blakeadam (1)

Both shows were excellent at what they did, and I find them highly watchable, entertaining and often informative, literally educational. Yet both began with heavy, doomed laden music, in the case of Highway Patrol, accompanied by stern narration whenever the laws of any state are broken a duly authorized law enforcement agency swings into action. Both shows sort of pose" as documentaries, though they're obviously fiction at the end of each episode, after things are wrapped up, the credits roll, and once more that funereal music kicks in. Not funereal as in the kind of music one would hear at a funeral but rather music so joyless and downbeat one practically expects a funeral to follow. The 50s was supposedly a happy decade for America, but was it? Many of the TV series of the period suggest as much, others don't. This was, after all, the Cold War era, and a kind of para-military mood prevailed, in real life and on television. It's certainly there in those two Ziv shows, one of which features the state police even though its lead player doesn't wear a uniform, while the other has a former navy frogman as the hero. https://www.steincoindustrial.com/

posted 3 years ago in Classic TV: The 50s

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