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Crime
dramas: Reality TV or not
By
Amy Geiszler-Jones
Crime
dramas are making a minor comeback among broadcast networks as they
roll out their new shows for the fall season.
But
are these shows that range from courtroom dramas to gritty detective
work to high-tech criminals another sort of reality TV with story
lines on laying down the law?
It
depends, says a WSU criminal justice expert who teaches the class
"Crime in Popular Culture."
"The
shows vary a great deal in their reality orientation," says
Delores Craig-Moreland, associate professor.
Some
show a balanced interpretation of what happens when a crime is committed,
an investigation is launched and a defendant is prosecuted. Others
make the criminal justice system more intriguing than it really
is. And some focus more on the characters, using the setting as
a vehicle to reveal the characters’ personalities.
NBC’s
popular "Law & Order" shows – the original and
its spin-off "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" –
get high marks on the reality scale among criminal justice professionals,
Craig-Moreland says. NBC is adding a third version of the series,
subtitled "Criminal Intent," which exposes crimes from
the criminal’s perspective.
The
two current series "show a very important component of the
work: They always have a theory of the case and a good detective
has to be willing to take a theory, run evidence, acknowledge stuff
that’s inconsistent with it and develop new lines that incorporate
it," says Craig-Moreland, who lists the two "Law &
Order" series as her personal favorites.
Another
reason the shows tend to rate high on reality is "that they’re
not preaching justice for all or that prosecutors never make mistakes,"
she says.
CBS’
"CSI: Crime Scene Investigators," which made its debut
last season, tends to make the job "more sexy than it is,"
although it gets high marks for accuracy, says Craig-Moreland, who
has partnered with a Wichita Police homicide detective to teach
a forensic science class at WSU in the past. If you followed a crime
scene investigator, their work, while still rooted in science and
the piecing together of clues, may be a little more mundane, she
says.
Other
dramas, like ABC’s "The Practice," may show how difficult
it is for a criminal defense firm to be successful, but the story
lines seem more centered on the personalities of the characters
and show more dramatic twists than what commonly happens in a courtroom.
Shows
that do a bad job in the reality realm are those that emphasize
"the high excitement" only and ignore the more routine
police work or those that seem like police never make mistakes,
she says. Another misrepresentation is that men and women professionals
can’t work together without sexual undercurrents being involved.
At
WSU, the "Crime in Popular Culture" class has been a popular
one in each of the past five summers it’s been offered. Not
surprisingly, creative writing majors tend to find the class appealing.
About half the students are from disciplines outside criminal justice,
says Craig-Moreland.
The
class focuses on different theories in criminal justice, and students
analyze TV shows, movies and even books to determine which theories
are presented and if they are credible, and also how criminal justice
professionals and the criminals are portrayed.
"Some
people may say this doesn’t sound like an academic course,
but the truth is that each of us is probably more influenced by
what we see on television than the news reports on (criminal justice),"
she says.
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