# What is extremely common in TV or movies but almost never happens in real life? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 6, 2021, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-extremely-common-in-tv-or-movies-but-almost-never-happens-in-real-life/932311 "2021-02-06T04:16:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 4657
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2025, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-extremely-common-in-tv-or-movies-but-almost-never-happens-in-real-life/932311/4657 "2025-01-22T14:33:48Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Or go relative-shopping for a cousin willing to sign off on risky surgery for a comatose victim so the victim would either recover and be able to testify or else die and up the charge to murder. Despite that blatant tapestry of justice, that is still one of my favorite episodes. Not just for the outcome, but that it spawned a sequel. Plus, it makes Larry Miller a three time “repeat offender”: twice as the killer Dobson, and once as himself. He’s still obnoxious all three times. 🙂 Whoever told him he was funny? > [@Legality of Columbo's trick with the cigar box](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legality-of-columbos-trick-with-the-cigar-box/1013310/1): > > I’m just saying: there’s “basically” bullying someone into confessing, and then there’s “actually” bullying someone into confessing Criminal Intent, season 6 episode “Bombshell” (inspired by Anna Nicole Smith) has two murders, committed by two people. One a psycho nutjob woman, the other the father of pseudo-ANS’s baby. Detective Logan watches as the nutjob woman holds the baby over the ledge of a tall building (on her own accord, did I mention she’s a psycho nutjob?) and his idea of “talking her down” is to urge (coerce) the father to confess to the _other_ murder. No way that confession holds up. “Your honor, Detective Logan merely watched as psycho nutjob threatened to murder my client’s child. For all we know, he put her up to it. He had no choice but to lie to save the child!” Not one of my favorite episodes! If Goren has a formula fault, it was coercing guilty suspects to confess to hide a deeper (to them) sin. (such as a priest who fathered a child with a parishioner, and if the secret came out, it could bring harm to them.\*) He did that enough that I thought he should be reined in. Or find better writers. 🙂 \*ada Carver: You do that again, detective, and I’ll have your badge. --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-extremely-common-in-tv-or-movies-but-almost-never-happens-in-real-life/932311)._