NBC to remake Prime Suspect?

[BrotherBenny]

Star Wolf, in the UK there is a dedicated Murder Investigation Team for homicides in London's Metropolitan Police, but usually in other smaller cities the murder is still solved (or not) by a senior detective and his wing-man plus any constables temporarily reassigned for legwork.

Unlike in the US police system, a detective does not outrank a beat officer. A Police Constable and Detective Constable are of the same rank and there is no legal seniority, though a DC will get a PC to do the legwork.

 

[wamdue]

Star Wolf, in the UK there is a dedicated Murder Investigation Team for homicides in London's Metropolitan Police, but usually in other smaller cities the murder is still solved (or not) by a senior detective and his wing-man plus any constables temporarily reassigned for legwork.

there has been a "Murder Investigation Team" series, a spin-off from ITVs theBill, didnt last long and was not very good.

 

[BrotherBenny]

Star Wolf, in the UK there is a dedicated Murder Investigation Team for homicides in London's Metropolitan Police, but usually in other smaller cities the murder is still solved (or not) by a senior detective and his wing-man plus any constables temporarily reassigned for legwork.

there has been a "Murder Investigation Team" series, a spin-off from ITVs theBill, didnt last long and was not very good.

True, because it was not very true to life and the writing/acting was awful.

 

[wamdue]

you know im surprised we not have some type of SOCA series yet, would not have to be a TheBill spin-off, but when it was first launched it was dubbed a "British FBI" and I though it would make a good TV show.

 

[Star Wolf]

No, I don't even know what Damages is, except that it's something recent. I'm thinking of something from at least a decade ago.

Okay, I found it. I was thinking of Under Suspicion, a 1994 CBS police drama starring Karen Sillas. It had a similar title and a similar theme, focusing on a lone female homicide detective contending with the sexism of her male colleagues. Apparently it was conceived as an imitation of Prime Suspect but wasn't actually an adaptation.

I never saw the gender politics as the prime mover of Prime Suspect. That was played years before on Cagney and Lacey.

The sexism of Tennyson's colleagues was played up a lot in the first few episodes of Prime Suspect (coupled with racism in Prime Suspect III, the one with Colin Salmon as Sgt. Bob Wilson).

Cracker also dealt with tensions among the police squad, to an even greater extent or at least more severe consequences.

Consider this, when I saw Prime Suspect on PBS the gender barrier had been passed a generation before. For US network detective show fans seeing a female lead officer stopped being a story about the time Law & Order made their police supervisor and Assistant District Attorney female a generation ago. The racial angle may be new if they attempt a racially mixed couple. Advertisers have recently been featuring mixed couples so even that won't be a reason to green light a project. That's why I see the major case task force as being the template taken from Prime Suspect for any NBC remake

 

[Bob The Skutter]

^I doubt it happened 25 years before on L&O than it did on Prime Suspect... In fact L&O only started 1 year before Prime Suspect did.

 

[Star Wolf]

^I doubt it happened 25 years before on L&O than it did on Prime Suspect...

By generation I didn't mean 25 years. Just before, when new television viewers were old enough to stay up til' 10:00 PM became of age. If they missed a show by a year they are a part of a different audience generation.

L&O didn't really play gender politics except for a back ground story of Lieutenant VanBuran's career being stalled at Lieutenant squad commander and a supermodel detective who got her gold shield because she won an off duty shootout. The gender thing of OMG woman homicide detectives without a man to care for/bodyguard them came with Cagney and Lacey. Since that time about a third to half of all investigators have been female. Its not a new frontier

 

[Bob The Skutter]

^I don't think by gender politics being part of it people mean "OMG WOMAN!" they mean tackling the in-built prejudice that gets built up in these institutions. They don't disappear over night just because one woman/black man/gay man made it. You still hear of pay gaps for men and women today, or institutional racism, etc. supposedly decades after everyone was supposed to be equal.

