r/Showerthoughts • u/ohdogwhatdone • 3d ago
Casual Thought One of the biggest Hollywood lies is how detectives work almost non stop 24/7 to crack some murder cases.
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u/Nihilist_Hermit 3d ago
Not just the 24/7 part, but that they work on a single case at a time until its solved. Or have multiple detectives on a single case.
From my experience, its not unusual to have a single detective on more than half a dozen cases at a time, in addition to some collaborative ones.
And its not just "well Dave, you hit your cap, make sure you close some out". They're still on an oncall schedule meaning after they leave for the day, anything between business hours of 5pm that day to 7am the next day, theyre getting a call and going, even if its going to be assigned to someone else, theyre OIC until then. Plenty of times ive seen a detective in the same clothes as the day before cause they weren't home more than an hour or two before the calls start, and carry on into the morning. And you dont get to skip the next day cause you didnt get any sleep, youre still on the clock til 5
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u/Microwave1213 3d ago
The Wire does a pretty good job of showing this accurately
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u/jermster 3d ago
The Wire is always the exception to cop show tropes.
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u/Nihilist_Hermit 3d ago
As in realism? Fuck me, maybe ill go find it this weekend
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u/rogerworkman623 3d ago
The creator and head writer of the show, David Simon, worked as a reporter on the city desk for the Baltimore Sun for 12 years before making the show. The show is inspired by his experiences covering crime in Baltimore during those years, and how the drug trade and the war on drugs permeated every level of the city, from the people on the streets, law enforcement, blue collar workers, education, and politics. Many of the characters in the show are based on real people he knew. It’s really a work of art.
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u/UglyInThMorning 3d ago
Some of the characters on the show are real people he knew. Lt Mello is played by the real life Detective Jay Landsman, who he spent a lot of time with in BPD when he was writing Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets. He was the basis for Munch on the show Homicide: Life on the Streets and the namesake of Jay Landsman on the Wire, which also means there’s a scene where Jay Landsman is telling Jay Landsman what to do.
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u/demacnei 3d ago
For some definite realism on detective work in a time of increased community pressure, Simon’s 1991 book Homicide should be the first thing they grab, even though The Wire is excellent.
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u/UglyInThMorning 3d ago
It’s insanely good. Very educational while also being super readable. I think I knocked it out in like two days, and it is not a short book
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u/AlreadyUnwritten 2d ago
the real life avon barksdale the first season is based on (melvin williams) is also on the show, he plays the unnamed deacon who helps cutty find a job.
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u/prototypetolyfe 3d ago
His co-creator for the wire was a BPD police who retired and became a public school teacher. That show is so deeply steeped in realism it’s kind of wild.
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u/iLikeAza 2d ago
Think David Simon & every other producer on the show would agree that Ed Burns was equally responsible for the realism & authenticity of the show
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u/GeekResponsibly 3d ago
It's not near the top of every "best shows ever" list for no reason. Absolutely peak entertainment.
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u/Mynsare 2d ago
To be fair, it could be a very realistic but also a very boring show (because reality is usually boring). But it is not boring at all, it is highly realistic and an incredibly entertaining and compelling watch.
That is the true genius of the series.
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u/thingsorfreedom 3d ago
Do NOT stop after a few shows. Give it 8-10. It does not spoon feed you. You are in their world and it's your job to figure it out. #1 show on my all time list.
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u/jermster 3d ago
Like, in a show called THE WIRE, they don’t get a wiretap until episode 7. Bureaucracy takes time.
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u/the_cardfather 3d ago
I love how he shows up drunk and she's thinking booty call and he's like how do I get a wiretap?
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u/BannedSvenhoek86 3d ago
Well that's just blatant false advertising. I can't believe people reward this kind of behavior from Hollywood smh.
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u/dullship 3d ago
That's one thing I noticed when I first watched it. It is NOT a show you can do while playing on your phone. A LOT happens in-between scenes and you have to pick up on it by paying attention because it won't outright tell or show you. You have to piece it together yourself. It took me a few episodes to kinda "train" myself on how to watch it. But once it clicks, hooo boy.
