I actually like that as an ending. How often does a show get to say goodbye to its fans.

What he said.

It does take some balls to end a show like that. More than likely there was some behind-the-scenes pressure to end it as quickly as they could, and they decided to just go candid with the audience.

I do agree with Lupa that the show really couldn't last with that kind of premise, but it was fun while it lasted.

Not only does a show that gets canceled halfway into its first season never get to say goodbye to the viewers, but how many shows at all decide that they're going to finish on a note that shows that they're not taking themselves too seriously.

How on earth could a show have closed all thus story lines within the season, much less the show? It was as if they were leading the show into a hopeless mire they'd never be able to crawl out of, only to stick it to the people who canceled them by closing out the show with a break-the-fourth-wall, over the top, SNL-style joke song with the whole cast out of character.

You can say that's how cynical viewers would expect them to close out, but at least they went out on their own terms, which no other show that got canceled that quickly could ever say.

Pretty funny, if you ask me.

It's a little known fact that the spin off from this show was "Fish Police"... and of course lasted an even shorter amount of time.

A show like this couldn't end any other way, really. I hadn't even heard of it until I saw it on TV Guide's list of the 50 worst TV shows of all time.

I thought this review was informative, but a bit disjointed. TV Trash had a review of this show I thought was pretty good(yes, I know the host's style is similar to Linkara's):

http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=gJJlQ_U5894

I was wondering if this show would work as a movie if Shawn Ryan and Tim Burton were behind it, and had a SLIGHTLY different tone.

"Some day, some way, We'll rise again" ... hmmm ... fitting.
Though i never preferred the Musicals genre, Glee seems to be the more successful spiritual successor, and in a way being that second Rising
I'm at that stage where when i watch Glee, i enjoy it, but when i think about watching it, i don't want to. You know that feeling? Anyway, i still applaud what they do. And just because i don't like musicals, doesn't mean i should call for the denial of entertainment for all the gay little boys growing up out there. They deserve to exist and be entertained, too! And i guess little girls like it, too, of course.
But yah, I'm just not a fan of shows that pause the story for 3-5 minutes to say what can be said in a few sentences, without requiring any bad singing to be involved. But i appreciate their existence for the maybe smaller groups of people who like musicals that much that they can tolerate it in a TV show, because it's fighting for the existence of the small groups that allows us all to grow.

I just love how you look in these title cards, Lupa.

So, "Cop Rock" is like "Police Squad," except if it was blended with "High School Musical."

11:01- Come on, Cohagen. You have what you want. Give us people air!

This show's most likely precedent was Moonlighting, and viewed in that light it doesn't seem like such a weird idea for a show. Actually, that finale could have been a tribute to the finale of Moonlighting.
Also, "Cop-A-Feeliac"? What?

I have to commend the makers of Cop Rock for at least trying to come up with something original. Whatever else you can say about Cop Rock, at least it was a truly original idea. Of course not all original ideas are good ones. I'll give the show an A+ for effort into thinking up an original idea... um, but an F for execution.

On a side note Glee Club is a good example on how to make a musical episodic TV show work. One of the decisions that saves it from being another Cop Rock is they don't have to come up with original music, since all their music is from already existing sources. Instead they come up with original ways to use the music and work it into the storyline. Cop Rock may have lasted longer if they went that route (however a glee club has a built-in explanation for why the music's there... a lot harder to justify it in a police drama.)

Oh, and to be fair... "He's Guilty" is not only the best song from this show, it ranks up there with one of the best songs from ANY TV show, imho.

rowdycmoore already reviewed this on his show Tv Trash http://rowdyc.com

I like your TV reviews (well, the only ones I've seen are Tales of the Gold Monkey and this one. I will go check out She Wolf of London right now.)

Actually, when I think of instant TV failures, I think of that sitcom with the Geico cavemen. That or Viva Laughlin.

I'm actually rather fond of that last scene. So long as no one's watching anyway, why not end the show with a bang and have some fun in the process? It also showed the cast and crew working together and having fun behind the scenes, in a spirit similar to a good old-fashioned curtain call. I'd like to see more of that in movies and TV, to be honest.

As glad as I am that this show got cancelled so quickly, I do hope that doesn't stop us from getting a musical episode of Castle.

I tried watching this on Blip last week & it would not play. I was expecting Pocket Ninjas to go up.

SING is the only good highschool musical.

I understand Cop Rock was popular with stoners.

