Highway Patrol episodes were almost all action, and it happened quite often that the bad guy would die in a shootout with Dan Mathews and his men. Dragnet episodes were almost all talk and there were only a few gunshots on the 1967-70 series.
shareYou need to watch the black and white earlier version of Dragnet from the 1950s to really have a good discussion.
There was a Dragnet movie from early 50s featuring some actors still around in the 60s version to which you refer. Some of them got shot many times in different episodes.
"I shot you dead last week! You just can't stay dead, can you?"
Virginia Gregg was in many of the various Jack Webb productions.
Enough so that if a Virginia Gregg tribute is ever considered, she has enough Dragnet, etc. guest appearances just for Jack Webb tv alone to fill a several day marathon.
No Highway Patrol movie or even a multi-part episode to combine into a tv movie.
You are correct about the 1950s Dragnet being a better comparison. The B&W Dragnet still included minutes of banter between Joe and his partner; in general, the episodes included a lot of of talk. Dragnet is focused on the police and never shows the criminals without the police being present. In Highway Patrol we see the action by the criminals as they commit their crimes and not merely at the end when they are apprehended, as is usually the case on Dragnet.
I suspect the difference follows in part from Dragnet originating as a radio series. There is not much point in including a lot of action that the audience can't see in a radio episode. Most of the early episodes of TV Dragnet were reenactments of radio episodes that honestly didn't make very good use of the visual medium. Even after the series was no longer simulcast on radio, the episodes were still being written in a radio vein. Highway Patrol did not have this limitation.
I like how on both shows if there's some bad guys with guns holed up somewhere, all that the cops deem necessary to bring them in is just a couple of cops.
In Highway Patrol, that usually means Matthews and only one or two other cops. If the location is out in the country and there's almost a certainty that someone will get shot, there's no ambulance on its way until it's needed.
On Dragnet, there were two bandits in a hotel room with a sawed-off shotgun but the police department apparently thought they didn't need any help, these two middle-aged plainclothes men. Of course, they got the job done, but to our modern eyes when a whole SWAT team would show up to ensure the bad guys didn't get the upperhand and get away, these old-time methods seem laughable. Sure, this was just the way TV was back then, not just with these two shows. But I'm always amused at how much confidence the cops showed in their ability to get the job done.
"All necessary truth is its own evidence." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Liked them both, but Highway Patrol is my favorite......Really enjoy the way they were filmed, and the action...
shareThey're both California based shows, but they show the changing landscape of America of the 50s as well, including the urban landscape. Highway Patrol shows the viewer a still largely rural Cali of truck stops, small towns, pick-up trucks, working men and women. It was shot outdoors, and those coffee shops and diners feel real. Dragnet was, as other have noted, more police oriented, less about criminals, it was basically a police procedural. HP has some of that but it offers vistas, hills, country roads, an era when jeans were called dungarees, were as often as not standard ware for working folk, especially those who worked outside. I find the show more visually appealing than Dragnet, and Broderick Crawford brings his own special brand of charisma to the proceedings, which perks things up. His rapid fire line reading are priceless. As a slice of Americana, I much prefer Highway Patrol.
shareMe, too!
I'm watching it right now and how he nailed so many "bad guys" right in the chest, with his little handgun, is nothing short of a miracle.
Actually, I like both Dragnet and Highway Patrol. Both have their own individual, uniqueness, like comparing apples and oranges.
shareTwo of my favorite shows. I record both when possible. Nothing nowadays compares.
shareI think HP was deliberately written to portray a variety of stories and characters, as well as a variety of police tactics and procedures. Also variety of settings.
Dragnet had a sameness to all the episodes. Stories and characters were merely backdrops for Jack Web's incessant proselytizing. As such they needed only superficial variety.
I like HP better for the action and the cars. Grew up in the 50's remember those big finned cars, my family and relatives had Dodges with the typewriter drive. It's funny now watching them bounce around. They called it torsion air drive.
shareI'd have to give Dragnet the nod for what I prefer. Webb did such a good job of showing the day-to-day operations of detectives in various divisions.
Having never seen Highway Patrol until a few months ago, it was as another poster noted an entertaining slice of Americana, but there are so many errors that it cannot compare to Dragnet.
Joe "We're authorized" Fontana: I can do this all day, Mitch. How about you?
Webb was so wooden and later started preaching virtual fascism-note how most of the civilians he encounters are portrayed as idiots. The best on was when the mom smoke some pot, acted as if lunatic, and "forgets" her baby in the bathtub, drowned-as if pot were the cause
shareHindsight is usually considered to be 20/20. You have to remember the era in which the show was made. You can compare it using modern standards, but it will not be an apples to apples comparison any more than comparing a 1965 Mustang to a 2015 Mustang.
Joe "We're authorized" Fontana: I can do this all day, Mitch. How about you?
That is like comparing Cristal and Dom Perignon Champagne.
Both are exquisite. A matter of personal taste.