By the time his top 5 were or TV, I'd pretty much stopped watching anything except baseball...so I can't comment on any of those. And I really did not like Hawaii 5-0. And, while I only saw them in syndication, I always thought that the (1950s) Dragnet was excellent, and that The Naked City was better than that.
Max Allan Collins and John Javna (in their book The Best of Crime & Detective TV, published in 1988) have this as their top 10: Hill Street Blues Dragnet (1950s) The Naked City Columbo Police Story (which I loathed) The Untouchables Crime Story (which I never saw) Kojak (which I also loathed) Cagney & Lacey (which I never saw) Baretta (which I cordialy disliked)
(Y+They have Barney Miller in "comedy crimefighters, along with Police Squad...)
I think Adam 12 should be on the list. When you say "cop" most people would think of an officer in uniform, driving a patrol car, answering calls, and patrolling the city looking for crime. That was Adam 12. Sure it was cleaned up, but it had a reality to it that a lot of shows don't have.
8 comments:
It occurs to me that many westerns featured lawmen, who are, at least technically, cops.
Also, why is Lewis here, but not Morse?
I would have included Southland.
Where's Columbo?
My favorite cop show starred Andy Griffith and Don Knotts.
John Duke
Lewis would NOT be on my top 10.
By the time his top 5 were or TV, I'd pretty much stopped watching anything except baseball...so I can't comment on any of those. And I really did not like Hawaii 5-0. And, while I only saw them in syndication, I always thought that the (1950s) Dragnet was excellent, and that The Naked City was better than that.
Max Allan Collins and John Javna (in their book The Best of Crime & Detective TV, published in 1988) have this as their top 10:
Hill Street Blues
Dragnet (1950s)
The Naked City
Columbo
Police Story (which I loathed)
The Untouchables
Crime Story (which I never saw)
Kojak (which I also loathed)
Cagney & Lacey (which I never saw)
Baretta (which I cordialy disliked)
(Y+They have Barney Miller in "comedy crimefighters, along with Police Squad...)
I think Adam 12 should be on the list. When you say "cop" most people would think of an officer in uniform, driving a patrol car, answering calls, and patrolling the city looking for crime. That was Adam 12. Sure it was cleaned up, but it had a reality to it that a lot of shows don't have.
Danny
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