My attempt at understanding the Randy Newman themesong:

Laser sunshine, tears & rain.
Precious limousine girls go by.
Isles of darkness, feel the pain.
All the time that we had....
We were not as nothing as a photograph.
Someone throw the woman in the sun.
Chewie would have to be just 59 doodoo Conan.
Under the sun.
Under the doors.
Under the doooooooooooooooor.
When you see some darkened beer.
& I had to sign a Coke for everyone.
In the audit, on the stair.
You called it out, we'll be there.
When no one else seems to care, 59 doodoo Conan.
Under the door.
Under the door.
59 doodoo Conan.

"no more peanut butter, no more mayonaise"?!?! BUT..BUT I love peanut butter and mayonaise! D:

It's peanutbutter-mayo time! Peanutbutter-mayo with a baseball bat.....& onions.

Never heard of this series. But looking at the cast it seems that the ONLY person I recognize is Ronnie Cox. I love his music and he's released several albums over the years. Course most everyone recognizes him from Stargate.

Cop Rock actually WON 2 Emmy's in 1991. Outstanding Editing for a Series and Outstanding Achievement in Music and Lyrics (Randy Newman musta been thrilled to get that. *lol*) It was also nominated for Directing and Sound Mixing. Musta been a slow Emmy year.

Never heard of this series, either. Though (and dear lord will I get thumbed down for saying this), I think both this and Glee have the same problem: it doesn't quite know if it wants to be silly or serious.

Based on what I saw in the video, Cop Rock didn't quite know if it was comedic or serious, and it often had some misplaced songs, like the dead boy song. Glee is like that. One minute you have a love triangle between teenagers, often involving teenage pregnancy, and the next you have people singing a Katy Perry song.

I think when you create a series you have to decide what it should be. You can't be comedic and then try to ram in drama. You can't be dramatic and still get away with high comedy. A balance must be created in order for it to work.

And you CAN create a serious musical, too. Just look at Sweeney Todd. Again, the key aspect is that the music must reflect the mood of the story and its characters, so again having a peppy song to portray a grim setting isn't a bright idea (unless the feeling you are trying to convey is that of irony or sarcasm).

But those are my two cents.

Being a gigantic fan of musicals, to see something like this done well would really thrill me. I really liked some of the songs you featured here.

Glee is terribly shallow and not well acted in the least, and they tend to butcher iconic songs unless they have some legit guest star like Idina Menzel or Josh Groban, so I don't count that as doing the musical TV show right.

If the setting was whimsical enough, I would buy it. Pushing Daisies featured the stunning Kristin Chenoweth who sang a few songs, and I think if the entire show had a cast of singers, it might have been really cool. Granted, it was fantastic just the way it was (however unfairly short lived with only two very short seasons), but I think if anyone's going to try and make a weekly musical, it needs to be from the minds of people like Bryan Fuller.

Good review I had good laughs.

A yes, since I had latin recently, does Obscurus Lupa mean something like obscure she-wolf?

But wouldn't "Obscurus" be the masculine declension? Shouldn't it be "Obscura Lupa" instead?

Obscurus actually means dark. And it's the masculine form. I assume it's deliberately done though.

The ending made me think of how Jem ended...

What pissed me off about that show's end was the sudden "Oh look it's over" part but the fact that they spent the final episode resolving a plot line that no one f*cking cared about.

They could had resolved the BIG plotline but no... they helped the most whiney girl on the show find her daddy.

At least this one with out with some class even if it knew it came to an end.

Not like Pushing Daises which ended on a cliff hanger. I still blame George Hamilton because he showed up at the end, and I am convinced that's why it was cancelled :(

I remember when this show was on, I kept thinking that I've got to catch an episode some time while I still could, just for the weirdness of it, because everyone knew damm well it wasn't going to be around for long. But I never managed to catch it before it was gone.

When the song set in the gym about people exercising was playing, I thought I detected the hand of Randy Newman in there somewhere, and sure enough a minute later Lupa mentions that he sings the title song, which means he almost certainly contributed to the songs in the actual show as well. Several of the other songs after that also sounded suspiciously "Newmanesque" to me, and given how this peculiar idea seems peculiarly suited to his sensibilities I wouldn't be a bit surprised if he wrote the biggest chunk of songs for this show.

Come to think of it, putting aside all the other challenges this show brought on itself, how many TV shows have there really been that have even attempted to come up with multiple completely new, original fully-formed songs every single week (aside from things like Seasame Street & other sorts of children's shows & the like)? Offhand the only one I can think of is The Monkees, and they had a pretty deep well of really talented professional songwriters to draw on. I don't know who Cop Rock had aside from Randy Newman, who's no slouch, but he's not exactly the most productive guy when it comes to releasing albums of actual songs (as opposed to mostly instrumental movie scores).

