The show starts with panoramic views like a travel film of Los Angeles, California. Showing Museums, parks and points of interest. Narrated by our deep throat-ed creator and producer Jack Webb the Dragnet series this time is in color and with a new Partner second banana Harry Morgan. The show starts with a disclaimer that the stories are real and the names are changed to protect the innocent. The Iconic theme song comes in showing the badges of the L.A.P.D. with city hall embossed. The show was guided by the narration of Jack Webb as detective Sargent Joe Friday as he speaks in exact detail the time, weather report and location he's at during each episode. The dialogue is quick and fast paced but basically wooden by acting standards. Some humor is injected by Harry Morgan from time to time but for the most part producer Webb keeps things straight forward and serious. When watching the series in marathon form i.e. net flix you'll notice that Webb has his cast of usual suspects, his troop of co-stars he uses to create the Dragnet Lumberyard Acting Academy. The regulars the likes of Art Balinger, Virginia Gregg,Olan Soule, Peggy Webber, Herb Vigran, Stacy Harris, Robert Clarke and Vic Perrin. These individuals had no specific role in the show. One week they could be cast on the side of the law and the next episode on the other side. Webb always ran the show with an iron fist keeping the flow of the episodes moving and under budget.With his unmistakable phrase, "How's that?, What's that?" The subjects(Episodes) were vast and diverse from Drug abuse to smuggling. From robbery to pornography. Racial injustice to misunderstood teenager fiddling with a hand grenade. Joe Friday going to night school to complete his masters in Criminology while busting a classmate for weed possession. I remember my first introduction to the show featuring a baby found in a garbage can. That will get anyone's attention to watch this Law Enforcement show. Dragnet was filmed during a transitional time in our U.S. history as a generation gap began to ferment across this country. Vietnam protests were the norm. Black Panthers, Civil Rights, Hippies and L.S.D. were on the rise. Cop were called pigs or the fuzz by the anti establishment. Jack utilized these serious issue into the Dragnet episodes throughout the run. I watched this show with my daughter who's take on the show was obviously dated by her standards. The Joe Friday character was proficient in his work and never seemed to take time off from his job yet a batchelor and on the side of being intreverted. The Gannon Partner was impossible to watch with his silly quirky ways and especially when he invited Joe to his home for dinner acting very territorial as to which chair he should sit on. My cop friend had a problem with the efficiency and expedience of our detectives in catching the crooks. In the real world of Law Enforcement there will always be loads of unsolved cases and more piles growing in the file cabinets of police stations across America.That bothered him but he understood that was television. Every episode closed with an outcome of the sentencing as trial was held in some Department in and for the County of Los Angeles. A short break and then the guest crook would stand alone as sentence was pronounced and usually the suspect was found guilty. Even Our Star Jack Webb stood before the camera in a final shot but he was reinstated to the force. Whether the show was of high quality drama.I can't say but I can tell you it was most entertaining and informative.
Review of Dragnet 1967
