History Franchise / Dragnet

* TrueCompanions: Bill and Joe in the 60's revival. Despite their once-an-ep banter they are best friends on and off the clock, they're an excellent team (Bill even tells a Secret Service agent trying to offer Joe a job that of he wants one of them, he has to take both), they have each other's backs no matter what, and Bill even mentions in an ep that he and Eileen consider Joe a member of their family.

Archetype of the PoliceProcedural, ''Dragnet'' followed the exploits of Sgt. Joe Friday (badge number 714) and his partners as they investigated crime in Los Angeles.

* CelibateHero: ZigZagged with Friday - In the original radio/TV series, Friday lived with his mother, despite being in his twenties and thirties. In the '60s series, this would seem even more unusual for a man of Friday's age, so he went to living in his own bachelor apartment, despite a few brief references that his mother was still alive. Gannon is frequently making mention that Friday, at his age, is still unmarried, rarely dating, and lives alone eating canned soup, a big thing during the time period the show was on. That said, Joe is not seen to be a slouch with flirting with attractive women, particularly if it's needed to gain access to a criminal enterprise (like, say, an illegal card-game). Taken altogether, the best explanation for Friday is that he's MarriedToTheJob.

** A scene in the episode involving stealing dogs to collect reward money references the purse-snatching dog episode.

* ContinuityNod: In the 1970 episode "The Dognappers" Gannon is reading a book from the police library to try to "brush up" on his dog knowledge. The book was ordered by Sgt. Friday in response to the events of the 1968 episode "The Big Dog".

* TheMainCharactersDoEverything: Different episodes put Friday and his partner in different departments -- whichever one is appropriate for the case being investigated, basically -- but within each episode jobs are delegated as normal. Averted at the same time, however, as whatever department Friday and his partner were in, the two only did the plainclothed work. If they needed something else done, like tracing a license plate or fingerprinting a suspect, they would contact whichever appropriate division was needed for that certain task. They would also work with other divisions and officers if their cases happened to overlap with each other, such as narcotics working with juvenile if the suspect is turns out to be a minor.

* HealthcareMotivation: In the ''1967'' episode "The Bookie," a man takes bets to pay for surgery for his ten-year-old daughter, who has a heart defect. [[spoiler:Not only is he caught and arrested, [[ShootTheShaggyDog his daughter dies a few hours after surgery]].]]

* HospitalityForHeroes: In one episode, Friday and Gannon bust a perp just before he can go after a restaurant owner. Immediately afterwards, a line of dialogue reveals that the cops haven't had lunch yet. The restaurant owner immediately offers a free lunch; when they refuse she tells them to sit down and order anyway, [[LoopholeAbuse there's nothing controlling the size of the portions she serves them.]]

** A pair of phony vice cops shakedown out-of-town businessmen by getting a scantily-clad woman into their room somehow, then conducting a phony prostitution arrest. The con comes when the not-cops claim the victim out-of-towner needs to stay in town long enough to testify at the woman's arraignment. [[note]]Friday and Gannon point out that saying this makes no sense from a legal standpoint, as at an arraignment, there is no testimony taken, only a plea (guilty or not guilty) and a trial date. Of course, victims were probably chosen who were least likely to be aware of this.[[/note]] They convince the mark, however, that if he forks over $1000 for bail, the woman will likely disappear, meaning no need to testify, and more importantly, no chance anyone back home will hear the mark had anything to do with a prostitute.

%%* GenericCopBadges: Subverted, see above.

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

* OvertOperative: When Joe Friday has to go undercover and pretend to be ''anything'' other than a cop. InUniverse, he's good at it, but it can be awfully tough for the ''audience'' to buy, since everything about Jack Webb's demeanor just screams "cop," even when he uses the alias [[NamesTheSame "Joe Fraser."]]

* AmbiguouslyChristain: Gannon mentions his religious beliefs once, in Episode 25, Season 3, of the 1967 revival. When he and Friday are at a hospital, checking on a baby who wasn't expected to survive, Gannon and the Doctor have this exchange.

