#Columbo Candidate for Crime

[anamon-book]

野望の果て　刑事コロンボ 19 W・リンク、R・レビンソン 板橋幸・訳 サラブレッド・ブックス64 二見書房 design＝森下年昭

[citizenscreen]

Five Movie Stars turned Columbo Murderers

[columboscreens]

[un-monstre]

Showed my sister Columbo for the first time and she said "it's just like watching mob movies, but I don't have to worry that I am going to see anyone get graphically murdered."

[fern-spotting]

Columbo S3E3: “Candidate for Crime” (1973)

Ferntastic! This is the earliest fern spotting yet, at 0:22. That's right, this Boston fern appeared during the weird mini-trailer at the beginning of the episode for just a couple of frames (hence the video controls over the screenshot).

If you don't think that counts, don't worry. The first proper fern sighting is less than two minutes into the episode.

[1day1movie]

Columbo: Candidate for Crime (1973) Boris Sagal.

[ashleybenlove]

This Italian-American dentist (of which Columbo is also Italian-American) is deeply offended by the Mafia stereotype.

There was a line in Any Old Port in a Storm, the episode before this, about Italians needing to stick together, and I almost made a joke about the Mafia.

[riverlarking]

COLUMBO

S03E03, “candidate for crime”

[twistedtummies2]

Gathering of the Greatest Gumshoes - Number 7

Welcome to A Gathering of the Greatest Gumshoes! During this month-long event, I’ll be counting my Top 31 Favorite Fictional Detectives, from movies, television, literature, video games, and more!

SLEUTH-OF-THE-DAY’S QUOTE: “Now, I may be wrong…but frankly, I doubt it.”

Number 7 is…Jessica Fletcher, from Murder, She Wrote.

I had a tough time deciding between Jessica Fletcher and our previous pick, Columbo. Both are from classic detective programs, and each show had a remarkably long lifespan (incidentally, both ended the same year, 2003). However, while I love the twist formula of Columbo, I personally always liked “Murder, She Wrote” a little more. I blame this on two primary facts: one of them is the simple fact that I’m a sucker for an old-fashioned “Whodunnit” mystery, of a more traditional sort. The other is summed up in two words: Angela Lansbury.

Angela Lansbury – may she rest in peace – was, is, and always has been one of my favorite actresses. She was one of those ubiquitous types of performers where it’s hard to say where people would know here best from: for some, she may be recognized most chiefly for her work in musical theatre, with shows like “Mame,” “Gypsy,” and “Sweeney Todd.” Others may know her for her connections to Disney films, like “Beauty and the Beast” or “Bedknobs and Broomsticks.” Still others may know her for any of a variety of other shows and parts some may call more “serious,” such as the villain of “The Manchurian Candidate.” And of course, for some, there’s “Murder, She Wrote,” where Lansbury – from 1984 to 2003 – played the marvelous Jessica Fletcher, easily my favorite female detective character in all of fiction.

Jessica can best be described as a sort of combination of Ellery Queen and Miss Marple. She’s a mystery writer who lives in a quaint little town – the fictional seaside village of Cabot Cove – and uses her experience writing detective work to help her solve crimes. While she finds plenty of cases in her hometown, research for her books (along with past experiences and jobs, such as working as a teacher) has brought Jessica all over the globe, and she has many friends and connections as a result of her travels. In a typical “Murder, She Wrote” episode, Jessica will find that one of these connections is under suspicion for murder. However, for one reason or another – sometimes simple faith in her friends, other times for more practical and logical reasons – Jessica refuses to believe they are responsible. When the police dismiss Mrs. Fletcher, she takes matters into her own hands and eventually solves the case and clears her friend’s name.

Mrs. Fletcher’s sheer determination and confidence are probably her most noteworthy traits as an amateur sleuth. Once she feels she’s right about something, nine times out of ten (at least), she typically is, and she won’t allow anyone to tell her differently or treat her as inferior for any reason. Her personality is fun, too, of course: she is in some ways a very soft, almost maternal figure, but she also has a sharp wit and a fine amount of sass in her soul. However, what I personally find most interesting about Jessica Fletcher is her attitude towards crime itself. I’d argue she is probably one of the most empathetic detectives out there.

Most of the time when Fletcher solves a case…she’s sad about it. There’s almost always this sense of pity and sympathy towards the ones she helps take down, even when they try to kill her, themselves, in turn. When she isn’t sad, she’s angry; this is most typical when the killers are people she knows well. She recognizes that murderers are just as human as the ones whose lives they destroy. Many of the victims in the show were unlikeable people, and while Jessica can’t agree with the ones who took them out – especially since they often endangered people close to her – there’s a sense she often feels sorry for them. In her mind, they aren’t necessarily bad people, simply people who made bad choices. So she doesn’t hate them; mostly, she seems to feel disappointed in them.

