History Series / Columbo

Columbo's other trademarks are his weatherbeaten raincoat, a cheap cigar, his broken-down car, his refusal to carry a gun (because ''of course'' perps always surrender quietly when the jig is up, though it is implied its not so much an [[DoesNotLikeGuns aversion to firearms]] on his part but more an awareness that his ''absolutely horrifying'' marksmanship with one is more likely to put bystanders in danger than the perp), and constant references to [[TheGhost his never-seen wife, Mrs. Columbo]]. Later, in an interesting subversion of ExecutiveMeddling, the network tried to force a permanent sidekick on him. He got one: a shiftless, droopy basset hound that is most often seen being instructed to stay in the car.

Another mild running gag was Columbo's first name, never revealed (everyone calls him "Lieutenant" instead). An early episode has him showing an ID badge with the name "Frank", a fact only visible with video technology not available when the episode first aired. WordOfGod confirmed that this was never intended to be the character's canon name. (In the 1970s, famously, a trivia book author invented the first name "Philip" as a copyright trap. When the answer appeared in the game ''TabletopGame/TrivialPursuit'', he sued for plagiarism. He lost the case, as the defense argued successfully that they had merely been doing research.)

** The standout is Adrian Carsini in {"Any Old Port In A Storm." Carsini actually delights in having Columbo around, especially since Columbo seems earnest about learning about the wine trade, which is Carsini's strong suit. [[spoiler: It's telling that, unlike some other murderers, Carsini never suspects Columbo's gambit which ends up proving him guilty. It's also telling that as Columbo is taking Carsini in, he stops to share a drink with Carsini at the Carsini Winery. Carsini is even wowed by Columbo's selection of a dessert port and happily chugs away on his way to the police station.]]

** In "Negative Reaction", Columbo deliberately makes a mistake involving a camera that was used in the murder, prompting the murderer to angrily grab the camera to show Columbo what he had done wrong. Unfortunately, the camera is on the shelf in the police evidence room along with several other cameras, so the murderer incriminates himself by identifying the correct camera.

* BusmansHoliday: In common with many detective series of the period once their creators got bored with the standard milieu. Wherever Columbo goes to relax, somebody else will die. "Troubled Waters" and "A Matter of Honor" are examples.

Columbo has solved every case put before him onscreen (he sometimes claims that he only solves about a third total, but this could well be part of the humility act) and hasn't gotten his man only once -- in which case the perp was dying anyway. In true classic mystery fashion, each episode wraps up with the Lieutenant confronting his prey with his train of deduction, culminating in the vital clue; the perp may not confess, but they know, and the viewer knows, they have been beaten. To show the subsequent arrest and trial might be interesting in a lot of cases, but would be entirely superfluous in all of them.

* BellyDancer:
** In "Try and Catch Me", Columbo ends up having to walk into the middle of a belly-dancing class to question the niece of a famous writer for a murder case.
** In "Identity Crisis" he [[DistractedByTheSexy can't seem to look away]] from a sexy belly dancer in a nightclub, barely listening to what the witness has to say.

Columbo's last appearance was in the 2003 TV movie ''Columbo Loves the Nightlife''.[[note]]The character's final filmed appearance was a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gu4Q2D4Y-Q0 short in-character skit]] for the ABC 50th Anniversary special, involving ''Series/{{Alias}}'', in which he visits their facilities (apparently created at the behest of Michael Eisner), although ''Columbo Loves the Nightlife'' was the final proper episode.[[/note]] A "finale" TV movie was planned and written, but Creator/{{ABC}} refused to insure it due to Falk's age and subsequent declining mental health, and Falk died in 2011 with the last script still in limbo.

->''Oh, and, ah, by the way... How did you know that the tropes poisoned when {{I never said it was poison}} that killed the victim?''\\

->''Oh, and, ah, by the way... How did you know the victim was poisoned when {{I never said it was poison}} that killed them?''\\

Columbo's other trademarks are his weatherbeaten raincoat, a cheap cigar, his broken-down car, his refusal to carry a gun (because ''of course'' perps always surrender quietly when the jig is up), and constant references to [[TheGhost his never-seen wife, Mrs. Columbo]]. Later, in an interesting subversion of ExecutiveMeddling, the network tried to force a permanent sidekick on him. He got one: a shiftless, droopy basset hound that is most often seen being instructed to stay in the car.

