If the trial of Johnny Depp vs. Amber Heard had its own IMDb page – listing everyone involved in a TV or movie production – it would certainly be a star-studded one. Considering the way in which the trial has been treated by television coverage of the court process – as a juicy, highly sellable narrative affixed to a supposed pursuit of justice – it's a shock that it doesn't.
An increasingly popular genre of television, courtroom broadcasting seems to have seized its place in the broader media marketplace overnight with its wildly popular coverage of the Depp vs. Heard trial. Judging by its impact on the public and pop culture in the last couple months, the trial serves as a prime example of the way in which court-centric media needs to pathologize its subjects by design and maintains a fiduciary love of hating women. Court television has unabashedly cashed in on a survivor's trauma because it promises to yield high returns and large numbers of new subscribers. As an employee of one such station, I can attest to the fact that these networks have just as much to gain from this trial as Heard has to lose.
