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| My impression of some of the various police shows... by Fullofkittens 06/14/2009, 3:53am PDT | ||||
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| ...based on walking through the room when my wife was watching them.
Law & Order: probably still the best one? I've never seen The Wire but I'm guessing it delves into the characters' personalities which is bad and should never be done. Law & Order SVU: As JW calls it, Law & Order Cigarette Burns Unit. The charter of the Special Victims Unit is that kiddie rapers require especially edgy outsiders to catch them. I dislike this one because A: something about all the raping and torture brings me down and B: the head edgy outsider is a guy who HATES people that are mean to children (to CHILDREN!!!) and wants to beat them up. This is too much character development for a Law and Order show. Law & Order: Criminal Intent: Apparently the police's SOP is to get people who are somewhat like the criminals they are hoping to catch to do the catching; presumably this worked well with speeding tickets so they decided to apply it across the board. So the Criminal Intent teams consist of a crazy guy and his tomboy partner who are investigating a criminal genius with lots of conversations. It's kind of like Columbo if, instead of being an amiable guy that everybody likes, Columbo was Vincent "Edgar Suit" D'Onofonononfrio chomping on the set and holding his hands to his temples. This one is a bit more entertaining than SVU but frequently has the same problems that SVU has i.e. stories that are too depressing and occasional sorties into character backstory which should never be done. Without a Trace: This always starts with a person disappearing (like House and Six Feet Under, the fun part of the first five minutes is guessing who is this week's victim - OMG that's not who I expected!), and always ends with (spit) character development (spit). The guy that I used to think was a Baldwin (but who is apparently not a Baldwin) has some kind of problem with being divorced or some shit. WHO CARES. Cold Case: aka Law and Order: Our Writers Work Out Their Issues From High School Edition. Some lady uses the power of period music and flashbacks to solve crimes that are 30 years old. Her job is pretty easy because the guilt is usually bothering the killer, even today. I suspect that in a lot of real life "cold cases" the murderer is just as happy to not get caught now as he or she used to be so she would probably have more trouble in real life. The main appeal of this show is that Law and Order very rarely plays "Don't Stop Believing" as the credits roll but I think that Cold Case has had it several times. Not much character development in this show (good!). The main lady's character portrait seems to consist of "pale, wants to solve crimes" which is a step in the right direction. NCIS: I originally thought this was a quirky, lighthearted take on a cross between CSI and Law and Order - IN THE NAVY. But apparently I was thrown off a little by the presence of Mark "Summer School" Harmon and the goofy kinda-hot goth CSI girl: NCIS sometimes gets a bit dark as well. Mark Harmon is mean in this show! But he's so likable that he stills endears himself to his subordinates, and to me. Bones: This stars Angel as a loose cannon and Zooey Deschanel's frigid-looking sister as some kind of forensic genius. Ironically, although I dislike a lot of these shows for being too dark, this one sucks because it's too goofy. I think they were hoping for David Duchovny but by some (possibly clerical) mistake they got David Boreanaz instead. =( The Mentalist: I've only seen this a couple of times, and for some reason I thought the Mentalist guy was supposed to be psychic at first (he's not, he's just some kind of ex-hypnotherapist or something), but nevertheless this one is not terrible just because the cast is likable and they solve crimes by being smarter than the criminals. They frequently conveniently know things that solve the case, or notice little details that solve the case; in the few times I've seen this it's all a bit implausible, but hey, likable cast, good dialog, what do you want? The Unusuals: aka Amber Tamblyn's Show That Gets Canceled This Year. Who does this lady know? Are her parents Hollywood players or something? This show has a lot character development. >:( That's all I can think of for now, but there are at least three or four more. 8| |
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