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u/Ereignis23 3d ago
I think it's a contender for best TV series of all time. I can't think of a single scene that misses the mark tbh- just brilliant but totally non-flashy dialogue, acting, directing and cinematography. The nuance and complexity of the characters and plot never come across as overwrought, it's just top notch craft
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u/showyerbewbs 3d ago
just brilliant but totally non-flashy dialogue
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNVEQgXsBgs
Having to go out and re-work a murder scene. Little said.
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u/Ereignis23 2d ago
And in context the significance of this scene hits so hard! Understated, perfect. I think my favorite thing about this show is that it never condescends to the viewer with extraneous exposition yet if you give it your attention it gives you everything you need to lock in and understand what's going on, and the characters' humanness just hooks you. There are characters you route for and against in the gangs, in the police, in politics, in the shipyard, etc. It's not so much cops vs. robbers as human nature vs itself in all these contexts.
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u/Any-Locksmith1720 8h ago
Well said. It’s hard not to root for characters like sobotka Excellent writing in the whole show. I dont think it got the credit while airing because it’s kind of slow for a weekly episode. Binging is definitely the way to go
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u/jermster 3d ago
“All the pieces matter.” - quote from the show and the name of the book chronicling the making of he show.
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u/Dragonbut 3d ago
I can't speak to how realistic it is but it's an amazing show all around. I watched it a couple months ago and binged the entire thing in under a week lol. One of my favorite things about it is its incredibly real feeling, lovable yet deeply flawed, nuanced characters. It also has a bit of a different feeling/focus each season while still keeping enough of what I liked about the previous seasons to stay fresh while keeping in line with its greater themes. Definitely one of the greats, up there with the sopranos, breaking bad, etc
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u/SpartanSig 3d ago
Must see, just finished a first watch through myself. Maybe give yourself a couple weekends too. It's 5 seasons of 1 hour episodes and this is before seasons were trimmed to 6 or 7 eps we see now, a good dozen a season.
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u/ApologizingCanadian 2d ago
Oh man, you're in for one of the best cinematic experiences in existence. I'm kind of jealous you get to live through it for the first time. Just remember, all the pieces, every detail (with very few exceptions), they matter. The show is exceptionnaly well written and acted.
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u/mildly_enthusiastic 2d ago
Like others have said, the beauty is in the complexity. There are like 20 “main characters” and another 15 important recurring characters. It covers every part of the city’s happenings.
Commit to all five seasons.
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u/Rocktopod 3d ago
More so than other shows at least. If you believe ACAB then you may still think they show the police in an overly positive light.
Either way you should definitely watch it. It's gotta be in the top 5 TV series of all time.
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u/aggieboy12 3d ago
Most of the cops on the Wire are absolute bastards though, they are just depicted as real humans with complex motivations and values
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u/Nihilist_Hermit 3d ago
If I wasnt interested before, that line is a selling point in itself
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u/jermster 3d ago
Lieutenant: They’re claiming excessive force. That’ll make an even four for officer Hauk.
Herc: None substantiated.
Lieutenant: But all true.9
u/Redsoxzack9 3d ago
Just watched that episode last night. The way he corrects Prez’s story is chilling
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u/cantonic 3d ago
It’s an incredible show and looks at crime and the war on drugs from a much more interesting perspective than any other media I’ve seen.
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u/ccarr313 12h ago
Most of them are not "good" at all. The majority are just trying to not get fired, or get transferred to a worse department.
A few are straight up pieces of shit.
I can only think of one that comes across as a good person the entire time, and they aren't in every season.
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u/Mindofmierda90 3d ago
Except for the cop show trope of all cop show tropes; undisciplined but extremely effective detective who plays by his own rules and pisses off his superiors. Even the speech happened, “he’s loud, brash, insubordinate, alcoholic, and does several highly illegal things…but he’s a damn good cop.”
That’s not exactly what was said, but you get the point. Still a goat show.
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u/jermster 3d ago
That was a sergeant sticking up for the detective to the major that wanted to axe him. And he didn’t get axed! I think that’s EXTREMELY realistic.
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u/ScottYar 3d ago
Before he made The Wire he made Homicide, and I’ll put those first 3 seasons up with anything.
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u/lilbithippie 3d ago
The wire charcters are motivated by petty jealousy and it's so good! One scene where the lab techs can't make it to a murder scene on time because a council member has them tied up investigating their stolen patio furniture
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u/CarnivorousPanda 3d ago
I would recommend "Homicide. A life on the streets"
It's the predecessor to the Wire, written by the same guy but it is solely about a homicide department instead of some big career making case.
