Superhero Films Since 2000

Superhero Hero Films from 1990-1999

Superhero Films Before 1990

1.1. Across the board, negotiators tend to have excellent self-control, calm under stress, communication skills, a calm and confident demeanor, strong listening and interviewing skills and the ability to work effectively on a team.  They’ll have at least 40 hours of training on techniques, abnormal psychology, active listening skills, case studies and drills.

2. The main goal of negotiation is to convince the subject(s) to surrender.  If that is not possible, the secondary goal is to give the SWAT team the best opportunity to rescue the captives with a minimal loss of life.  To accomplish these goals, the negotiators want to:

• Stall for time.  First, time allows emotions to cool down, which reduces the likelihood of hostages getting killed.  Second, it may take hours (rarely, even days) for the subjects to realize how hopeless their situation is.  Lastly, if it does come down to a shootout, the operation will be more successful and less dangerous if the SWAT team has had time to prepare.
• Establish communication and develop rapport.  For example, the subject might be thinking about giving himself up, but he isn’t sure whether the 20+ armed cops outside will shoot him if he comes out.  A negotiator could work something out fairly easily.  For example, “if you’re ready to come out, the police will lower their weapons.”  (By the way, if the police are willing to lower their weapons, they probably have sharpshooters ready to fire if the subject reaches for his gun).
• Gather intelligence.  A secondary negotiator should check the subjects’ criminal, civil, medical and psychological records and conduct interviews with friends/family/coworkers.  Is the criminal actually likely to kill his captives?  What might cause an escalation? What actions could the police take now and after the crisis to make sure that there’s a long-term solution here?

3. The negotiator’s tactics will be shaped by whether the subject has substantive demands. If the subject has a tangible goal in mind, he’s usually more rational and less dangerous.  For example, a subject that kidnaps someone in the hopes of ransoming him back to the family and prison rioters that grab prison guards to keep the police at bay would be “hostage-takers” because they want some sort of negotiated settlement.  In contrast, somebody that has taken a “victim” by force has no clear, negotiable goals.  For example, a spouse might fly into a rage over divorce and/or infidelity or a laid-off worker might capture his ex-boss.   Victims are in much more danger than hostages because a hostage-taker has no personal incentive to kill his hostages.  Killing his hostages destroys his bargaining leverage.  In contrast, a victim-taker might want to commit murder-suicide.

Negotiating with hostage-takers: 

• The negotiator will try to lower the HT’s expectations.  The negotiator will probably stall him at every turn (frequently by claiming that he has to consult with his commander before any decision can be made).  The negotiator will rarely offer a HT anything for free because that would empower him to demand other things for free and help convince him to keep going.  For example, “My commander would be willing to pull back the police barricades a little, but only if you [fulfill some police desire, like releasing a hostage or tossing an extra gun out the window].”   By the way, if the subjects have extra guns, it’s helpful to try to convince the subjects to give them up.  Removing excess firearms reduces the amount of people they could kill without reloading.  (In a shooting situation, the subjects will probably not have time to reload).
• Hostage situations are much safer.  95% of hostage situations are resolved without any loss of life (hostages or hostage-takers). Even missing deadlines might not convince a HT to start killing hostages.  ”Remarkably few hostages have ever been harmed as a result of missed deadlines. Of course, negotiators take deadlines and demands very seriously; however, skilled negotiators generally can work around them and even make them work to law enforcement’s advantage.”
• Negotiators can reason with the subjects and discuss the benefits for coming out quickly.
• Police will usually be deployed more boldly in a hostage situation (to encourage the HTs to think about the potential cost of not negotiating), but police should not be deployed in an overtly threatening fashion.  The goal is “to bring the subject to the table, not to his knees.”