* BlackmailBackfire: It is very common (as in, once or twice a season) for the murderer to leave a clue or be noticed not by Columbo, but by somebody who tries to profit by extorting the killer(s) either for money or, occasionally, because [[MadLove they are in love with the murderer]]; it is just as common for this to [[GoneHorriblyWrong go horribly wrong]] for the blackmailer themselves, and more than once the blackmailer is either the murderer or the initial victim. About the '''only''' time the killer agrees to the terms is in the second pilot, and that was a trap where the "blackmailer" was actually working with Columbo the whole time. In almost every other case, the blackmailer is simply murdered themselves, and in "A Storm in Any Old Port", the killer is actually relieved to be caught ''because'' they are being blackmailed.

* TheGhost: Mrs. Columbo. We know she ''exists'' not just becuase Columbo often mentions her -- and it's not just a ruse, since he speaks about her in situations where he has no reason to be lying. Even more conclusively, there are a few episodes where ''other'' characters indicate they've interacted with her, most notably the episode in which the Columbos take a cruise. But she never actually appears on the show, and her husband's descriptions of her vary immensely. He's always describing her to the perp though, so it's unlikely he'd give them an actual description.

** Aside from his wife, Columbo also has several siblings and cousins who are often mentioned (he has at least one sister named Mary who is deceased as of "No Time to Die"). His wife also has several brothers and sisters, and he has a few children -- the exact number of each are never specified. In fact, despite many clues that he has a large family on both sides, the only relatives we ever see are his nephew, Det. Andrew Parma from "No Time to Die", as well as a photo of a sister-in-law from "Rest in Peace, Mrs. Columbo".

* TheGhost: Mrs. Columbo. We know she ''exists'' since Columbo often mentions her -- and it's not just a ruse, since he speaks about her in situations where he has no reason to be lying -- but she never actually appears and her husband's descriptions of her vary immensely. He's always describing her to the perp though, so it's unlikely he'd give them an actual description.

According to WordOfGod -- ''a.k.a.'' prolific TV production partnership Creator/LevinsonAndLink -- the film ''Film/LesDiaboliques'' (1955) and its shabby inspector, Alfred Fichet, was the major initial inspiration for the character. Other influences include Porfiry Petrovich, the similarly klutzy Russian inspector from Dostoyevsky's ''Literature/CrimeAndPunishment'', and Creator/GKChesterton's humble ''Literature/FatherBrown''. Lieutenant Columbo (then conceived as Lt. Fisher) first appeared in the short story "May I Come In": the story ends with the detective confronting the killer and uttering [[TitleDrop the titular words]] as the story ends. "May I Come In" was then adapted as an episode of the TV anthology series ''The Chevy Mystery Show'' entitled "Enough Rope" (with Bert Freed playing Columbo) which in turn became the play ''Prescription Murder'', with the detective character evolving into a more significant supporting character each time. Eventually the play would be adapted into the ''Columbo'' pilot.

** Brimmer in "Death Lends a Hand" punched his victim in the face in a rage, not intending to kill her, but the punch caused her to fall over and die from head trauma.
** Vanessa Farrow is physically accosted by ex-husband Tony Galper when he finds out that she's having a relationship with his loanee Justin Prince. Vanessa pushes him away in defense but he falls onto a glass coffee table hard and dies from the broken glass.

** In "A Deadly State of Mind", Dr. Mark Collier accidentally kills Nadia Donner's huband Carl while he's trying to stop Carl from attacking Nadia.

** Grace Wheeler is quite athletic despite her old age and shown to be in terrific physical shape. [[spoiler: Her mental health, however, is another story...]]

* AssholeVictim: About half the time or so the episode'll feature one. Funnily, the show didn't ''always'' have it used to establish a sympathetic killer; plenty of times the murderer is just as bad (if not worse) than their victim.

