Amid Protests and Calls for Police Reform, TV Networks Drop Cop Shows

In recent weeks, as protests against police violence have spread nationwide in the wake of George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis, TV critics and others who cover the medium have raised a frequent refrain: Cancel all the cop shows.

Kelly Lawler, TV critic for USA Today, wrote an excellent piece that summarized the problem as one of overrepresentation. There are so many cop shows, and most of them depict police officers as brave, stalwart heroes. It’s inevitable that the idea of the police as effective guardians of the public, constantly and...

It’s probably not the scales of justice or a police badge, but rather the red-and-blue logo of NBC’s long-running cop and lawyer drama.

The series and its many spinoffs, created by Dick Wolf, are among dozens of TV series about law enforcement. From “Dragnet” to “NYPD Blue” to “FBI,” the cop show is a prolific American institution that is immensely influential. In the 2019-2020 TV season, three of the top five dramas were cop shows, according to Nielsen. With 21 seasons and at least three more on the way, NBC’s...