TV Series Review - Under Arrest
Kookiest Cop Show in Television History.
I just randomly watched three episodes of the television program Under Arrest.
What the fuck just happened ... a phrase that keeps coming to mind as the credits role. Hmmmmm. This surreal and violent show is apparently from Canada, circa 1980s or 90s ... I should look it up with a few keystrokes, but I'm watching plotless television to relax after a long work-day, and looking up facts on the Internet like I'm writing a fucking term paper would defeat the game plan for the rest of this day in LA.
Which is to do nothing.
Suffice it say to say, I'm pretty sure Under Arrest is the kookiest cop show in the history of television. It's surreal. It starts with cheesy credits and a Ramone-esque hypnotic theme song, which makes you happy even though the Death Star is right around the corner. The lyrics, all of them, are this -- "You are under Arrest!" Over and over and over and over. Which is presumably the title as well.
After the opening, Under Arrest gets intense, laws are seemingly broken by everybody at one point or another. It's like somebody live-action filmed a bunch of cut scenes for Grand Theft Auto 7 Canada.
THE CAST? - A surreal bunch of super-polite kinda sorta overly-violent cops, like a small army of cloned Village People cops thrown into a Stepford Wives movie in Canada, while Piers Morgan sings Nickelback tunes ... one could not assemble this cast, nor these strangely surreal overly-polite violent performances if you tried. Well, maybe Tarantino could or whatever, but the list is short.
At the other end of the spectrum, the antagonists are a well-selected group of belligerent and crazy-drunk people. Three episodes in, the suspect's #1 response when asked their name by the super-polite cops? "Fuck you!"
Then there's usually some sort of big fight, even happening once at the hospital as the suspect was laying on the doctor's table.
I am sold on this show, it's freakin geeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeenius, to quote one of my favorite acceptance speeches ever, and I'm bummed that Netflix only has one season online.
But I have a lot of questions. Are there more seasons? Was it all acting, one big crazy performance art film broken into episodes? Will episode #4 suck? Were the Village People involved in this production, in any way, shape or form? Is life in Canada really just life imitating art imitating art imitating life, imitating life, on television? The Trailer Park Boys are real????
I'm not sure of the answer to any of those remaining questions. But watching this show as a citizen relaxing at the end of the day -- not an entertainment lawyer or producer -- I'm going to remain intentionally ignorant about the origins of this crazy television show until I've watched and enjoyed each and every episode ... let's keep the magic going.
p.s. I wrote this review when the show was on Netflix, it’s on Amazon Prime now.
Lee Rudnicki
*** 7 ***
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