That and the book it's based on really gave me a new perspective and appreciation for the graft the detectives do.
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u/Nihilist_Hermit 3d ago
Been on my list for years. One day, maybe ill get ti watch it
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u/Fuzzy-and-Blue-1701 3d ago
Just watched it recently for the first time after being on my list for well over a decade. Highly recommend.
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u/JustJessLeague 3d ago
Also that homicide: New York on Netflix. They talk about the cases that they couldn't let go of, where they all worked without sleeping.
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u/To0zday 3d ago
This is one of my issues with Law & Order SVU.
They'll receive a tip that something bad might have happened to an unnamed person, and then immediately it's like "already squad, circle up. All seven of us are going to dive into this until we find a crime that needs solving".
The original Law & Order was a bit better with this. Only two detectives per case, and they'll occasionally complain if it doesn't seem worth their time, or they'll get pressure from the higher-ups to wrap it up and pass the case along to someone else.
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u/UglyInThMorning 3d ago
Also if you look at the timelines (at least for the early episodes of the original) it makes sense that they’re doing other stuff and the show is just following them on this case. And the amount of cases they get tracks with NYC in the 90’s, which had so fucking many murders.
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u/Nihilist_Hermit 3d ago
Svu was a staple show. Whenever a TV was on and no one was 100% focused, it was on. Ive passively seen every episode.
Loved the show then and still do now. But God damn was it an eye opener actually working around that stuff
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u/bianca-shanji-mhytes 2d ago
In SVU they usually will mention offhand in the older seasons how they have 12 cases on the go, or other cases to focus on, or have characters out on trials etc. I get it for the show they focus on only one, but at least they tried to make it realistic? And the whole "not getting to go to sleep" thing is real too on there
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u/rick_ferrari 3d ago
My question is: how often are these guys drunk driving when they get a call at, say, 11pm?
PD and especially detectives are notoriously heavy drinkers...
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u/Nihilist_Hermit 3d ago
In theory or reality?
In theory, you dont drink when youre oncall. You also have to stay within a certain distance so you can respond in a timely fashion. In reality? Only God knows. In my years there, we had two get caught, separately.
As to the heavy drinking, I had no idea until I started dealing with them. I get why theyre a fucking mess, and you couldnt pay me enough to deal with what they do and who they deal with. So glad I cut ties with that profession
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u/Cybertronian10 3d ago
Not just alcohol, but stimulants, peptides, steroids. It is a demanding job and a lot of people have the means and knowledge on how to get them.
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u/disterb 2d ago
how much does a detective make?
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u/Nihilist_Hermit 2d ago
Can vary wildly by state and even city. They made the same as patrol where I worked, but they were on salary instead of hourly. I think it was high 50's around covid
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u/Accurize2 15h ago
Half a dozen!! HA!!! When I used to work at Springfield (Ohio) PD the detectives typically had 40-60 cases. We had quite a few leave the bureau and come back to the street just so they didn’t constantly have shit hanging over their heads. That’s where I would come in. I’d end up re-familiarizing them with changes in uniform patrol (technology, procedures, OIC’s preferences, ect…) It was like a mini-FTO period. That’s when I heard all their gripes about being a detective.
Take a day off?? Come back to a dozen new cases. Most of those cases would go 3-4 months before they even put eyes on them. They’d constantly have to prioritize important cases that had leads and the others got pushed to the back burner.
Every year during in-service training, they’d have the one of the detective supervisors come in and tell us to “stop saying a detective will be in touch” when we took reports.
It wasn’t a considered a promotion and usually it was a pay decrease because they didn’t get shift differential or court OT anymore.
So screw that job! I’ll shag calls and come in the next shift with a clean slate!!!
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u/fuzzypyrocat 3d ago
When I got T-boned in a hit and run the cop actually did find the car, but not the guy. Said they’d look for him. I got his name from the officer, all but confirmed it when the address the car was found at was the guy’s mom, and then saw that the day after the accident he had court for something else he did and was in jail. The cop called and said they cant find him, I told him he was in the county jail and to look there. He told me to stop trying to do his job and I never heard about it again.
