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Officer Michaels and Officer Slater (Superbad)
The Cops: Michaels and Slater are both two bumbling cops who aren’t so much corrupt as just utterly irresponsible in the line of duty.
The Partnership: All comic relief and no efficiency. They can’t even take a witness account down without getting everything wrong (after being told that a suspect looks like Eminem, Slater responds “M&M... so he was circular?”
Best Moment: So many great quotes, but the famous one wins it: confronting the fake ID-ed McLovin’ with “Great name... sounds like a sexy hamburger!”
Art Ridzik and Ivan Danko (Red Heat)
The Cops: The tagline says it all: “Moscow’s toughest detective. Chicago’s craziest sop”. Guess which is which.
The Partnership: Danko is the stern, taciturn Russian captain of the Moscow Militia, who finds Ridzik’s down-to-earth, fast-talking American ways to be rather unorthodox. It’s fair to say the feeling is mutual.
Best Moment: Danko’s cutting observation to Ridzik: “This Chicago is very strange city. Your crime is organised, but your police is not.”
Danny Costanzo and Ray Hughes (Running Scared)
The Cops: The pair are immature detectives who decide they aren’t cut out for police work after all and plan to retire and open a bar in Florida together... after ONE LAST JOB.
The Partnership: Together, the duo are street-wise quippers, using inappropriate means to solve their cases. Best of friends who are pretty much just as bad as each other.
Best Moment: As Danny lies after having been shot, he makes Ray promise that, if he doesn’t survive, he will go to Florida by himself. After Ray promises, Danny is outraged: “Without me? You son of a bitch! Where’s my gun? I’ll kill you first!”
Gerry Boyle and Wendell Everett (The Guard)
The Cops: Boyle is a crude Irish police officer who regularly drinks and takes drugs while on duty. Everett is a FBI agent sent to Ireland to track down four Irish drug traffickers.
The Partnership: Everett may be an efficient agent, but there’s a language barrier and culture shock to contend with. Meanwhile, Boyle knows his way around, but is too busy sleeping with prostitutes to make any immediate headway.
Best Moment: Boyle messes with Everett’s presentation when they first meet, openly making ‘innocent’ racist accusations just to cause a stir.
John and Charlie (Money Train)
The Cops: John is the tough, martial artist cop, forced to look out for his foster brother Charlie, a loser cop with huge gambling debts.
The Partnership: The pair work as New York transit cops who get in trouble when Charlie’s debts catch up with him. When he vows to pay back the money he owes by robbing the ‘money train’, John feels no choice but to go along with him, out of brotherly love rather than professional respect.
Best Moment: In defence of his brother, John goes to the stip club owned by the gangsters to whom Charlie owes $15000 and – in true Wesley Snipes fashion – beats them all up, ending on a classic roundhouse kick.
Matt Sykes and Sam 'George' Francisco (Alien Nation)
The Cops: Sykes is the bitter LAPD detective on the hunt for his former partner’s killer. George is an alien.
The Partnership: Sykes is prejudiced against the alien race known as the Newcomers, so their partnership is on shaky ground to begin with, but he eventually learns to look past George’s heritage and the two bond.
Best Moment: When Sykes makes fun of George’s real name for sounding too much like ‘San Francisco’, George replies with “It is like your name... Sykes. I'm sure it doesn't bother you at all that it sounds like ‘ss'ai k'ss’ - two words in my language which mean ‘excrement’ and ‘cranium’”, pausing before adding “... Shithead”.
Allen Gamble and Terry Hoitz (The Other Guys)
The Cops: Allen Gamble is a dull, bookish police desk jockey with an unfeasibly attractive wife, while Terry Hoitz is a bored, frustrated detective dreaming of action and adventure.
The Partnership: Allen is the reserved, cautious type, scared that his past pimp personality Gator will make a reappearance if things get too dangerous. Meanwhile Terry is the hot-tempered cop pushing his partner to help him follow up on an exciting lead.
Best Moment: Angered by his partner, Terry lays down some smack talk about how he dislikes Allen so much, he would attack him in the wild even if he wasn’t part of the right food chain. There proceeds a lengthy argument as to which would win between a lion and a school of tuna.
Nick Lang and John Moss (The Hard Way)
The Cops: Moss is the hardened, embittered cop. Lang is the spoilt movie star undergoing undercover ‘research’.
The Partnership: It’s mostly unfriendly, with Lang studying Moss for his own film role, while not appreciating the true gravity of their police investigations. Meanwhile Moss gets easily fed up with having to pander to the star. Of course, they eventually grow to like each other.
Best Moment: In a rage-fuelled rant, Moss shouts at Lang for not understanding the seriousness of facing daily horrors on the street and having to take lives while he is busy living his rich, Hollywood life. Lang’s response? Asking him to say it all again into a tape recorder so he can later use it for his character.
Chris Lecce and Bill Reimers (Stakeout)
The Cops: Bill is the younger straight man detective partner to Chris’ older cop who gets in over his head when he falls for their girl they are both staking out.
The Partnership: It’s mainly a disapproving, scolding one on Bill’s part, while Chris is the farcical hero who gets in – and out – of scrapes. Great chemistry between them though.
Best Moment: Whenever they fall foul of a prank by rival cops Pismo and Coldshank. Ink rings on the binoculars is a particular classic.
Johnny Utah and Angelo Pappas (Point Break)
The Cops: Utah is the wet-behind-the-ears, athletic FBI rookie partnered with the ostracised veteran Pappas.
The Partnership: Pappas has a ‘crazy’ theory that a famous gang of bank robbers known as the Ex-Presidents are actually surfers. That’s all the reasoning Utah needs to suddenly take to the waves under his partner’s guidance.
Best Moment: The pair bicker, on a stakeout, chat momentarily about getting a sandwich (Pappas wants TWO meatball sandwiches because he is so hungry he can “eat the ass end out of a rhino”). Unfortunately, this leads to them almost completely missing the Ex-Presidents’ latest heist.
