Boards
i've spent most of my morning trying to put together a list of tv detectives and their vices/angles...
Frank Columbo (Columbo) - occasional poor memory, cigars, bad driver, fondness for opera.
Jack Frost (A Touch of Frost) - dead wife.
George Smiley (Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy & Smiley's People) - regularly unfaithful wife.
Gene Hunt (Ashes to Ashes & Life on Mars) - an extremely heavy and unsuitable beige camel coat, sexism.
Theo Kojak (Kojak) - lollipops, an over-reliance on catchphrases.
Fitz (Cracker) - alcohol reliance, obesity, chain-smoking, extremely sweary.
Morse (Inspector Morse) - girly first name, being middle class, misogyny, real ale.
Jim Bergerac (Bergerac) - alcoholism, divorce, gammy leg.
Jim Taggart (Taggart) - failing marriage, ridiculously Scottish.
Hamish Macbeth (Hamish Macbeth) - lazy, lacks ambition, bad with birds.
Jessica Fletcher (Murder She Wrote) - widowed, no kids.
Thomas Magnum (Mangnum PI) - dead son, too American, too fond of wearing trunks.
Hercule Poirot (Poirot) - OCD, tache anxeity, infrequent sea sickness.
Sherlock Holmes (Sherlock Holmes) - eccentricity, anti-socialness, pipe smoking, silly hats, occasional dabblings into illegal drugs.
Tony Clark (Between The Lines) - regular extramarital affairs.
Jim Carver (The Bill) - alcoholism, failing marriage, spouse abusal, gambling.
Reg Hollis (The Bill) - longer, oddball, trainspotter, deep-rooted self-belief issues.
Robert Ironside (Ironside) - bad legs.
John Luther (Luther) - obsessive compulsive, over-emotional, seperated from hot wife.
Adrian Monk (Monk) - extreme OCD & phobias.
Dr Quincy (Quincy M.E) - dead wife, classic cars.
Vic Mackey (The Shield) - questionable morals, frequent affairs, autistic son.
Cedric Daniels (The Wire) - bulgy eyes, supreriors always being on his ass, occasionally unecessary shouting, failing marriage.
Jimmy McNulty (The Wire) - heavy drinker, shagger, occasionally lax with the parental duties, major struggles with authority.
* i'm aware that a couple of these are not actually detectives
feel free to add more...