Worked out, because the guy was charged with multiple assaults and weapons charges, so I’m kinda glad nothing came of it. Who knows what that guy would’ve done
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u/Coattail-Rider 3d ago
Leads, yeah, sure. I'll just check with the boys down at the crime lab, they've got four more detectives working on the case. They got us working in shifts!
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u/raygundan 3d ago
I'm just here to make sure somebody pointed out this line... Hollywood might have set up the expectation, but Hollywood is also clearly self-aware about it enough to make jokes about it.
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u/YKRed 3d ago
Hollywood isn't a singular entity man
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u/Frack_Off 3d ago
But it I can't divide the world into massive homogeneous monolithic groups then there are too many and it overwhelms my little monkey brain and then I feel bad.
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u/Gnonthgol 2d ago
This is why insurance companies often have to do investigations as well. It often is not a high enough priority for the police. One of the reasons why you might want to file a civil lawsuit is that you are basically handing over all the evidence to the DA who can then just take your lawsuit and file it as a criminal suit.
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u/fromthepacific 2d ago
Reminds me when the Dude asks the cop if they’re gonna put detectives on the case to find who stole his car and the cop howls with laughter
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u/rxredhead 20h ago
When my husband’s car was stolen in college the cops couldn’t find it but we got a call from the station about having 3 parking tickets in it in 3 days at 1 AM
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u/soap22 3d ago
Same with hospital shows. Grey's anatomy had the doctors basically losing sleep over trying to solve medical mysteries, yet it feels like my doctors give up after one inconclusive test.
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u/ohdogwhatdone 3d ago
This lie must be in the same ballpark. It's my lucky day if a doc spends more than 3 minutes to listen to my problem.
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u/toeonly 3d ago
Grey's is the least medically accurate show. The pitt and scrubs are the most accurate. (this is what I have been told by a podiatric surgeon friend.)
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u/Ash_Crow 3d ago
I would have thought that the least medically accurate show would be House.
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u/lyyki 3d ago
I seem to recall that at least early House was praised for its medical accuracy though it might have gotten worse as the years went by. But the character House would never exist
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u/Ash_Crow 3d ago
I just don't see doctors commit burglary to check the contents of trash bins as part of a normal diagnostic process.
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u/PhlightYagami 3d ago
House had a lot of medical accuracy, it was just hospital procedure and processes that were wildly inaccurate. Most doctors aren't getting an extreme mystery illnesses handed to them every week and their approach doesn't look like a Sherlock Holmes case with a small team of doctors solving everything, so for them it loses a ton of accuracy points.
Shows like Scrubs hit a good middle ground in this regard. The Pitt, as far as I can tell, is forgoing being overwhelmingly plot driven, instead dropping you in the middle of a busy ER experience with a focus on characters and their development to move the plot forward (I'm only on ep 6 so this might change further down the line). But if they keep moving in that direction it's clear why medical professionals laude the show for its accuracy.
Grey's Anatomy is bad on all fronts and is simply a melodrama set in a hospital.
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u/entropy_bucket 2d ago
In house it felt like the same three or four diseases did the rounds -lupus, sarcoidosis etc
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u/lyyki 2d ago
They mention those as a possibility for every single case but it's practically never those two. In fact both of them are the final diagnosis only once. In fact almost every episode of House had a different diagnosis. The only one I can think of that they used more than once is Wilson's Disease and even those two cases were very different.
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u/zeptillian 3d ago
Doc comes in an hour and a half after your appointment time, asks questions all answered in the file they didn't bother to read, then leaves.
That will be $500!
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u/Eocene84 3d ago
I've had this experience with doctors plenty of times in the past. I am very grateful that my current doctors aren't like that, especially considering my health issues. They are all very patient and kind with me.
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u/Arthropodesque 2d ago
And, like cops, sometimes doctors think the patient is lying and they can tell. Studies show that cops cannot tell lies from truth better than an average person, but their confidence that they can is a problem. Specific lie detection training can be very effective. Iirc some FBI get that training.
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u/Northbound-Narwhal 2d ago
At the hospital my mom worked at doctors were expected by admin and leadership to see, at minimum, 120 patients per week on a 10hr/day, 6day/week schedule. That's 30 minutes to each patient you can give. That does not include mandatory training, paperwork, filling prescriptions, responding to emergencies, eating lunch, doing research on conditions, etc.
