Anyone who has read my review of the previous Blu-ray release comprising the Columbo episodes from the original pilot through to the dishevelled cop’s apparently final screen outing in 1978 will know that I hugely admire the show. The original run of ‘Columbo’ maintained an extraordinarily high standard of scripts, performances and direction (giving early opportunities to Steven Spielberg and Jonathan Demme, no less). Reboots are something of a mixed blessing. So your favourite show is back, with the original actor Peter Falk reprising his most iconic role, but can lightning strike twice?
No. And I may as well say that up front. ‘Columbo – The Final Years 1989 – 2003’ assembles the 24 newer episodes of the police procedural drama with a difference and presents them in high-definition Blu-ray. Enjoying them again in high-definition is a fantastic experience. But you don’t have to get too far into this run to realise that the reboot is, for the most part, a decided dip in quality, or wildly inconsistent at best (some great episodes, but more than a few outright stinkers). It probably doesn’t help that I so recently reviewed the magnificent 1970s series, taking in almost every episode, so the sheer brilliance and incredible high standard of those original episodes is so fresh in my mind.
While original ‘Columbo’ is among the greatest television ever made, using innovation to its advantage, the reboot too often feels complacent. The original premise of the show is present for the most part. We meet the murderer first – usually a high calibre guest star – and we see them commit homicide. Then Lieutenant Columbo of LAPD arrives on the scene. He’s scruffy, shambling and apparently absent-minded. But he quickly latches onto the killer and enters into an unfailingly polite game of cat and mouse. They often believe they have committed the perfect murder and will get away with it. The canny, “ass backwards Sherlock Holmes” detective must use all his wiles to conjure an ingenious way of breaking their alibi or getting them to incriminate themselves.
It’s a fantastic concept, and when executed well, it works brilliantly, making for gripping television. Unusually for a police procedural drama, there’s no suspense about who did it. The only suspense is – how will Columbo catch the killer? There are some wonderful moments in these two dozen instalments. The 1993 episode ‘It’s All in the Game’ features Faye Dunaway as perhaps the most sympathetic murderer in the series’ long history. It’s based on a script by Peter Falk, and he and his leading lady have terrific chemistry on screen. Celebrated and beloved guest actors from the original series return, sometimes more than once. Patrick McGoohan (‘The Prisoner’) makes a further two appearances, taking his tally of Columbo killers to a record-breaking four. And they’re both good examples of a series that could return to form, even if McGoohan’s undertaker in ‘Ashes to Ashes’ is more memorable for his macabre crime than for the weak evidence produced by Columbo as the ‘gotcha'. It’s somehow enough to enjoy watching two old pals having an absolute ball working together.
William Shatner (‘Star Trek’) returns for ‘Butterfly in Shades of Grey’, a strong episode in which the guest actor’s enormous performance and screen presence is delightfully entertaining, if a little too large for the small screen. Fan favourite Robert Culp, three times the murderer in the original run, gives the good detective another run for his money as a condescending father in ‘Columbo Goes to College’, one of the most imaginative episodes. Look out also for ‘Brideshead Revisited’s Anthony Andrews (‘Columbo Goes to the Guillotine’) and ‘Succession’s Fisher Stevens (‘Murder, Smoke and Shadows’). The collection ends in style with the 2003 episode ‘Columbo Enjoys the Nightlife’ that brings in Welsh actor Matthew Rhys (‘Brothers and Sisters’) to ensure the good detective bows out with a cracker at the dawn of the Twenty-First Century.
There’s a certain comforting charm in watching the wonderful Peter Falk play this part into his seventies. It’s comparable to the later Roger Moore ‘James Bond’ films. You know the lead actor is far too old for the part, there’s something faintly ridiculous about him carrying on, and it’s rapidly descending into pastiche: and yet you still welcome any new adventure and time with this captivating character.
But whereas, even with the weaker episodes of the original run, Peter Falk never fails to be on top of his game, frustratingly the same cannot be said of these later episodes. I love Peter Falk so much that I have twice visited his grave to pay my respects – and I live thousands of miles away from where he is buried. So I don’t say this lightly. But somebody ought to have reined in his worst excesses and his relentless temptation to go down the route of buffoonery. His name often pops up in the credits as an executive producer, so I suspect it’s an example of the lead actor holding too much sway without a strong producer to keep his bad ideas in check. A bit like how Tom Baker’s best ‘Doctor Who' episodes were the early ones where he was disciplined and his stupid ideas were turned down. In later ‘Columbo', the tragedy is you had a great actor who originated the part who imagined that his strong identification with the character ought to grant him licence to shape the series creatively. It's a miscalculation that leads to so many fundamental weakness of later ‘Columbo’ episodes. And just how many times did Falk’s real-life wife need to be cast in episodes? Watching them in quick succession, her constant appearances, always in different parts, becomes distracting. I want to love them all, but there’s a ratio of around one great episode to two mediocre ones and two dreadful ones here.
Whilst I’m getting all of this off my chest, the worst episodes in the later ‘Columbo’ aren’t merely weak by the magnificently high standards set by the 1970s episodes, they are bad by the standards of daytime television soap opera. The episode ‘Murder in Malibu’ is laughably and irredeemably awful. The episode ‘No Time to Die’ (no, not the ‘James Bond’ film that doesn’t do this title any more favours) doesn’t even have a murder in it. Fine, change the format if the idea is great, but this staggeringly dull, weak and cliched kidnap storyline is sure to have you doom-scrolling on your phone throughout a turgid hour and a half of half-baked TV. I looked up briefly to note that ‘Desperate Housewives’ star Doug Savant was in it, and then again when ‘Frasier’s Bulldog (Dan Butler – who had clearly cornered the market playing alpha male idiots) turned up. Even they couldn’t save it.
All of which is to say that ‘Columbo – The Final Years 1989-2003’ is a must-have in the collection of every ‘Columbo’ fan, but too many of the episodes show signs of complacency for this to be a rave review. For unadulterated affection, see my assessment of the original ‘Columbo’ run. There are enough gems scattered amongst these two dozen cases to recommend the upgrade to Blu-ray, but I can’t honestly say every instalment is worth your time. For more detailed analysis of every episode, take a look at the Columbophile blog, which is not affiliated with this site in anyway. However, 90% of the time I find their assessment spot-on, and the reviewer has a canny knack of unpicking just what it is that makes each episode special or tarnished.
In 4K Blu-ray, these later ‘Columbo’ episodes look cleaner, sharper and better than you have ever seen them before. ‘Columbo’ earned its place as an iconic slice of TV history, so if you love classic detective series, you’ll find much to enjoy. Just lower your standards from expecting the perfection it achieved earlier in its long run!
Cast: Peter Falk, Faye Dunaway, William Shatner, Patrick McGoohan, Matthew Rhys, Tyne Daly, Anthony Andrews, Robert Culp, Fisher Stevens Director: Patrick McGoohan and others Writer: Jeffrey Bloom, Frederick King Keller and others Certificate: 12 Running time: 2242 mins Released by: Fabulous Films Release date: 18th November 2024 Buy ‘Columbo – The Final Years 1989 – 2003’
