Miami Vice

Miami Vice was a TV series produced by Michael Mann and starring Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas as a pair of undercover Miami vice detectives. The show more closely resembled a long form music video than Dragnet. But who cared about procedure when you could show cops dressed in Armani driving Ferraris along South Beach? The series was allegedly based on certain actual laws that allowed cops to use property they seized from convicted drug dealers to do their job. Hence: cops in Ferraris. Sounds good to me.

Speaking of sounds: The official Miami Vice soundtrack actually made it to #1 in the US and stayed the #1 album on the charts for an incredible 11 weeks in 1985!

People magazine is often quoted as saying that Miami Vice "was the first show to look really new and different since color TV was invented." It made household names out of Johnson and Armani, influenced the look and sound of the mid/late 80s and ran from 1984 until its cancellation 1989.

Miami Vice trivia: After the 2nd season Don Johnson threatened to withdraw from the series. NBC executives called his bluff and lined up Mark Harmon to replace him. Mark Harmon?! Fortunately, Johnson gave in and agreed to return, thus saving us from the unthinkable: the extraordinarily uncool Harmon taking over the coolest role in TV.