Negotiating with people that seize victims: 

4. Negotiators should make it as easy as possible for the subject to surrender.  First, negotiators don’t call it “surrender.”  Euphemisms like “come outside” make it sound less cowardly.  Second, negotiators should carefully consider how they can conduct the “surrender ritual” (surrender and arrest).  According to one FBI negotiator, “Some subjects want to shave and put on a clean shirt because they want to look good on the news.  Other subjects want to look like ‘bad guys.’ A British colleague reported that he told a subject that a sweater could be put over his hands so friends, neighbors and relatives outside the house would not see him in handcuffs.”  The most awesome surrender ritual I have heard of is when one subject asked to be tackled by the SWAT team so that he could brag in prison about how it took 10 or 20 cops to take him down.  And even then he got some good punches in, or so he claims.  ;-)

5. Other miscellaneous negotiation tips:

• Negotiators are loathe to lie.  There are long-term costs to dishonesty.  First, it will be difficult (if not impossible) for this particular criminal to trust the police ever again, which could be a huge problem if/when the criminal gets of prison and tries this again.  Also, the criminal might tell everybody in prison that the police lied to him, which will make it harder to manage them in prison (and afterwards, if they continue to commit crimes).
• Negotiators shouldn’t be judgmental.  The subjects are going through extreme emotional duress and they will have an easier time controlling their emotions if they believe that there is someone at least trying to understand them.  So negotiators should not call them criminals or hostage-takers, but rather address them in a way that the criminals would like. (Don’t worry, there will be plenty of time to call the HT whatever you want at the trial, but don’t let your ego get people killed now).  Also, negotiators should probably avoid words “hostages,” “victims” or “captives.”  Use more humanizing terms.
• Since Ruby Ridge, psychological warfare tactics (like breaking windows, tossing rocks and playing loud rock music) have been phased out in hostage and victim situations.
• Between radios, TVs, computers and smart-phones, assume that the subjects have full access to what the media is reporting.
• If and when the SWAT team is ready to kick in the door, the negotiator will probably get on the phone with the lead subject to distract him.  This helps give the police an idea of where the lead subject is and gives the police a chance to explain anything that the subject might see or hear.  Finally, if the subject has a hand on a phone and is distracted by conversation, he’s probably NOT pointing a gun at a hostage.  When the police kick down the door, that’s ideal.
• Hollywood loves the idea of negotiators talking face-to-face with subjects, but it doesn’t happen much in real life and doesn’t make much sense.  Nobody’s ever been killed over the telephone. If you really want the drama of having somebody go inside, sending in a doctor/medic is somewhat more believable.  At least the police have some reason to send in a doctor–a doctor can’t tend to a wound or a medical complication over the phone.
• Killing the subject is not an ideal outcome.  Most hostages and victims die in tactical operations.  If a hostage/victim gets killed in a tactical operation, the police department could get hammered by a lawsuit unless the police can show that they exhausted every other option and that a tactical operation was absolutely necessary.   Expect a lot of second-guessing from politicians, media and the public if anything goes wrong.  Also, depending on the race/ethnicity and/or political goals and/or anything remotely likable about the criminal(s), the police could get political heat for killing the criminal even if no innocents are harmed.

• Revenues from adult novel sales grew 8.8% from 2008-10.
• Juvenile fiction revenues grew 6.6%.
• In total, book-publishing revenues are up 5.6% and total sales are up 4.1%.
• From 2008 to 2010, e-books grew from .6% to 6.4% of the total market for books.
• Adult hardcover and paperback books grew only 1% and mass-market paperbacks declined 16%.  (Ouch).

Hat-tip: This Week in Writing, by Mark Evans.

