Why do you think dramas are so popular?

I think that dramas are popular because of the broad audience appeal it can possibly have, depending on the sub-genre. I feel that dramas are able to convey gripping story lines in TV series' that are able to captivate audiences to continue watching, this is true for series such as Mr. Selfridge (UK) and Breaking Bad (US) where their audience is so strong due to good plot and characters.

Drama is generally very broad for audiences and they manage to capture various ages and genders and countries usually, this is different to comedy for example where the comedy make be specific to a particular country such as Angry Boys which is specific to Australian and potentially British humour however for american humour for example they likely wouldn't understand. Another example with age would be The Inbetweeners which would only really aimed at teenagers and young adults and thus more elderly people may not find the humour as funny.

The sub genres are extremely wide, for example crime is incorporated in both Dexter and also the UK show of Midsummer Murders but it varies to historical action dramas such as The Musketeers.