Law & Order (TV Series) Kids (1994) User Reviews

Jerry Orbach vs. Robert Hogan, and a Sterling Speech from Michael Moriarty

[Better_TV · 8/10 · 1 May 2018]

This is a classic case of an episode that starts out middling but gets more exciting during its latter two thirds.

Here we've got a dead kid murdered by gunshot, and ostensibly the hook is that the perpetrators appear to be unwitting prep school kids - cleaned-up rich kids committing crimes, oh the irony! But then there's the twist that makes this one worth watching: Detective Briscoe (Jerry Orbach) knows the father of one of the suspects, a scowling ex-cop played by Robert Hogan. While the kids aren't exactly cold-blooded killers, Hogan'll be damned if he's going to let even a single charge stick on his precious boy, which puts him in conflict with the upstanding Briscoe. Hogan and Orbach's scenes together are major highlights.

And savor Michael Moriarty's classic closing argument in this one, because he'd already resigned from L&O by the time this episode aired - there's only a handful of episodes featuring the morally righteous EADA Ben Stone left!

"And though justice must be tempered with mercy," he tells the jury, "it can never lose a sense of retribution - or it is no longer justice."

Watch and find out if the jury agrees!

"What if it was one of your kids"

[TheLittleSongbird · 8/10 · 7 October 2020]

Of the 'Law and Order' franchise, my personal favourite of the shows is the original 'Law and Order'. Particularly the early seasons, not sure whether it's a popular opinion as the first six seasons are not aired very much on re-runs in my country. The franchise always excelled when it came on exploring tough and still relevant topics and doing so in a way that does not hold back while not generally getting heavy-handed. The early seasons of the original 'Law and Order' and the early ones of 'Special Victims Unit' were particularly good at this.

"Kids" may not be one of my favourite episodes of 'Law and Order' or even of Season 4. It is another very good, if not quite outstanding (the best elements of it are though), outing for the show, with a tough and relatable subject that will hit home to any parent that has ever had this dilemma or similar. It also boasts a few classic scenes and while the episode is overall very good two thirds of it are actually more than that.

What stops "Kids" from getting a higher rating? There is not an awful lot wrong actually, but it is agreed that the early portions of the episode are a bit ordinary and doesn't have much that makes it stand out.

It, the episode that is, really does pick up and gets into gear once Briscoe and Parker are together and after that there is not really anything to criticise. As usual for 'Law and Order' and its spin offs, the production values are solid and the intimacy of the photography doesn't get static or too filmed play-like. The music when used is not too over-emphatic and has a melancholic edge that is quite haunting.

The writing is exceptional in "Kids", well certainly for two thirds of it when things gain momentum properly. The standout is Stone's closing argument, which is one of his most powerful and one of the show's greatest in my view. Briscoe's dialogue when with Parker is suitably hard-boiled, his response to Parker asking him "what if it was one of your kids" is particularly telling and is just one of the quotes to sum up what the moral dilemmas of the subject is. The story is gripping once it gets going, shining in the chemistry between Briscoe and Parker and towards the end. The tone is uncompromising while not being preachy or one-sided, both easy to do with this topic, and the questions raised and moral dilemmas are interesting. Also found it incredibly moving and it is one of those cases that makes one both sad and angry.

All the performances are strong across the board, with Jerry Orbach (in one of his best performances of the season), Michael Moriarty (especially at the end) and Robert Hogan (nuanced and harrowing) being superb.

In a nutshell, very good with an ordinary first quarter or so but riveting for the rest of it. 8/10

What do we do with our children?

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 21 October 2018]

This episode has Jerry Orbach and Chris Noth investigating the death of a fourteen year old good kid from a nice Catholic school. Turns out he really is a good kid, but some at that prep school ain't so good.

At the bottom of this is the old code of the street that says don't rat out anyone which in this case is added the caveat not even to protect your own life. The innocent victim got in the way of a bullet that another good kid Danny Gerard fired at gun dealer Guillermo Diaz.

It might have gone differently had Gerard hit what he aimed at, but such was not the case. As it happens Gerard's father is a former detective Robert Hogan who is not above calling in some old favors from friends on the force. He tries to call one in from Orbach. Hogan and Orbach's scene is a classic.

It's tragic all around.

The Street As War Zone.

[rmax304823 · 9 September 2011]

Kind of an interesting episode that raises important questions. What if everything that happened around you and was considered normal also happened to be illegal. Suppose you had good reason to believe that your life depended on shooting and killing someone else, and everyone was in agreement with you, even some of the police, but there was no legal justification for the killing? That's the bind some kid at St. Mathews Prep School finds himself in, a nice boy who's also the son of a former police officer. But the nice, proper boy is involved in a network of drugs and arms deals. And a nasty drug dealer from Monticello, New York, has let the word go forth that the proper kid is dead meat because of some conflict.

The nice proper kid takes a shot at one of the potential hit men from across the street and kills a fourteen-year-old Puerto Rican kid by accident. The police investigating the scene manage to dig up two older slugs in addition to one that just missed the PR. That's the kind of neighborhood this is. An ordinary wall of an ordinary building can have three different bullets embedded in it.

In any case, the proper kid is brought up for manslaughter. His father pleads with an old friend, Lennie Brisco, but there's nothing Lennie can do. The DA's case against the kid is a little weak, depending as it does on the testimony of the despised drug dealer.

But, whaddayouknow, the dealer is killed during a drug bust in the 33rd precinct. Complicit are the father's friends in that precinct. With the chief witness dead, a mistrial is declared and the proper kid goes home with Dad. Brisco meets the former cop later and asks how he's sleeping lately, and how his friends at the 33rd at sleeping. They're sleeping just fine. "There's no statue of limitations on murder," says Brisco ominously and walks away. And it's true. An unsolved homicide case is never closed. It's just forgotten.

It's unusual, this episode, because as far as the viewer can tell, a cabal of police officers from the 33rd precinct precipitated a murder and just let it go at that, a kind of favor to a friend. And it's unusual too in that we're made to feel some sympathy for the proper kid who lived in what the rest of us would consider a subculture of some blight. He happened to respond normally and the results happened to be lethal to a passer by.

Kid's Cop Daddy

[safenoe · 7/10 · 7 November 2023]

Robert Hogan who was memorable as Smilin' Jack Mitchell in M*A*S*H around 20 years before Kids debuted, plays a cop who won't stop at anything to get his kid off a murder two charge. The final scene with Briscoe and Hogan's cop character was a harbinger of things to come, and demonstrated that corruption can run deep in the NYPD when it comes to protecting their own and their own offspring.

I'm enjoying watching the early seasons of Law and Order, although as we get further into the 90s we get less of the French Connection and Serpico feel of the streets of New York City.

Coincidentally, Kids debuted one year before Kids, the Harmony Korine one that was also filmed in New York City.

Claire resigned in the previous episode!

[muncieharts · 5/10 · 12 April 2020]

How did she become employed by the DA again? How does this not get addressed in the storyline? I'm a fan of the show but this was sloppy.