We have a rule here at Law In The Lounge: any program by Steven Bochco is worth a look, and probably a lot more. And the opening sequences of the first episode of "Brooklyn South" are worthy of a very long look indeed.

There is one very disturbed man roaming the Brooklyn streets, and he quite obviously has a particularly warped attitude towards our boys (and girls) in blue.

He heads straight to the 74^th Precinct station house to settle some obscure (and perhaps imagined) score, and it is not long before he has murdered two policemen at blank range with a handgun.

More carnage follows, and when the police finally capture the "perp", they leave him to bleed to death on the floor of the station house while the ambulance is on the way. Did one of them give him a kick in the chest for good measure, and will this be the actual cause of death?

Sgt. Richard Santoro is the show’s most endearing character, a desk sergeant with a heart of gold and the backbone of a soldier. A burly bloke with a mile-wide streak of compassion that is often stretched to the limit by the passing parade of rabble. Check out the way he dealt with his son’s teacher, who had the temerity to call the youngster "stupid" in front of the class (it had this reviewer cheering).

Officer Jimmy Doyle is the best cop in the house. Friend of widows and orphans, tactically brilliant and (predictably) bereft in his personal life, Jimmy is everyone’s best friend and his own worst enemy.

Internal Affairs Bureau Lieutenant Stan Jonas may appear temperate on the surface, but watch out when he gets you on your own at the station house. He is quite ruthless in his determination to get to the bottom of an internal affairs inquiry, and if that requires an overt threat, so be it!

Officer Ann-Marie Kersey was the fiancée of one of the officers who was killed in the pilot program, and there is a suggestion that she might not have the temperament for a long and fulfilling career in the NYPD.

Patrol Sergeant Francis Donovan seems like a great guy, but we know his secret – he’s a stooge for Internal Affairs, recruited out of the Academy.

Officer Phil Roussakoff is the new boy on the beat, and lucky for him he’s teamed with Jimmy Doyle, so he’ll be learning from a master. Should learn to be a little more circumspect.

Gary Basaraba is Sgt. Richard Santoro. Yes, he looks like the burly desk sergeant he’s playing in "Brooklyn South", but he trained at the prestigious Yale Drama School (alumni Meryl Streep), where he arrived fresh from a stint as a steelworker in Vancouver. Recognise him from the "Last Temptation Of Christ" and the inspiring "Fried Green Tomatoes"?

Dylan Walsh is Officer Jimmy Doyle. You probably last saw him playing second banana to a talking gorilla in the movie adaptation of Michael Crichton’s "Congo" (which should have been titled "Inconguous"). He did a lovely turn as Jake in Alan Alda’s "Betsy’s Wedding" (from which came a star of Bochco’s "Murder One" – for the answer take a look at our review of "Murder One") and as Peter in the underrated "Nobody’s Fool".

James Sikking is Internal Affairs Bureau Lieutenant Stan Jonas. An expert at the ironic smile, James is a veteran of Bochco shows, from "Hill Street" to "Doogie Howser" (he was Doogie’s dad). He has a very long list of past efforts, including a passable General MacArthur in "In Pursuit of Honor", "The Pelican Brief" (he was Denton Voyles), and back as far as 1963 in "Combat".

Richard T Jones is Clement Johnson, and was apparently brought on board to add to the minority representation in the ensemble cast. He has previously appeared in "NYPD", "Dangerous Minds" and "In The Heat Of The Night". You might have caught him in the appalling "Event Horizon" (he was Cooper).

Yancy Butler is Officer Ann-Marie Kersey. In 1997 she played Lucinda Hastings in "NYPD", following her television debut in "Law & Order". Her father is the lead singer of the reunited "Lovin’ Spoonful" (remember "Summer in the City"?). See her with Jean-Claude Van Damme (the muscles from Brussels) in "Hard Target" – didn’t see it? Neither did we.

This is only the latest in a sequence of brilliant dramas from the stable of producer/writer Steven Bochco, whose first effort was the finest television drama of the 80s, "Hill Street Blues".

That show has set the trend for everything that has followed, culminating in probably the best drama of the 90s, "NYPD Blue". But it hasn’t been all beer and skittles for Bochco, who at times seems to have overreached himself while searching beyond tried and true formulas – and this is probably why "Brooklyn South" succeeds, where the all-singing (yes, singing) "Cop Rock" and "Public Morals" have gone to the teledrama graveyard.

"Brooklyn South" marks the return to the traditional format for Bochco, who is an acknowledged master of the genre. Okay, he may never be the Fellini of the cop drama, but that’s fine with his millions of admirers, and even at his worst he is streets ahead of most of his imitators.

Brilliant co-creator David Milch admits the resemblance to "Hill Street Blues", but he believes he has learned a lot since his involvement in that groundbreaking drama. He co-produced this show and "NYPD" with Bochco

The show’s 74^th Precinct station house is in fact the 78^th, near Flatbush in Brooklyn. It has been perfectly recreated to the most exacting detail.

The violent crime in the opening episodes is a dramatization of a real event.

