History Series / StarCops

** Anna Shoun. Japanese, Physician, TheChick, TheMedic, TokenMinority, Something of an ethnic stereotype.

''Star Cops'' was a British science fiction television series first broadcast on Creator/{{BBC}}2 in 1987. Set in the year 2027, the world of ''Star Cops'' includes five permanently manned space stations orbiting the Earth, as well as bases on the Moon and Mars, and approximately three thousand people live and work in space. The setting was influenced by the potential for greater access to space promised by the then new Space Shuttle programme, and by concerns about the militarisation of space through the US government's Strategic Defense Initiative (known as "Star Wars"), both of which were underway in the early 1980s. Space travel and life in space are portrayed in a hard science-fiction style, with fairly realistic depictions of weightlessness and low-gravity environments, lengthy space journeys of months or years, and hazards such as spacesuit failures and radiation exposure.

''Star Cops'' was a British science fiction television series first broadcast on Creator/{{BBC}}2 in 1987. Set in the year 2027, the world of ''Star Cops'' includes five permanently manned space stations orbiting the Earth, as well as bases on the Moon and Mars, and approximately three thousand people live and work in space. The setting was influenced by the potential for greater access to space promised by the then new Space Shuttle programme, and by concerns about the militarisation of space through the US government's Strategic Defense Initiative (known as "Star Wars"), both of which were underway in the early 1980s. Space travel and life in space are portrayed in a [[MohsScaleOfSciFiHardness hard science-fiction]] style, with fairly realistic depictions of weightlessness and low-gravity environments, lengthy space journeys of months or years, and hazards such as spacesuit failures and radiation exposure.

* TheGreatPoliticsMessUp: "An Instinct for Murder" reveals that both the Soviet Union and the Cold War are still going strong in 2027. In "Trivial Games and Paranoid Pursuits", Griffin, the commander of the American space station the ''UsefulNotes/RonaldReagan'', claims that the British have always been soft on the Soviets.

* ArtificialGravity: Averted. Spacecraft and space-stations don't have artificial gravity, apart from the American stations which have rotating sections. The weightless environment is cleverly simulated with wires, camera angles and careful movement by the actors.

* FrickinLaserBeams: Handled realistically. The laser weapons only produce a green "muzzle flash" but no visible beam.

* UsedFuture: The first couple of episodes were a bit squeaky-clean, then the series switched to a less brightly-lit, used-and-cluttered style for three episodes, before switching ''back'' for the remaining four. See Screwed By The Network above...

* AnyoneCanDie: Nathan Spring's girlfriend Lee Jone was seemingly set up as a recurring character in the first episode "An Instinct for Murder" but killed off suddenly in the second, "Conversations with the Dead".

* AnyoneCanDie: Nathan Spring's girlfriend was seemingly set up as a recurring character in the first episode, but killed off suddenly in the second.

* BluntYes: A rather good one from Nathan after Kenzy demands to know if she's going to be [[YouGetMeCoffee a glorified secretary]] for the rest of her Star Cop career. It's not that he's noticeably sexist by the standards of the day, mind you; Kenzy was [[DirtyCop on the take]] but too politically well-connected to be fired outright or overtly ReassignedToAntarctica.
* BollywoodNerd: Dr. David Chandri, who turns out to have [[TheCracker written a computer virus]] responsible for hundreds of deaths.
* BombThrowingAnarchist: Dr Chandri again. How exactly blowing a chemical plant and causing a train wreck are supposed to help create the "society without leaders, not a society without laws" he claims to want is difficult to fathom, although he ''was'' demonstrably insane.

* {{Eagleland}}: Indulges in the "Americans are jingoistic war-mongers" stereotype.
* EvilTwin: An evil clone actually.

* TheMafia: The primary antagonists of "This Case to be Opened in a Million Years".

* ReassignedToAntarctica: Nathan ended up in charge of the ISPF because he's not very good at office politics, although you have to give him credit for making the best of a bad situation. It's also strongly implied that Theroux departed from NASA on bad terms, although [[NoodleIncident we never find out the exact details.]]

* SpacePolice

A new audio series featuring some of the original cast is due to be released by [[Creator/BigFinish Big Finish]] in 2018.

