5 Forgotten '60s TV Crime Dramas That Are Perfect For A Modern Reboot

Decades before "Law & Order" premiered, there were still plenty of shows about law and order. The 1960s were awash with crime dramas, many of which have since fallen into obscurity. Now that there's such an appetite for crime shows in the 2020s, however, why not look back to the '60s for shows that could be rebooted for the modern era?

While it's reasonable to suggest that we need more original programming on TV and not less, the following five series are still interesting candidates for a reboot. Each of them has an interesting premise, and most of them were cancelled before they could fully explore it. 

Some of these shows have a setup that would actually work better in the 2020s, as modern shows enjoy higher budgets and a greater ability to show violence and the dark side of crime. A few would benefit from a pretty drastic reinvention for the current age; others need only be brought back to the airwaves with a fresh coat of paint. If nothing else, let this list of forgotten '60s crime shows serve as a prompt to revisit the original series while waiting for their (hypothetical) reboots. 

Charles Bronson starred in the NBC series "Man With a Camera," which technically premiered in the late '50s but was still on the air when the '60s began. One of Bronson's first leading roles, coming out a few months after he played the title character in the gangster-noir "Machine-Gun Kelly," "Man With a Camera" follows former World War II combat photographer Mike Kovac (Bronson) as he makes a living collecting photographic evidence for cops, lawyers, and other paying customers. Often, this ends up being dangerous work, but Kovac gets the shot — in part because he has top-notch camera equipment, which includes hidden cameras in gadgets like radios.

On the one hand, the idea of a heroic photographer fighting crime seems a little bit harder to pull off in the current day, when everybody walks around with a camera in their pocket all the time. Add to that the increasing concerns of misinformation and the possibility that images could be faked or made with A.I., and the man with a camera's mission seems both less impressive and harder to pull off. But that's exactly the challenge that a reboot could rise up to. What crimes could possibly require the special skills of a combat photographer to expose, and what new camera techniques and technologies might a modern cameraman have access to? And of course, if the new show finds the next Charles Bronson as its star, all the better.

Airing for one 39-episode syndicated season in 1961, "Johnny Midnight" followed an actor-turned-private investigator who solves crime around Broadway and Midtown Manhattan. Sometimes, his acting abilities come into play as he adopts disguises and performs a new identity to get closer to a crook.

A reboot would have to change a lot of things about the original show, including getting rid of Johnny's Japanese manservant, a character trope that belongs far in the past. While the series was something of a straightforward throwback to noirs of the '30s with a Broadway seasoning, any reboot should fully lean into the camp. This could be a silly show — nay, it should be a silly show. The main character's name is "Johnny Midnight," for goodness sake. It ought to be a kitschy crime series for theater kids; perhaps a rebooted "Johnny Midnight" could even be a musical, kind of like "Glee" — except the main character is a middle-aged former actor working as a private detective.

Airing on NBC from 1961 to 1962, "Cain's Hundred" starred Peter Mark Richman as Nicholas Cain, a lawyer for the mob who decides he wants to leave his criminal connections behind once he gets engaged. The mob, however, doesn't take too kindly to their attorney abandoning them and orders a hit on Cain, only to accidentally kill his fiancée in the botched effort. Cain vows to get revenge working on the side of the law, teaming up with the FBI with the aim of prosecuting 100 mobsters. Sadly, the show was cancelled after 30 episodes, so he didn't quite get there. Perhaps, with a reboot, Cain could finish the job?

In the book "Masters of the Shoot-Em Up," Peter Mark Richman said NBC axed the series because the network was "concerned about the level of violence on their shows." Luckily, that's not as much of an issue these days. A reboot of "Cain's Hundred" would be free to have plenty of gunfire and action, and more than a couple of the hundred could easily meet grisly, bloody ends rather than facing justice in a courtroom. While there's plenty of possibility in "Cain's Hundred" for a prestige TV reboot, the nature of the premise makes it especially suited to an ongoing network series. (Think NBC's "The Hunting Party," but more legal drama and less conspiracy thriller.) If a network reboot tackled one of the mobsters every episode and each season was 22 episodes long, you'd have more than four seasons worth of criminals to bust!

In the '50s and the first half of the '60s, there were plenty of men on TV cracking cases and solving crimes. It wasn't until "Honey West" that a female detective got title billing and led her own show on U.S. network television. Based on a series of mystery novels, "Honey West" starred Anne Francis as Honey, a stylish karate master who inherits a private investigator business from her late father. Together with her later father's partner Sam Bolt (John Ericson) and Bruce, her pet ocelot, Honey proved she was not your old-fashioned gumshoe detective. And yet, while Honey dolls were briefly more popular than Barbie, the show ended after one season.

Thankfully, female-led crime series are no longer a novelty. There are some great crime series out there, like "Furious," with women in the lead role. Still, bringing Honey's fashionable brand of mystery-solving to the modern era would be a fun way of making sure the show's trailblazing legacy is remembered.

There's one potential problem for a "Honey West" reboot, however. In 2025, Ethan Coen released "Honey Don't!" The movie starred Margaret Qualley as a hard-drinking private investigator named Honey O'Donahue. It was also a critical flop and performed poorly at the box office. It's unclear if Coen was explicitly paying homage "Honey West," but, in any case, the movie's failure casts something of a stink over the concept. Maybe give it a few years so people can forget the movie before rebooting the unrelated show.

Burt Reynolds' breakout role was playing a Native American character on "Gunsmoke." He appeared as another Native character in his next major TV role, too — this time around, though, he was in present-day New York City rather than the Wild West. In the ABC series "Hawk," Reynolds played police lieutenant John Hawk, an Iroquois who faces prejudice while working on major criminal cases on the streets of the Big Apple. Reynolds, who claimed to have Cherokee heritage, once said the character wasn't "running around in moccasins or anything like that."

"I wanted to play this Indian my way — after all those years of watching TV Indians getting undignified treatment," he said (via Google Books). The show was serious, well made, and critically acclaimed. However, it was a ratings failure, partially because it was up against the highly popular "CBS Thursday Night Movie." It could easily have become one of the great detective dramas, but was cancelled too soon, ending after one season.

With so much wasted potential, "Hawk" seems especially ripe for a reboot. A new version of the show would, of course, have an actual Native actor in the lead role. The AMC drama "Dark Winds" provided a tremendous showcase for the great Zahn McClarnon; a rebooted "Hawk" could do the same for another actor, while also depicting Native characters in an urban setting, rather than a rural or historic one.