• Someone caught in a botched crime.  For example, maybe the criminal is trying to rob a bank, but the police respond unexpectedly quickly.  In the heat of the moment, an utterly trapped criminal might take hostages out of desperation.  In his stress-addled mind, he might think that taking hostages is the only way to somehow effect an escape and avoid a 15+ year sentence.  (He might even have dreams of demanding a helicopter, but that’s a Hollywood fantasy).
• Someone that cannot outrun the police.  For example, if the police come to serve an arrest warrant, an unwilling suspect might take a hostage (usually a family member) to buy time and space for an escape.  Alternately, rioting prisoners may take guards as hostages to deter police reinforcements from retaking the prison by force.
• Somebody in an emotional crisis without a clear set of negotiable demands.  For example, a laid-off worker might seize his former boss or a disturbed lover might seize his/her significant other after being rejected.  These criminals are not looking to bargain.  In police parlance, these criminals are not considered “hostage-takers” because “hostage” implies tangible demands.  People captured without demands are “victims.”  Victims are in much graver danger because the criminal may have murder-suicide in mind.  In contrast, a “hostage-taker” does not have a personal incentive to murder the hostages.  (If you murder a hostage, you lose your bargaining leverage).

2. Hostages are fairly high-maintenance, particularly in long-term standoffs (which are very rare).  In the short-term, the criminals have to worry about food/water, toilets, the potential for medical emergencies and the difficult task of controlling the hostages.  In the long-term, the criminals also have to worry about hygiene, medicine and recreation/hostage morale.  (The HTs probably do not have any humanitarian concern for the hostages, but there are strong reasons to care. Happy/healthy hostages are easier to control, less likely to infect criminals and less likely to result in a murder conviction.  Also, killing a hostage that happens to be a prison guard could be very hazardous to an HT’s health when he is returned to police custody).

2.1. Keeping a handful of hostages is much easier than keeping many, especially if the HTs don’t have the manpower to control many hostages.  But the police will still give criminals a lot of latitude even if they have a relatively small number of hostages. The police will offer the criminals incentives to release some hostages and make other seemingly meaningless concessions (like giving up any extra firearms).

3.  Taking and constantly watching over hostages is extremely stressful.  The criminals’ minds will probably start to play tricks on them as the siege wears on.  They can only keep going on pure adrenaline so long.  Also, most hostage-takers aren’t very mentally balanced to begin with.

4.  If there are multiple hostage-takers, there’s some possibility of internal dissension.  If a hostage-taker was having second thoughts about following his leader into death and/or an extremely long prison term, he might surrender himself to the police anticipating that he will be treated much more leniently.  The FBI negotiator that wrote Stalling for Time recounted one incident where a hostage-taker got only four years in prison because he surrendered quickly and never pointed a gun at the hostage, for example.  Alternately, perhaps it’s the leader trying to keep the situation from devolving into violence (which will result in the police kicking down the door).  But it might only take one accidental round from a trigger-happy HT to convince the police to burst in to save the hostages from possible execution.  Alternately, a criminal may start to have second thoughts about the sanity of his teammates and/or leader.  In a really complicated situation like a prison riot, there might be different factions vying for different goals.

4.1.  There are quite a lot of scenarios under U.S. law where a non-violent kidnapper really gets nailed.  If a hostage dies for any reason (criminal gunshot, police gunshot, heart-attack or possibly a miscarriage induced by stress, etc), every kidnapper can be charged for murder–even if they didn’t fire a weapon.  If one of the criminals is waving his gun around like it’s a toy, a more practical HT might wonder about where this is going and whether he can get off this train before it’s too late.

5. Most hostage situations end with a whimper, not with a bang.  95% of hostage standoffs end without any loss of life.  According to Crisis Intervention Strategies by Rick James (not that Rick James, unfortunately), the most common resolution is that the police are able to draw out the situation long enough that the criminals get emotionally overwhelmed, realize that they do not have control of the situation, lose hope and eventually surrender.

1. I’ve included the movies that have come out in the past year (X-Men: First Class, Thor and Green Lantern).
2. A few people thought that it would be fairer to look at only the current wave of superhero movies (starting in 2000 with X-Men).  I’ve added a section comparing both companies’ performance post-2000.

Summary

• Including the older movies, the average Rotten Tomato score was 50.2% for DC and 58.1% for Marvel.  If we look only at the modern movies, the gap narrows somewhat.  Since 2000, DC has averaged 54.8% and Marvel has averaged 59.9%.

