Police Squad!

This is the brief series that lead to the NAKED GUN trilogy. Leslie Nielsen gets to play madman with all the delicious relish he can bring to the part of the straight-faced detective.

The stories are parodies of all the very, very, very serious and very, very, very important police and crime shows on TV over the years. Nothing escapes the satiric bashing that goes on here. The guest stars each week are murdered in the opening scene and then are never heard of again. The titles of the episodes don't fit the narration. Nielsen's own narration is a wonderful satire of all the crime story voice-overs going back to film noir and DRAGNET. And -- wonder of wonders -- the show is "In Color!"

No pun goes un-punned. No sight-gag is left un-gagged. Nothing is spared. Imagine the Marx Brothers and Three Stooges in a crime movie setting, and that gives you a hint of what POLICE SQUAD is all about. This is one of the funniest shows ever made for TV, but since it is satire, it of course had only a short run. Nevertheless, I loved it.

The creative team that brought us Police Squad - and the Naked Gun derived from it - said in interview that they were told by their network contact that the show would be canceled, after their delivery of the first episode. Basically, the show was never given any chance. Typical Hollywood. The contact apparently told the team that the problem with the show was that, for the show to be funny, the viewer would actually need to watch it; most shows are presented on TV with the understanding that the viewer needed to get up and miss a few minutes while getting food, or going to the toilet, etc.

The humor of the show is extremely dry (it uses no laugh-track), and the universe the characters inhabit is one in which anything can happen, regardless of logic, as long as it was totally unbelievable; so, for instance in one episode a surgeon has to bribe an informant on the street in order to get a tip on heart surgery.

Those familiar with the Naked Gun films should be warned that there are a number of interesting disjunctions between the show and the films. In the films, Nielsen developed a particular "take" approach - that is, eyes widened when confronted with the unexpected. This doesn't happen in the show, where Nielsen's Drebin is the center around which the rest of the universe revolves - nothing is unexpected to him. Also, there are no romances in the show, and no parodies of MTV. Finally, the show takes certain risks that the films avoid; in the first episode, Drebin, to "re-enact the crime", has a squad of homicide detectives shoot each other from a number of different angles - ballistics the hard way. This is actually a risky bit of humor, since we need to accept that it's perfectly normal for policemen to kill each other while investigating a crime, for no other reason than experimentation. This sort of thing rarely happens in the films.

Taken individually, each of the episodes is actually funnier than any one of the Naked Gun films, since they are both more compact (more happens in a shorter time-frame), yet more leisurely paced (there's not the rush for a punch-line as sometimes happens in the films). There are some inconsistencies that happen in the films (primarily "2" and "3") that never occur in the show's shorter time-frame.

Of course, there's no doubt that Naked Gun (the first film) is one of the great comedies of theatrical cinema. And if you watch the TV show episode after episode in one sitting, the dry quality of the humor might wear away one's tolerance.

None the less, it would be useful to have a DVD of this, and watch an episode a day for a few weeks - If laughter has, as some claim, medicinal value, watching this show is good for one's health.

This was a truly unique show. Many of the comments in this section regret that there were only 6 episodes made. But to be honest, the show used so many jokes per episode, I don't see how they could have gone too much further without running out. The great thing about this show is that every one who watches it has a favorite one-liner that they remember, and like to repeat. One could say the same thing about the movie "Airplane". There are so few things that are really original, especially in television, the medium that thrives so much on imitation of previous success. So the time has come for this limited series to get its chance on DVD. But not just another release. Visualize this. The show did such a good job of satirizing police dramas from M Squad to the QM series, that the DVD should do the same this for DVD special features. In short, the DVD release should have all the usual special features, but they would all be send-ups of special features. Now that would make for a great DVD release of this great show.

...a burlesque dancer to Det. Frank Drebin (Leslie Nielsen) as he approaches her in a dressing room...

"Yes, that's very impressive, but that's not why were here"...(Det. Drebin's deadpan response)

The best sight-gag comedy ever. But of course, it got crushed in the ratings and was yanked right away. Our loss.

I recently purchased a VHS tape with three episodes for my dad and watched 'em again with him. I'm happy to report that if you like the Zucker's style of humor (first unleashed in "Airplane"), you'll have a blast.

Proof that TV execs don't always know a good show when they see it (See "Family Guy"), all you have to do is look at "Police Squad!" A VERY short lived show (Only 6 episodes were aired) with humor that still holds up 20 yrs later. Leslie Neilsen as Frank Drebin is incredibly funny, with his partner, The late Alan North as Ed Hocken. My favorite episode is "Rendezvous at Big Gulch," (Or, as the announcer says, "Terror In The Neighborhood.")when Drebin runs a locksmith business to check out the thugs (Next to the keys, are "Florida Keys, Francis Scott Keys,""Turkeys," and "Pot Roast."). Too bad the network didn't get a clue to the humor of the show, but at least it inspired 3 very funny movies based on the series! If you haven't seen the movies or the show, you should check out the inspiration behind the movies!