eight million stories
Jun. 24th, 2012 05:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sergebroom"There are eight million stories in the Naked City."
Today, I watched four of those stories and what strikes me about the 1961 TV series I followed way back then is that the bad guys tend to be damaged people, and that's how the two main cops treat them. Even when Mickey Rooney's character walks into a crowded arena with a bomb strapped to his hand, the cops listen to this ignored man who wants to be *heard*. My favorite episode is the one where Martin Balsam plays someone who committed a robbery that went very badly, and he's been sentenced to the Chair. He's going thru a new trial though because the officer who had arrested him eventually realized that his criminal behavior had been caused by a tumor in his brain and, now without the tumor, he's lost all memories of the last ten years and is basically a different person.
By the way, how many cop shows do you know where an episode begins with a cop quoting Plato?
Today, I watched four of those stories and what strikes me about the 1961 TV series I followed way back then is that the bad guys tend to be damaged people, and that's how the two main cops treat them. Even when Mickey Rooney's character walks into a crowded arena with a bomb strapped to his hand, the cops listen to this ignored man who wants to be *heard*. My favorite episode is the one where Martin Balsam plays someone who committed a robbery that went very badly, and he's been sentenced to the Chair. He's going thru a new trial though because the officer who had arrested him eventually realized that his criminal behavior had been caused by a tumor in his brain and, now without the tumor, he's lost all memories of the last ten years and is basically a different person.
By the way, how many cop shows do you know where an episode begins with a cop quoting Plato?