The series gave Lansbury a lot of room to flex her acting chops, in a lot of different ways. As the nominal star of the show, she had a lot of input on the content of episodes, and Jessica was not the only character she played in the show. There was also Jessica’s flamboyant cousin, Emma, a recurring figure who even took over for Jessica in one story. It’s hard to imagine anybody else now in the role, and I would argue it’s the actress, as much as the character herself, who makes this series so enjoyable to watch.

Tomorrow, the countdown continues with Number 6!

CLUE: “I did not know the bank was being robbed because I was engaged in my sworn duty as a police officer.”

[joshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh]

Candidate for Crime

I've been slacking like crazy on Columbo recently. Felt it was time to check back in on the lieutenant. Kind of... okay episode today? I liked Hayward, he was well acted and enough of a cult of personality to where it made sense to me that he'd be a popular politician. Stone was good as well, I was able to more or less intuit why Hayward wanted him out of the picture. But then the episode sort of just drags its tail and muddies its water. Like it's a longer episode anyway but not a lot is done with that - we'll devote like a whole 5 minute scene to Columbo getting his car checked out and not really get much of anything from it, meanwhile surprisingly little of the runtime is spent on the Columbo and killer back and forth. Columbo does independent snooping that we don't see the purpose of or he'll do independent snooping that's completely off-screen but is a key component of the gotcha. The gotcha in general is really dull actually, the two key pieces of evidence being things that we only learn from Columbo in this very scene. Hayward's part of a failing marriage and an affair which is only really a thing to establish a motive but his wife and his mistress barely matter beyond that despite sticking around, the political game is barely explored so feels like surprisingly weak set dressing (suppose they didn't want to upset either real life party by painting one of them as having murderers?), Columbo's fun and likeable as always and there were some good jokes that gave me a little chuckle throughout, but yeah idk the more I think about this episode while writing here the more I think it just really wasn't all that. Didn't bother me in the same way as some of the outright weakest episodes, just kind of falls flat instead. Oh well.

[falkisms]

"Candidate for crime" is on and I'm remembering why I love this episode so much, and it absolutely wouldn't make sense to anyone who doesn't watch Columbo but,

Every conversation with Columbo is dragged, and meandering, and scrounging, and pained. Columbo himself is like a stone in everyone's shoe they are trying to run away from, and it only causes him to dig further into their heel.

I love it. I love him

[columboscreens]

[michaelcoffeysthoughts]

Columbo: Season 3 (1973-74)

This is a pretty solid season that continues the series' overall consistency. The stories move at a good pace and play with the typical murder mystery format of the series in clever ways. The series keeps many of its core elements but they are often presented in refined and exciting new directions. Columbo is given some added character depths here, which allows for some of Peter Falk's best bits in the series thus far, and the guest characters are given some nice variety. The guest actors continue to shine here with some iconic figures used in unexpected ways. The direction plays with the series' style while letting each episode stand out in their set pieces. The visuals make great use of the settings while having distinct moments for each episode. This is a fun season that matches the previous seasons and in some episodes surpasses them.

Episodes Ranked:

8.Candidate for Crime

7.Mind Over Mayhem

6.Publish or Perish

5.Double Exposure

4.A Friend in Deed

3.Swan Song

2.Lovely But Lethal

1.Any Old Port in a Storm

[opossum-on-the-spectrum]

tagged by my friend @katagawajr for a tag game!! thank you so much :3

last song: Hasta Mañana - Abba (thanks collin!)

favorite color: dark green..... save me dark green...... dark green help

sweet/spicy/savory: I love savory food too but sweet stuff is the best

last movie watched: honestly can't remember 😭 it's been too long!

last show watched: COLUMBO <3 specifically it was the "candidate for crime" episode!

last game played: just started playing TGAA:2 and it's really good!!! I'm having a great time with it so far

last google search: I was looking up local radio frequencies!

current obsession: some of my pals have an AU that i've been rotating in my head so so much in the past months 🤸‍♂️

[whatyourusherthinks]

Columbo Season 3

Oh thank god Season 3 is WAAAY BETTER than Season 2. I'm not gonna lie I thought this was gonna be a one hit wonder show. Y'know, one of those shows are like really good for the first season and everyone says the show is great because they only watch that first season over and over because when they get to the second season they realize the rest of the series wasn't as good as they remember so they stop watching the show and then forget about the whole thing and get the itch to rewatch the show after telling people it's the best show ever and the whole cycle repeats itself in a never ending loop until that person eventually grows old and their memory completely declines as their symptoms of Alzheimer's went completely unnoticed by their friends and loved ones because they were distracted by the show-watcher's insistence on how excellent the show is and eventually that person needs to get put into a home where they slowly wither away in a pastel Americana prison and pass away disconnected from their families. Well Columbo is not like that show at all.

