And you thought he wore that ten-gallon hat for no apparent reason. 
On White Collar, we had Neal Caffrey, a charming, sophisticated, ridiculously well-rounded gentleman thief who struck a deal to solve crimes for the FBI. One thing I really liked about this show is that, every now and then, they did make a point of reminding us that his FBI handler (apparently the only person smart enough to catch Caffrey) was actually pretty clever as well and was perfectly capable of solving crimes without any outside assistance. On too many of these shows, law enforcement is portrayed as being basically useless.
Officially, the FBI agent solved the crimes. The anthropologist was a technical consultant.
Vega$ with Robert Urich as Dan Tanna, a private investigator who solved plenty of crimes and criminal cases often working with LV Metro detective Lt. Dave Nelson. Great show!!!
Father Brown is another one of those homicidal psychotics who would have you believe he’s “solving” all these murders that happen right in front of him, or where he is conveniently the first person to arrive at the murder scene. The only reason he hasn’t murdered Mrs. McCarthy is because she keeps him fed with her award-winning strawberry scones.
Pray for the remaining souls of Kembleford.
It’s been awhile since I watched the show, but I seem to remember Bones going with Booth to question witnesses and suspects a lot-- so what she did with him on the show went way beyond technical consultant. Also, a lot of those murder cases they were on didn’t seem like they would warrant FBI jurisdiction. It just felt like a writer’s room pitch-- “let’s team up an FBI agent…and an anthropologist!” “Genius! Never been done before!”.
(Yes I know the show was based on a series of books which I haven’t read)
Castle had Beckett solving cases on her own some of the time. Other times Castle figured it out.
I weould argue that private investigators are “real” detectives, at least in TV land. A lot of them are “exes” - ex-cop, ex-Naval Intelligence, ex-spy.
In the heyday of private eye shows, they’d usually have a friendly police contact for the usually titular PI (Rockford, Cannon, Magnum, Simon, or Simon) to both make the actual arrest, but also to provide useful (and free!) information. They were sort of the “hacker collective/database” of the 70s - providing otherwise unobtainable information to move the plot along. The other useful service they provided is keeping the PI out of jail for all the killings they did!
Note that Jim Rockford “only” worked on closed cases, because he didn’t want the police to hassle him if he butted into their investigations. I think that lasted three episodes, maybe less. Like Next Gen’s conceit that Picard would never go on away missions, I don’t know why they bother with these rules they never intended to follow.
Oh c’mon, they didn’t all die. Some of them just left because of heartbreaking tragedy.
At least, that’s how the Cartwrights tell it.
Or from their mom, like on the Barkley ranch?
Yeah, even dating a Cartwright was deadly. One time there was a girl that Little Joe just had his eye on-- they might have kissed just once, and as a direct result of that (due to a Hatfield / McCoy style family feud plus a romantic rival) she went and got herself pitchforked to death during a fight between Joe and the rival.
Hey, one of Little Joe’s surviving girlfriends was thought to be a werewolf…
Not surprising, since Little Joe himself was also a werewolf.
I’ve been listening to an old 20th century radio drama called The Shadow. The premise of the show, which is introduced at the start of every episode, is that The Shadow, a mysterious unseen figure “who aids the forces of law and order” with hypnotic powers to cloud minds, “is in reality Lamont Cranston, wealthy young man about town”.
It’s a very entertaining radio show. Can understand why it was so popular in its day of the 1930s-1950s.
When I was a kid I bought an LP that had two episodes of ‘The Shadow’-- one on each side. I loved it. “Who knows…what evil…lurks…in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows!”
I wonder if the creators of ‘Batman’ got their idea from ‘The Shadow’. He kind of sounds like a proto-Batman. But Batman dates from the 30s I believe, so maybe not.
The Shadow pre-dates Batman so I’m sure there was inspiration for Batman. The Shadow comics which pre-dates the radio show were different than the radio show and more in line with Batman too. In the comics he had more powers as a crimefighter and Ms Margo Lane was more of a female nuisance who ascended to join The Shadow as a crimefighter too but in the radio show she is his “lovely companion” and obviously but never overtly confirmed romantic partner.
The Shadow as a character on radio initially was just a sinister sounding host introducing whatever actual drama was scheduled to begin. But so many people were intrigued and thought he had his own comics which got produced as a result of the demand. The popularity got his own radio show.
One from the UK that doesn’t seem to have made it to the US is Rosemary & Thyme, definitely aimed at the cosy/undemanding daytime TV market. It’s about a couple of ladies who have a small gardening business, though somehow every job involves them in a murder mystery (and the actual gardening they do looks a bit desultory). A similar sort of show - and definitely at the comedy end of the spectrum - is Agatha Raisin, a fish-out-of-water city slicker PR who tries for a quiet country life, only trouble seems to find her just the same.
In France there’s a detecting nun, Soeur Thérèse. And let’s not forget Cadfael.
Both R&T and AR have been aired in Canada. I watched a few episodes of the former because of Felicity Kendal, but it was just too hokey for me to continue.
Interesting! Hey @Boycott, since you like old-timey radio shows, if you also like listening to podcasts, have you heard of “The Thrilling Adventure Hour”? It’s a spot-on parody of old-time radio shows that’s very funny and entertaining. Unfortunately new episodes are not made on a regular basis anymore, but there’s a big backlog of old episodes, and it looks from my subscription feed that they occasionally do a new show.
They recorded it live in front of an audience, old-timey radio style. There are several ‘shows’-- my favorite is probably “Beyond Belief” in which Paul F. Tomkins and Paget Brewster play a high society couple who fight the supernatural. She absolutely nails the old fashioned Mid-Atlantic accent. I could listen to her read a phone book in that accent. “Sparks Nevada - Marshall on Mars” is maybe my second favorite. But they’re all good.
I hadn’t heard of it but will take up your recommendation. I am a big fan of old-timey radio shows (and audio plays in general) so will definitely check it out.
What I like about radio shows is they just transport you into another world. I go for a walk every evening and like listening to The Shadow or some other show and visualize the pictures painted by a great story, good voice acting and sound effects. Last few days I am currently on a 1950s BBC sci-fi show called Journey into Space which was the last radio program to get bigger primetime audiences than TV in the UK.