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This thesis addresses a gap in scholarship by theorising star status for those performers whose public image is defined by a single televisual role. It proposes the 'signature role TV star' as a new category of stardom by evaluating Adam West as a quintessential example of this type of figure. West was best known for playing the titular role in the television series Batman (ABC: 1966-1968), which became a worldwide phenomenon after its debut in 1966. Despite its initial popularity, Batman was cancelled after three seasons and West was unable to develop a lasting career as a mainstream leading man, meaning that his signature role remained the defining aspect of his stardom. West's connection to Batman continued to manifest, as he occasionally reprised his former role, whilst also taking other parts that evoked his superhero success. Meanwhile, he regularly played himself in a parodic fashion in his latter-day career. West demonstrated that the strong link with a signature televisual role can generate new inflections over time, meaning that he embodies both the advantages and disadvantages of this form of stardom. By theorising West's star status, this thesis contributes to knowledge in the field of television stardom. Influential theoretical paradigms in this area posit that television is unlike cinema because it creates personalities rather than stars (Ellis, 1992; Langer, 1997). Conversely, Deborah Jermyn (2006) challenges prior theories by analysing Sarah Jessica Parker's image, suggesting that it may be time to revisit the notion that true stardom needs to be associated with a range of different roles. Although Jermyn links this to the contemporary scene, her notion is also relevant to figures like West who are primarily associated with earlier eras. American television stars of the 1960s and 1970s were particularly likely to be defined by their connection to a flagship part, because this period was characterised by scarcity of viewing options (Ellis, 2002: 39-60), the emergence of repeats as a quintessential televisual form (Kompare, 2005) and a strong cultural tradition of American programmes being exported to nations such as the UK (Rixon, 2006). In conjunction, these factors helped cement the association between prime-time TV stars and popular characters. Such connections are an underexamined area in current TV star scholarship and therefore theorising signature role TV stardom as a distinct type of fame addresses this gap in the field of star studies. The analysis of West as an archetypal signature role TV star is accomplished within a star studies theoretical framework that focuses on his onscreen roles, his promotional and publicity appearances and the criticism and commentary that has been produced about him. Richard Dyer's star theory (1998) is modified and combined with elements of the work of John Ellis (1992) and Jermyn (2006), to argue that the latter's suggestion that a theoretical star image can be associated with a single TV role can be expanded to conceive a distinct category of stardom. By employing this approach to theorise West as a signature role TV star, this thesis demonstrates that Jermyn's observation applies across a broader chronological timeframe than previously recognised. Therefore, the signature role TV star category can be utilised to illuminate the cultural significance of other television stars who have hitherto been overlooked by scholars.

This thesis is a comparative study of the teenaged superheroine (the super-girl) across two comics cultures: the United States of America (US) and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (UK/Britain). It considers comics from 1940 to 1984, and its focus are those super-girls who appeared in girls’ comics, or comics which clearly catered towards a young female demographic. Rather than providing a chronological overview of the various characters, this thesis focuses on key characters who act as case studies. From America, Mary Marvel, Miss America, Tomboy and Supergirl, and from the UK, The Silent Three, Starr of Wonderland, the Cat, Valda and the Supercats. The aim of this thesis is to provide a theory of the super-girl that positions her within a framework of whiteness, imperialism and gender. The thesis argues that the super-girl occupies and embodies a fluid space that allows her to move between gendered identities and move beyond the restrictive gendered norms that made up much of the world of twentieth century teenage girls. Using the work of Michelle J. Smith on New Imperialism and teenage girls in fiction, this thesis argues that the active role of the super-girl is in service to white patriarchal imperialism, and to further the goals of her nation. Her transitional age here is key; because she is not yet a fully grown woman who must take on a more passive and nurturing role, the super-girl is given temporary leave to escape the world of the home and carry out her patriotic task. The whiteness of the teenage girl adds to her privileged status and adds to how the texts fashion her as an ideal for her audience, often using the language of stardom and celebrity, thus creating a specifically (and less threatening to patriarchal power structures) feminine form of the superhero. Finally, the super-girl’s body, which fluidly moves between passive and active forms, is considered a queer space. The super-girl thus is a construction of whiteness, imperialism, stardom, gender, liminal age and queerness, but she is also an unstable construction, and at times threatens patriarchal structures even as she attempts to uphold them. This thesis explores this unstable construction through a series of close readings of the comics and their accompanying paratexts, grounded in identity theory, historical context and a transnational comparative approach. Throughout this thesis I have responded to the texts and my evolving theories through the comics form, and provide a close reading of these creative responses in conjunction with the academic research. By comparing the UK and US comics cultures, this thesis challenges the American-centric nature of superhero scholarship and provides a richer reading of the genre. Another original contribution to scholarship in this thesis is the research’s engagement with the age specificity of super-girls. In addition to this, the thesis presents sustained scholarly critique of characters who have often been on the fringes of academia, such as Supergirl, Mary Marvel, Tomboy, Miss America, Supercats, Valda and the Silent Three, and is the first academic work on Starr of Wonderland.

This thesis brings together work on the fairy tale, feminist anthropology, and star studies to explore the figure of the crone archetype in the contemporary live-action cinematic fairy tale reboot, considering this as a neglected facet of the analysis of post-feminist media culture and its engagement with ageing femininity. Using Snow White and the Huntsman (Sanders, 2012), Maleficent (Stromberg, 2014) and Cinderella (Branagh, 2015), this thesis develops a series of case studies that unravel how ageing femininity is managed in various ways. A detailed examination of the off-screen personas of specific Hollywood stars, Charlize Theron, Angelina Jolie and Helena Bonham Carter, and the way in which they resonate with their on-screen portrayals of the crone in each of the films named above, enables a discussion of ageing as complex and ambivalent. The fairy tale film offers a rich, safe space for working through some of the traumas and losses associated with growing old, particularly for women. On the one hand, these films seem unafraid to suggest that ageing involves fear, loneliness and a loss of desirability and agency. In this way, these texts can be seen to echo the historical function of the fairy tale as a device for women to negotiate difficult and emotive subjects that pertain to their experience of ageing within the restrictions of a patriarchal culture. On the other hand, this thesis reveals that many of these real-life anxieties are denied or shut down by the very presence of a star's off-screen persona. The glamorous and sexy female star body can perform unglamorous and unsexy ageing via the role of the crone, but she will always be restored to her youthful off-screen self. Therefore, the crone in the live-action fairy tale reboot provides a useful figure to unpack issues of ageing femininity in contemporary media cultures produced by Hollywood, both exposing and containing the ageing process.