Homicide Squad: New Orleans

This is the other side of the First 48, and if you've watched that program, you'll see some familiar faces from NOPD, and new faces, working to resolve homicide cases. It's done with the same combination of crime scene canvassing, witness interviews, reviewing available video, and compiling a case, but without the clock ticking down in the corner. The cases take as long as they take, and sometimes they're resolved, sometimes they aren't. The hardest part is watching witnesses refuse to cooperate, yet they then tell the police they want them to solve the crime. The best episodes are the ones which do have a resolution, but, it is a real-time, real-life program.

Show is great, and it really pulls you into the investigation. The cases are compelling, the detectives are top-notch, and the city itself is a character. But there's a huge piece missing that shows like the UK's 24 Hours in Custody get right: we never learn what sentence the perpetrator got. It feels like the story ends before it's over. Getting that final piece of information would make the show so much more satisfying and complete.

Absolute must watch if you want to see real provincial police at work. Scripted TV shows like Law&Order (especially Law&Order UK) give the audience the unrealistically cerebral view of the work detectives do to solve crimes. Homicide Squad NO is there to set the record straight - unbothered detectives blundering from crime scene to watching CCTV, to guessing the identity of the perp, to realizing they guessed wrong, to watching more TV... The mixture of indifference and incompetence gets old pretty quick, but you've got to watch this whole thang, to inoculate yourself against unrealistic expectations.

And yeah, when these detectives tell you they are "cooking with gasoline" or "or cooking with grease" (quotes), take it on face value...