Police Squad! Police Squad! Police Squad! is an American television comedy series broadcast on the ABC network in 1982, created by David Zucker, Jim Abrahams, and Jerry Zucker, and starring Leslie Nielsen as Frank Drebin. A spoof of police procedurals, the series featured Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker's usual sight gags, wordplay and non sequiturs. While a parody of many television shows and movies, it bore a particular resemblance to the Lee Marvin cop show, "M Squad" (especially the opening credits) and the late 1960s series "Felony Squad". Although cancelled after six episodes, the show spawned "The Naked Gun" film series. In 2013,
Police Squad! The final two episodes were aired that summer. According to the DVD Commentary of "A Substantial Gift" (episode 1), then-ABC entertainment president Tony Thomopoulos said "Police Squad!" was cancelled because "the viewer had to watch it in order to appreciate it." What Thomopoulos meant was that the viewer had to pay very close attention to the show in order to get much of the humor, while most other TV shows did not demand as much effort from the viewer. In its annual "Cheers and Jeers" issue, "TV Guide" magazine called the explanation for the cancellation "the most stupid reason a