The Facts Of Life

You know what else you should've been watching last year but probably didn't.  It's my number two pick for the best new show of this Fall's TV season (which again is an old show that debuted last season)!

2. Life

Let's face it, cop shows have been done to death.  Since the advent of television there have been police procedurals (and westerns; but western themed TV shows have been out of vogue for a while--but I haven't forgotten you 'Adventures of Brisco Country, Jr.').  

I remember when I was a kid, Nick at Nite showed actual vintage TV programs from the 50's and 60's, as opposed to reruns of 'Cheers' and 'The Cosby Show' that they currently run.  This gave me a great education in early television, and I learned about the classic cop show.  Chief among them, I was a big fan of the original 'Dragnet' with Jack Webb as Sgt. Joe Friday. He was a tough no-nonsense cop that followed witnesses and clues to solve a crime every week.  Sound familiar?  That's the first half an hour of every 'Law & Order' program (and dozens of other shows).  In fact, I am often surprised just how similar the first half of 'Law & Order' is exactly like an old 'Dragnet' episode from 50 years ago. Some things never change.

There was Hawaii 5-0, Adam 12, TJ Hooker, SWAT, Chips, Hill Street Blues, Miami Vice, Homicide, Wiseguy, not to mention the slew of "let's solve a crime in about an hour" shows that are so popular these days (Without A Trace, Numbers, Criminal Minds and all The CSI's). And those are just the first shows that come to mind. I know there's a bunch more.

With so many cop shows on TV, the formula is bound to get stale (ask me why I've never watched an entire episode of 'NCIS').  The solution to this problem; whacky characters.  

The whacky cop character had been around for a while, but I think it was perfected in the early 90's with Andy Sipowicz, Dennis Franz's character on 'NYPD Blue'.  He was a tough no-nonsense cop, but he had many personality quirks and character flaws.  He was sexist, racist, a drunk and a bully; and sometimes he'd show his butt.  Basically, he was something different in the type of show we thought we were familiar with.  Andy Sipowicz was the gateway character to some of the crazy crime solvers we have now.

Sometimes it works like with the obsessive compulsive crime solver in 'Monk'.  Then there's the math-whiz who fights crime with his wicked algebra skills on 'Numbers'.  We have the incredibly morally questionable bad-ass cop on 'The Shield'.  We have a fake psychic detective on 'Psych'. And we have a scientist/resident bug expert on 'CSI'. 

But often times the character spin on the cop show doesn't work at all.  Remember 'Hack' about the cop who moonlights as a vigilante/cab driver?  And what about 'Blind Justice' with the cop who lost his eye-sight yet remained on the force and still carried a gun.  Trying to create the balance between cop and quirk can get a little silly at times.

Basically Hollywood is no longer producing normal cops.  All these guys are a little "off" in their crime-solving methods, making them different and some would argue more entertaining that the cops in the police shows of yesteryear.

Which brings me to the show I was trying to recommend.  The NBC show called 'Life'.  For some reason, it seems nobody but me watched this show when it premiered last year, but it is definitely worth a second look.  'Life' is about a good cop named Charlie Crews who was wrongfully convicted of multiple homicides and sentenced to life in prison.  After 12 years in jail, he is exonerated, and given a multi-million financial settlement by the state.  As part of this settlement, he also got back his old job as a detective.  

So now he's out of prison with a lot of money, a badge, and a gun, and he really wants to find the guys that set him up in the first place.  Also, time for a cop behind bars has been difficult, causing him to adopt an odd zen-like philosophy about life and people.  He is a man with a foot in two worlds.  He sees a crime scene from both the perspective of a cop and a criminal, because he has experienced life as both things.  Charlie Crews is funny and off-balanced as a man stuck between his old life and his new one (Did I mention while in prison, his wife left him?  Talk about bad luck).  He is one of those great TV characters, and if you haven't seen it, you should really check it out. 

'Life' season one is now on DVD (Come on--there are only 11 episodes) and the new season premieres on September 29th.  See ya there!