• Marvel has been having more critical success with more series.  Since 2000, DC’s non-Batman movies have averaged 47.1%.  Since 2000, Marvel’s non-Spiderman movies have averaged 55.8% and its non-X-Men movies have averaged 56.4%.

DC Movies

A-Grade (80+ on Rotten Tomatoes)
The Dark Knight-94%
Superman-94% *
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm-87% *
Batman Begins-85%
Superman II-83% *

B-Grade (60-79 on Rotten Tomatoes)
Batman Returns-77%*
Superman Returns-76%
V for Vendetta-73%
Batman-71%
Watchmen-64%

C-Grade (40-59 on Rotten Tomatoes)
The Losers-47%
Constantine-46%
Batman Forever-44%*

D-Grade (20-39 on Rotten Tomatoes)
Green Lantern – 25% (after three days of reviews–this figure may change slightly as more reviews come in)
Superman III-23% *

F-Grade (19 or less on Rotten Tomatoes)
Steel-13% *
Jonah Hex-12%
Batman and Robin-12% *
Superman IV: The Quest for Peace-11% *
Catwoman-10%
Supergirl-8% *

*–These movies came before 2000.

Marvel Movies

A-Grade (80+ on Rotten Tomatoes)
Spiderman 2-94%
Iron Man-93%
Spiderman-90%
X2: X-Men United-88%
X-Men: First Class-87%
X-Men-81%

B-Grade (60-79 on Rotten Tomatoes)
Thor-77%
Iron Man 2-73%
Incredible Hulk-66%
Spiderman 3-63%
Hulk-62% (How!?)

C-Grade (40-59 on Rotten Tomatoes)
Blade II-58% *
X-Men: Last Stand-57%
Blade-55% *
Daredevil-44%

D-Grade (20-39 on Rotten Tomatoes)
X-Men Origins: Wolverine-36%
Fantastic Four-36%
The Punisher-30%
FF: Rise of the Silver Surfer-26%
Ghost Rider-26%
Blade Trinity-26% *

F-Grade (19 or less on Rotten Tomatoes)
Elektra-10%

*–These movies came before 2000.

Here are some other ways to look at the data.

ALL OF THE ABOVE MOVIES (REGARDLESS OF YEAR)

Including the older movies, the average Rotten Tomato score was 50.2 for DC and 58.1 for Marvel.

ONLY MODERN MOVIES (SINCE 2000)

Excluding the older movies, the average Rotten Tomato score was 54.8% for DC and 59.9% for Marvel.  That’s closer, although Marvel movies are still a bit better on average.

Some other trends that stuck out.

• In the modern era, Marvel is having more critical success with more series. In the modern era, DC averaged 54.8% with all movies included, but 47.1% in non-Batman movies.  Marvel averaged 59.9% with all movies included and 55.8 in non-Spiderman movies and 56.4 in movies without X-Men.  In the modern era, DC has had 4 non-Batman movies rated A-grade or B-grade.  Over the same period, Marvel has had 8 non-Spiderman and 8 non-X-Men A-grade or B-grade movies.  
• Hollywood is still as inept with female leads as it was 25 years ago. Elektra (10%) and Catwoman (10%) turned out as bad as 1984′s Supergirl (8%).  That probably can’t just be attributed to budget: Catwoman had a production budget of $100 million in 2004 and Elektra had $43 million in 2005.  According to IMDB, Supergirl’s budget was $35 million, which (if adjusted for inflation) works out to about $80 million in 2005.  Other films did much better with comparable budgets, such as X-Men ($75 million in 2000).  That said, most of the above movies had budgets between $100-200 million.

Questions? Concerns?  Other comments?  Please let me know and I might incorporate them when I update the survey with more recent releases.