* VanityPlate: According to Wiki/{{Wikipedia}}, those sweaty hands banging out Mark VII are none other than Jack Webb's himself. [=IMDb=], on the other hand, states that the hands actually belong to Harold Nyby, Webb's construction foreman, who was chosen because his hands equaled the size of former boxing champion Sonny Liston.

* RomanAClef: As it says on Wiki/TheOtherWiki, "Webb was a stickler for accurate details, and Dragnet used many authentic touches, such as the LAPD's actual radio call sign ([=KMA367=]), and the names of many real department officials, such as Ray Pinker and Lee Jones of the crime lab or Chief of Detectives Thad Brown." The then-Chief of Police was always credited at the end of every episode.

At the time of Webb's death he was developing yet ''another'' revival of ''Dragnet'', in which he would once again star as Friday. As Morgan was starring on ''Series/{{MASH}}'' at the time, his character would have been replaced by yet ''another'' new partner, likely played by Kent [=McCord=] of sister series ''Series/AdamTwelve'', though whether he would actually be reprising his role of Officer Jim Reed is unclear. After Webb's death, the franchise continued to grow, with varying degrees of success:

** The 1967 series was quite fond of this as Joe Friday has had his fair share of long-winded lectures about the moral of the episode. In "The Interrogation," a policeman (Kent [=McCord=], pre-''Series/AdamTwelve'') is accused of robbing a liquor store. He says that whether or not he's found guilty he'll leave the force. Friday gives him an ''[[Quotes/{{Dragnet}} epic]]'' [[Quotes/{{Dragnet}} three-minute rant]] about how tough police officers have it.

*** The aforementioned three minute rant occurs in an episode called "The Big Interrogation" (1967) in which the only characters are Friday, Gannon, and the guy they're questioning (a cop named Paul Culver, played by Kent [=McCord=] aka Jim Reed of ''Series/AdamTwelve'' fame). It's just the three of them in a room in Internal Affairs for the half hour.

* CrossOver: Officers Malloy and Reed, from the Webb-produced ''Series/AdamTwelve'', appear in a 1968-69 season episode, "Internal Affairs: DR 20". There are cases of Kent [=McCord=] in earlier episodes appearing as other officers, including ones named Reed. However, it's not certain if the character's name is '''Jim''' Reed since those episodes aired before the first episode of ''Adam-12'' did.

* RequiredSpinoffCrossover: Kent [=McCord=] and occasionally Martin Milner appearing as their ''Series/AdamTwelve'' characters Reed and Malloy.

* SignificantReferenceDate: In the third season episode "Community Relations -- DR-10", the comic relief subplot has Gannon bothering Friday about Friday's horoscope. Joe tells Bill that his birthday is April 2 -- the same date that his actor Jack Webb was born. (In a similar ''Series/AdamTwelve'' episode scene Pete Malloy's birthday is ''not'' the same as Martin Milner's).

** ''Series/AdamTwelve'', essentially the "patrolman" version of ''Dragnet'', was also produced by Webb. Both stars had already appeared on ''Dragnet'' multiple times (indeed, Martin Milner had appeared on the ''radio'' version). Webb and Robert Cinader of ''Series/AdamTwelve'' later did ''Series/{{Emergency}}'', which was ''Series/AdamTwelve'' [-[[RecycledInSpace WITH PARAMEDICS!]]-]

->''"Ladies and gentlemen, [[RippedFromTheHeadlines the story you are about to hear/see is true]]. The names have been changed to protect the innocent."''

** A more benign version, citizens are calling the department looking for "Officer Gideon C. Dengle" to give him awards for his service. The LAPD has no Officer Dengle on the payroll, so Friday and Gannon go looking for the amateur cop.

* KnightInSourArmor: Friday is a KnightInShiningArmor who sometimes slips into this, particularly in the 1967 revival when confronting egregious examples of late '60s societal decay.

