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Comment by lolive | Hacker News Reader

The Columbo TV show is, in my humble opinion, a masterpiece in disguise. The basic scheme of each episode is well known. But the beauty is in the details. The few minutes in each episode where the character is not in representation and you can grasp a few moments of his mental process.

That's where you discover that:

- he takes NOTHING as assumed

- he works A LOT (usually not shown on screen, but sometimes mentionned by him, and you can infer that a given piece of information took a lot of time to discover)

- he always starts from the ground up, asks (what seem to be) stupid questions

- All of his actions are here to close the options. Conversations are done with no malice, but with that clear objective in mind.

I do a lot of the Columbo way at work, and it works surprisingly well.

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I watched Columbo for the first time in the past year and I *don't* think the format is well known (I was born in the 90s, so it may be a generational thing).

I want to expand on it because it's really unique and amazing.

For those who don't know, each episode opens with us seeing the crime being committed and covered up. We always know who it is, immediately.

Then in the 2nd act we're introduced to Columbo, and we observe him trying to figure out what we already know.

For all of the reasons stated in the parent article, Columbo is one of the most perfect representations of a "real smart person" in media. Another favourite of mine is Jonathan Creek

Just started rewatching the JC catalog last week. The tech seems a bit dated (big cellphones, cars, etc) but the stories generally hold up well (so far, and FWIR). I do wish there was some effort to remaster/restore/polish up the video. What we have (and what I've seen rebroadcast) just looks a bit... washed out.

Also, I watch with headphones on, and it's amazing to me how much food people eat, and how loud they are, in many TV shows. Just went through Blue Murder (also with Caroline Quentin in it) and every episode there's one or two roundtable shots of the group eating... loudly.

But yeah, JC is good, and I'll be watching another one tonight :)

JC did something really cool in doing specials years after the original broadcasts that kind of jump back in with Jonathan and where he is in his life now.

The tech in those is a bit more modern (I think the most recent is in something like 2015)

Early Jonathan Creek is a masterpiece. In particular, the "Black Canary" special is possibly the finest two hours of television ever constructed. I often think if they had released it as a movie it would have been a hit.

I agree with you about the picture quality. Black Canary from the DVD is really very noisy and grainy - to the point where I actually made my own "remastered" version by doing some basic color correction and digital noise reduction. It looks a lot better.

Some modern televisions have pretty good built-in modes for doing noise reduction and improving the color, try experimenting with those. (Just don't leave it on all the time.)

I watched the DVD set on my CRT television, it looked absolutely fine to me. One advantage of being a "late adopter".

The overly loud eating you hear might have been overdubbed in post-production by foley artists (sound effects technicians).

Read the closing credits at the end of each show and you may find a foley artist was part of the production (and therefore the likely person who created recordings of simulated eating sound effects, to sync with the filmed visuals of the actors eating)

Columbo is often described as a "how catchem" instead of a "who dunnit".

A little nit pick from my side: there was a few episodes where this format was changed a bit in various ways.

> we observe him trying to figure out what we already know

Except that that's not really what happens. Somehow, Columbo seems to know immediately who the perpetrator is, and spends the rest of the episode just trying to figure out how to prove it.

I haven't watched my old DVDs in a while, but my recollection is that (in most episodes, at least) Columbo would explain what detail from early in the investigation made him suspicious of the perpetrator and what evidence and/or reasoning he used to rule out the other suspects along the way.

Yes, that's true. But I always found it a little annoying that based on some pretty scant initial evidence he focused on a single suspect to the exclusion of all other possibilities. In the real world that would be considered pretty bad police work, notwithstanding that it turned out that his initial hunch was always right. That starts to push up pretty hard against my willing suspension of disbelief after a few dozen episodes.

We only ever see him question a single suspect, but he's constantly alluding to things he's done offscreen

Sherlock Holmes has many flaws, but one thing it does get right is that the titular character repeatedly emphasizes how much of our worldview is defined by assumption, the danger of favoring a preferred hypothesis too early in the investigation, and the importance of systematically eliminating all possibilities until one remains.

It's a generational thing yeah. Even in Holland Columbo was always on rerun. Everyone born in the 70s would know the format because it takes only one episode to know it :)

Good show though!

