Missing Persons

Steven J. Cannell Productions presents "MISSING PERSONS" TV Series Createed by Peter Lance & Gary Sherman. With Daniel J. Travanti (Lt.Ray McAuliffe),Jorja Fox(Officer Connie Karadzic),Paty Lombard(Mrs.Barbara McAuliffe), Juan Ramirez(Carlos Marrone),Robert Swan(Dan Duck),Fred Weller('Soapy' Sadowski),Amy Carlson (Somebody or Other).

Any time a producer wishes to make a Cop Series here are basically two routes to go. One can be all escapism, super fantasy all the way. In this type, there are no "sorta bad guys" and no "less than enthusiastic about their jobs" Coppers. The lead character usually lives just for his job. And regardless of how much the main character gets into trouble, makes waves or rocks the bureaucratic boat, he remains in the same position.

The other type of story lone tries its best to be realistic. Any glamor is played down. The tedious monotony of a Criminal Investigation is very much a large part of mostly all of the installments.(The typical investigation depicted is the FOLLOW-UP, rather than the PRELIMINARY, mainly because most Cop Shows center on the "Big Heat", "The Man", you know, the DETECTIVES.) Very few of these shows have the Uniform Cops as their subject.

As to the next case, one series called "MISSING PERSONS(1993-95), we can only say that it falls somewhere between the fantastic and the realistic.

Our Series is set in my town, Chicago, you know the "City with Broad Shoulders, the Stacker of Wheat, Hog Butcher to the World", etc., etc.In actuality, all of these Carl Sandberg attributes are mostly poetic anachronisms in this "Modern World". There is a certain amount of these industries left, but not to any great degree as to make it a "Center" for any one of them.

Chicago still has the Spectre of the Prohibition Era hanging over it, and it probably always will. This is unfortunate, and largely undeserved for most of our citizenry. Therre is also an unfair attitude out there concerning the C.P.D. To some, we are either the most crooked Coppers or the most "Police Brutality Prone." In reality, neither is true, these attitudes merely being a product of a prostituted press.* It would appear that this "MISSING PERSONS" started out as a legitimately sincere project. The crux of the show seemed to be an honest attempt to play down violent crime, gun play, car chases and any other "Bad-Ass", Bumper Morgan-Dirty Harry type activities.

In contrast, the characters of "MISSING PERSONS" seem bent on making a point of their almost Pascifist behaviour. Detective Bobby Davison (Erik King) states that it was good to be bringing families back together, instead of breaking them up. This occurs during an exchange with a Detective from Homicide. This is a gruff, gravely voiced character who smirks at such an nonviolent activity as a Missing Person Investigation is below his contempt and dignity.

As a definite 'Plus'(+)for the Series and Its Creative/Production Team is the excellent uses of Chicago locales. Chicago has been said to have a wide range of looks and appearances vary highly from one section of town to another. You may find the Architechture of the Schools will vary a great deal, also.** The best use of a shooting location has to be their choice for Missing Persons Bureau Headquarters. It is the old Brighton Park Police Station,3900 S. California Avenue, which from about 1962 to 1994 was Home to Area 3 Detectives, Youth and (until '73)Traffic Divisions. It is a very old building dating to the turn of 19th to 20th centuries. It is now used as a Satellite Facility by the Cook County Sheriff's Police.

Again on the down side, this Missings series probably inadvertently does a dis-service to the public by creating th false impression that any Missing Persons Case gets far more individual attention than they really do, as they are handed out in bunches to the Investigating Officers, rather than one at a time, as is pictured.

And even though they were given full cooperation of the Chicago Police Youth Section(Youth handles all missings in Chicago.), they still missed the boat a little when it comes to speaking Chicagoan. Case in point involves a latter episode which was introducing Valerie Harper as an Investigator returning to work after an extended Medical Absence, with an implication that there had been something between her and the Lieutennant. Well, in this installment, she brings the morning sweet rolls, priding herself in remembering what were the preferences of her co-workers. For one she announces "a Jelly Doughnut".

BONG! BONG! ALARM sounding here!! In our provincial dialect, we Middle Americans would not call it a "Jelly Doughnut", but rather use the much more proper terminology of "Jelly Bismarck". A Technical Dialect Adviser was needed. (I was available) Once again, it seems that all of this is done by the Production team with good intentions. It would seem that the old sayings are proved here are: 1. "A Little Bit of Knowledge is a Dangerous Thing.", and 2. "The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions!"

NOTE: * 'Scuse me oh Noble Fourth Estate of the Land, but it's true. You've managed to neuter our country's Police Departments, just the same way that you are now doing it to Our Armed Forces!

NOTE: ** Architechture varies greatly, neighborhood to neighborhood depending on when settled and who were the original Ethnics founding the community.

I don't disagree with the essential premise offered by the previous reviewer -- all cop shows vary from some mix of the realistic and the fantastic. C'mon, please: Lab techs who bust down doors with the badges? Decades-old cold cases where all the key suspects are still among us, living in Philadelphia? And these examples represent two of my favorite recent procedurals.

That said, I skipped this one when it first played on ABC -- I was still riding high on Hill Street Blues, and I feared Daniel J. Travanti was slumming for a gig. Never heard of the supporting cast, and when Valeria Harper came on, I figured she'd given up the ghost, as well.

Kind of glad I waited until Cannell's new omnibus DVD set came out with all 18 eps. Have watched four, and what I'm seeing so far is a fairly solid, reasonably low-key modular procedural -- the kind Ed McBain used to write with his 87th Precinct novels. It reminds me of another underestimated ABC short-timer, The Unusuals. Travanti brings his best boss sensibilities, along with some credible gray, to Lt. Ray -- the kind of guy who might have mentored Frank Furillo. Ray's short-fused impatience with incompetence and callousness is well-rationed, and his home life reminds me nostalgically of Barney Miller's.

Jorja Fox (later CSI), Frederick Weller (later In Plain Sight), and Erik King (later Dexter) all make credibly dogged investigators, following trails far freer of melodrama and coincidence than Without a Trace. I enjoy spotting out the Chicago 'hoods and the city's various cultural enclaves as the tecs seek their prey. Unlike Trace, not every step is traced with the help of an ATM or mini-mart surveillance cam, and not every missing person is involved in some labyrinthine scheme or conspiracy.

In terms of realism, I like at least the semblance of some genuine police procedure being applied to the proceedings. Stan the office phone jockey, surrounded by reverse phone directories and city maps, is another nice contribution to the ersatz-reality of the show.

This one probably would never have caught on in the pre-Bruckheimer era. But if you like a cop show with some plausible human interaction (a la Glades, Memphis Beat), I'd recommend it as a pleasant diversion and a look at some young stars who'd someday make their way. It shows me Cannell still had some oomph between the classic Rockford Files and the latter-day punch of Wiseguy.