bluetenille  02/18/08

How about the three csi's?

RobGrizzly  02/18/08

Maybe if there were three ERs, the one show wouldn't be umpteen season old!

bootsycolumbia  02/18/08

I agree. The only one worth watching anymore is the original L&O. The new cast this season has brought new life back into the show. The other ones are boring and repetitive, but Original L&O is good again.

Tropical_Woman  02/19/08

I adore Law and Order, and watch all three of the shows. Granted, SVU is the current darling, Vincent D'Onofrio doesn't have a six pack like he did on Adventures in Babysitting (The Mighty Thor!), and I miss "Lenny" with all my heart, but I cannot stop.

The original franchise has been jump-started by the revitalized cast (hotties!) and it might become my favorite again.

CI had a fantastic arc last season with Rita Moreno playing Bobby's mother, and the episode where his partner found her husband's real killer was outstanding. I wish Chris Noth would get a fantastic partner, but I am willing to wait and see what happens next. Besides, like EW said, CBS came crawling back during the strike, didn't they? Take that, morons!

As for SVU, they should have let Olivia and Elliot get together after he got divorced and then have them realize it would not work. Their longing for each other was fine at the beginning, but after so many years, it has become ridiculous. Elliot and Olivia shouldn't continue to pine for each other. It is wrong, not to mention completely stupid and dangerous for cops who are putting their lives in each other's hands. ENOUGH. Even Ms. Hargitay said in a tv interview that when the show began, she and Mr. Meloni got it on a few times until they got "it" out of their systems and, after that, they worked just fine together. I am NOT making this up. The rest of the show's excellent cast deserves more screen time.

Enough said.

jkcampbell  02/19/08

A big fat Word.

Carli  02/20/08

There's only three?!

the mule  02/20/08

Huck is right!

The all day marathon is becoming such a common practice it is important you have content to support several marathons a year. A show that runs only once a week has to wait two or three years before officially going into syndication. CSI was fully fleshed out the first year.

thorswitch  02/20/08

But they aren't all the same format. The original L&O opens with a murder, the cops spend the first half-hour determining who to arrest, and the 2nd half hour the prosecutors try to put them in jail. On SVU, there's more of an overlap as the cops and prosecutors work together to solve the crimes and seek justice. You see a lot more of how the cops work with the DAs office to get warrants, and how the DA works with the cops if they need to reinvestigate something while they're working on putting the case together or trying to get it through the court. Both the original and SVU are *solely* from the perspective of the cops and DAs. We never see or hear any of the suspects or witnesses and so on. On Criminal Intent, you do see some of the suspects and/or witnesses interacting and pick up a bit of information from that, plus you get a lot more in depth with the "investigating" aspect of the show, especially now that there's no regular DA involved. And you get to see a lot more of how the partners work together and how their strengths and weaknesses are balanced in the team. It's much more of a character-driven show than the other two. The characters have a bit more of a life outside the office (though not too much, which, IMO, is a good thing - when I'm in the mood for cops with a bit of a touch of "soap opera" to it, I can always catch the CSIs.)

charinator  02/23/08

Think of it as a big corporation branching off to many small LLCs. If one LLC goes down, the big corporation remains. So to take down the big corporation, you need to go after each LLC one by one. Using this business minded concept, Law & Order knows that its chances of being cancelled is really really slim. If one show goes down, other shows remain.

danielletbd  02/25/08

You're forgetting one simple thing: "Law & Order" is one show, "Law & Order: SVU" is one show, and "Law & Order: CI" is one show. They are not three shows with the same exact formula: they look at very separate, very distinct jursdictions. The "L&O" franchise divides the police precincts up in a way other shows have not attempted before. It is different from the "CSI" franchise for those specifics; the various "CSI"s all look at the the science being done to collect and process evidence in three different cities, but the detectives are all in the same branch: they are all forensics experts. With the three "L&O"s, you have very specific cases assigned to very specific detectives. And its a bit ironic that "SVU," the one that deals with often the most offensive and guesome of crimes (ie, sex crimes and child victims), is the highest rated and currently most acclaimed.

Salemskeeper  02/28/08

How can you even argue that? Each Law & Order is still some of the best quality tv out there. Fresh, new, interesting stories w/ twists, and they don't always get the bad guy! SVU is my fav but CI is incredible thanks to the brilliant character Bobby. To see how his mind works is truely fascinating b/c there are real people who do that every day. So many times cops are portrayed in such a neg. light, it's great to see 3 shows that celebrates making the criminal pay for crime.
SVU handles topics no other show will even touch! Olivia being the child of rape herself, dedicates her life to helping others. Sometimes the storyline is so intense, they need a commercial break. People need to look at how sex crimes, child abuse, neglect, kidnapping, rape, murder, and selling off to be used as sex slaves right here in America. No, we need shows like these to remember not everyone's as lucky as us. No matter how much your life sucks, you'd never trade it for a second of what these poor kids go through every day. That's our world

Salemskeeper  02/28/08

The reason all 3 Law & Order's work is b/c they'll never run out of material. Most if not all stories are based on or real life events that happened to someone. The real world & society is only getting more violent & black-hearted. Years ago we'd never known things like this actually existed and took place. Think about that shaggydan! Watch your cheers reruns, we'll take all THREE Law & Order shows, thank you very much ;)

shaggydan  02/28/08

I had no idea that a topic like this would elicit such passionate responses. A lot of great comments here weighing in. I managed to miss my chance to put in my last argument- a reminder to all to get arguments in within the three day window- but let me just conclude by saying that the its the repeated execution of basically the same formula that bothers me about the three shows, especially within the context that- in my opinion- most actual crime or human drama rarely falls rigidly into a set three act platform.

I'd like to believe that a successful television producer blessed with what is essentially three hours of air time a week would be more willing to take chances and experiment with the standard.