# Police procedurals vs classic detective shows **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** tv-shows-scripted\ **Created:** [June 29, 2021, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245 "2021-06-29T13:13:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2021, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/41 "2021-07-01T13:39:14Z")
> [@DCnDC](#): > > Today, it’s rare any given scene lasts more than a few minutes at a time, and if something does require a very long scene, they still break it up somehow. Older shows like _The Rockford Files_ and _Murder, She Wrote_ are glacial in comparison. Every once in a while, I’ll try watching an old episode of a vintage cop show. The pacing is painfully slowwww… One episode opened with a detective sauntering into the police station, getting a cup of coffee, stirring sugar into it, greeting other workers, walking to his desk, taking off his sport coat, sitting down and getting out a pen, starting to do some paperwork (seriously, we are watching him pick up a piece of paper, scribble something on it, put it down on a different pile, and reach for another paper!)… But then, thank God, the boss calls him into his office. Good, _now_ we’ll get the plot rolling! But no, we watch him casually stand up, finish his coffee and slowly put his sport coat back on… At this point my wife walked by and asked “What is this?” “A half hour cop show stretched out to an hour.” ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2021, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/42 "2021-07-01T16:38:56Z")
I was thinking that Joseph Wambaugh might have been the dividing point between old and modern cop shows. Maybe, maybe not, but I found this quote by Robert Aldrich, who changed _The Choirboys_ onto a different movie than the book: “Aldrich said he did not feel the same way as Wambaugh about “the problems of the cop… I don’t find the fact that cops can’t “cope” particularly rewarding; I can’t relate to it. I don’t know how to feel sorry for a cop. It’s a volunteer force. You’re not drafted to become a cop. So you’ve got to take some of the heat if you don’t like what people think about you. After all, that’s an extraordinary pension you get in twenty years; nobody else gets it. In fact, I disagree with Wambaugh to such an extent that I don’t think people really like cops.” Aldrich said the book “doesn’t go far enough for me” for instance not showing them to be racist, taking bribes or wanting to be stormtroopers. "I think you’ve got to show L. A. cops as brutal as they really are. And Wambaugh can’t face that problem, so it’s never touched in the book. " Wikipedia citation: “I CAN’T GET JIMMY CARTER TO SEE MY MOVIE!” Aldrich, Robert. Film Comment; New York Vol. 13, Iss. 2, (Mar/Apr 1977): 46-52. ---
**Author:** ![zbuzz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e19b73/32.png) [@zbuzz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zbuzz)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2021, 7:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/43 "2021-07-02T07:58:36Z")
> [@pkbites](#): > > IIRC Joe Friday waited until the in custody subject was being interviewed before reading them their rights which is how it is actually done in real life. I think Webb did a lot of research, listening to real police consultants, and opted for realism over the cliche drama police shows today go for. And it worked. Great show! By being in custody, you mean Friday waiting until the suspect is in the interview room at the station and not by reading the rights on the spot before the suspect is cuffed? Because I just randomly opened 8 Dragnet episodes (1960s version, don’t know about the 50s) and 3 of them had scenes of Friday or other cops advising people of their rights before they were cuffed or taken to the station. That’s a totally scientifically valid sampling, of course. I dunno, I think you can praise Dragnet for “opting for realism” insofar as the mundane aspects it portrayed, like watching them do paperwork, or working an intake desk instead of getting into a car chase which is important stuff, but you also still have to consider that the show was very propagandistic. That made it decidedly less realistic. There are practically no shades of grey in Dragnet (60s version at least). All cops are good, all hippies or drug users are bad, except for the time that one hippie shaved his beard by the end of the episode and confessed to how wrong he had been to be a hippie. The show was also no stranger to glossing over issues of racism and other inequities in policing (which, if you’re into depressing irony, actually does make the show more realistic, I guess). ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2021, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/44 "2021-07-02T12:52:32Z")
The 1969 revival was more propagandistic (I recall one show where Friday discussed the dangers of drugs with a drug dealer), but the radio show and 50s version concentrated on the mundane aspects of investigating a crime. Few minorities were portrayed, but that was true of most every show of that era. ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/779978/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats2)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2021, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/45 "2021-07-02T16:13:43Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > Dragnet, The Untouchables and Adam-12 are laughably stiff and painful to watch. You have no taste. ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/779978/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats2)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2021, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/46 "2021-07-02T16:25:27Z")
