With his rumpled raincoat, ever-present cigar, bumbling demeanour and Sherlock Holmesian powers of deduction, disarmingly polite homicide detective Lieutenant Columbo took on some of the most cunning murderers in Los Angeles, most of whom made one fatal, irrevocable mistake: underestimating his investigative genius.

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Season 1 Ep.01: Murder by the Book

Ken Franklin is the untalented writer but skilled PR agent of a mystery book writing team that created detective Mrs. Melville. He kills his partner and the real writer, Jim Ferris, because Ferris is planning on breaking up the team and writing on his own. Franklin uses an elaborate scheme to make it appear as if Ferris were killed by mobsters because his next story, an expose on the Mafia, would incriminate them. Franklin’s plan is perfect except that a fan of Mrs. Melville, Lilly La Sanka, saw him.

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Many criminals made the mistake of underestimating Lieutenant Columbo, a homicide investigator with a crumpled trench-coat and a beat-up car, who certainly acted as an incompetent bumbler.

But he was so polite to every suspect, and he talked so much about his wife (who we never

got to see on any episode, but who many believe later had her own show, starring Kate Mulgrew, later of Star Trek: Voyager fame) that he lulled even the shrewdest murderer into a false sense of security.

And although the audience had witnessed the murder in the beginning of each episode, it was still a surprise to see what mistakes the killers had made during the seemingly perfect murder.

Peter Falk carried the old trench-coat for 7 seasons of 90 and 120 minute movies on NBC, before the series ended. But over a decade later, Falk agreed to revive the character on ABC for an additional 2 seasons with a subsequent string of TV-movies with the loveable detective once again using his calling-card false good-byes: “Oh, there´s just one more thing…”

Cast and Crew:

Creators: Richard Levinson, William Link
Stars:

Peter Falk, John Finnegan and Mike Lally

Date Release: 1971
Additional details in:

Columbo episodes in IMDB | Columbo tv series in TV.com

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