Z-Cars

Z-Cars or Z Cars (pronounced "zed cars") is a British televisionpolice procedural series centred on the work of mobile uniformed police and CID detectives in the fictional town of Newtown, based on Kirkby, near Liverpool. Produced by the BBC, it debuted in January 1962 and ran until September 1978.

Z-Cars ran for 801 episodes, of which fewer than half have survived. Regular stars included Stratford Johns (Detective Inspector Barlow), Frank Windsor (Det. Sgt. Watt), James Ellis (Bert Lynch), and Brian Blessed ("Fancy" Smith). Barlow and Watt were later spun into a separate series Softly, Softly.