* LimitedWardrobe: For the '60s incarnation of the series, Joe Friday and Bill Gannon wore the same outfit for every episode to save time and money. The one exception was when Jack Webb and Harry Morgan once swapped jackets to see if anyone would notice. No one did.

* MommasBoy: Middle-aged bachelor Friday still lives with his mother during the early seasons of the original series. In the 60's series, this would seem even more bizarre for someone of Friday's age, so he was given his own bachelor apartment.

* MuggingTheMonster: A robber made it his MO to hitch rides with women on whom he then draws a gun--help him rob a bank or die. The fourth time around, however, he picks a karate instructor. As soon as she [[DamselOutOfDistress recovers her wits]], she decks him!
* MustHaveNicotine: Joe Friday smokes regularly. Both because Jack Webb was a heavy smoker and because the series was sponsored by Liggett & Myers Tobacco Company. This was a plot point in one episode as Joe gets involved in an off-duty shooting because he stopped by a laundromat looking for a cigarette vending machine.
* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: The culprit in ''The Big Crime''. The only thing he's glad of was that he [[spoiler:forgot the pocketknife--he'd have killed the kids had he remembered it. In the shot after Friday and Smith take him away, we see his pocketknife on the floor next to the chair he'd been sitting in]].
* MyopicArchitecture: During a security check of a business during one of the '60s episodes, Gannon manages to open a locked door by pulling it open and breaking the door frame in the process, then explains to the shocked business owner that a fancy new lock means nothing if the door it's attached to has a frame that's rotting away.

* NoAntagonist: Some of the episodes didn't take place on the job and involved incidents at one of the officer's residences. In the 1969 and 1970 seasons, several episodes were dedicated less to specific ''cases'' and more to specific ''roles'': such as the Business Office or the Robbery Desk. Other times, the case doesn't involve pursuing a specific criminal. In "Management Services - DR-11", the focus was the Emergency Control Center which helped maintain order in the wake of the Martin Luther King, Jr. assassination, and in "Public Affairs - DR-12", the case involved planning guard detail for a visit from the President.[[note]]No actual name was given; the filming took place in the end of Lyndon Johnson's administration, and it was unknown at the time who would succeed him.[[/note]] In such cases, there may not be a criminal epilogue, so ''if'' there was a narration, it focused instead on the role displayed in the episode. Most of the above also tended to be Bottle Episodes.

** In the 1966 revival, his opening narrations often included facts and statistics about the city of Los Angeles relating somehow to that episode's case. By the time of ''Dragnet 1970'', however, Webb more often then not just opened with a standard "This is the City -- Los Angeles, California. I work here...I carry a badge", before the opening credits.

* PyrrhicVictory: In the 1954 movie, Friday and Smith finally get the evidence to put Starkey's two killers away. Unfortunately, by the time they get it, [[spoiler:one has been rubbed out by his fellow crooks, and the other has died during a cancer operation.]]

** In the episode "The Big Starlet" of the same season, Friday and Gannon try to rescue a young woman of 16 who got involved with adult motion pictures. They find her, [[spoiler:but not before she commits suicide from drug overdose]]. (Fortunately, the man who filmed her is arrested.)
** Later that season, "The Little Victim" featured a baby in danger of child abuse by her father. Unfortunately, [[spoiler:the child dies as a result of the abuse before the father can be arrested for it]].
* PoliceProcedural: Invented the genre and was king of it for two decades.
* {{Ponzi}}: The aptly titled "The Pyramid Swindle" has a televangelist-esque woman running a "give me money, recruit other people to give you money" scheme. People who buy in gain access to a catalogue of items sold cheaper than in stores, as well as a $19.99 recruitment tape. At her trial, a statistician demonstrates how, in order to reach the twelfth level, her scheme would need to recruit more people than live in the United States.

