Friday, April 23, 2010

CMRT Visits Alaska! Part 1





Criminal Minds recently shot part of episode 5.21 Exit Wounds in Frazier Park, CA. This episode takes place in the fictional city of Franklin, Alaska and the show needed a mountain locale to pose as the Alaskan town. CMRT paid a visit to the set on April 01, 2010 and took a few shots which we will gladly share with you.

The team was there filming a scene in front of the local sheriff's office (actually the Frazier Park newspaper office). Present were Thomas Gibson, AJ Cook, Joe Mantegna, Matthew Gray Gubler and guest star Wings Hauser as Sheriff Rhodes.











35 comments:

  1. Wow cool, thanks for sharing the pics with us!! :)

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  2. So....If they needed a mountain locale to pose as an Alaskan town, why didn't the just come to Alaska to film?

    As an Alaskan, I've always found it rather annoying how most films/TV shows "set in Alaska" are never actually filmed in Alaska....

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    1. I totaly agree with you. during the episode I was all "that ain't Alaska"

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  3. Another Angry Alaskan, thank god! Luna, just be glad they didn't use that god-awful plane over Denali shot. If they wanted a beatiful small town, why not Sitka? Sadly, Anchorage wouldn't fit.

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  4. Or Juneau, Homer or Seward!!

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  5. Ketchikan, Wrangell, Kodiak, Nome, Anywhere in Alaska... A

    But the most offensive part of this episode.... Alaska has no Sheriffs... VPO's, Police Officers, Alaska State Troopers, but there is not a sheriff in the state!!!!!

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  6. Ditto, all above. Wonder where the marina shots were filmed? When I saw the camper with the ubiquitous tramoline shot I thought for sure it was somewhere in AK. I, too, am tired of seeing "AK" TV and movies filmed in BC, CA and other non-AK places. WTH? And this is one of my favorite shows!

    Signed,
    Offended (Again) in AK.

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  7. Oh! And why is it always a fictional town if the story is supposed to be AK? Double WTH?!

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  8. I was thinking it was Alaska, but there were a few give-aways that, alas, it was not.
    1) no sheriffs and no Alaska-native type people, 2)several deer-hunting references (moose-hunting, anyone?), and 3) the house that had the air conditioning condensing unit prominently displayed. I've lived in Alaska a while and have yet to see a residence with an AC unit (I'm sure they exist, but are rare).

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  9. So lame!! For a minute some of the buildings resembled some I've seen in Valdez... Why don't they just film in Alaska?! I mean even the Propsal movie was actually filmed in AK... why is that so rare??? Alaskans know what is and isn't Alaska... So far they don't seem to be fooling anyone. Why fake it?! And why not know more of where it is supposedly filmed and incorporate it?! (moose hunting is far more likely than deer, sheriffs? Seriously? That was just a google away... Not that tough!)

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    1. Actually the Proposal was filmed in Massachusetts

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  10. another angry Alaska. You know we have tax incentives to film in this state. A little research goes a long way!! i too was offended about the sherrif bit. Alaska State Troopers!!! and the 1980's yellow license plate style, is slightly different then the 1990's and later yellow plates. you guys should really actually come to Alaska.

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  11. Seeing the palm trees at the marina gave it away!

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  12. I sure hate when they get the planes wrong as well. First they showed them flying in a beaver on amphib. floats and then they showed a super cub on straight floats.

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  13. Why do alaskans always have to pick everything apart? I lived in alaska for several years and found alaskans to be very bitter and always looking for the negative in things. Its just a television show.....get over it

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  14. The reason for staying in CA is to stay within budget. Same reason CSI Las Vegas is taped in SoCal, The Office of Scranton, PA, etc.

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  15. For the record... Franklin isn't fictitious. It's an old mining town, now a ghost town.

    http://wikimapia.org/6607381/Franklin-AK-Ghost-Town

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  16. Another Alaskan transplant that is PO'd about the "Alaskan" town shot elsewhere. BTW, The Proposal was NOT shot in Alaska, but in Rockport, Massachusetts!

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  17. This show needs to do more research. Alaska does NOT have a Sheriff's Department.
    If a show does Alaska, at least get something right.

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  18. All the trees were wrong, too
    They couldn't at least shot it somewhere with similar vegetation
    And seriously, a rabid bear?!?!
    It wouldn't been shot As soon as it came near the smallest town

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  19. My comment is that in summer in Alaska, the sun shines almost continually. There really is no "night". Darkness in Alaska is a winter phenomenon. I have lived in Alaska off and on for 20 years. I love Alaska and can't stand it when people misrepresent it. Who else feels the same?

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  20. Good episode, but BAD BAD BAD research.

