TV Cop Show Interrogation Method #1: It Was Only Right For You To Do What You Did!
“If it were up to me, I’d be giving you a medal for killing that guy. I’m surprised you held back as long as you did! If I caught some pervert banging my cheating wife, I wouldn’t think twice about putting a bullet in his head!”
A cherished building is getting demolished to make way for a “mini-mall”. The lead character, emboldened by a talk with a person from the 60’s about nonviolent protest, organizes a group to chain themselves to the building. One by one, the group caves in, mainly for “hilarious” reasons… (”There’s gonna be a Contempo Casuals here? Awesome!”) until the only person left is the main character. Crushed, he or she begins to cave in until the owner of the development company arrives. They have a heart to heart talk and the developer decides to still build the mini-mall, but renovate the building into the mall instead of tearing it down and building from scratch. Cue 80’s live studio audience. Awwwww!
A distant family member that nobody ever mentioned before comes for a visit. Everyone is excited, especially the youngest family member, who regards the relative as a “hero”. However, there seems to be something wrong, but only one family member seems to notice.
That family member’s suspicions are confirmed when he or she catches the relative drinking, drugging or engaging in bad behavior. When he or she lets the rest of the family in on this terrible secret, nobody else believes him or her. When the distant family member storms out, the youngest family member runs off in tears, blaming the accuser. Soon, however, the rest of the family discovers that the allegations are true and the relative breaks down. He or she is “sick” and desperately needs help.
Soon, all is right in the world; the doubting family member is apologized to while the distant relative runs off to a rehab clinic to clean him or herself up, never to be seen, heard from, or talked about again.
The Theory:
Horatio Caine of CSI:Miami is a crooked cop.
The Evidence:
Despite only having one job (that of a Crime Scene Investigator) Horatio Caine seems to be flush with money.When he discovers that his (believed dead) brother had fathered a child out of wedlock and that the little girl needed expensive surgery, he chose to pay for it out of his own pocket. Since his brother was a detective who had died in the line of duty, the out of wedlock daughter was entitled to her father’s insurance. Mr. Caine paid for it all anyway, however, just because he didn’t want his sister-in-law to find out about the affair. What an expensive and unnecessary expense! Recently, Mr. Caine installed his own illegitimate child into a cushy job with the coroner’s office and set him up with a rather nice “bachelor pad”. All paid for from an honest investigator’s salary? We suspect not….
Conclusion: While Mr. Caine lectures others on following the law, he seems to be engaged in some rather unseemly activities of his own; at least he must be, since no honest cop could possibly afford expensive medical procedures and expensive secondary apartment rentals. The only reasonable conclusion, therefore, is that Horatio Caine is a crooked cop.
5. Slap a Cop!
Grieving parents are always welcome to slap any cop they want to on TV with no repercussions. That’s because they are “mourning”, “not themselves” or “still dealing with their grief”. Often, the heroic police officer or detective will wave off his or her fellow cops who begin to intervene in their defense, taking the blow ‘like a man’. However, if the officer tries to defend him or herself and promises to press charges, he or she will quickly become the villain and won’t find one witness willing to assist in the arrest of the slapper. (Despite the offense having taken place in a crowded squad room full of witnesses that stopped to watch the proceedings.) In real life? The slapper would be on a bus to jail in time for a free dinner on the taxpayers.
4. Act Like A Total Jerk At Any Business!
On television commercials, people get away with the most annoying and obnoxious behavior. Want to run over a store’s employees to get to a ’sale’? Why not? Want to treat sales assistants and fellow customers with no respect? Sure! Customers on commercials can act like complete jerks and their behavior is often rewarded with special sale prices, extra service and smiles. In real life? Try acting like one of the morons in a fast food company’s commercials and you’ll get something extra alright, but we’re pretty sure it will be a “special sauce” that you won’t actually like. Act like a jerk in a bank or a store and you’ll probably find yourself getting not a smile and a shrug, but a nice ride downtown with a police officer.
3. Dress For Work Any Way You Want!
On TV, there’s no such thing as a dress code for any workplace, so you can dress any way you want, no matter what job you have! That’s why women crime scene investigators can wear low cut tops and high heels while the guys can dress like total slobs or night club lounge lizards if they so choose. In fact, most television crime scenes look like a night at the Roxbury, with the investigators looking more like prostitutes and pimps than the actual prostitutes and pimps being investigated. In real life? Dress like any random TV man or woman and you’ll probably find yourself with plenty of time on your hands, especially after you get fired.
2. Sass Back To Your Boss!
It’s a time honored tradition on television; the sassy employee who lets his or her boss know how stupid he or she is every moment of the day. Quick with a one liner, these outspoken employees rarely get fired because their bosses appreciate their quick wit and sense of humor. In real life? Sass back to your boss and he or she will certainly make sure that you have tons of time to come up with new one-liners – especially after you get fired.
