The future of the ‘Cop Drama’

Professor Yvonne Tasker, Chair in Media and Communication, provides analysis.

Professor Yvonne Tasker has written and published numerous articles and books on crime television over the years, including her most recent piece ‘The female detective and middlebrow crime tv: writers, investigation and authorship in bones and castle’ with Lindsay Steenberg.  

This article pays particular attention to female detectives, debating and discussing important issues of gender, spectacle and investigative fiction in relation to crime dramas (specifically women in this space). Her work and research in this field of study has made Professor Tasker an authority about the longevity of the ‘Cop Drama’ and the surrounding issues of the genre.  

An interview with Luke Buckmaster from the BBC saw Professor Tasker discussing television crime drama, its popularity, the genre, the issues of changing audience expectations and the problems of trust in authorities. In Professors Tasker’s interview, she believes that “little change has been made” with no attempts to address the issues surrounding the police, and in particular issues highlighted by the Black Lives Matter Movement.