What bothers me is when they’re in the middle of prosecuting someone who looks guilty but launch a new investigation just because something just doesn’t feel right. Then they discover someone else committed the crime. So even though they’re in the middle of a trial, they drop the charges against the innocent suspect, charge the guilty person, and start a new trial. Maybe prosecutors would do this kind of thing in a perfect world, but in the real world and especially in the NYC District Attorney’s Office, I don’t think they have even a fraction of the time they’d need to do it. And they usually get convictions in these cases even though it seems like they’ve stirred up several tons of reasonable doubt themselves by admitting they put the wrong person on trial.
All right, I’ll take a shot at it. When you lead with your chin and all…
“So, you’ve been doing the same job for 30 years, and yet that is. somehow, an argument that you’re not lazy, dumb, and incompetent?”
“Posted at 10:34am. From your work computer, most likely. I’m just feeling that security!”
“Next time I see you sleeping at the bank, I’ll wake you up and say ‘hi’, ok?”
I once read an interview with my brother’s brother-in-law after he had been appointed forensic technician of the year. When asked if he used to watch CSI he answered no and that from what he had heard about the program it had little or no correlation with what he was doing.
I’ve seen a room full of prisoners watching cop shows and laughing about the way the writers got the criminals wrong.
“You see that? He just walked into the liquor store without a mask and never even looked to see where the security camera was. The writers on this show have obviously never committed an armed robbery in real life.”
In the case of forensics, I know nothing about the profession, but I’ve always been amused at how the technicians on NCSI, etc. always have the time and technology to run any test the cops ask for at a moment’s notice.
“We need you to find out which tailor from the Garment District this cotton fiber came from. Once you do that, cross reference that tailor with any emails containing shipping manifests going into or coming out of Mauritania. My hunch is that there was only one ship sailing out of Nouakchott which uses pine deckrails instead of ash. Find that ship and we’ve found the drugs we’re looking for. I’ll pick up the results after lunch.”
RL response:
“The best I can do is get you a pair of cotton underwear that might’ve had some drugs stuffed in them at some point. Fill out this ream of paperwork and come back in eight months after I’ve fulfilled the requests for the 42,593 New York City homicide cases in front of you.”
I’ve been meaning to do a thread asking about this. I don’t even watch CSI and I am used to seeing it done. EVERY show involving Police/FBI seems to do it. Is it really done that way?
Two points:
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The idiocy about writers appears in all TV shows (except Castle). Whenever there’s a mystery and there’s a writer involved, you can bet that the author is rich and someone has stolen a book idea from someone else (something that never happens in real life.
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All these stupid cliches about writers and created . . . by writers. You don’t have doctors or CSI writing TV shows. You do have professional writers doing them. And they’re always portraying things contrary to their own reality.
That’s not true! You also belong to the profession that provides the key escalation of a tense bank robbery situation by deciding to suddenly die (or at least be wounded) a hero. Vital, vital work.
NCIS always seems to be doing the jobs of local cops too. Oh, the 4th victim of a serial killer was in the Navy??? Let’s jump right in and take over the investigation!
My husband works with some NCIS agents, and they all seem to hate the show with a passion. Mainly because their main job is writing threat assessments, (Not romancing international terrorist’s daughters, or running deep cover operations only tangetially related to the Navy), and people always ask them about Mark Harmon and that “Hot Mossad agent.” “What, were they to busy to come??”
Soldiers, or anyone in the military.
I have seen glimmers of reality, but it’s far and few.
As a game developer, I’m always tempted totighten up the graphics on level 3.
I’m with you on knowing virtually nothing about the profession, but what kills me on shows featuring crime scene investigations/forensics is the wardrobes. Sure, the CSIs are looking for minute bits of evidence to run through the magical 5-minute DNA tester, but their own long unfettered hair or stylish-but-uncovered shoes could never contaminate a sample, right? And of course, no one seems to worry that their clothes might just get ruined traipsing through a blood spattered crack house or in the underbrush of a heavily-wooded mountainside. Public servants get huuuge wardrobe budgets!
I think “Archer” is pretty accurate at portraying the spy world and the bumblefarks in it.
My own profession.
I’ve always found it interesting how the different professions are portrayed depending on who the show focuses on. NYPD Blue and other cop shows? The CSI techs and coroner are almost invisible (still weirdly efficient). Show about CSI techs? Cops are there just to keep people from the crime scene, and maybe stand behind the CSI tech while he conducts and interview with the suspect. Coroner show? Yup, that’s the coroner, with a gun, leading SWAT.
Nothing says “Shoot me now!” like fumbling your gun out of its holster in front of three guys with semiautomatic weapons already drawn.
Medical lab techs. Actually, the portrayals aren’t ridiculous so much as they aren’t seen on tv AT ALL - in the real world, anyone taking your blood and running tests is most likely a lab tech. On tv and in movies, they’re always doctors and nurses. The idea of a doctor coming into the lab and running their own tests - hi-frickin-larious! I guess someone picking up a phone and calling down to the lab to get someone to come up and draw blood doesn’t play as well as the doctor just drawing a couple of samples.
A bigger issue for me on forensic shows is the convenient clue. A particular bit of leather found on the scene is only used in one brand of shoes, which is only sold in two stores in the entire city. That’s just lazy writing.
Not to mention that store clerks always identify one of the suspects as a customer, even if it item was purchased weeks before. Most store clerks make absolutely no note of any customer unless they do something annoying or especially nice. Someone who comes in and buys a can of paint is not going to be remembered the next day, let alone weeks later.
As a tester, I found that hilarious. I’d love to enter that bug: “Level 3 needs tighter graphics”.
Yes, games need to be tested. No, testing games doesn’t mean sitting there playing games with your buddies.
The military was mentioned earlier and writers are all over the place with soldiers. Green Berets in movies and TV are often huge muscley Rambos and John Matrixes who leap out of trees and slash everyone’s throats, cutting a path through the enemy installation like some kind of roided up Tasmanian devil, screaming and huaaaahing their way to victory.
From my experience (I’ve worked with Special Forces when I was in the Army), many are big guys, but not all. The bigger guys usually aren’t all ripped and usually have a bit of a gut – something to live off of a bit when they’re deployed. Some are small and wiry, but all of the ones I’ve met generally eschew the typical military yelling and bravado and prefer to be “quiet professionals.”
And like mentioned by JSexton , the majority of their time probably isn’t that interesting. SF operators are all capable sharpshooters, but would rather avoid fighting if possible and leave that for conventional and indigenous forces. Much their time is either spent in Listening Posts/ Observation Posts hiding and watching or training local forces.
And of course, police procedurals always have an episode where the disgruntled sniper goes on a kill spree when I don’t think something like that has happened since Lee Harvey Oswald.
But yeah, how interesting would a TV show be if it just showed two guys hiding under a tarp in the sand for an hour watching for a truck to drive by? Of course real firefights happen, like Seal Team 6’s assault on Bin Laden’s compound, but real missions aren’t typically that noisy and well known. I’m OK with watching this if it’s a little far fetched, though I do notice discrepancies.