1. Guns are loud!

Crazy loud.  Without any ear protection, a gun battle is louder than a rock concert.  The cartoonish image of somebody’s ears bleeding after a loud sound is almost accurate if a gun battle were to erupt inside a building. Decibel levels of a gunshot can be 140dB, which is more than four times as loud as a common rock concert (115dB). (See this breakdown for more info.) It is worth adding, though, that when adrenaline (and even morphine) levels are running high during a fight-for-your-life scenario, strange things have happened where (in addition to expected things like tunnel vision) gunshots feel much, much softer, so it’s conceivable for a conversation to take place right after a gun shot.  However, this is incredibly unlikely.

2. “Silencers” aren’t.

They’re also more formally (and accurately) referred to as suppressors. Technically speaking, they suppress the concussive shock waves that are released from the barrel in front of the exiting bullet. Suppressors tend to greatly reduce the “boom” associated with gunfire, but the sounds of the actual explosion of gunpowder and all the metal moving parts on the gun are not really decreased at all.  Either way, it’ll be very loud.  For example, most suppressors on the market will bring a .22lr round from 160 dB (loud enough to rupture an eardrum) to about 120 db (a rock concert or jet engine).

3. Gunfire rarely knocks somebody over by itself.

A shotgun blast from close range may knock back a lightweight person slightly, I suppose.  But conservation of momentum teaches us that the force hitting the victim is no more than the force of the recoil of the shooter, and that’s generally not enough to knock a person over. Especially with a handgun. Getting shot isn’t fun, though (see below), and the victim may lose their balance and fall down (though not very likely backward!) or trip and fall off a ledge if they double over in pain or otherwise react physically to being shot.  Just understand that it wasn’t directly from the force of the bullet.

4. Automatic fire wastes ammo.

It may be neat to watch an M16 (or even more amusingly an AK-47) run through a whole magazine of ammo, but realistically, fully automatic fire runs through ammo in a hurry. An M16 can theoretically fire at 750 rounds per minute (ignoring accuracy and magazine changes), or 12.5 rounds per second. Even with a typical 30 or 40 round magazine, those would be empty in about 3 seconds. Obviously you can attach a 100-round drum, but even at that you’re still talking about 8 seconds to empty it. The point is that in fully automatic fire you will run dry super quickly and have little to no accuracy. It’s fun to play with on a shooting range, but hardly ever practical.

5. “Spray and Pray” rarely actually works.

Also called a “death blossom,” sending automatic fire randomly into a crowd of enemy combatants has a very low success rate and wastes ammo very quickly (see #4 above). Even if you happen to hit a few of them, those hits may very likely be in non-lethal parts of the body, and so they may remain a threat. It is a much better idea to take quick but separate, more accurate shots. On the other hand, feel free to have an enemy shooting like this, it’s a good way to make them look crazy and not actually inflict much damage on their victims.

6. Guns usually can’t unlock doors.

Sometimes guns are shown being as used as a proximity card by just firing one perfect shot at a lock (or control panel) and unlocking a high-security door. That’s not very realistic. Access panels are a lot more likely to fail to function whatsoever if shot (with no change in the door’s locked status). Any physical lock, if shot, would become so corrupted with mangled metal that it may never open again! It is worth mentioning though that there are some breeching rounds that can be used to shoot out door jambs or hinges. Those are pretty cool!

7. Getting shot really hurts.

I fortunately cannot speak from firsthand experience, but I can tell you anecdotally that getting shot can cause a range of reactions. The most common is shock, which usually starts quickly.   The blood loss (and even just the shock of it) can cause loss of consciousness. If the round enters the chest cavity, it can bounce around, doing lots of damage in an instant. If it’s a hollow-point (or other) round, it can carve a huge path out of the victim’s body, causing damage to multiple organs and draining a lot of blood. If the victim is lucky, it’ll be a FMJ (full metal jacket) round, and a small and fast caliber, such as a .22 or even 9mm. Those may go fairly cleanly through the person (commonly called a through-and-through), which usually does the least damage (unless of course it is through-and-through the heart or something). So make sure your shooting victims observe the pain. (Unless they are coked out of their mind or have a superpower or something).

