Fairness and justice in fictional murder stories

As the differences between the U.S. and China are increasingly sharp, I have noticed one obvious commonality between the peoples of both countries, and that is an interest in murder stories. I remember when Chinese street stall literature flourished in the 1980s, the bloody legal story on the cover of the publication was particularly eye-catching, and occasionally there were two feet in high heels. Of course, we cannot ignore the amazing circulation of Shanghai "Democracy and Legal System" Weekly and pictorial. We are naturally interested in murder stories, and the associated fantasies of revenge, deservedness, and karma are not easy to achieve in real life, and getting justice from fiction is a sip of fine whiskey.

For American audiences, "Law & Oder," whose creative cycle spanned more than 30 years from 1990 to the present, spawned a series of spin-offs that totaled more than 1,200 episodes is also a miracle. The 2,262 murders in New York in 1990 have dropped to 488 in 2021, and the series, which features at least one fatality per episode, remains popular.

Each episode of "Law & Order" has a two-act structure, first with the police finding the victim's body, and then by the prosecutor's rhetoric in court to win the jury's approval to bring the perpetrators to justice. The former centers on respect for the deceased, even if he is a serial murderer, while the latter focuses on the moral dilemmas often encountered in the criminal procedure system.

I've just watched several episodes of the 2022 season, and the newer sentencing date is already February 25, 2022. After seeing a sensational crime in the media, screenwriters need to complete the script in a very short creative window, integrating fresh cases from all over the United States into the New York time and space, including the Bill Cosby sexual assault case, the Silicon Valley goddess Elizabeth Holmes fraud case , the disappearance of travel vlogger Gabby Petito and the tragedies sparked by inflammatory comments from far-right talk show hosts.