 

[Star Wolf]

^I don't think by gender politics being part of it people mean "OMG WOMAN!" they mean tackling the in-built prejudice that gets built up in these institutions. They don't disappear over night just because one woman/black man/gay man made it. You still hear of pay gaps for men and women today, or institutional racism, etc. supposedly decades after everyone was supposed to be equal.

The thing is in a Prime Suspect remake she also would not be the second or third. Every cop show is full of women and minorities in authoritative positions and they have been in place for decades. The only thing possible new is having a white female superior in an affair with a black subordinate.

 

[Bob The Skutter]

^I don't think by gender politics being part of it people mean "OMG WOMAN!" they mean tackling the in-built prejudice that gets built up in these institutions. They don't disappear over night just because one woman/black man/gay man made it. You still hear of pay gaps for men and women today, or institutional racism, etc. supposedly decades after everyone was supposed to be equal.

The thing is in a Prime Suspect remake she also would not be the second or third. Every cop show is full of women and minorities in authoritative positions and they have been in place for decades. The only thing possible new is having a white female superior in an affair with a black subordinate.

Oh, sorry, I thought you were talking about the original, not the remake.

I don't see how an inter-racial couple would be breaking the mold nowadays either. I mean sure you could have it, but I don't see how or why it would be a talking point for the show... unless it still would be in the US?

 

[Star Wolf]

^I don't think by gender politics being part of it people mean "OMG WOMAN!" they mean tackling the in-built prejudice that gets built up in these institutions. They don't disappear over night just because one woman/black man/gay man made it. You still hear of pay gaps for men and women today, or institutional racism, etc. supposedly decades after everyone was supposed to be equal.

The thing is in a Prime Suspect remake she also would not be the second or third. Every cop show is full of women and minorities in authoritative positions and they have been in place for decades. The only thing possible new is having a white female superior in an affair with a black subordinate.

Oh, sorry, I thought you were talking about the original, not the remake.

I don't see how an inter-racial couple would be breaking the mold nowadays either. I mean sure you could have it, but I don't see how or why it would be a talking point for the show... unless it still would be in the US?

I am seeing them in advertising but I can't recall a Black man, White woman couple among TV show lead characters yet. Black male, Asian females, or Asian and Latino males with others but that last frontier of the descendant of the former slave with the master's daughter has not been crossed on a major network I think.

 

[Bob The Skutter]

The thing is in a Prime Suspect remake she also would not be the second or third. Every cop show is full of women and minorities in authoritative positions and they have been in place for decades. The only thing possible new is having a white female superior in an affair with a black subordinate.

Oh, sorry, I thought you were talking about the original, not the remake.

I don't see how an inter-racial couple would be breaking the mold nowadays either. I mean sure you could have it, but I don't see how or why it would be a talking point for the show... unless it still would be in the US?

I am seeing them in advertising but I can't recall a Black man, White woman couple among TV show lead characters yet. Black male, Asian females, or Asian and Latino males with others but that last frontier of the descendant of the former slave with the master's daughter has not been crossed on a major network I think.

First thing that pops in to my head is Doctor Who, Mickey and Rose... but that's a UK show, but there's plenty of other examples on British TV... Deb and her CI boyfriend in Dexter are one that come to mind in an American show, although he's just a recurring character and she's a not the lead.

 

[Deckerd]

I am seeing them in advertising but I can't recall a Black man, White woman couple among TV show lead characters yet. Black male, Asian females, or Asian and Latino males with others but that last frontier of the descendant of the former slave with the master's daughter has not been crossed on a major network I think.

We furriners don't understand what a major network is. HBO had just such a pairing in The Wire and pretty explicit it was too.

 

[Bob The Skutter]

I am seeing them in advertising but I can't recall a Black man, White woman couple among TV show lead characters yet. Black male, Asian females, or Asian and Latino males with others but that last frontier of the descendant of the former slave with the master's daughter has not been crossed on a major network I think.

We furriners don't understand what a major network is. HBO had just such a pairing in The Wire and pretty explicit it was too.

Dexter was shown on CBS, but only the first season... so I guess mines out.