** Worse than that, in "A Matter of Honor" his plan to reveal Luis Montoya as a coward involved trapping him in a ring with a very angry bull, risking either Montoya, a ranch hand or a bystander getting killed if the bull ran wild.

** Columbo applies his quirkiness, politeness, absentmindedness, humility and curiosity to off balance the suspect. This seems at first glance to be [[ObfuscatingStupidity an act]] but if you observe how he interacts with people he knows well, it turns out he's actually like that all the time. Columbo's abilities as a detective are never questioned by his superiors, only by the suspects, and that's usually because he's getting too close to catching them.

** Played with in "Butterfly in Shades of Gray" (the second William Shatner episode), where the victim was murdered because [[spoiler:he was going to help Fielding Chase's adopted daughter become a published author and move out from under Chase's domineering wing.]] Although the attempted frame job at least tried to play this straight [[spoiler:Chase attempts to frame a gay actor that the victim had recently broken up with]] but is quickly found to be a ruse.

** Played straight in episode "Lovely but Lethal", character Shirley Blaine swoon for Vivica Scott only to get drugged via cigarette and die in a car accident.

** Lenore Kennicut in "Death Lends a Hand" dies from head trauma at the beginning, after being punched in a rage by Brimmer. Brimmer panics because he doesn't want to be a killer; he dumps her lifeless body at an industrial lot to disguise the death as a robbery.

** "Death Lends a Hand" features a still shot of Robert Culp's face with his cleanup of the crime scene reflected in his glasses. [[spoiler: It's also the only episode in the entire series that features one death, committed accidentally by culprit Culp. While other episodes included an accidental first death, the killer or killers invariably cemented their guilt by trying to cover up the crime either by killing someone who knew too much, or someone attempting to blackmail them. The episode also ups the weirdness ante in the sense that many of the murderers attempt to clearly frame an innocent party for their own crime. While Brimmer (Culp) certainly tries to impede the investigation, he never plants evidence or tries to frame anyone for the crime, not even the man that his accidental victim was having an affair with. He seems content to just muddy the waters and leave it as an unsolved crime. Possibly justified in the sense that Brimmer is a private investigator, and very intelligent, and thus may be acutely aware that trying to frame an innocent party will backfire spectacularly. It has in every other instance it's been used in the series, possibly making Brimmer one of the most GenreSavvy characters in the series.]]

* HairTriggerTemper: Creator/RobertCulp had two characters that suffered from this. For Brimmer in "Death Lends a Hand", that temper resulted in him striking a woman and leading to her accidental death and him trying to avoid being arrested. Paul Hanlon also got angry at the drop of a hat frequently during the episode, but was level-headed for the actual murder. Another shining example is Creator/DonaldPleasence who gets several moments in "Any Old Port in a Storm". His "LIQUID FILTH!" tirade at the restaurant has made the episode, and his killer, a fan favorite of the single appearance killers in the series.

** He seems to be holding the idiot ball in both "Try and Catch Me" and "Undercover". In both cases he reaches his finger into a light bulb socket to remove a piece of evidence. This might be fine if he'd either unplugged the lamp (in the latter case) or had the circuit breaker shut off (in the former -- it was a ceiling fixture). Instead, he simply reaches in with his finger without so much as making sure their power sources were off.

** Brimmer in "Death Lends a Hand". He is shown to be unethical in how he uses third parties to spy on people, and he has bad temper that is a liability, but Brimmer never intended to be a killer. Brimmer becomes enraged and punches Lenore Kennicutt in the face when Lenore confronts Mr. Brimmer to rebuff the blackmail scheme he had in mind for her. Lenore falls over and dies of head trauma, and Mr. Brimmer has a look of fright on his face, after he finds no vital signs on her body. Brimmer seems relieved when Columbo catches him trying to dispose of evidence, and he proceeds to confess to Mr. Kennicutt.

** Lydia Corman says this almost verbatim in "Uneasy Lies the Crown" when she thinks she's accidently killed her lover with her heart medicine. [[spoiler: Thankfully it wasn't her. It was her sleazy ex-husband who tried to frame her for the murder.]]