Perhaps I should elaborate. _Dragnet_ and _Adam-12_ are fine, stylized shows, and they may seem stiff because of that. But _The Untouchables_? Stiff? You are aware that the stoic Mr Stack is not the whole show, right? _The Untouchables_ was one of the few programs that relied on the _bad guy_ for the viewpoint. Watch the interchanges between Bruce Gordon as Frank Nitti and Nehemiah Persoff as Jake Guzik, and then come back and tell me that the show was stiff. ---
**Author:** ![filmore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7993a0/32.png) [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2021, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/47 "2021-07-02T16:31:53Z")
I never even knew _Police Story_ was a show until I happened to catch a few episodes this year. I was surprised at how gritty it was compared to the shows I typically associate with that time period. Like in one episode, a detective with a drinking problem comes home, fights with his wife, throws her all around in front of the kids, trashes the place, fights with the police who come to break it up, etc. The violence felt a lot more personal and intimate than the cop shows we have today. ---
**Author:** ![MikeF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@MikeF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MikeF)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2021, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/48 "2021-07-07T17:21:01Z")
Can I hear an “Amen!” for Highway Patrol? The least Highway Patrolling police agency in the west! 21-50, 10-4. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2021, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/49 "2021-07-07T20:45:55Z")
> [@SciFiSam](#): > > > [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > > > A lot of those older police shows weren’t “mysteries” like they are today. You often knew who did it from an opening scene depicting the actual crime. The shows weren’t whodunnits; they were about the cat and mouse game between the bad guys and the cops. > > Which shows other than Columbo did that? I can’t think of any classic shows or modern either, though with the modern ones I might just not be aware of them. Here’s one you may have heard of: > **[Monk (TV series)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monk_(TV_series))** > > Monk is an American comedy-drama detective television series created by Andy Breckman. The series premiered on the USA Network on July 12, 2002, and concluded on December 4, 2009, with 125 episodes broadcast over eight seasons. It follows Adrian Monk (Tony Shalhoub), a private detective with obsessive-compulsive disorder and multiple phobias, and his assistants Sharona Fleming (Bitty Schram) and Natalie Teeger (Traylor Howard). The show is primarily a police procedural that traces Monk's investig... ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2021, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/50 "2021-07-07T20:51:37Z")
And few shoot-outs, no car chases, and the murder isn’t solved in one episode. Barney Miller was pretty realistic, although having that many top wisecrackers in one shift is unlikely. Bad coffee? Check, filthy restrooms? Check. Lots of paperwork? Check. Uniform wanting a shot at detective? Check. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2021, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/51 "2021-07-07T20:58:20Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#): > > I was thinking that Joseph Wambaugh might have been the dividing point between old and modern cop shows. Yeah, although they were fairly well written, he was too homophobic to make me comfortable. he had a cop burn the head of a gay guys penis with his cigar, and that is portrayed as a “Good Thing”. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2021, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/52 "2021-07-07T21:01:40Z")
With those ridiculous snub-nosed .38s. But a fat cop back then? Totally realistic. > [@Skywatcher](#): > > Here’s one you may have heard of: > > [Monk (TV series) - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monk_(TV_series)) Monks started out as a detective with a quirk, then degenerated into a sorta kinda quirky comedy about a guy with some serious issues… who also sometimes made the police look like morons. Early seasons were quite good. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2021, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/53 "2021-07-07T21:57:53Z")
Thanks! Yes, I have heard of Monk and seen a few episodes, but they must have all happened to be the ones that weren’t Columbo-style. ---
**Author:** ![Icerigger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icerigger/32/432_2.png) [@Icerigger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icerigger)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2021, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/54 "2021-07-07T23:02:25Z")
You can’t beat Mancini’s “Columbo et al” theme, when I was a kid this man slowly coming at me scared me half to death. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/8VI9mUyG_f0/hqdefault.jpg ""NBC Sunday Mystery Movie" TV Intro") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VI9mUyG_f0) ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2021, 7:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245/55 "2021-07-08T07:41:59Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > _Homicide_ spanned genres – a procedural, a mystery, and a workplace show. Often all three in one episode. In retrospect, _Homicide_ was essentially a proto-“prestige” series. It had more in common with the cable dramas of the following decade like _the Sopranos_ or _Breaking Bad_ (or _the Wire_, of course) than it did with anything from its own era. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/police-procedurals-vs-classic-detective-shows/945245.md?page=2)