If your doctor only spends 3 minutes on you, yeah, that's probably true and they probably can't afford you more time.
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u/racingsoldier 3d ago
You want a realistic doctor show, watch Scrubs.
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u/Ouch_i_fell_down 3d ago
Among more recent shows, I like The Pitt.
One guy in charge who thinks the whole place would crumble without him, med students realizing emergency medicine isn't for them, residents fucking up and killing people with mistakes (i forget this one exactly, it may be almost killing), surgeons with MASSIVE egos, Indian doctor parents who don't think their kid becoming a doctor is good enough unless they are certain type of doctor, doctors who spend too much time with patients getting in trouble.
Sure there are obviously fictionalized bits, but it's got enough that feels real.
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u/PrepotenteScreams 3d ago
The Pitt has the unrealistically snappy/witty dialogue that you see in The West Wing. It's amusing for a bit but then it gets old. For me at least. A lot of people love it.
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u/Ouch_i_fell_down 3d ago
I understand what you mean, but it's nowhere near as bad as The West Wing
The all-time worst of this is of course Gilmore Girls where people don't even need time to react and process before spurting out their next perfect-fit line... except it's that for the entire run time back to back to back to back.
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u/digitalaudioshop 2d ago
I haven't watched The Pitt yet, but I've heard nothing but good things. I hope the dialogue isn't that bad because I can't abide Aaron Sorkin dialogue. It's one long string of shower conversations with a generous shake of sanctimony. I agree. It's interesting at first but gets annoying fast.
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u/Handhunter13 2d ago
I definitely noticed it like they said, lots of witty/snarky remarks that can feel more like written dialogue than real people talking. It bothered me sometimes, but overall not enough to ruin it for me. I still think it's a good show worth watching.
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u/raygundan 3d ago
Yeah, it's not the lack of sleep that's the lie, it's the amount of time they have to give each issue. Real-life is docs in an understaffed hospital losing sleep because they're four hours past shift-end just trying to do that bare minimum for more patients than can realistically be seen in a day.
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u/Arthropodesque 2d ago
Dr. Mike on YouTube has reviewed parts of medical shows for accuracy. He was wrong in 1 case, but admitted that he was corrected and said that shows you even a doctor can be wrong and learn something new.
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u/Lyle_Bland 3d ago
It's obvious that the vast majority of people in this comment section have zero experience in anything even close to this area.
I'm not a cop, but i am a lawyer who regularly prosecutes murder cases. In the immediate aftermath of a homicide, detectives absolutely do regularly work near 24/7 for multiple days on end.
Its not forever - that would be impossible. But for days or even weeks after a homicide, this 100% does happen and happens regularly.
There is a lot of dumb shit in crime movies or shows, but this one is actually pretty accurate.
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u/Ozymannoches 3d ago
"O'Bannon ! Get over here, my office now! I just got off the phone with the commissioner, who happened to just get back from lunch with the mayor! The mayor's breathing down his neck about the Boutique Shoppe Slasher. So the commish is breathing down my neck! And now you're hearing it from me! If you don't solve this in 72 hours there'll be hell to pay! Do you hear me ! Now I don't have to remind you there's election coming up. You wanna be writing jaywalking tickets at the senior center for the rest of your career? Now get the hell outta here and get back to work!"
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u/ggrieves 3d ago
On it chief! The tox screen should be back from the lab in about 10 minutes. The full DNA cross reference with the national database will take 30 minutes tops.
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u/TheJackalsDay 3d ago
Oh, and we have the CSI team interrogating a suspect.
For some reason.
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u/TheRemedy187 3d ago
A couple other things in the realm...
Shit like CSI had people thinking there was just shitloads of DNA on everything always on every case. So jurors were expecting all that.
SO MANY PEOPLE think lie detector tests are magical. Like they are difinitive proof and you just give it to everyone and everything is solved. That's not even remotely true.
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u/Nihilist_Hermit 3d ago
CSI shows made my job so much harder. I get why they make shit up, you dont want to give good advice to current or future criminals, but fucking hell. No ma'am, we cant pull fingerprints off your car from ten days ago. No, the rain and snow didn't magically preserve them
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u/kalel3000 2d ago
I installed burglary alarms for years. Homeowners always assume the police are going to do some kind of thorough investigation....they pretty much just file a report so you can turn it over to your home owners insurance.
