Dragnet 1967 (TV Series) Internal Affairs: DR-20 (1968) User Reviews

Another typical season 3 show...

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 22 November 2009]

Friday and Gannon are working for Internal Affairs and they have been assigned to investigate an allegation that one of the policemen has used excessive force when dealing with a group of disorderly (and possibly drunk) people. While this is NOT the actual hearing, the detectives job is to gather evidence to submit to the hearing board.

First, they interview the person who filed the complaint. The way he explains it, the officer assumed they were drunk (he says they were not) and the cop struck him. They interviewed the others from the group as well as witnesses. It's interesting that next they interview Officers Reed and Malloy--who had just debuted in their own Jack Webb series, "Adam-12". The officers confirmed that the man arrested definitely WAS intoxicated--blowing a .21 on the Breathalyzer. However, they did not see all that occurred and could neither confirm nor refute all the charges against Officer Hillier. They also interviewed Hillier as well as his wife.

In the end, it was confirmed that Hillier DID hit the man, though he clearly was goaded into it. What happened at the subsequent hearing is something you'll have to tune in to see.

Overall, a decent and fairly typical season 3 show. Almost all of the 3rd season consisted of public service-oriented episodes and little, if any, direct crime fighting by Gannon and Friday occurred in the shows. This makes the shows generally interesting but also less than thrilling.

Amygdala Hijacking.

[rmax304823 · 6/10 · 18 January 2012]

An after-work party is being held by some people from the office. The young cogs in the bureaucratic wheel let loose by boozing it up and playing loud music. An elderly lady appears at the apartment door, complaining, and claims that she has already called the cops.

This frightens one of the guests, the unwittingly funny trumpeter Jack Shelton. It's understandable because he's scared to death of cops and is thoroughly soused. He tried to drive away just as officers Hillier and his partner arrive at the scene of the ruckus. Shelton smashes into another vehicle and is carted off in a subdued state to the overnight slams.

The other guy, Peter Duryea, begins to sound off and blackguard the two officers. He demands to see Hilliard's badge. Hilliard displays the shield open and tells him to take down the number but not to touch it. Of course Duryea does exactly what he's told not to do. He grabs the badge and tries to rip it off, tearing Hilliard's shirt. Hilliard back hands him across the face.

Now Hilliard faces an investigation by Friday and Gannon at Internal Affairs. His record shows that he has the background of a promising officer, having served in Vietnam, spent two years in college, and has no blot on his professional escutcheon.

The way the interview is staged leaves no doubt about which side the writers are on. Hilliard was finally hijacked by his amygdala, the part of the midbrain that controls rage, after a career of being called a drunk, a pig, a fascist, and his wife a "pig sow." Duryea was a drunken self-indulgent moron and Hillier lost his temper -- but who wouldn't? Duryea gets off with a 30-day suspension on his record and Jack Shelton is punished for vehicular abuse or something. The police represent legitimated authority. And the authority is what the sociologist Max Weber called "rational/legal." The rules are written down and must be followed. The President operates under the same strictures. It's recognized by everyone. But, as we see in other TV series, the story adheres to Max Weber's "ideal type," the model of authority exercised so perfectly that it can never be achieved in real life.

The real world of law enforcement doesn't work quite that way. Where I grew up, if you were seen by the the police throwing a snowball into an empty parking lot, the squad car would zip around, push you up against the fence by the collar, and slap your head back and forth. Unlike Duryea, no one ever complained about the police because everyone knew what would happen after a complaint. Nothing. The object was to curb crime not by protecting and serving but by inspiring fear.

It's a fascinating series nonetheless because it illustrate the way the system is SUPPOSED to work. A viewer can learn how disputes and unusual cases are handled. It's a reassuring picture. It's rather like going to church, where we made satisfied and assured that God's in his heaven, all's right with the world. Anyone wanting a less ideal, more convincing picture of police work in LA, should check out "LA Confidential," where the cops get the job done pretty much any way they want -- and with the approval of the writer and director.

Season three: yakitty yak

[jbacks3 · 3/10 · 7 July 2010]

In Dragnet's later incarnation, Season 3 is the dullest. Webb focused on P.R., training and community relations. While these color Dragnets were never known to be action-oriented, Season 3 became largely desk bound, possibly a reaction to the actor/producer's increasing demands developing his second hit, Adam-12. This episode is obviously meant to show that the Los Angeles Police Department is self-policing, the twist here being the officer is, in fact, guilty of the accusation. Plusses: there's the Adam-12 cross-over with the appearance of the often-seen Jim Reed (Kent McCord) and Pete Malloy (Martin Milner). You also get to see 29-year old Peter Duryea, the great Dan Duryea's son, in the thankless role of the accuser. Not as bad as some of the other 3's but no classic.

These are tenuous times we live in

[sol1218 · 5/10 · 27 December 2011]

***SPOILERS*** Overly boring and sermonizing "Dragnet" episode with a robot-like Sgt. Joe Friday, Jack Webb, doing all the talking and his co-star Harry Morgan as Officer Bill Gannon in what seems like a Alfred Hitchcock like cameo role. This earth shaking saga of crime & punishment involves police brutality that was about as brutal as a cream puff being thrown in someone's face.

This incident involved officer Ed Hillier, John McCook, who after taking all he could take from cop hating motor-mouth John Meadows, Peter Duryea, that he without thinking back handed him in the face. That's after Meadows almost ripped his police badge off his shirt which in fact constitutes in any municipality in the USA, including L.A, assault on a police officer!

Officer Hillier for his part has a sparkling record as an L.A policeman and Vietnam veteran but that doesn't seem to help him at all in his defense of his un-police like action for the straight laced and by the books in it's dealing with the public LAPD. But the fact that he back-handed someone who in fact attacked him without provocation is enough to have Hillier not only suspended for a much as 60 days without pay from the LAPD but even fired! Without going into the results of the finding in Hillier's case and what and if he was punished for his actions this entire "Dragnet" episode stunk to high heaven.

If Jack Webb who produces the show wanted to do a story on police brutality he could have come up with something a lot more serious then what Officer Hillier did. Something like, even though it didn't happened when the episode was filmed, the Rodney King beating or anything close to it. Which Webb would have had no trouble finding in researching the LAPD police files that was,in him being in with the department, readily available to him. Instead Webb chose something so harmless as a guy getting slapped when he went for a cops badge that even the most extreme cop hater in the audience would side with the cop instead of his "victim".

P.S Besides Harry Morgan as Officer Bannon there's also a brief cameo appearance, that's a lot longer then Morgans, of Martin Milner & Kent McCord as officers Malloy & Reed from the TV police series Adam-12. Which Jack Webb, in giving the series a free plug on his show, was also deeply involved with!