1952 vs. 1967

I recently got The Big Dragnet DVD set from Amazon. It has 30 of the Dragnet episodes from 1952, the first season.

I noticed that the 1967 version has no trouble mentioning the Viet Nam War. It was going on at the time the show was filmed and it gets mentioned from time to time.

The 1952 version was filmed at the height of The Korean War. The episode, The Big Betty, features a swindle operation that targeted people whose relatives had recently died. One victim tells Joe that she was contacted right after she had been notified that "my fiancé died overseas." Later, Joe says that the criminals founds victims "in casualty lists published in the newspaper." But, the War in Korea and the American involvement is never directly mentioned. I have only watched 8 of the 1952 episodes, but I do wonder why direct mention of the war was avoided in that episode.

Also, I just watched the 1952 episode where Joe Friday kills a man for the first time. The punk fired at Joe three times in a cramped hotel room, but somehow missed all three shots. Joe finally dropped the hammer on the scumbag and killed him dead. Joe felt horrible about it and was unable to concentrate on doing the report. Frank Smith had to finish the report for him and it was Frank's wife who finally talked to Joe and got him to accept the fact that he had no choice.

The 1952 Joe Friday was a lot more human and a little softer than the totally dedicated, perfect cop Joe Friday in 1967.