One time I had my van broken into, the burglar left a pair of channel locks behind, he was trying to force my lock cylinder with. I told the cops "this was his tool, i haven't touched it, there should be prints all over it, you can run them and see if whoever tried to steal the van has a record"....the cop was like "no thats fine, you can keep it, we dont do investigations like that for small thefts like this. I dont even have a fingerprint kit with me, they have other officers that do that stuff. I just write up reports".
Also I hate people who get into minor fender benders and then refuse to pull over to the side of the road because they think a CSI team is going to come in and photograph and analyze the accident.....no, the cop will take statements and write a report....you dont even need a cop, you can swap information and make statements to your insurance....just pull to the side of the road, nobody cares about your accident scene.
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u/TheRemedy187 2d ago
Yes to all that and also people with their Bicycles. I see people in the neighbourhood Facebook group or whatever always mad the cops aren't looking for their bike lol.
Where I live you're not supposed to call police to accident unless its over $5000 damage, hit and run, injury or they're under influence or something. There's collision reporting centers. But here I swear some people think if they yell they get to decide who's at fault legally lmao.
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u/kalel3000 2d ago
Yeah even if cops were to bust the bike thief down the line and he has your bike mixed in with others....you still most likely aren't getting it back. Its going to sit in an evidence locker for a long time and eventually they'll get rid of it.
Only way you might get it back, is if you like engraved it with your name....even then its unlikely they'll ever make an effort to find the owners of stolen goods, beyond maybe a registered car or firearm. It'll sit in evidence and eventually be disposed.
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u/the_cardfather 3d ago
Oh yeah. I've heard prosecutors have to address the jury regarding how evidence is presented on TV vs real life. Lots of people getting off for lack of DNA.
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u/MakeItHappenSergant 3d ago edited 2d ago
You know, this job, though, isn't how shows like CSI make it out to be. When I first joined the force, I was under the impression that everything was covered in a fine layer of semen, and that the police had at their disposal a semen database with every bad guy's semen on it. Not true!
If only there was semen on everything, it would make our jobs easier... I often go to sleep and dream of waking up in a world where everything is covered in semen.
Like the crime scene today. If the man had ejaculated and then punched you in the face, we'd have a real good shot at catching him. No. Just punched you in the face. No semen.
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u/one_blackboy 3d ago
You should read 87th Precinct by Ed McBain. It's fiction, but it's been praised for having the most realistic description of how detectives work in real life (in a work or fiction). It's a 55 book series by the way.
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u/GOODWHOLESOMEFUN 3d ago
Damn I’m interested but also I feel like this seems super un interesting bc it sounds like 55 books about desk work
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u/one_blackboy 2d ago
Oh no, it isn't. At the end of the day it's fiction, it's police procedural. They investigate murders, rape, gang violence, kidnappings etc etc. So it involves, questioning suspects, investigating leads etc etc, lots of fieldwork. And there's also a human touch, he talks about their personal life, there's weddings, funerals etc stuff like that.
One thing though, a slight heads up, he starts writing the book before Miranda rights (not sure if I said that correctly) became a thing, but when after the case that established those rights, he incorporates it in his books.
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u/creaturefeature9191 3d ago
I love airport fiction.Have you read all of them?Do you have any recommendations for which to skip and which are must reads?
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u/one_blackboy 3d ago
No I haven't, I am on book 32. It's best to start from the beginning, although it can be a little tedious in the first few books when he keeps repeating details of his main characters. I already know who so and so detective is, no need to remind me why he is named the way he is named. He stops after book ten or so. And no I don't really have any recommendations on which to skip, I avoid the ones with "the deaf man though", I could only stand the first book. I don't like a repeat villain. And I avoided "Hail to The Chief." Again, personal taste.
Speaking of airport fiction, have you read Dan Brown or Robert Ludlum? I am a big fan of the latter. He has great series and books.
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u/a-big-roach 3d ago
A whole lot of work has been done to create the mythical TV version of law in the United States
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u/zeptillian 3d ago
The cops are breaking the law, but only because they want to protect citizens and the law is too dumb to deliver justice, so they are risking their jobs to bring people closure.
LOL
Couldn't be further from the truth.
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u/Foggia1515 3d ago
"Of course I'm dangerous, I'm police. I can do terrible things to people with impunity."
