"The Big Producer" is not one of the better episodes of the original "Dragnet" television series. It suffers from being a bit too vague but the biggest problem is the final 10 minutes--as they just drag and could have used a HUGE editing.
The show begins with Friday and Smith going to a local high school to arrest the school's resident porno prince (Martin Milner). Apparently he's selling porn to his classmates and someone has complained to the police At first, the kid is evasive and denies everything but soon the little rat is spilling his guts--implicating another student as well as the dirty old man behind the business.
Following this, the officers track down leads to find the guy, as he's not just guilty of distributing this material to kids, but he's also apparently photographing under-aged models. Here's the problem, however, they find the guy rather quickly. What follows is what looks like one of the most blatant examples of padding I've ever seen--with the goofy old guy taking the detectives on a very long and meandering stroll down memory lane.
As far as the vagueness goes, apart from photographing some naked teens and selling it to other teens, the viewer is left wondering what really constitutes pornography in this. I especially was confused when Milner's character referred to some of the magazines as 'joke books'. Huh? Were dirty jokes considered pornographic? Were there pictures in them? What?! The bottom line is that this episode of "Dragnet" isn't written or paced well. Enjoyable, yes, but nothing more.