Who's your favorite TV cop character so far and why ?

Eras Forum

Who are your 1- 3 favorite TV cop characters
(be it a detective or a uniformed / undercover cop, but not a private detective or a lawyer) so far and please say why, for anyone named ?

I am going to say Cagney and Lacey (no longer on TV) 'cause I love the way they worked together, and their banter was really funny sometimes.

Hetty Wainthropp Investigates, a PBS Mystery series with Patricia Routledge. I love this actress, and her role on this series is excellent. She really has a quirky way of solving things.

1: My favourite, I think Chief Wiggum from the Simpsons. They just make so much fun of him and it's funny beacsue he looks like a pig.

2: Detective Goran from Law and Order Criminal Intent. I just love him I think he is great. He is a bit up himself and thinks he know everything, but he is still the good guy and really likeable. Also it is just funny thinking of him in his "Edgar Suit" from Men in Black. I also saw him in a soft porn movie once, that was really wierd.

3: Grisham from CSI. I don't know if he counts as a real cop or not, but I like him for the same reasons as Goran. I just love how he knows so much. I dont really believe any one person can have that much information stored in their brain, but it makes for good TV.

I'm going with the agents from CSI. They are the best... and that show is top notch.

The dude from CHIPS... he was about as smooth as sand paper

Olivia d'Abo

I think she used to be in the Wonder Years...

Yes, she was Kevin Arnold's sister. Cool, thanks gaboman. (I had a look at what else and she was also Princess Jehnna in Conan the Destroyer, interesting)

Oh yeah, that's right.

Well, anyway, I think that almost confirms she didn't act in Australia.

She looks just like her though, it is uncanny. I did some research, tell me what you think: Do you think she looks like Alyssa Jane Cook though?

THis is Olivia D'Abo:
http://ia.imdb.com/media/imdb/01/I/73/75/12m.jpg
And this is AJ Cook from various Australian TV series and movies:

http://www.btinternet.com/~e_street/images/FrontPage/cp_lisa.jpg (This photo is from E-Street, from the 1980's)

Oh yeah, I know who you mean now

But wasn't she... hosting some talk show recently?
Funniest Home Videos or something like that...

And making these God-awful TV movies...

Yes exactly, TV movies are AJ's specialty lately. I think she might have hosted Funniest Home Videos at one in time too.

Anyway, sorry guys, I pulled this right off topic. Who is your favourite TV cop and why?

Jon Baker (Larry Wilcox) Frank "Ponch" Poncherello (Erik Estrada) and Bobby Goren (Vincent D'Onofrio)

Hubba hubba hubba! No other explanation needed.

Someone is in-love with the cast of, "CHiPs" wouldn't you say?

Was Vincent D'Onofrio really on CHIPS? I never watched the show but he seems a little young for that. Just kidding. I do remember him from "Men In Black", however.

Any Erik Estrada fans watching him on The Surreal Life?

KJ, I was just a teen when CHiPs came out, so it was a crush I had on both of them.

scout, Vincent is on Law & Order, not CHiPs... I had to pick three and those are it

"The Surreal Life" lives up to its name. It is classed as a "reality show", I suppose, but I'm not sure if there is any purpose to it. I mean, the "players" are not forced to do anything and I don't think they are competing for any kind of prize. In fact, I don't know why this show is even on TV, except that it's funny as hell !

I've only caught a couple of episodes so I'm not an expert on the show but I'll tell you what I know. It is broadcast on the WB channel, which is a broadcast (not cable) channel where I live. I think that it's a "free" channel all over the States. It comes on Sunday nights, here in New Mexico.

It seems a lot like that other show, where a lot of strangers were packed together in a house and "sealed off" from the outside world and had to live together but they got together and voted someone out every week until they got down to a "winner". I never watched it. It seemed like a stupid concept.

Well, The Surreal Life is sorta like that, except that it's different. The house is in Southern California (somewhere in Los Angeles, I think) and the players are all celebrities of one kind or another. I think this is the second season. I don't know who was on the first season but this year the players are Tammie Faye Baker (ex-evangelist), Ron Jeremy (ex-porn star), Vanilla-Ice (ex-rapper), Erik Estrada (ex-television actor), and a couple of bimbos, whom I didn't recognize (one is an ex-Playboy bunny).

