Best of 5: TV Detective / Sleuth …
Kung Fu Drafter
It’s time for a new Best of 5 post where we take 5 items and find the best one! Where do we get the five candidates? Well we crowdsource them from Twitter, Google+, email, and plain-old-fashioned in face conversation. So what is the topic for this week? Oh it’s a good one: TV Detectives / Sleuths!
Ponch Poncherello - CHiPs
Ah, CHiPS. Is there anyone over the age of 30 who doesn’t remember this cop buddy show? NBC was the place to be to watch this California motorcycle cop rolling down the highway solving crime and picking up disco bunnies.
Jessica Fletcher - Murder She Wrote
For twelve years American enjoyed the semi-retired / crime-solving antics of Jessica Fletcher. Wherever she went, there was a murder to be solved. Basically if you saw this old broad coming, you ran! Why? Because chances are you were going to be murdered. But don’t worry, it would be solved.
Joe Friday - Dragnet
In the history of television detectives it is hard to imagine one that is more iconic than Joe Friday. A man’s man who was gruff in his attitude and quick with the police work. When you “My name’s Joe Friday – I’m a cop.” You knew Badge 714 was on the case!
Lennie Briscoe - Law and Order
If Joe Friday was the “Joe Friday” of the 50’s then Lennie Briscoe was certainly the “Joe Friday” of our generation. Gruff and imperfect, Lennie was a recovering alcoholic with a heart of gold. He wasn’t perfect but he did always get the one-liner before the second commercial break.
Vic Mackey - The Shield
Another cop from the modern age of gritty, realistic television age was Vic Mackey. Whether he was chasing down drug traffickers or solving murders or trafficking drugs or committing murders, Vic was real. He was REALLY real! So real it was hard to find a clip that wouldn’t scar our readers.
The Best
So which of the five great detectives / sleuths, selected by our social media friends is the best? Let us tell you, it was close! But after much deliberation, it finally came down to a toss-up between Lennie Briscoe and Jessica Fletcher.
Lennie was a great cop and with a great supply of witty cop one-liners. He was like the grandfather we all wanted … with a gun and a badge. Our real grandfather didn’t have both. Still we had to choose Jessica Fletcher as the Best of Five. Not only was she adorable, she was able to hide that twelve-year killing spree she was on. Come on, did you really think that there just happened to be murders everyplace she went? Nope, she did them all and then “solved” the murders on someone else!
Thanks to every one who contributed to our list for this week’s Best of 5. Do you have a favorite detective / sleuth that we didn’t list? Leave us a comment and let us know. We know our readers have opinions …
- KFD -
Image credits: Ian Britton and Markemark.
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