 

[Star Wolf]

I am seeing them in advertising but I can't recall a Black man, White woman couple among TV show lead characters yet. Black male, Asian females, or Asian and Latino males with others but that last frontier of the descendant of the former slave with the master's daughter has not been crossed on a major network I think.

We furriners don't understand what a major network is. HBO had just such a pairing in The Wire and pretty explicit it was too.

NBC can't be HBO

 

[Bob The Skutter]

I am seeing them in advertising but I can't recall a Black man, White woman couple among TV show lead characters yet. Black male, Asian females, or Asian and Latino males with others but that last frontier of the descendant of the former slave with the master's daughter has not been crossed on a major network I think.

We furriners don't understand what a major network is. HBO had just such a pairing in The Wire and pretty explicit it was too.

NBC can't be HBO

Can be a little confusing because HBO/Showtime and everything are shown on network TV here just fine.

 

[Christopher]

I am seeing them in advertising but I can't recall a Black man, White woman couple among TV show lead characters yet. Black male, Asian females, or Asian and Latino males with others but that last frontier of the descendant of the former slave with the master's daughter has not been crossed on a major network I think.

Oh, there are plenty of examples. Let's start with Eriq LaSalle and Alex Kingston on ER, fully a decade ago. In fact, LaSalle complained about having his character paired with a white woman, because of some sort of "message" he imagined it was sending.

More recently, there was DL and Niki on Heroes, a married couple with a biracial son. Race was never an issue there at all. There's also Eddie Steeples and Jaime Pressly on My Name is Earl. Apparently Marg Helgenberger and Gary Dourdan on CSI had a borderline romance between their characters for a while. I also find a reference to a pairing between characters named "Skills" and Bevin in One Tree Hill.


Beyond "major networks," there's Christopher Judge with both Musetta Vander and Jolene Blalock on Stargate SG-1. The animated Secret Saturdays on Cartoon Network is about a family consisting of a black man, a white woman, and their biracial son (though he looks more Latino or something, because of his freaky anime hair).

Pretty much every black male lead on Star Trek has had at least one romantic plotline opposite a white actress: LeVar Burton with Susan Gibney; Michael Dorn with Suzie Plakson, Jennifer Gatti, Terry Farrell, and Nicole deBoer; Avery Brooks with Nana Visitor and Farrell (in the Mirror Universe only); Cirroc Lofton with Jill Sayre; Tim Russ with Sandra Nelson and Lori Petty; Anthony Montgomery with Johanna Watts.

More, from a 2006 article:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20060215/news_1c15couples.html

Meanwhile, the forthcoming WB drama “The Bedford Diaries” features scenes of a black college freshman struggling through a relationship with a pregnant white girl still in high school, and an FX drama called “Thief” places Emmy-winning actor Andre Braugher in a marriage with a white woman.

 

[BrotherBenny]

you know im surprised we not have some type of SOCA series yet, would not have to be a TheBill spin-off, but when it was first launched it was dubbed a "British FBI" and I though it would make a good TV show.

Wamdue, the reason a SOCA-based series wouldn't work is because it is an intelligence-gathering organisation and none of the people working for them have powers of arrest unless specifically granted for a particular case. The "British FBI" that it was originally identified as was a complete misnomer. The SOCA is more like Interpol than anything else. Intelligence and supervision only.

 

[Bob The Skutter]

^since when have TV shows had to be accurate though?

 

[Star Wolf]

you know im surprised we not have some type of SOCA series yet, would not have to be a TheBill spin-off, but when it was first launched it was dubbed a "British FBI" and I though it would make a good TV show.

Wamdue, the reason a SOCA-based series wouldn't work is because it is an intelligence-gathering organisation and none of the people working for them have powers of arrest unless specifically granted for a particular case. The British FBI that it was originally identified as was a complete misnomer. The SOCA is more like Interpol than anything else. Intelligence and supervision only.

It could work. TPTB just have to remember they are making a show and not a documentary. In the recent Criminal Minds we had a show about FBI criminal profilers but instead of the local police moving in to make the arrest week after week the FBI Agent/doctor would be the guy to make the take down.