OPENING TITLES:Immediately we can identify that these soaps are aimed at two differing audiences due to the differences in their opening titles. Hollyoaks heads for a ‘introducing the characters’ style with bright, popping colours and an accompaniment of fast-beat, pop-music which is clearly aimed at a young demographic with the purpose of making the characters immediately identifiable for the audience. Contrastingly, Coronation Street chooses to introduce the iconic locations (such as the pub and streets) while implementing throw focus, a sepia filter and the iconic slow, string theme-tune to represent the soap as calm and fairly slow-paced for the older target audience.

SHOOTING AND EDITING:Both soaps mostly follow the same generic and expected shot types often seen in soaps, with the main features being shot-reverse-shot due the soaps being massively conversation-based, along with the majority of the shots being close-ups/medium close-ups as the reactions/facial expressions of the characters drives the episode forward.

However, when comparing the soaps we can see that Hollyoaks implements much more abstract/experimental shots that break the generic expectations of how soap operas are usually shot. For example, this specific episode see’s the use of extreme high and low angles and a rotating camera. This makes the soap more visually engaging as a way of targeting a younger audience. Similarly, Hollyoaks also breaks traditions by using non-diegetic music and displaying text on screen to represent text messages/phone calls.

CASTINGObvious casting choices have been made to create a range of characters that the target audience can identify. On the channel 4 website, the creators of hollyoaks state that the soap is shown ‘through the eyes of our primarily young cast to reflect the aspirations, fears and preoccupations of modern young adults’, explaining why the cast of Hollyoaks are mostly young, stylish and good-looking. Contrastingly, Coronation Street states that their target audience is predominantly ‘Female, Housewives with children’, explaining why the majority of the characters in the soap are more mature in age and behaviour compared to Hollyoaks characters.

THEMES AND NARRATIVES:As expected, narratives within Hollyoaks often revolve around issues faced during adolescence and growing up as the majority of the cast are young adults. This particular episode contained themes of eating disorders, body image, family violence and relationship disputes. Coronation street offers issues revolving around family/grownups that aren’t as dramatic and are more identifiable for the target audience, such as moving house, money problems and finding a job.