Product Description

The definitive collection of your favorite '70s cop shows is finally here! See how all the action started with this collection of the first episodes of Charlie's Angels, Starsky and Hutch, S.W.A.T., The Rookies and Police Woman!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #27353 in DVD
• Brand: Unknown
• Released on: 2003-05-06
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .25 pounds
• Running time: 252 minutes

Amazon.com
It may sound like a gimmick--The Greatest '70s Cop Shows is a compilation of first episodes from Starsky and Hutch, Police Woman, S.W.A.T., The Rookies, and Charlie's Angels--but this DVD anthology really opens one's eyes to the look and feel of dramatic television during the so-called Me Decade. Except for Angels, which never wavered from its self-mocking, glossy action/stiff exposition playbook, these cop-program debuts (four of them from Aaron Spelling) import much of their fluid camera movement, multiple points-of-view, and dynamic, often wordless storytelling from the era's rough-and-tumble action movies (e.g., The French Connection). Which is to say these shows may be dumb but not necessarily cheesy (except Angels' post-modern cheese). There is a lot to admire about the opening ambush in S.W.A.T.'s "The Killing Ground," the hard-boiled camaraderie of Police Woman's "The End Game," and especially the reckless physicality and ironic jokes of Starsky and Hutch's "Savage Sunday." --Tom Keogh

Customer Reviews

A Starsky and Hutch Fan
I love the fact that they are putting out DVD's like this I grew up with all these shows and I love all of them and seeing David Soul (Hutch from Starsky and Hutch, He is Hot !!!!) in it is a plus also !!!!! Starsky and Hutch was my favorite show as a kid and I still love watching it. It is worth the money to buy it with all 5 shows they were some of the best shows on TV in the 70's.

3 stars if you didn't grow up with these shows
I was a child of the 70s and remembered these shows fondly. I took them VERY seriously at the time. Now they are instant nostalgia and a hoot. I love the bland studio bars and apartments, the lack of much blood after some serious gun fights, the friendly neo-fascist cops who do their duty & then go party. These are the "first" episodes of each show but that is misleading. Most started as 2 hour movies of the week. These are the first of the on going episodes but in most cases the viewer's second helping.

The Rookies-the most social conscious of the group. The street wise cop who grew up in the 'hood with the very naive suburban kid. Nice sentiments here about getting through to gang members excpet that these guys are psuhing 40 when they should be teens & the slum is obviously a Hollywood backlot with lots of newspapers thrown all over it.

Police Woman-good drama, Angie does some nice touches. The show isn't just about her though, a whole unit so it's kinda misleading. That hippuie undercover has on of the oddest faces to grace a TV screen. And I loved the casual traffic driving past a desperate shoot out early on.

SWAT-Now this felt like a pilot. Like most of SWAT's villains, total psychos. Although no one mentions it, they are sniffing alot during the episode so grown up viewers will know that they are all coked up.

Starsky & Hutch-lame plot but good commadarie. Watch for a sexy cameo but Suzanne Sommers. This show was a little more into innuendo but then came...

Charlie's Angels-not a cop show! This one actually isz the first time we'd seen the Angels. Not bad but the whole Doyle as a preacher bit was grating. I remeber them calling this a "jiggle show" but note the lack of the extra large busts we've come to expect nowadays.

I wish they'd have released the "best" ep of each show rather than the "first", now that would be a 5 star DVD!

More Angie, please...!
"Starsky & Hutch" were entertainingly silly for a couple of years, as were "Charlie's Angels", and "The Rookies" looks earnest but dated and tad naive. "SWAT" is essentially a shoot-em-up with few characters you get to know at all.

Interestingly, the one out of the five (and the one NOT produced by Aaron Spelling) that is easliy the most legitimate cop drama is "Police Woman" with Angie Dickinson--- it feels like a damn movie... something the other four certainly do not.

Funny how memories have written-off this series as a single, older version of a Charlie's Angel who still has her badge but does nothing else but turn "tricks", when, in fact, "Police Woman" seems to be the most sophisticated of the lot; it's aged beautifully.

Instead of packaging this mismatch of fun but otherwise unconnected 70s cop-show memories, let's see a DVD release of at LEAST "Police Woman"s first season, as I seem to remember it was the best year of the show--- and certainly quite removed from the other more comic-strip, though watchable, entries.