I will add that obviously most comic books aren’t revered for their realism. However, (especially with graphic novels) it helps if there are pieces of your work that are based in reality. Personally I appreciate it when real weapons are written about realistically. If you want to create your own weapons in your story, though, have at it!

Michael blogs at Art Room Melody, having been a bit of an artist his whole life. Having owned guns for many years, Michael has taken several firearms and self-defense classes and enjoys reading and writing about guns and their proper use as well as of course getting out to the range as frequently as possible. In his spare time he’s just a bit of a geek in general.

Reasons why a character might not be able or willing to obtain a warrant:

• Time.  Under the best of circumstances, a police officer can get a warrant within an hour, but in smaller towns, there might not be any judges on duty in the middle of the night.  Also, judges will be slower to respond if the case is less urgent (i.e. no lives are at stake).
• The police may not have probable cause yet.  Gotham’s police may find it suspicious that Bruce Wayne always seems to disappear right before Batman shows up, but that isn’t enough to get a search warrant for Wayne Manor.
• Warranted searches come with limits attached.  For example, if the police can convince a judge that a murder victim’s body has probably been stashed at a house, the judge would probably allow a search of the house but only places where a body would fit. If the police started searching drawers or other small containers, any resulting evidence would probably be inadmissible.

So let’s say your police officer doesn’t have a search warrant.  Under what circumstances can he legally search?

1.  The suspect voluntarily lets officers inside and/or consents to a search. “Hello, I’m Detective Smith and I have some questions.  May I come inside?”  If an owner lets the officer come inside, anything within plain view of the officer is admissible as evidence.  If an owner consents to a search, anything found is admissible.  Note: Consent must be freely and knowingly given.  If the officer uses deception or threats to obtain permission, any resulting evidence will probably be thrown out at trial.

2.  In certain circumstances, permission may be given by a third party. Third parties are almost always more receptive to searches because they have less reason to fear the police than criminals do. 

• A spouse (or anybody with equal rights to the property) can let police search.  Frequently, spouses don’t know about the criminal activity and will let the police look around if asked nicely.  One really effective tactic is emphasizing the possibility that the search may help clear the suspect.  (“We’ve received some troubling information about your husband and we’d like to clear his name as soon as possible.  Do we mind if we look around? We’ll leave everything like it was and you can watch us.  Or we can come back with a warrant later, but it’ll be messier”).
• An employer can let police search a workspace (including lockers and computers).  “We’ve received some troubling information about your employee.  Could we check his computer?  We’ll be real quiet.”  Note that a manager may be leery about offering access if she fears that the company is somehow involved in the crime.  If so, police can gently prod the manager with veiled threats like “We can come back later with a warrant, but if we do, we’ll have to cordon off the building.  It’d be bad for business.”
• Police can ask school officials for permission to search the lockers, purses and backpacks of minors without a warrant.  School officials don’t have much reason to decline such a request (they hate crime as much as the police do).
• When a child lives with his parents, a parent can allow police to search the child’s space unless the child pays rent or has otherwise established exclusive, private ownership over his space.
• A host can allow police to search a guest’s quarters. A landlord cannot.
• Hotel employees can let police search a vacant room.  See #9 for more details.
• Store-owners are usually very cooperative about sharing surveillance footage.  But you’ve got to be fast!  Many stores cut down on costs by retaping over old footage every few days.

3.  Exigent circumstances–action is immediately necessary to prevent physical harm, preserve evidence or prevent a suspect from escaping. For example, let’s say your officer is on patrol when he hears a scream from inside a building.  He would be entitled to force entry to investigate a possible assault in progress.  Anything he sees in the course of investigating this possible assault would be admissible.

