First, husband and I were watching The First 48 on A&E the other night - they have a new police force on the show now, Dallas (used to be only Miami and I think Memphis). During the show, they show shots of downtown Dallas and I was wondering what is the skyscraper that is outlined in green lights?
Second, we were watchings Cops Saturday night - and husband suggested that different markets see different towns. For example, we never ever see Chicago Cops on Cops - we see other towns. Do other towns that are NOT Chicago ever see Chicago Cops? If you live in, say, Las Vegas, when you watch Cops do you see Las Vegas Cops or do you see towns that are NOT your town?
Yes, these are the things I ponder on a Monday morning…
I believe that Cops is in different towns based on the season. They will come out to a city and shoot a bunch of shows all at once, certainly. I was told by a police officer that Des Moines was used more than once as they treated the COPS crew pretty well.
As to seeing different markets, that’s not the case. I’ve often caught the Des Moines episodes here.
The new Cops each week is (was?) broadcast nationally, so if that week they were in Des Moines, everybody who watched saw Des Moines. In syndication, though, I’m sure its possible a city can show its own episodes more often, or exclusively, if they choose.
No cite, but back when Cops was a bigger hit in the 90’s I remember hearing that Mayor Daley explictly said that the Chicago police department would not accept invitations to be part of the show.
In the 90’s Fort Lauderdale’s rather corrupt sheriff made a point of getting the COPS crew to come as much as possible for the purpose of self promotion. We saw those episodes in Fort Lauderdale.
I heard the same thing about Oklahoma City. Someone in power (Chief of Police? Mayor?) thought that Cops perpetuated the myth that good policing was all about car chases and foot chases.
As a kid who watched Cops every Saturday from Olympia, I know Cops used to film in Lakewood, Washington, all the time; they weren’t in other towns nearby very often- usually if they were, it was because of a pursuit that started in Lakewood*- but we also saw police everywhere from New Jersey to Albequerque, with special Mardi Gras edition from New Orleans.
Ever since Lakewood set up its own police force, instead of being part of the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department, Cops hasn’t filmed there- apparently Lakewood’s frequent appearances on the show are bad publicity for the housing market.
(My favorite episode was somewhere in the Southwest though- the truck driving transvestite. I’m pretty sure it was an Albuquerque sequence, but that might just be combining two Weird Al songs.)
*In elementary school, my DARE officer, part of the Lacey Police Department, claimed that a Cops camera crew rode with him one night, but he never got a call the whole night.
I was told by a San Jose cop that COPS would never be allowed here but he said it was because the cops in the show comitted a lot of procedural errors. I have no idea if this is true.
Can someone tell me why these guys who get arrested never have their faces blobbed out? I can’t believe they all give the show permission and I have seen bystanders faces blobbed out.