* TheGreatPoliticsMessUp: The Soviet Union is apparently alive and well in 2027. They're typically referred to just as "the Russians", but their flag is the red banner with hammer and sickle of the USSR. They are called "the Soviets" in the first episode "An Instinct for Murder", which also indicates that the Cold War is still going on in 2027.

* TheMafia: Primary antagonists of Episode 5.

* TheGreatPoliticsMessUp: The Soviet Union is apparently alive and well in 2027. They're referred to just as "the Russians", but their flag is the red banner with hammer and sickle of the USSR.
** They are referred to as "the Soviets" in the first episode "An Instinct for Murder", which also indicates that the Cold War is still going on in 2027.

* SurrealThemeTune: "It Won't Be Easy" by Justin Hayward of ''The Moody Blues''. Not surprisingly, it's actually rather good but has no obvious connection to the programme at all.[[note]]A case could be made that it is about Nathan's sense of lonelines and detachment from the world following Lee's death.[[/note]] Compare and contrast with the theme of ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise''.

''Spacemen are ten-a-penny. What they need out there is a good copper.''

* OohMeAccentsSlipping: Pal Kenzy's Australian and Alexander Krivenko's Russian accents are wobbly.

* RecycledInSpace: A literal case; the show was criticised at the time for being ''Series/{{Bergerac}}'' [-IN ORBIT!-]

Law enforcement in the developing stations and colonies is provided by the International Space Police Force (ISPF), initially made up of twenty ineffective part-time volunteers derisively nicknamed the "Star Cops". A decision is made to put the ISPF on a permanent, full-time footing, and veteran detective Nathan Spring is appointed to lead the force. Many episodes deal with the efforts of Spring and his team to establish the Star Cops as a credible organisation as he sets up headquarters on the Moon, recruits new staff, dismisses corrupt officers, and works to extend the ISPF's jurisdiction to the American space stations and Mars colonies. At the same time the team investigates the cases that come their way, many of which are new crimes arising from the technologically advanced future society the series depicts, and the hostile frontier nature of the environment.

* ScrewedByTheNetwork: The series was plagued with conflicts between the creator/writer and the producer. Two different directors ''and complete production teams'' were used to make the nine episodes (Team-A produced episodes 1 & 2, Team-B 3, 4 & 5, Team-A 6, 7, 8 & 9). Each team had its own designer, and very different ideas about how the series should look, leading to jarring continuity problems. Finally, the program was broadcast on a weird schedule that did not co-ordinate with the BBC's other programming (it clashed with [=BBC1=]'s flagship Nine O'Clock News for example).

''Star Cops'' was a British science fiction television series first broadcast on BBC2 in 1987. Set in the year 2027, the world of ''Star Cops'' includes five permanently manned space stations orbiting the Earth, as well as bases on the Moon and Mars, and approximately three thousand people live and work in space. The setting was influenced by the potential for greater access to space promised by the then new Space Shuttle programme, and by concerns about the militarisation of space through the US government's Strategic Defense Initiative (known as "Star Wars"), both of which were underway in the early 1980s. Space travel and life in space are portrayed in a [[MohsScaleOfSciFiHardness hard science-fiction]] style, with fairly realistic depictions of weightlessness and low-gravity environments, lengthy space journeys of months or years, and hazards such as spacesuit failures and radiation exposure.

* ScrewedByTheNetwork: The series was plagued with conflicts between the creator/writer and the producer. Two different directors ''and complete production teams'' were used to make the nine episodes (Team-A produced episodes 1 & 2, Team-B 3, 4 & 5, Team-A 6, 7, 8 & 9). Each team had its own designer, and very different ideas about how the series should look, leading to jarring continuity problems. Finally, the program was broadcast on a weird schedule that did not co-ordinate with the BBC's other programming (it clashed with BBC1's flagship Nine O'Clock News for example).

* WhodunnitToMe: "Conversations with the Dead" involves an investigation into an incident leading to the death of two astronauts -- who are still alive, and able to take part in the investigation by radio, but stranded in space with no hope of rescue before their oxygen gives out.

* OurGraphicsWillSuckInTheFuture: The computers and displays look ''very'' eighties, including obvious IBM PC/AT keyboards, and there's not a graphic interface in sight.