4.  Some highly-regulated businesses can be searched without a warrant. For example, gun shops (see U.S. v. Biswell).  In your story, other such businesses might include weapons labs, explosives dealers and anything else with a high potential for public danger.  If you’re writing supernatural fiction, other such examples might plausibly include a magical wand shop, a mad scientist’s lab or a licensed chupacabra dealer.*  (*Bob’s Chupacabra Emporium–For All of Your Goat-Sucking Needs!)

5.  Arresting officers are entitled to perform a protective sweep of a property to make sure they’re not about to be ambushed. This is a limited search aimed solely at places where someone might be hiding.   In rare cases, a protective sweep can be performed without an arrest.  See U.S. v. Gould: The police only had enough evidence to question a suspect (rather than arrest him) and were allowed inside to speak with the suspect but he wasn’t there.  Given his assault convictions and run-ins with police, the officers were sufficiently concerned to perform a protective sweep.  They found illegal guns in his closet which were allowed at trial.

6.  Hot pursuit. If the police have been continuously chasing a criminal, they are entitled to follow him into a property and search without a warrant.

7.  Police don’t need much evidence to justify a patdown/frisking. If the police have reasonable suspicion that the suspect is armed or may be involved in criminal activity, they are entitled to pat down his outer layer of clothing for weapons.  During a frisking, the police are entitled to reach into layers of clothing or to turn out pockets only if patting down the suspect’s clothes revealed something that might be a weapon.  If the possible weapon turns out to be some other criminal evidence (like a burglar’s tool or drugs), it’s admissible.  However, if the object turns out to be a box that may contain criminal evidence, the police would probably not be entitled to open it (see U.S. v. Miles).

8.  The police have arrested the suspect. After a legitimate arrest, the police are always entitled to search the suspect.  Unlike a patdown, which is limited to the outer layer of clothing, the police can freely turn out pockets and have the suspect take off a jacket. If the suspect was arrested in his car and the police have probable cause to believe that it contains evidence related to the arrest, they can search the vehicle as well (see Arizona v. Gant).  Searches incidental to arrest are the most common type of unwarranted search. Note that some arrests do not require arrest warrants.  For example, if someone commits a crime within view of a police officer, he can be arrested and searched.  Anything found in this search is admissible, even if it doesn’t pertain to the original crime.

9.  The property is abandoned. For example, if somebody throws away drugs when they see a cop coming, the cop doesn’t need a search warrant to pick up the contraband and arrest the suspect.  If the suspect has since vacated a hotel room, the police do not need his permission to search the room.  (They would need to be let in by hotel staff, but that’s usually pretty easy because most hotels don’t like being used as criminal staging grounds).  If the suspect is still staying at the hotel room, the police would need his permission or a warrant.

10.  Vehicles entering the United States can be searched without a warrant. In your face, Canadians.

11.  The police encounter anything criminal in plain view while conducting legitimate police operations. For example, if a police officer was placing a parking ticket on a windshield and happened to see a bomb or smell drugs in the car, he could search the car and seize the evidence.  If the police were driving by a house and happened to hear a crime, they could enter and search the property.  If they had only noticed this crime because they were trespassing on the property, this evidence would probably be thrown out unless they had some legitimate reason to be there (like a warrant).

12. Inevitable discovery: Judges may allow evidence from an illegal search if the evidence would have been inevitably discovered by legitimate means.

13.  Some forensic evidence can be taken from a suspect without a warrant. For example, if the police bring in a suspect for voluntary questioning and offer him a can of soda, the suspect will throw away the can when he’s done, right? The police can use any saliva/DNA or fingerprints left on the can.  If the suspect signs in to the station, the pen will retain his fingerprints.  (Just make sure to clean the pen beforehand to remove any preexisting fingerprints).   Generally, the police cannot force suspects to give a blood sample without a warrant, but they may be able to do so if exigent circumstances require it.  For example, they could probably compel a driver in a traffic accident to provide a blood sample because they’re looking for evidence that would quickly dissipate (alcohol/drugs in the bloodstream) and waiting for a warrant would result in the destruction of evidence.

