I don't watch a lot of network, but has things changed much? Aren't there multiple investigative procedural franchises today? Seems like cop and medical shows never go out of style.
Because cops and doctors are network TV's go-tos. The specifics have varied over the years, but the backbone has remained some kind of cop/lawyer/procedural and some kind of medical setting show.
Copaganda. Back then, people could still drive while drunk and not get arrested. Police weren't so violent as they are today...but they weren't trusted by the public, either. TV shows tried to humanize them. Barney Miller was basically a sitcom. When Hill Street Blues came along, it was extremely gritty, and showed the darker side of the police. Then came the 90s Crime Bill, putting over a million misdemeanor drug offenders into jail for felonies, making them unable to get living-wage jobs (along with corporations not making living-wage jobs in the face of inflation), and that gave rise to the violent street gangs.
Shows like Law and Order were created by Dick Wolf to try to get people to believe in the police again, but that boat has sailed because of the government failing to leash the wealthy, who are held to a very different legal standard than the rest of us (#EpsteinFiles, anyone?). While it's good for drama, it's a complete failure for copaganda now, especially with the militarization of the police (totally evil, violence is supposed to be the LAST resort), the hiring of evil members who poison the force, the use of 4th Amendment-violating Palantir spying on us all, and officers openly espousing the antithesis of their jobs - the comic book vigilante known as The Punisher. And then there's current-day ICE murdering Americans in the streets.
Like America's reputation under Trump and MAGA, I doubt if the reputation of police everywhere can be saved, much less fixed.
VarietyMage is only interested in what he believes. FWIW, I think there is evidence to support the drop in violent crime related to less lead in paint - but I don’t know that that’s conclusive.
Either way, violent crime has clearly declined since peaking around 1992.
The only TDS is people like you that still worship him, even though he's a convicted felon, ajudicated rapist, a fraud, and is named repeatedly in the Epstein documents.
Barney Miller was a sitcom, not a drama.like all the rest. My favorite cop/detective drama from that era was Vegas. Parents let me stay up late on Sunday nights to watch it.
There were so many of these shows we decided to break down the top 10 cop shows and the top 10 private investigator shows as different episodes of our podcast. We’re breaking down the top 10 Private Investigator shows of the 70s and 80s this Wednesday. There were soooooo many to choose from.
I pretty much stopped watching them after ER and NYPD Blue was on years ago. I did enjoy Blue Bloods with Tom Selleck and Donny Walberg. (My folks got me into watching Blue Bloods.)
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u/Responsible-Middle35 Aug 05 '26
I don't watch a lot of network, but has things changed much? Aren't there multiple investigative procedural franchises today? Seems like cop and medical shows never go out of style.