One of the great joys of following my friends online is watching them fall in love with a piece of media I have absolutely no knowledge of. Since October, one of my friends has been watching Columbo and flooding my feed with various Columbo content. I have never seen an episode of Columbo myself, and before they started watching I could barely recognize Peter Falk, who plays the titular character. However, after the nearly six months of absorbing memes, gifsets, and posts imagining the character in modern situations (Columbo at a drag show is a favorite), it will forever be impossible to watch The Princess Bride without acting like the Leonardo diCaprio pointing meme whenever the grandfather (also played by Peter Falk) is on screen.
I visited this friend at work today, and they morosely shared with me that they only have one episode left. This left me curious as to what I could remember about Columbo from only their posting. I now share that information with you.
Columbo (the show) started airing in the 1970s. Episodes typically begin with a rich or otherwise well-off person committing a perfect crime, something it’s impossible they will get caught for. Possibly this is some kind of rich person courtship, and they’re flirting with Columbo. Enter Lieutenant Columbo. He spends the episode interviewing suspects, looking for clues, and putting a case together, standard police procedural stuff. At the end of every episode, it looks like the villain has gotten away with everything, until Columbo asks them about one tiny nagging detail, one little thing that his keen observational skills have noticed, and just like that, their whole plot unravels. Case closed, roll credits.
Screenshots and clips from the show have a soft feel, with a slight grain and bright colors. I assume this is how all TV looked in the 70s, because it matches the feeling of the Tom Baker Doctor Who episodes I’ve seen. Guest stars include everyone from Vincent Price to Johnny Cash, mostly for one-off episodes.
Columbo (the man) has a dog who he loves, and a wife who he also loves. No word on whether Mrs. Columbo loves the dog. I don’t know if he has a first name (maybe it’s Lieutenant), but it doesn’t really matter. He’s just Columbo. He doesn’t really have a sense of style, spending most of his time wearing a trenchcoat that’s just a little big for him. He has a bad haircut until that gets fixed in my favorite clip of the show (which is only my favorite because of the side character he’s interacting with).
He’s not that bright, or pretends he isn’t to get people to underestimate them. When he encounters something he doesn’t understand, he responds with curiosity rather than judgment. That’s not to say he’s perfect. He does threaten a sex worker with deportation if she doesn’t tell him what he wants, in a scene that probably was fine when it came out, but now just reminds me why I don’t watch cop shows if I can help it.
Oh, and one more thing.
As stated previously, I don’t know how correct any of that information was. I also don’t know how long it will stay in my memory. It won’t be long before my friend moves on to something new, and stops posting about this weird little cop. I don’t know what the next thing will be, but it’ll be fun to learn about it only through their posts.
Image credit: NBC
