Posted by Bartels, 12/14/06
Earlier this year, Reuters reported that CSI: Miami was “the most-watched U.S. series around the world.” Between the original Las Vegas, the Miami and the New York series, it’s hard not to miss these CSI franchises. I, like most other viewers I imagine, catch the beginning of one of these shows and end up sitting through them helpless to the desire to see how it concludes. This is something I first was struck with by Law and Order several years ago, call it “the Lenny Briscoe Syndrome.”
These CSI shows are for the most part completely ridiculous. The shows feature unbelievable plots, outrageously convenient coincidences, and all of the parts that are a lot more interesting than anything that would occur at a crime lab in real life. Any observation of what I like to call the “dusting for prints montages” makes it pretty obvious. Dusting for fingerprints, waiting for lab samples, measuring footprints, searching shag carpet for hair samples and scanning an entire house with a blacklight looking for semen samples must not make for the best television. So they condense these processes, which in reality must take many tedious hours or even days, to a 45 second montage and then “voila!” the results are in. I ran into this NPR segment on the topic (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1908313) while googling and the real Las Vegas crime lab director concluded to nobody’s surprise that “the big departure from realism is in how speedy the work goes on the air.”
But nonetheless, I will often sit through more than my fair share of these episodes despite, or perhaps because of this ridiculousness. I’ll be immersed to the point where the surrounding scenes are so far from reality that details like this seem to fit into some kind of alternative CSI reality that makes the show a comedy in its own right.
The main thing that is overly ridiculous about these shows is how they could easily be mistaken for a police drama. I mean, at times you really need a stern reminder to let you know that these people are scientists. Despite all the time in their futuristic (and for some reason really poorly lit) labs with there ridiculously accurate computer software and obviously endless budget when it comes to every sort of imaginable piece of equipment, the show maintains this cop-drama edge. For starters, they have guns. Crime lab people do not have guns. This is something that anyone would presume and the NPR article I listened to confirmed adamantly. I’m currently doing some computer work at a pharmaceutical company and am working with many scientists and I could not picture one of them with a firearm. This show has somehow successfully took the stereotype of a nerdy scientist and thrown it out the window by casting these shows with beautiful, strong, tough people that could shoot a man while in reality they are the complete opposite. Think of your own stereotype of the average “scientist” and compare it with these shows.
These scientists are not in the field at the crime scenes. They do not question real suspects, they do not have real authority. If someone came banging at my door and held up a badge and said “Crime lab” I would slam the door and carry on with my business and would be within my rights to do so. In the Law and Order heyday, the crime lab was an accessory to the detectives. They’d send the bullet casings there or a blood sample and after a few days the results would come and often times, the cases would be slowed down by the time it would take the lab to process. Even L&O, somewhat notorious for its over the top unrealism, gets the crime lab down right.
I’ll conclude with a video that pretty much sums it all up. A collaboration of David Caruso one-liners that hilariously shows just how ridiculous this show really is, something that you may miss when you’re immersed in the “CSI alternate un-reality.”
Oh, and for those who dare try to be this cool, you can get your own pair of CSI: Miami Horatio sunglasses here.
4 Responses to “The Unrealism of CSI, featuring David Caruso’s One-Liners”
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Nobody in their right mind would try to be as cool as Caruso. Nobody.
David Caruso is one of the finest actors of ANY generation, and this hit reel you posted proves just that… long live D.C!!!
Caruso is GOD LIKE! “So he started the weekend, Big Man on Campus, and ended it…DEAD ON ARRIVAL”
Most of the shows on television are fiction why does the somewhat corny tough guy routine bother you so much i find it amusing and a levity to the rest of the overly serious show no one has ever claimed crime lab was sexy in reality otherwise documentary’s would be all the rage and this show is about entertainment right? besides anything to replace the bleeping soap operas.