Does the theme song sound familiar? Of course it does, not surprising given the authorship of Mike Post, the writer of the themes to "Hill Street Blues" and "NYPD Blue".

Do you remember what happened to Michael DeLuise, when he played the part of Andy’s son in "NYPD Blue"? tick, tick, tick…..He was killed in an attempted robbery on the eve of his entrance to the police academy. The wonders of television, he is now resurrected to resume his career on the NYPD.

Some of the sequences in the pilot were reshot to include Officer Clement Johnson, a black officer, apparently to strike a more racially balanced mix in the station house personnel.

A message from the real Chief of the NYPD Patrol Borough Brooklyn South: "Our primary goal is to maintain a safe environment for those who live and work in our geographical borough…In Brooklyn South we accept a zero tolerance for those infractions which impact negatively on community quality of life…"

Have you noticed that "Brooklyn South" has a lot more exterior shots than its more claustrophobic cousin "NYPD Blue"?

Recognise some of the characters in the show? Of course you do, because they have appeared in other Bochco efforts. Apart from the previously mentioned Michael DeLuise (via "NYPD"), you will remember James Sikking from "Hill Street Blues" and "Doogie Howser"; Titus Welliver has played roles in "NYPD" and "Murder One"; Yancy Butler and Richard T Jones have appeared in "NYPD". The lesson? When Mr. Bochco offers you a minor role in one of his shows, do it!

"Brooklyn South" achieved a credible 12.2 share on its premiere in the US, and charted at number 19 for that week.

Real life Brooklyn Borough President Howard Golden was unimpressed with "Brooklyn South’s" depiction of his New York neighborhood as a haven of violence. The opening sequence of the show earned it a TV-MA rating in America, for violence and adult language.

The show is filmed both in Los Angeles and New York, most of the interiors on the former.

If you want an insight into the lingo and culture of the NYPD, read "NYPD: On The Streets With…" by Samuel L Katz, published by Motorbooks International.

Some of the lingo:

IAB - Internal Affairs Bureau, the cops that investigate cops.

CSU - Crime Scene Unit.

DOA - dead on arrival.

Go down - bad luck, you’re busted.

Lawyering up - the suspect wants to see a lawyer, not a good sign for the interrogating officers.

Perp - the criminal.

Rat squad - the slang for those police on IAB.

Reaching out - getting in touch with someone, or getting them to help in an investigation.

The house - the station house.

The job - you are a member of the NYPD if you’re on the job.

A suspect is shot on the street, identified as the murderer of some police in the precinct. The surviving police take him inside the station house and dump him on the floor, where he bleeds to death – with perhaps a little help from a swift kick in the ribs.

How did he die, from the point of view of the law? Was it the shots on the street? The lack of care in the station house? The kick in the ribs, from which he suffered a punctured lung?

This goes to the question of what lawyers call "causation". This is the requirement that there be an "actus reus" of a crime – a what? Lawyers love Latin, in fact in days past a law student was required to study Latin (and a good thing too, many older lawyers will happily tell you). Strictly speaking, this Latin term means "a guilty act", the voluntary acts (or ommissions) that make up a crime.

In the context of the plot of "Brooklyn South", it is important that the actus reus can be a positive act or a failure to act. So it is necessary to prove whether the accused’s own actions, or in this case the police failure to act, caused the death to occur. What is important here is that the action of the police would have to be the direct cause of the death – in other words, is the kick in the ribs, and the punctured lung that resulted, the direct cause of the death, or was it really because of the gun shots sustained in the street? And even if it is the latter, would the "perp" have died if the police had attempted to give him some assistance as opposed to merely leaving him to bleed to death. Complicated, isn’t it – that’s why you have those snappy lawyers to defend you in court!

Let’s look at another legal issue in the show, the activities of the Internal Affairs Bureau. In Australia, all police forces have an internal investigations mechanism.

This show is distinguished by its tightrope skills – it walks that very fine line between entertainment and the confrontational realism of life in an urban police precinct. It is a hallmark of Bochco shows that they confront racism, and other topical issues, with the subtlety of an oncoming train. Check out Bochco’s earlier "Hill Street Blues", or Andy Sipowicz in "NYPD Blue", for a reminder of this style of television drama. Like those shows, "Brooklyn South" is not a piece of fluff, for which there are sacrifices to be made, for instance, the jargon ridden dialogue that must be endured until some familiarity sets in.

It is impossible to consider this show without reference to its predecessor "Hill Street Blues", or the trademark skewed camera angles we have become accustomed to in "NYPD Blue". There are a lot more exterior shots in "Brooklyn South", and this allows graphic representations of the layer upon layer of cultural and racial mixes that characterise the Brooklyn area. This theme is carried into the use of a large ensemble cast, another hallmark of the Bochco/Milch partnership. Put it all together and you have a frenetic concoction of people and places that dares you to use a little more of the grey matter than we are used to from relatively monosyllabic efforts. The camera roams through the byways of these relationships like a covert agent, taking the series to a higher plane, if not a little on the dense side for a prime time drama.