Crime Story Is Quintessential Chicago Television

It’s the middle of the night near Cermak and Canal, and the police lieutenant is angry.

That’s Crime Story, the spectacular police drama that ran on NBC from September 1986 to May 1988, long before Dick Wolf settled on our shores. From the locations to the dialogue, nothing quite as quintessentially Chicago—save, perhaps, 1993’s The Fugitive—has been filmed here since.

“Well,” the detective says before walking off, “he’s got a sick mind.”

“Hey you,” Torello tells a stick-up guy. “You hurt anybody else, when this is over, I’m gonna find what you love the most and I’m gonna kill it. Your mother, your father, your dog. Don’t matter what it is. It’s dead.”