TV is Like Real Life

Recently, I indulged in the American true crime show Forensic Files. It is the kind of show which skips between actors as criminals and interviews with true life friends and family members, all while a narrator intones details of deadly deeds. And frankly, not the sort of thing I usually care for (I never watched America's Most Wanted, for instance).

But I do enjoy true crime, to a point, and I was pulled in initially by a few cases I already knew about.

I came away, thinking, Wow, all those mystery shows I watch aren't so fake after all! 

The timeline is certainly exaggerated in fiction--as in the shortness of the timeline. Many Forensic Files cases are solved over several years, as in a decade, and I'm not even counting the legal side. 

What felt entirely familiar was the doggedness of investigators and the officers' cool-headed Gibbs-like  assessments--not to mention the wild unexpectedness of events, such as a woman going undercover and befriending a potential poisoner at a Mensa meeting. CSI writers couldn't make up this stuff! 

One exceptional example of doggedness is when a woman poisoned her husband with cyanide and then used it to lace several bottles of Excedrin. However, she ground up her cyanide with the same mortar and pestle that she used to grind up fish tank algae pills--

Note the fish tank behind Elizabeth Marvel!

And if both these plot elements sound familiar, they show up in Law & Order: Criminal Intent: "Art" and "Poison." 

What impressed me was the FBI Agent who decided to track down the origin of the green pills. He visited fish store after fish store until he found one that sold the green algae pills. That's dedication! 

The local investigators deserve mention here too. When the FBI's information about algae pills was sent to the local police, an investigator remembered seeing a fish tank not in the house of the woman whose death began the investigation but in the house of the woman who claimed that her husband also died from cyanide. The investigator went to pick up the woman's pills and saw the fish tank. He remembered it months later.

Move over, Columbo! 

The episodes can get a bit samey. I found the Poison DVD collection most fascinating since generally speaking, poisonings involve more premeditation. The "hit-and-run" type episodes--assaults, rapes, literal hit-and-runs--are less interesting. 

Every now and again, there's a total outlier, a "nah-it-can't-be-true" plot, such as when a cop committed arson and murder for, as far as any one can tell, insurance money so he could become--wait for it--a professional bowler. 

During that entire episode, the other cops say again and again, "Yeah--uh--no, we don't get it." 

I admit, so much of the time when I watch television, I take forensic-based shows as a little bit of science with a whole lot of story. And I don't mind because I mostly watch mysteries for that reason: plot. It is nice to know that sometimes, real life also gives us dedicated investigators and intuitive detectives and inspectors with exceptional memories--as well as fascinating science!