Disclaimer: This is based on what I learned from U.S. Criminal Procedure, but I am not a lawyer.  For further research, I would recommend checking out beginner-friendly textbooks like Criminal Justice in Action: The Core and Constitutional Law and the Criminal Justice System.  Also, I suspect that the rules are somewhat similar in other democracies, but please check resources geared towards the country your story is set in.

• What Does Your World Smell Like?:  This will help you incorporate smells into your story.  I don’t think smells come naturally to most first-world authors because we don’t encounter many on a daily basis.  That’s okay if you’re writing a story set exclusively in a sterile lab or a vacuum tube, but if you’re not, here’s some ideas about what you’re missing. 
  
• Worldbuilding Legal Systems: If you’re building alien legal systems, this will help you keep them distinct from the ones closest to home.  Especially if you’re Norwegian–nobody wants to read about publicly drowning criminals in mayonnaise, you sickos.
• Clothes and Setting: This provides useful ideas about picking clothing that is culturally and physically well-suited to your story.  (In case you’re saddled with characters that can’t rock out in trenchcoats and sunglasses).
• Language in Worldbuilding: This has some helpful ideas about how to use language to reflect cultural attitudes and other ways of thinking.  You know how Eskimos supposedly have ~30 bajillion words for snow?  Starcraft’s Protoss need just as many ways to say “we’re screwed.”

PS: I’m looking forward to Hayes’ upcoming superhero anthology, Gods of Justice, and not just because it won’t have many executions-by-mayonnaise.  She and Kevin Hosey really know their stuff.

1. Please do not ever use more than one exclamation mark at time.  It looks awful!!!
2. Even if you’re writing a heated conversation, please don’t end a string of sentences with exclamation marks!  It will look really strange!  I wouldn’t recommend it! In a heated conversation, readers can infer that the characters are shouting at each other even if the sentence ends with a period.
3. If you’re inclined to capitalize words for emphasis, 1) don’t and 2) if you do, please do so super-sparingly.  (No, really, just a FEW times in the manuscript, PLEASE.  It’s SO HARD to read when AUTHORS just seemingly use all-caps AT RANDOM).

• Like most superheroes, bounty hunters have a non-government job that entails some violence.
• They hunt criminals without all of the assets of a police force (authority, the ability to threaten prosecution for noncooperation, forensics labs, generous access to state records, virtually unlimited backup, etc).

Learning more about bounty hunters may give you some ideas about how to write superheroes cracking cases, so I’d recommend checking out this Washington Post article (hat-tip: Contra Glove).  In particular, I liked the tactic of calling the fugitive’s cell phone*, posing as a FedEx dispatcher and then asking the fugitive if he will be available tomorrow for a package delivery.  “Can you confirm the street address?”

(I also found the use of MySpace pretty hilarious, but I’m sort of hoping that your Lex Luthor isn’t on MySpace).

*You can get somebody’s number by asking family members,  friends, disgruntled exes or sometimes the cell company.

“Feeling is believing,” [the head trauma surgeon] tells a glassy-eyed intern as he fishes around in a knife wound in the back of a man’s knee, trying to augur whether its damage to the vein or the artery.  Watching [the doctor] operate shatters the illusions of TV medicine….

For [one thing], when he operates it is not the stuff of daintiness accompanied by the subdued pings of the EKG machine. He is often elbows deep inside the victim’s cavity, tugging and rooting around as if he’s lost a set of keys. And then there is his bedside manner, which is not so much sympathetic clucking, but rather a combination of pugilism and cold-water truth that has an odd but soothing effect on the patient….

And in the pursuit of saving lives, [the doctor] has donated his life. At 46, he has consistently worked 100 hours per week for more than two decades, which would make him 70 years old in working years. He plays no golf, reads no novels, has few friends and spends more time at the hospital than with his wife and three children.