** An especially good take on the trope is made in "Étude in Black", where Columbo is prepared to believe Jennifer Welles did commit suicide (there was evidence of an unhappy love life), until he discovered that her death also killed her beloved pet, and that didn't fit in.

** Dr. Fleming in ''Prescription: Murder'' and Leslie Williams in "Ransom for a Dead Man" particularly stand out because their utter lack of conscience and capacity for normal human empathy becomes crucial to Columbo's {{Batman Gambit}}s against them.

** In "Lady in Waiting" the killer, Beth Chadwick attempts to shoot Columbo after being found out... Only for him to casually inform her there was a police car waiting outside and such a thing would do her more harm than good. Columbo almost jokingly declares that Beth has more class than that.
** Fielding Chase (William Shatner) also doesn't lose with much grace. At the end a device is planted that intentionally disables his Mercedes-Benz in a seemingly empty stretch of road. After Columbo tells him how he committed the murder, Fielding pretends to open his trunk (or boot) and reach for roadside tools, but is hesitantly pulling out a shotgun. Fielding than asks Columbo to consider that he is acting foolishly because Fielding knows he's not armed. Columbo then agrees, but says he didn't come alone and holds down the car horn to summon the cops hiding further ahead.

--> ''Oh, and, ah, by the way....How did you know the victim was poisoned when INeverSaidItWasPoison that killed them?''\\
''*Xylophone Sting*''

--> ''Oh, and, ah, by the way....''How did you know the victim was poisoned when INeverSaidItWasPoison that killed them?''\\

----

* CluelessDetective:
** Averted. By his own admission, Columbo can sometimes be wrong and make mistakes. However, these usually concern the details regarding ''how'' the murder was committed: once he sniffs out ''who'' the killer is, he's always right, and it's just a matter of putting the full picture together. Of course, his use of ObfuscatingStupidity often leads others to think he is a legitimate example of this trope. In "Columbo Cries Wolf," Columbo poses an elaborate theory of how missing magazine publisher Dian Hunter was actually murdered by her business partner/lover Sean Brantley, seemingly supported by evidence... [[spoiler:only for Dian to show up alive and well, turning Columbo and the LAPD into laughingstocks. However, Brantley really ''does'' kill Dian after this fiasco hits the press, assuming that the police won't allow Columbo to search if she goes missing again due to all the bad publicity. Of course, the lieutenant realizes what's happened and nabs Brantley for the actual murder. Though Columbo only catches him because, while Sean's plan was brilliant, he forgot about Dian's pager, which give his hiding place away.]]

** Zig-zagged and ultimately averted. By his own admission, Columbo can sometimes be wrong and make mistakes. However, these usually concern the details regarding ''how'' the murder was committed: once he sniffs out ''who'' the killer is, he's always right, and it's just a matter of putting the full picture together. Of course, his use of ObfuscatingStupidity often leads others to think he is a legitimate example of this trope.
** The ultimate example of this is probably "Columbo Cries Wolf". In it, Columbo poses an elaborate theory of how missing magazine publisher Dian Hunter was actually murdered by her business partner/lover Sean Brantley, seemingly supported by evidence... [[spoiler:only for Dian to show up alive and well, turning Columbo and the LAPD into laughingstocks. However, Brantley really ''does'' kill Dian after this fiasco hits the press, assuming that the police won't allow Columbo to search if she goes missing again due to all the bad publicity. Of course, the lieutenant realizes what's happened and nabs Brantley for the actual murder. Though Columbo only catches him because, while his plan was brilliant, he forgot about Dian's pager which give his hiding place away.]]

** In "Negative Reaction", Columbo deliberately makes a mistake involving a camera that was used in the murder, prompting the murderer to angrily grab the camera to show Columbo what he had done wrong. Unfortunately, the camera is on the shelf in the police evidence room along with several other cameras, so the murderer incriminates himself by identifying the correct camera. In the closing moments of the episode, Columbo seems aware that he had to rely on this tactic and is disappointed in himself that he couldn't find stronger evidence without resorting to this kind of trickery and luck.