There are cameras and camera crews, which follow them everywhere and record what they do and say. They don't always hang out around the house. In fact, I think that every episode has them go on some kind of road trip. The episodes I've seen so far each involved a road trip. This past Sunday night, the episode had them go spend a weekend at a Palm Springs nudist resort and also visit a Karaoke bar.

It's a weird group and their interactions are predictably hilariious at times.

There is probably a website about the show if you want to know more.

Old Scout

I would have to say: 1. Rosco P. Coltrane....2. Elliot & Olivia from SVU....3. I dont her name but Bosco's partner on the show "The Third Watch"...I have a thing for tough women....lol...she plays her part good

Oh man... Rosco P. Coltrane from The Dukes of Hazard He cracked me up. Especially with that little laugh.

My three favorites at the moment are Detectives Goren and Eames (Law & Order: Criminal Intent) and Tutuola (Law & Order: SVU). As to why... well, the short answer is that they're interesting characters, in the case of Goren and Eames the partnership is superbly portrayed, and the quality of acting in all three is exceptional.

The more detailed version will probably exceed the space limitations for posts on this forum...

Goren is a fascinating, complex character. He has the perfect combination of skill sets and intelligence for a detective: a hypervigilant level of observation; a very high IQ, with an almost compulsive drive to collect information and a nearly eidetic (so-called "photographic") memory; and the ability to use both the "left brain" skills of working with linear logic, and the "right brain" skills of gestalt reasoning and "intuition."

Earlier in this thread "Old Scout" said, "...He's at his best when his observations and logic are believable. Unfortunately, sometimes the things that the writers put into the script are just not plausible, even for a character of his talents..." That's a reaction a lot of people have, especially it they're primarily "left-brain" thinkers. The thing is, if you've experineced hypervigilance, and are familiar with "right brain" gestalt thinking and fluid problem-solving skills, then what some people call his "leaps" of logic make perfect sense.

The character is kept from being too perfect by the fact that he has psychological issues stemming from a combination of a traumatic childhood (his mother developed schizophrenia when he was 7) and the negative effects (shared by many highly intelligent children) of having "never fit in anywhere." (Yes, that's a quote. Watch his face and body-language when he says it in "Bright Boy." He's speaking from experience.)

He's portrayed by an actor who has been described by entertainment writers as one of the best character actors of his generation. His portrayal of the psychological nuances of the character is amazing. I didn't discover this series until just before the beginning of the second season. However, by chance, the first episode I saw all the way through was a repeat of the series premiere. By the end of that episode I knew that Goren had a history of childhood trauma, beginning at a fairly early age, and involving his primary female authority figure - which usually means the mother. None of that was mentioned in the episode, but it was there in his emotional affect during interactions with other characters - and all of it has been confirmed in later episodes.

That level of psychological accuracy in the portrayal of a character is extremenely rare - and it has been amazingly consistent throughout the series.

Eames is also well acted - a strong, interesting female character who is completely believable as a cop - again, something that I very rarely see on television. One of the things that's most striking about Eames is that she's a strong woman who is successful in a traditionally male-dominated profession, and yet she fits neither of the usual television stereotypes of being either male-identified or else constantly acting out of a defensive reaction to sexism. She's comfortable being a woman, and comfortable with the idea that a woman can be an effective cop. So one reason I like her is that she's a great role model for young women.

Her character is intelligent - above average, though not in Goren's range - and well-grounded in some of the areas where Goren is weakest. They make an excellent team, and the quality of both actors means that the partnership is portrayed to unusual levels of depth and subtlety. Their slient communication and attunement to each other has played an important part in a number of plots, and the absence of it, when Eames was on maternity leave, was used by the writers, as well.

Tutuola is a surprising note of unselfconscious realism in a show populated by mostly good, but not outstanding, actors. I'm not in touch with popular culture, and hadn't heard anything about a new cast member for SVU - which I don't watch all that often - so when I turned the TV on and saw this character I was surprised... and riveted. I had no idea I was looking at a famous rap star. All I knew was that I was watching a cop who came up on the streets and who meant some serious business. He had me totally convinced - something not many actors can manage.

I still don't watch the series very often, but every now and then I watch it, just see Tutuola. Munch is fun, too, but not enough to keep me watching.