Based on this thread I'm watching Columbo now. Law and Order Criminal Intent is directly derivative of this. I see a lot of Vincent D'Onofrio's character in Columbo, especially how he gets into the houses and offices and messes with their personal effects to disarm and disrupt them.

> - he works A LOT (usually not shown on screen, but sometimes mentionned by him, and you can infer that a given piece of information took a lot of time to discover)

One episode where they actually showed some of that is the one where the murderer was the architect of a high-rise building. He needed the plans or some time with the building authority to have something explained to him, and he was shown waiting in line for a whole day with all the people applying for building permits, getting pushed from office to office, etc.

I could be mixing it up with another episode but I think that was the one where he needed to get a permit to excavate a concrete foundation under the pretense of looking for a body (to bait the murderer into subsequently depositing the body there after it had already been excavated and searched).

Coincidentally, that episode (Blueprint for Murder) was also directed by Peter Falk himself.

"Blueprint for Murder"

https://columbophile.com/2016/08/14/episode-review-columbo-b...

I rediscovered Columbo a number of years back and playing the original series is my way of having background noise while working. But every time I watch the same episode, I deepen my understanding of asking questions and how they lead to the next. Much of this is how I moved my thoughts into work postmortems, not just asking how this broke, but why did it break, how was it possible.

For added thoughts on Columbo, here's a short breakdown if the tactics used to find the guilty party was legal in court.

https://columbophile.com/2017/05/17/what-happens-when-columb...

It's also my favorite background noise while working. The only problem is I keep getting distracted as I see new things.

It's funny how much more character development shows had back then. For example Columbo talking to a parking attendant about something random that has absolutely nothing to do with the case. Or scenes of people walking down hallways, not saying anything, just strolling. I like the slow pace so much more than today's TV.

Also today's shows always feel so overblown. Crack investigative teams operating from luxury offices that could double as a nightclub, wisecracking all day. Earplug 'comms' with unlimited range. Explosions and gunshots in every episode.

Real police work is not like this. I feel like the shows of the 70s were a lot more realistic. Columbo, Hill Street blues etc.

Even though Columbo was not really a realistic depiction of detective work, it did make it feel like work and not just competence porn.

Then in the 80s the whizzbang started with Miami Vice and its blue night skies, cops driving Ferraris etc.

The good shows these days take a step back from this. Like The Wire. But must of them are just fluff IMO.

Possibly this is an American phenomenon? I can recommend the British show Happy Valley for a very realistic depiction of police work, that is no less tense and dramatic for it.

> The Columbo TV show is, in my humble opinion, a masterpiece in disguise.

Why in disguise? It’s just simply a masterpiece, not just as a detective show but also as a vehicle for the actors to enjoy themselves. It made it so much better watching the stars of the time do something they clearly liked. Everyone is in on the gag, the writers, the star, the guests, and the audience. It was more of the next verse in a familiar song than it was a show every episode.

> Conversations are done with no malice, but with that clear objective in mind.

At first, but by the middle of most episodes, he knows all he needs to already and is just playing cat and mouse with the villain, and the audience.

There’s a great episode with Donald Pleasance that Falk even went on Johnny Carson to promote. I got the same feeling you describe. Falk was an actor’s actor and fun and satisfying to work with.

Could you elaborate on what this means please:

  the character is not in representation

Not sure if it is the correct english translation, but in French "being in representation" means that you are not yourself. Instead you behave with social constraints or with a hidden goal in mind.

That makes sense, thanks!

This is only one half of the story, the deductive investigation. The other half is the psychological thriller: we can observe the murderers, who just committed an (almost) perfect crime, and who are strong and confident in the beginning, to slowly crack under the pressure put on them by Columbo, to make mistakes that finally lead to their arrest. This is not just great drama to watch, but also instrumental in Columbo's success, and you can't replicate that when you work on software (or anything other than humans). The points you listed are still useful, of course.

I once heard this described as "pruning the tree of possibilities".

It is a learned skill that is enormously effective. The great thing is you can practice a little at a time.

Also, he will mention how something he can't work out keeps on bothering him until he has worked it out.

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