    No sheriffs in AK, banned by the State Constitution, which only allows state and city LEO's.

    No deer; Caribou and Moose are the ungulates we hunt.

    No natives isn't THAT big an issue, especially if it is set in one of the white settlements. Tho not many are that monolithic, but one can go quite a while without seeing a native in Kenai or Seward. But anyplace that white-bread has decent internet available.

    And a 16yo would be tried as an adult up here. Just like the gang-member murderers. Who wind up serving time in McLoughlin until 18, then get shipped off to Hiland or Seward.

    Oh, and Franklin AK really exists. It's a ghost town near Chicken, but it's a real township from the gold rush.

    And there have been a couple serial cases since Hansen. Joshua Wade, tho only convicted of two, has bragged before of getting away with murder... according to a guy who served time in the same facility, he says he got away with two more. There's an unknown serial killer who's got three bodies. There was a suspected serial rapist.

    As for the lack of night, that ep is set probably around september... when there are a couple hours of dark in southcentral. But that was shot someplace way further south.

    bad research. call it Franklin WA, and it'd work.

    But even one of my favorite webcomics didn't know about the lack of sheriffs in Alaska. People just don't know.

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  21. Cool, I'm just waching this episode in France on channel TF1

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  22. If you go on Google Earth Franklin, AK location is 64° 9'49.28"N 141°46'9.38"O

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  23. From A Former Alaskan:
    It is irritating that they didn't actually shoot in AK, but I'm sure it was cost prohibitive to do so. But, there are a few errors made by some of the Alaskans here: First, moose and caribou are not the only things hunted, deer are hunted frequently. Finally, the film "The Proposal" was most definitely NOT shot in Alaska. It was filmed in California, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island.

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  24. I loved the episode even though it was not filmed in Alaska. I did miss seeing all the Carhartts and bunny boots. LOL. I knew it was Alaska because of the views. Not all places in Alaska have internet, I have a cabin in the middle of NO WHERE, Alaska and there is not any internet. It is only a TV show but some research would have been nice to make it more real. I am more concerned with the fact that most of the places they go for serial killers happens to be in Texas.

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  25. I'm from the AK I just want to say u guys are awesome. Except for the person that called us bitter people, we are not bitter. We are prideful. We just love our home and would like to see it portrayed acuratly. Your the only one that sounds bitter. -P.F

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  26. My goodness all tv shows have erroreous info scenes and dialect. It's only tv fantsy not a documentary.

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  27. I am watching this episode now. From the very first frame I knew they had it wrong. The chick would have had Xtratufs on. Then they kept talking about Sheriffs..not in AK. In fact it is highly unlikely they would have called in the FBI at all. State Troopers. Trees were wrong and I did catch the plane mix up. In fact they would not have crammed 8 people plus luggage in one float plane. It would have been overweight. No such thing as a rabid bear. No rabies in AK. If, and a very unlikely if, there was such a thing, the local people would have already shot it.

    Not too much in the way of deer hunting. mostly caribou, elk and moose.

    I love this show and generally they are dead on with their backgrounds, but they lost it on this one. And having lived in a small town of similar size in AK, nothing really looks as nice as that Inn. Too fancy on the outside. Interior was pretty accurate though.

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  28. Cmon ppl lighten up. They have a budget and I seriously doubt they travel to every town they say they are filming in. I live in central florida and laughed my butt off when they were supposedly traveling to a prison in central fl. It was all desert outside their car windows and you could see a mountain in the distance. Ummm first off there are no desert looking areas like that in central florida and there are DEFIANTLY no mountains. The closest thing we have to a mountain is some hills in Clermont. Those are the biggest hills in our flat butt state. I thought it was funny and didn't give it another thought. Calm down folks... Its a tv show... Lol

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  29. Don't think peeps are really bitchin about lack of filming in AK because ya know budgets. It's the fact they did no research at all, especially about things as basic as what kind of cops we have. For a show about criminals and the law they could have at least gotten that right.

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  30. Been here since the sixties. Always exciting to see ALASKA in a movie just as much as I like to see places on TV that we've been to. Hawaii 5 O. For example. It's fun to pick out the inconsistencies in the shows. Almost as entertaining as reading these reviews. Have to admit it would be nice to see all shows a little more real. But Hollywood is all about fake.

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  31. Been here since the sixties. Always exciting to see ALASKA in a movie just as much as I like to see places on TV that we've been to. Hawaii 5 O. For example. It's fun to pick out the inconsistencies in the shows. Almost as entertaining as reading these reviews. Have to admit it would be nice to see all shows a little more real. But Hollywood is all about fake.

    ReplyDelete

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