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Call the Cops

Call the Cops: Episode 5: The Sweeney

Episode 5

Episode 5: The Sweeney

The Sweeney

BBC Four - Call the Cops, The Sweeney

How The Sweeney ushered in an age where television coppers acted just like the villains.

Series about the history of British police dramas looks at The Sweeney, which ushered in a new age where television coppers talked and acted just like the villains.

A look at groundbreaking 1970s police drama The Sweeney, created when writer Ian Kennedy Martin realised that the real police were not behaving quite like their TV counterparts on Z Cars and wanted a more accurate portrayal of the new breed of coppers. 

Interviews with the cast and crew reveal that The Sweeney's fictional version of the Flying Squad was only slightly exaggerated. After its launch, despite the show getting no direct help from Slipper of the Yard, the Met's serious crime boys very quickly adopted the extra trappings of their screen equivalents - punch first and ask questions later, drive fast, drink hard and be the biggest, hardest gang on the block.

With lead characters Regan and Carter looking and talking just like the villains, the series was unrelentingly macho, with explicit violence, ripe language and a studiedly old-fashioned attitude towards women. However, it was massively entertaining, consciously funny and managed to attract a large number of children among its viewers.

Interviewees include creator Ian Kennedy Martin , producer Ted Childs and actors Stephanie Turner and Garfield Morgan.

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