The TV Show That Won't Bring Down Detroit

    Criticism of ABC's new show, Detroit 1-8-7, began back in July when the Detroit City Council requested a meeting with the producers to express their concern about how the city's reputation may be affected by the show's content.  Council member Kwame Kenyatta was quoted by several news sources, including USA Today, as saying: "The title itself is very negative―Detroit murder."  Actually, if Kenyatta was worried about the title harming Detroit's reputation, maybe he shouldn't have come up with his own, far more damaging title, disclosing the meaning of this obscure police code.
     Luckily the producers ignored the council's request and kept right on working.  Because, if they had gone before the council, it would bring into question just what sort of government we are living under which has the right to scrutinize what people are doing in regards to works of fiction.  One would hope the city council is aware that such a request puts them dangerously in league with the worst dictatorships in world history.  Before the Detroit City Council starts worrying about a fictional television show destroying the city's reputation, it should be concerned with how the, painfully non-fictional, Detroit City Council represents the city in the eyes of the rest of the world.
    Rumbling skepticism continued throughout the summer as to how dim a light the show would cast on our city; as if Detroit's reputation could actually sink lower.  The main complaint, as always when Detroit is put in the national spotlight, is something along the lines of  "Why do they always show the bad things?  Why don't they show the good side of the city?"  Well, probably because, this being a television cop show, there is no police code for "community garden in progress."
    What the show has done is bring some much-needed jobs to the city.  It has also handed out some substantial checks to businesses and homeowners whose properties they have used for filming.  Personally, my house was passed over for lacking the verisimilitude needed for the home of a murder suspect; which I take as a compliment.  But I would not have thought twice about accepting the large sum of money, considerably more than I've ever made in one week, let alone one day, in my life, just to vacate my house for the better part of a day; even if I knew it meant delaying the opening of a Gap store downtown by another ten years because it further tarnished the city's reputation.  In fact, if I could be assured The Gap was never going to open a store downtown I probably would have let them use my house for free.  Afterall, isn't that the bright side of our poor reputation, the fact that Detroit is the last place in this country to be homogenized?
     Judging from the first episode this show is a long way from bringing down Detroit.  A year from now, if it's still on the air, it could very well have morphed into a comedy.  Not a funny comedy, but a comedy nonetheless.  It's obvious the writers find macabre Detroit jokes irresistible; the best being: "That's what you get when you look for bullets in Detroit,"  after two cops, crawling around in a gutter, don't find the type of bullet shell they're looking for until the third one they come across.  Things like this make it so far removed from reality I pity anyone watching who thinks this is an accurate representation of Detroit.  I also feel sorry for anyone who is offended by something so boldly ridiculous.  Remember, if it weren't stupid it wouldn't be on prime-time television.

     According to FBI statistics from 2008, nearly 80% of the murders in Detroit go unsolved.  Maybe Detroit 1-8-7 will serve as the impetus for budding homicide detectives to come to Detroit and improve this number.  In that case we can look at it as a free recruitment video.