The most unrealistic aspect of the various CSI shows

LOL. I don't get to see Miami much because it's on while I'm at college but does this mean we should add hair related continuity errors to the list?

 

I agree that the length of time it takes to get results on DNA and so on is really an unrealistic part of CSI. However it doesn't particularly bother me that much, as realistically they can't do an episode of CSI without doing it that way.

I've mentioned this before, but something, which really, really annoys me, is how CSI seems to think contact lenses just fall out at a crime scene. I wear contacts and believe me they do not just fall out, it takes some doing for that to happen.

 

Why is it they can't get a knife mold from a wound tract? Too much distortion?

 

when you get stabbed or injured in a similar fashion, the tissue doesnt hold the shape of whatever did the damage. muscle and skin will spring back as close as possible, narrowing the wound tract. so you couldnt pour the plaster into the wound and get an exact mold of whatever caused it.

i remember seeing on the news real forensics people wearing the paper jump suits, booties and hair nets so they wont contaminate the scene. but we wouldnt want to watch that now would we? we want them in sexy little numbers with as much of the bits hanging out as possible :lol:

noticed in this weeks vegas episode, sophia moved the paper bag containing the gun with her own gun. and in other episodes they use objects to touch things before they put gloves on. im pretty sure they dont do this, because you can still contaminate things with residue or whatever on the object youre using to touch the evidence

 

Soft tissue just doesnt hold in the shape of the weapon or projectile that was used on it. It has give. It rebounds. Neither will it stay in place if you pump a syringe full of latex into it. Even just measuring the depth of a knife wound wont give you an accurate blade length particularly if the wound has been inflicted with some force.

Knife marks on bone are easier to interpret because bone isnt so elastic. It holds impressions that can be examined in much the same way as tool marks on other materials.

A number of articles have been upblished in the media about what the legal community call "The CSI Effect" where juries often have unrealistic expectations of what forensics can achieve from watching crime shows. Here's a good one from USA Today.

 

Ah so my suspicion was right. And I've seen the body covering thingy, my thought is that the writers want the characters to be sexy and not hide under all that stuff and if they wore face masks their lines would be muffled.

 

About the body covering thing, on the show they have said that humans shed like 1,000,000 hairs a day (or something.. I forget ) and that's how they find hairs sometimes.. But then the CSIs wear their hair down all over the place and they never collect a hair that's one of their own.

 

we shed about a hundred hairs a day, a million is a little off but yes, if they dont have their hair covered they would drop some hairs all over the crime scene

 

I think that deep down everyone knows that its pretty unrealistic, but when your watching it, at least for me, you just forget everything else, and don't care how off-beat it is, and usually, you don't even want to.

 

ha-ha... my sister always say: why don´t they use the light?! but i guess, like other people have mentioned, that it´s for the details...
we also talk about how Cath and Sara can drop a few hairs without them being covered-up.. but it wouldn´t be nice on tv... we keep forgetting that this it´s entertainment and it will have a few changes (from reality) in order to please us...

 

Well.... it's common knowledge that DNA processing takes at least a month to cough up a written report. Not 5 seconds.

But hey, it's TV lol

 

I have noticed some things that are not realistic, but I don't care...For me, CSI is all about having fun and enjoy while watching...Plus, it's a Drama Series, not a Documentary, so we can't blame them for do not show exactly the reality! They have to keep things interesting for who is seeing...it wouldn't be nice have to wait three episodes to see the DNA results from today's epsisode case...So, even though I agree that there are some incorrect things, I don't really give them a lot of importance...

 

i aggree. or if they have to go to a normal home where dogs, and up to 5 people live. in a suburb. no fancy cars or anything. something normal for a change.

 

oh i forgot about the contact lens thing! i only wear colours sometimes, but i was sitting having lunch at school and the thing just peeled off my eye i wasnt doing anything, so it could happen. it only got about half way off before i stuck it back in there though

 

It might not be unrealistic but does anyone else think it's weird that they now have gun-shaped torches?? So instead of holding a gun ready and shining light on a body, they could accidentally shoot the body and be in the dark?? Not v. good...