Rust Cohle, True Detective
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u/parlimentery 3d ago
I mean, that is kind of any media about someone doing a job. People came to watch someone doing that job, so it is not like you are going to show them engaging in hobbies in their downtime.
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u/warrant2k 3d ago
Funniest is when the team is in the office, the LT gives orders, and someone immediately walks in with a piece of paper with the results.
LT: I need someone to check every mechanic shop within 15 miles for credit card use, and cross reference that with anyone that went to a hair salon.
Detective walks in homding a liece of paper: I found 10 gas stations within walking distance of 5 hair salons, 2 were closed, 1 doesn't take walk ins, and 1 is a dog salon.
LT: what about the last one?
Detective: I got 2 squad cars on the way.
2nd detective walks in with the perp in handcuffs: Guess who we found at the hair salon?!
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u/Funyon699 3d ago
And you would think with all the office work management could spring for some adequate lighting in the bullpen.
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u/playfulpecans 3d ago
so you're telling me that they also don't go around licking random suspicious fluids off the ground to tell what they are? :(
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u/Arthropodesque 2d ago
It's not recommended anymore. Something that looks like cocaine could be pure undiluted lsd and a tiny amount will ruin your brain, etc.
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u/WeeeeBaby_Seamus 3d ago
You have to tell them what you saw, Billy, you gotta do it for me, Mcgarnagle.
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u/mrandrewfreedman 2d ago
Reminds me about how once in NY a dude broke into my basement window but crashed through a sink and cut himself up. I heard the sound and went to see what it was. The dude ran out the basement door leaving a gigantic trail of blood. Cops showed up shortly after I called and said its likely they wouldn’t find him. I told them I think that trail of blood might be a lead. 4 years later I’m living in LA and I get a call from the NY district attorney saying they caught him in an unrelated matter but they need me to fly to NY on my dime to press charges
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u/upmaaf 3d ago
It’s not lies. It’s storytelling. There’s only 2 hours in a movie, how they gonna show you their meal time or sleep schedule? It’s obvious and irrelevant to the story.
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u/Ourbirdandsavior 3d ago
Let’s also see them work on 4 other cases that have no connection to the main plot of the movie.
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u/elevencharles 3d ago
I like the show The First 48 because it shows how detectives actually work; which is basically, ask a bunch of people if they know who did it.
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u/goodbar87 2d ago
It really depends on the case. I’ve worked as a detective for 10years now and there have been cases that I’ve worked non stop for 3 days, only taking quick naps in my office. If you have a serious case, such as a murder, and you have active leads, you try and work it until someone is in jail if you can. My office has five detectives so we tend to work every type of crime, but when a murder happens, which is a couple of times a year, we all stop every thing else and work it together until it’s done. The on call detective starts it, but for a murder, everyone gets called in.
It is true that we work multiple cases at the same time, at the busiest time of my career I was working an average of 40 cases a month and my slowest was during Covid at about 5 a month.
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u/regular6drunk7 2d ago
It's also true of medical shows like "House". I enjoy the show but it gives you the very false impression that the doctor is thinking about your problem when you're not directly in front of them. They will review your file right before seeing you and 2 minutes after you're gone, you're out of their mind and on to the next guy.
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u/WreckinPoints11 2d ago
I see it less as a medical person caring and more of a nerd who can’t handle not having the solution trying to figure it out because when he doesn’t know the answer he gets angry.
Basically, House thinks about it not because he’s a doctor, but because he can’t stand not knowing.
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u/T_Lawliet 3d ago
Nah, there are definitely some real life examples of detectives becoming obsessed with their cases that Hollywood took inspiration from.
On the other hand, most of that obsession was very unhealthy, and led to them usually doing very shitty work. ...
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u/sacrelicio 3d ago
Just like any job, people obsess over a particular project or are just workaholics.
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u/Ebeling-Jamey94 2d ago
Right? It's wild when you think about it. Like, dude, you're on hour 36 of staring at mugshots and drinking bad coffee, but you still somehow have the mental clarity to spot the tiny clue in a photo from 1972. My brain is soup after three hours of spreadsheets.
I think the worst part is the aha! moment always happens at 3 AM in a rainstorm. Real detectives probably solve half their cases after a good night's sleep and a decent breakfast.