And yes, Lupa is just flat out dead Wrong about the ending. The show was apparently a night-time soap opera with a continuing, ever-expanding storyline like Hill Street Blues, I can't imagine that she would actually expect them to suddenly wrap something like that up with one or two episode's notice. This seemed like the perfect way for them to have ended the show, be it after 11 episodes or 11 years, with what amounts to a final curtain call by the cast, similar in spirit to actual live musical theater. It was a nice touch that they were even shown supposedly playing the music as well as singing.

Police series that is musical? Person who come up with this must had been high at that time.

I hate most musical theatre, but some of those songs didn't sound bad at all, particularly the more soulful ones. But then again I'm a huge fan of classic soul/r'n'b so I guess I was always gonna say that.

As for the rest of this, I like shows that try to push the envelope, but there are some genres that if you simply shouldn't try to cross them over, then you need the flat-out best writers in the world to make it successful. I mean, cop drama and musical...really?

Anyway, grand review Lupa, as per norm.

Wow. I never thought I'd see anyone review this show. I remember seeing the preview for it on one of those preview shows they used to love to make in the 80's and 90's. Like the ones showing casing all the new Saturday morning cartoons. Man I miss those. Someone should find and review those shows. I would love to see them again.

My show, TV Trash, has covered a handful of old cartoons and will be doing more in the future.

You can find the show at rowdyc.com and http://rowdyc.blip.tv. And yes, my own Cop Rock review is still there also.

I first saw this show on one of the "I Love The 90's" Specials on VH1. (BTW, NOW is the time to finish up "I Love The New Millenium" VH1! Get to it! Chop Chop!)

I remember their collective group of comedians, journalists, and celebrities commenting how the show ended because they actually GOT a Fat Lady to sing them out!

Sitting down and listening to the lyrics, some of them sounded quite nice. Well written and well executed, and covering topics not usually heard on the radio. I mean when was the last time you heard a big name band sing a song about losing weight? That's usually a theme for music that only Weird Al covers.

I think it'd be cool to get a "Top 10 Best Songs From Cop Rock" from you just like how you did "Top 10 Best Moments from Tales of the Gold Monkey".

Also, as a final piece of suck up, but I swear this is true, Andy Dickman makes you look REALLY good as a cartoon, Lupa. I think it'd be awesome to see a comic about the adventures of you, Nash, Phelous, Sad Panda, Welshy, and all the characters that Andy (I'm not going to call him Dickman. It's too impersonal and potentially hilarious. I might as well call him Sea Man.) draws title cards for.

I mean let's be honest. He makes you look good.

I can't speak for everyone else, but I think selling one's baby for drugs is a perfect time to burst into song.

...do Fish Police :)

Like quite a few of the commentators above, I actually liked the way they chose to go out. But I've always been a fan of fourth wall breaking moments; one of the best examplesI can think of was the running joke about being cancelled in season 3 of Arrested Development.

Watching your review, I'm embarrassed to admit that I was one of the many people who dismissed this show before episode 1 had even aired. I find myself regretting doing that :-(

Now, if you need me, I'll be watching my tapes of Viva Blackpool ;-)

I so glad I'm not the only one who immediately thought of Viva Blackpool when seeing clips of Cop Rock for the first time. Now there's a series that knew how to pull off the concept of a "Musical Drama mixed with both Police Procedual and just the right touch of camp" sucessfully.

P.S. I'm suprised that you never mentioned how the judge here was played by none other then Carl Anderson, aka Judus from "Jesus Christ Superstar."

Musicals usually bore me.

Yet I remember sitting through the South Park movie only to realise at the ending credits that I had been having a blast with a musical.

Hmm, I actually thought the songs you played, even the bad ones, were pretty catchy and entertaining for a musical.

The review was good. It makes me want to watch the show...with no expectations, of course. :)

I would like to thank the few comments that acknowledge my own review of this show. I'll actually be posting it on the blog this Tuesday night - this was according to my own schedule and just an insane coincidence that this review would come out at the same time.

With that said, this was a pretty good and informative review that was clearly an original work and does a good job covering certain angles and musical numbers that I didn't find the time to fit in. Given that I consider my own show to be pretty obscure (ooh, bad pun there), I can't fault Miss Lupa also pursuing a review of this series and I do commend her for the work.