-->'''Joe Friday''': (To a fellow cop belittling the dog program) "Woof"

** In the first episode of the '60s revival, the famous "Blue Boy" ep., Bill states he has two boys. But every time his kids are mentioned later, it's four boys. It's true they could have been born during the series, but when Joe visits Bill's home in two episodes, it doesn't look like there are any babies or very young children living there.
** During season one of the '60s revival there is a pair of episodes involving frauds. In the first episode, Friday and Gannon are working on a case involving phony bank examiners. Later they are working on a magazine subscription racket with a ''different'' pair of detectives working on the bank examiners case.
** Joe is promoted to Lieutenant in the end of the '50s run but in the revival, he's back to Sergeant[[note]]Jack Webb realized that lieutenants in the [=LAPD=] act primarily as supervisors and do little work in the field so he made Joe Friday a sergeant once again so that the character could work on the streets[[/note]].
* ShaggyDogStory: "Homicide: Who Killed Who?" - a guy murders two men and the manager of the rooming house he was living at, then gets shot when a third guy fights back. At the end of the episode, Friday tells the reporters that the dead suspect's motive was a quarrel about what television programs they watched in the common room. As they file out, a delivery man shows up asking about the suspect - he has the brand-new TV set the guy ordered the day before.
* ShoutOut:
** Friday's badge number (714) commemorated Babe Ruth's career home run total.
** The Mark VII Limited VanityPlate at the end was a reference to the Mark VII, a type of car manufactured by the Lincoln division of the Ford Motor Company.

* SomethingElseAlsoRises: A NightmareFuel variant appears in the intro to the 1966 TV movie, when the (as yet unnamed) murderer in the A plot is shown watching footage of himself about to strangle victim #3--and excitedly snapping the cord he used.

** More recently, Team Bondi's ''VideoGame/LANoire'' is effectively one big love-letter to ''Dragnet'', albeit set in the postwar '40s and somewhat DarkerAndEdgier.

* StrawPolitical: In a television debate in one episode, Joe Friday has to defend the police force from criticisms by a leftist public intellectual and a radical activist involved in the 60s hippie scene. Interestingly, a StrawPolitical characterization of law enforcement is brought up by these two StrawPolitical characters.
* SuddenDownerEnding: In "The Little Victim," the abusive father is jailed, and the mother gets a divorce so she and her infant son can live in safety. [[spoiler:Until a year later, when the husband gets out of jail and pays his ex-wife a visit. The mother is so lonely that she lets him in, and he beats his son to death.]]

* VignetteEpisode: Occasionally happened during the '60s series, particularly in later seasons, when Friday and Gannon were assigned to work covering a special desk, like Juvenile on the Night Shift, or the Business Office, where several different people with unrelated cases would ask for help. At least one of those cases would result in an arrest, allowing for the OncePerEpisode trial result epilogue.
* WhoWatchesTheWatchmen: The Internal Affairs Department does, and they're presented as just another aspect of the job rather than as KnightTemplar people out to railroad good cops.
* WrongNameOutburst: At the end of the TV version of "The Big Sorrow", Friday and his new partner Frank Smith capture the two fugitives. Frank says he'll go bring the car around and Friday reflexively replies "Thanks, Ben." Somewhat ashamed he apologizes to Frank, but Frank tells him it's okay. "He would have wanted to be here."

* TheMainCharactersDoEverything: Different episodes put Friday and his partner in different departments -- whichever one is appropriate for the case being investigated, basically -- but within each episode jobs are delegated as normal. Averted at the same time, however, as whatever department Friday and his partner were in, the two only did the plainclothed work. If they needed something else done, like tracing a license plate or fingerprinting a suspect, they would contact whichever appropriate division was needed for that certain task.

* ItIsPronouncedTroPay: In the 1950s TV and radio episodes, archaic pronunciations for "Los Angeles" (Los ANG-el-ess, with a hard "G" sound compared to a soft "G" or "J" sound that comes out "Los An-jel-ess") and "California" (Cal-i-forn-ee-a) are often heard.

* ImpersonatingAnOfficer: Con artists try this occasionally.
** The 6th episode of the Radio Series has someone who is impersonaliting a police officer by flashing a red light from their car and pulling over the victim to steal money and assaulting them.