1. Stalk Your Favorite D-List Celebrity And Get Rewarded For It!
Every 80’s sitcom eventually used the following plot during Sweeps Month: a character suddenly decides that he or she is a huge fan of some D-List actor, actress or rock star who coincidentally is in town this week. He or she vows to track down the celebrity to his or her hotel room to get an autograph. They scheme with a friend and their plan is almost successful until hotel security apprehends them. As the stalker gets carted away, the celebrity just happens to walk by and orders the fan released and invites him or her for an amazing after party. Of course, by next week’s episode, the extreme fan conveniently forgets that he or she ever loved the celebrity and never mentions the encounter ever again. In real life? Well, we’re pretty sure that law enforcement and restraining orders would probably be involved were you to even think about trying this.
Turner Downs is a former Hollywood “It” Guy who now lives in Pumpkin Center, CA. Check out his blog here:
NBC has become a mess of a network. In addition to showing cheap and sleazy reality programming that even FOX wouldn’t air, they can’t even properly take advantage of their existing programming. The worst network dove deeper into irrelevance on Sunday, when they used the powers of the NFL’s “flex game” to air the Chargers/Broncos game, a football event made more important by a blown call made by Ed Hochuli, who handed the first matchup between the teams to the Broncos. If Mr. Hochuli hadn’t completely blown a fourth quarter call in the first game, the Chargers would have easily won it, thus making Sunday’s game completely moot. But since he made the most notorious bad call in recent memory, the Chargers had to win this week’s game in order to get into the playoffs.
Knowing all of this, NBC selected to air the game nationally, eager to perk up its disappointing ratings with a “dream game” where the wronged party got another opportunity to get their revenge on a team that didn’t deserve to win the last time they played each other. A competent network would have played up this conflict the entire time, making it the main story and the focus of their coverage. Not NBC, however. They never bothered to mention a word about Ed Hochuli and how his embarrassing blunder gave this game undeserved importance. To get a conflict they were actually willing to talk about, they reached back to last year when the quarterbacks apparently yelled at each other or something. The Broncos QB was allowed to say that he thought the Chargers QB was a big meanie. Meanwhile, the reason why the vast majority of viewers remembered that NBC existed that night was allowed to remain an unmentioned elephant in the room.
So why was nothing mentioned about the blown call? Probably because of Al Michaels. Mr. Michaels has proven to be a wonderful “company man” when it comes to the NFL. Despite the fact that it is NBC and not the NFL that pays his salary, he loves fawning over the league at every moment. Since Mr. Michaels pointed out Ed Hochuli’s physique earlier this season, we can probably assume that it was he who forbid any discussion about Mr. Hochuli’s lousy officiating. Seeing as how NBC traded a cartoon rabbit for Al Michaels, it is safe to say that it was they who came up with the short end of the stick in that deal.
Next time, NBC, grow a backbone. It is you that pay both the NFL and Mr. Michaels. (In the case of the NFL, billions of dollars.) You should be able to discuss issues of importance, such as how a league official botched a call and handed a win to an undeserving team. Who cares if you might “bum out” the NFL or your commentator? In the real world, we call the person who hands over money for a service or product a “customer” who is within his or her rights to comment on the quality of the product or service received. If the NFL wants your billions of dollars, they should have to get a thicker skin and let you cover the product you paid for in any way you see fit. Also, you should seriously let Mr. Michaels go. He’s not impartial and it totally shows.
(*Full Disclosure: Ralphland is not a fan of either the Broncos or the Chargers but is a stockholder in the company that unloaded Al Michaels on NBC. Ha-HA!)
For some reason, most cable channels seem to have a problem living up to their names. Everyone knows that very little “Music” actually plays on “Music TeleVision” these days, but this syndrome appears to be widespread among so many other channels. For example, “TLC’s” full name is “The Learning Channel”, but very little actual “learning” seems to happen on that channel these days, as shown in….
Things We’ve Learned from The “Learning” Channel:
*If the only thing interesting about your life is that you had a ton of kids, you can make money and get companies to give you tons of free stuff!
*There’s a ton of money to be made from “flipping” your house! (Oops, this “lesson” no longer valid.)
*A catty woman and a catty gay man can help you improve your wardrobe by mocking your weight and style tastes.
*Tattoo parlors are no longer full of degenerates and sailors; they’re full of whiny degenerates and trendy hipsters who will probably regret their “tatts” once tattoos are no longer trendy.
And finally,
*Yelling at your employees and making idle threats is the best way to get them motivated!
On this day 20 years ago, TV History was made as Mystery Science Theater 3000 premiered on local station KTMA. It would later go on to bigger and better things….
“Audiences won’t soon forget when the thing they don’t know what it was was put into the helicopter by the guy they didn’t know.”
-Tom Servo, from MST3K’s riffing of The Giant Spider Invasion
“A violent argument erupts over whose day was more pleasant.”
-Tom Servo, from MST3K’s riffing of A Date With Your Family
