The intriguing premise of Comrade Detective is that a hit Romanian detective series of the 1980s has been dubbed for an American audience.
There is little attempt to make this persuasive; the show is shot in wide-screen, the show looks better filmed than even American TV series of the period, and the constant swearing seems like it would be no more likely in Romanian series of the period than in American ones. (I don't know what to make of the numerous user reviews that seem to believe this series really is an old Romanian series; it doesn't strike them as silly that Romanians in the 80s wouldn't even know what blue jeans are?)
The most amusing part of the one episode I saw were those that had characters spouting propaganda points, as when the detective lectures drug dealers on the CIA bringing drugs into black neighborhoods or tells his commander that he knows there can't be a mole in the police force because there is no corruption among the Roumanian police. It's also amusing to see two cops eagerly watching a chess tournament or the portrayal of the U.S. embassy chief as a conniving, overly-made-up woman in a ridiculous fur coat.
I found myself never really understanding what Comrade Detective was trying to do. It had some of the style of '80s series, but it didn't hit the era's tropes all that hard and doesn't come across as much different from today's cop shows. The political satire is fitful, as though the series keeps forgetting it's supposed to be a parody of something. It feels like the creators felt that once they had the basic idea the series would write itself, so they just let it spool out without ever deciding what kind of thing they were making.
It's not quite satire, not quite parody, not quite cop drama. It's not quite anything.
If you want to see someone who gets east European parody, find the user review of this series by ferdinand1932 called "Historical materialism." He wrote his review in fractured English that is full of badly- expressed communist nonsense So far it's gotten all down votes, probably by the same people who don't know the series is a fake.
There is little attempt to make this persuasive; the show is shot in wide-screen, the show looks better filmed than even American TV series of the period, and the constant swearing seems like it would be no more likely in Romanian series of the period than in American ones. (I don't know what to make of the numerous user reviews that seem to believe this series really is an old Romanian series; it doesn't strike them as silly that Romanians in the 80s wouldn't even know what blue jeans are?)
The most amusing part of the one episode I saw were those that had characters spouting propaganda points, as when the detective lectures drug dealers on the CIA bringing drugs into black neighborhoods or tells his commander that he knows there can't be a mole in the police force because there is no corruption among the Roumanian police. It's also amusing to see two cops eagerly watching a chess tournament or the portrayal of the U.S. embassy chief as a conniving, overly-made-up woman in a ridiculous fur coat.
I found myself never really understanding what Comrade Detective was trying to do. It had some of the style of '80s series, but it didn't hit the era's tropes all that hard and doesn't come across as much different from today's cop shows. The political satire is fitful, as though the series keeps forgetting it's supposed to be a parody of something. It feels like the creators felt that once they had the basic idea the series would write itself, so they just let it spool out without ever deciding what kind of thing they were making.
It's not quite satire, not quite parody, not quite cop drama. It's not quite anything.
If you want to see someone who gets east European parody, find the user review of this series by ferdinand1932 called "Historical materialism." He wrote his review in fractured English that is full of badly- expressed communist nonsense So far it's gotten all down votes, probably by the same people who don't know the series is a fake.