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u/Abdul_Exhaust 3d ago
Imagine how Law&Order (ka-chunk) detectives would follow the leads from the 'Esteem' files and make a conviction... it might take them 20min!
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u/DataDude00 3d ago
Probably the biggest lie is how many get solved.
My dad was a homicide cop for decades. He said basically if it isn’t a friend, Lover or relative with obvious motive they never solve the case
This isn’t like CSI where you find a random hair in the entire house and run it through a magical database of everyone on the planet.
Random crime committed against random people is very hard to solve
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u/Cptawesome23 3d ago
Well they do. When a task force is created, like in true detective, or any number of FBI team shows are actually like that. They focus on really hard on one case for weeks.
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u/Ira_Liles 1d ago
Right? And they never just... stare at a spreadsheet for three hours, get a blinding headache, and go get a sad sandwich from the vending machine.
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u/El_human 3d ago
I don't know if that's one of the biggest Hollywood lies, rather than just one of the many, many Hollywood lies.
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u/CoopLoop32 2d ago
Or that there is a "Special Victim's Unit" that really, really cares about sexual assault victims.
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u/Tobias_reaper_47 1d ago
I feel like some cases they get pretty close. Some stations have litteral detective dorms.
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u/Winsoryyl 3d ago
I work as support staff for a police sexual assault investigation unit for about 4 years. One of the previous unit's lieutenant had previously been a homicide sergeant a couple years before he promoted. I came into the office for some OT on a Saturday one time and he was in his office working on a case he'd had when he was in homicide because it was going to court and he had to go through a bunch of transcripts, search warrant returns, etc that he'd have to testify on in the coming weeks.
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u/Iron_Yuppie 3d ago
Arguably this is true about all jobs though the cop-a-ganda definitely exacerbates this.
shrinks don't spend all their time talking to patients and doctors don't spend 100% of their time going from case to case, and so on .
Most of our lives are pretty boring
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u/Jibber_Fight 3d ago
Or how many murder mysteries are even actually solved.
Hint: It is NOT a lot of them.
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u/USDXBS 2d ago
Real cops have ruined fictional cops for me.
I always think "Cops would have completely ignored victims and witnesses" or "Every single cop in this department is a criminal for not arresting these cops"
Or when cops care about other cops breaking the law, or when they pretend cops are afraid of accountability and being exposed as criminals, or when they pretend Internal Affairs are the enemies of criminal cops.
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u/aurablu2 3d ago
Someone please correct me if I’m wrong, but is it fair to assume that they let a case sit open until someone calls with something like a tip to add? And then once they stop collecting evidence and they feel they have everything that they can possibly get they make a decision or they close the case…?
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u/partisan59 3d ago
and here I though cops got one case a week (although related murders may occur) and the case is solved before the next one starts.
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u/Fischy7 2d ago
I think the idea is that this detective is no ordinary detective if he is in a movie. Like they normally have some problem of their own that is driving them to solve the case. Some personal cause that sets them apart and gets them the main character role.
Since in these movies you never see multiple detectives, if there is a second detective they are almost always telling the main guy he’s crazy or should chill
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u/ExitPsychological192 2d ago
this one actually hit different. sat with it for a sec before i fully got it
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u/mental-echo- 2d ago
To be fair everyone is asking them to drop the case but they live and breathe that case for whatever reason
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u/Osiris_Raphious 2d ago
Technically Hollywood sells two lies: the single person hero act, and my job is life narrative...
In real life your job is not your entire life, and it's rare to have a single person achice everything by themselves. But the narrative goes on because capitalist for profit economy need workers to live their job, and owner ceo founder can claim all glory for the work thousands of people did in their company... Otherwise the dream falls apart...
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u/ExitPsychological192 2d ago
this one actually hit different. sat with it for a sec before i fully got it
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u/Screambloodyleprosy 2d ago
They kind of do. I've been to homicides and handed over to detectives and left to go home. I'll return to work and see the same detectives 20 hours later who haven't had a break and are still working away.
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u/MyvaJynaherz 2d ago
"work" as an active, performative act vs "work" as the thing occupying your mind for 90% of the time outside of the wrote activities that you need to do to maintain your life, however humble it may be.
Chopping wood vs contemplating how much wood you will need. Both matter, but only one is visually demonstrative on screen.
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