# Police Story (1973)

> Interpol detective Cheng goes undercover to bring down the Empire of Chaiba, a worldwide criminal organization based in Southeast Asia.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/9147

## Facts

- Seasons: 6
- Episodes: 104
- Episode runtime: 60 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: crime, drama, action
- Created by: Joseph Wambaugh, E. Jack Neuman
- Network: NBC
- Cast: Val Avery, Sal Mineo, Jan-Michael Vincent, Peter Brown, Barbara Rhoades, Bruce Glover, Joan Blondell, Ron Leibman
- TMDB rating: 7.5/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0069620/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: brisk
- Intensity: moderate
- Complexity: accessible
- Violence: moderate
- Tone: tense, earnest, gritty, sincere

## Synopsis

Police Story (1973-1988) is an American crime anthology series created by Joseph Wambaugh and E. Jack Neuman for NBC. Detective Cheng, commissioned by Interpol, leads an undercover operation to infiltrate and destroy the Empire of Chaiba, a worldwide criminal organization based in Southeast Asia. Each season and episode builds around a distinct police investigation, giving the show a rotating structure of standalone cases rather than one continuing story. Across six seasons and 104 episodes, the series follows officers working the streets and the paperwork of law enforcement, with cast members including Val Avery, Sal Mineo, Jan-Michael Vincent and Peter Brown appearing in various stories. The engine is procedural: patient investigation, danger, and the pressure of working inside a shadowy network. Its tone is gritty and earnest, with a seventies network-television sensibility that favors tense case work over spectacle. Set in the 1970s United States with international reach toward Southeast Asia, it is a rare crime series that treats global organized crime as its scale. Fans of Hill Street Blues, Kojak and Adam-12 will find resonance in its blend of police work, episodic cases and undercover tension.

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