I actually like Season 3 more than Season 1. Unfortunately those stupid cold opens from the last season return, but it feels like whoever made them learned from their mistakes as don't show anything significant from the episode. Also, I just think the plots of this season were just better. Well, you'll see what I mean when we get into it.

Episode 1 'Lovely But Lethal'

This episode is pretty good. It's got Vincent Price as a waspy make-up CEO, so yeah. I am always surprised when I see Vincent Price in something I like, even though he's pretty much known for doing shows and movies I liked. He adds class. Martin Sheen is also the victim. But honestly the best part of this episode is that I learned a lot about make up in this episode. I never realized you have to physically put on those beauty marks. Watch Columbo try to explain why he knows so much about make up made me chuckle darkly, but we'll talk about that in a later section.

Episode 2 'Any Old Port in a Storm'

This is my favorite episode of the season, simply because I really like the relationship Columbo has with the killer. I also really like how the guy got caught, I even predicted it. Won't say anymore those, watch this episode.

Episode 3 'Candidate for Crime'

In this episode, Columbo takes down a corrupt candidate for senator. I dunno, watching corrupt politicians get taken down specifically tickles me. One of my favorite episodes of Leverage (which is a show I'd be more than happy to review if people are interested) is the episode where they infiltrate Congress to stop a CEO of a cheerleading company.

Episode 4 'Double Exposure'

The episode has the coolest trap I've seen Columbo set for the killer. I also really like that the final piece of evidence that proves Columbo's theory is something that Columbo didn't know was part of the equation until it turns up at the very end. Really though, whenever Columbo and the killer come to and unspoken understanding that they both know the murderer did it but that Columbo has no proof are really entertaining.

Episode 5 'Publish or Perish'

I'm thinking a secret trick to knowing a great Columbo episode is if the writing industry is involved, because just like 'Murder By the Book' this episode is really good. Another trick might be the killer trying to set up a frame job too. Anyway, this episode is great and I'm not gonna say anything else.

Episode 6 'Mind over Mayhem'

This episode the killer uses a robot to cover for his alibi, and it still isn't the most absurd thing the show has done. I actually like that Columbo just full on lies at the end and almost arrests the wrong suspect on purpose to trick the killer into confessing (Whoops that was a spoiler my bad), it's sleezy and totally corrupt but it also really worked.

Episode 7 'Swan Song'

This episode has Johnny Cash playing a pedophile. He's also an airplane pilot, which is funny if you know about the man in real life. This episode is the weakest of the Season, and might be the weakest overall, despite having Mr. Cash guest star. There is a lot of filler. Some of it makes sense, if you have Johnny Cash you should have him sing. But there's like a five minute sequence of Columbo getting a sales pitch from a funeral director. Also they are really inconsistent with Cash's character and they try to go for a sappy ending where he admits he was going to confess at some point and Columbo knows that because he's a good singer? Yeah it's kinda stupid.

Episode 8 'A Friend in Deed'

If Columbo was a more serialized show, I could see the killer of this episode being a reoccurring villain or his nemesis or something. But as it stands this episode is pretty cool. I started thinking what if there was a Columbo villain where the Lieutenant's usual bag of tricks wouldn't work, and this episode is kind of that. I really like the way Columbo catches the bad guy in this episode as well, it's another great trick and I didn't even see the final twist of the episode coming.

Summation

I should probably start changing the title of these final sections to "Ranking" since this is what these are going to become. But anyway, just like last time I'm going to make the new episodes red to help you know which episodes were just added to the list.

Suitable for Framing

Any Old Port in a Storm

Murder By the Book

Publish or Perish

Double Shock

A Stitch in Crime

Double Exposure

Mind over Mayhem

A Friend in Deed

Candidate for Crime

Dagger of the Mind

The Most Crucial Game

Short Fuse

Blueprint for Murder

Prescription: Murder

Most Dangerous Match

The Greenhouse Jungle

Ransom for a Dead Man

Lovely But Lethal

Dead Weight

Etude in Black

Death Lends a Hand

Lady in Waiting

Swan Song

Requiem for a Falling Star

Oh... uh... since I have you here I was just wondering if you could hear out a theory of mine. What I was wondering

Is Columbo Gay?

Season 3 showed some promising clues for my little theory here. Some is just circumstantial, like Columbo knowing about make up, but my big piece of evidence is this: In 'A Friend in Deed', Columbo sets a trap for the murderer in an apartment he bought to do that. And he puts pictures of his "brother-in-law" and his nieces. But not his wife and his kids. Yeah, apparently Columbo has kids too. Admittedly that fact is does contradict my theory, since gay people definitely would be able to adopt at the time. Eh, let's just break even for now and move on to the next season.

[ashleybenlove]

Columbo's spidey senses are tingling so he climbs into the hearse with the corpse to check something.