters
· Puzzles, games, riddles and the genre
· The therapeutic aspects of solving the case
· Heteronormativity and/or queer romance
· Celebrity casting and fan studies
· Social blindspots and the value of the team
· Nostalgia and tradition
· From deductive hero to puzzle-solving Sisyphus and the post-heroic detective
· the regional and cultural variations of the awkward detective archetype.
· the aesthetics of awkwardness and formal analysis of camera work, editing, and sound design to create comedic moments from social gaffes.
We invite scholars from multiple disciplines to submit abstracts (300-500 words) by 1 Dec. 2026, with completed papers due 31 May 2027. Please send abstracts and inquiries to mouellet@odu.
Marc A. Ouellette