Board Thread:Game Discussion/@comment-32983682-20171015075802/@comment-25174522-20181024055546

PinkElephantMan wrote: Not to burst any bubbles here, but I know generally nothing about Fillmore! So, I am basically lost right now. Fillmore! was a Disney-Animation-produced parody of 1970's police procedural TV shows, like Dragnet and McLeod, but set in X Middle School in Minnesota. The school's safety patrol have full authority to investigate crimes of all levels (but usually misdemeanours) on the extensive and extravagant school grounds (how many schools have their own lake, with a private dock for the paddle boat club, the water-skiing club, the jet-ski club, and the fishing club?) with some plots or characters lifted almost directly from popular TV shows and movies of the time, a decade ago, when the series was produced.

The show focuses on Cornelius Fillmore and his partner Ingrid Third as principal detectives of the X Middle School safety patrol; other members of the safety patrol also show up regularly: crime scene photographer (and primary comic relief) Danny O'Farrel, crime scene forensic investigator Joseph Anza, crime lab tech Karen Tehama and safety patrol commissioner Vallejo; all are experts in their investigative functions, at the level of (or even above) highly trained and experienced police officers, despite only being in middle school. They are way more than just hall monitors! Also, the safety patrol students seem to spend more time investigating the crimes and other (very advanced) safety patrol duties than they spend in class. The principal, Mrs. Folsom, invariably wants the episode's investigation wrapped up as soon as possible and if it takes too long to find those responsible, then she usually threatens to turn the safety patrol office into something else, like a teachers' spa; she would mention a different new use for that space on each episode when the threat is made.

The show often featured issues related to school, like bullying and cheating on tests, but also used themes from other crime shows and movies, like the movie Silence of the Lambs. The severity of the crimes would be reduced to more family-friendly fare than from the source material. For example, in the episode that used elements of the Silence of the Lambs, the crime under investigation was serial vandalism, instead of serial murder. Tartar sauce being smuggled out of the cafeteria was a more kid-appropriate version of drug smuggling.