If there's one thing we're not in danger of running out any time soon, it's police-related reality television shows. And while "Armed and Famous" may not have worked out the way producers and advertisers had hoped, there are plenty more where that beauty came from. But if it's hard to keep a reality show featuring real cops and the interesting work they do on the air, a reality show about mall cops might just be mission impossible. A long-time source of ridicule on show's like "South Park" and films like "Paul Blart-Mall Cop," the real men and women of retail security are finally getting their moment in the sun.

If you didn't catch the premiere episode of "Mall Cops," on TLC recently don't worry. There should be at least a couple more episodes before someone pulls the plug on the program. To be fair the show features the behemoth Mall of America - a shopping center the size of a small city located in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

If there was ever going to be a wildly entertaining foot pursuit of a shoplifter through a sprawling food court it would most likely take place here. But what's really happening is that the smart folks at M of A are trying to cash in on the popularity of the Kevin James movie "Paul Blart: Mall Cop."

When the movie came out earlier this year, Mall of America was inundated with requests from production companies. "We literally had dozens of companies come to us," public relations director Dan Jasper told the Pioneer Press. The mall picked a group that agreed to show the Mall "in a positive light."

In other words nothing that could actually be considered entertaining will be aired. So if you were hoping for pepper-sprayed, trouble-making skateboarders and obese security guards you're out of luck.

According to producers, what viewers will see are things like a shoplifting arrest, a celebrity on a roller coaster and at least one screaming mental patient. The MOA employs a security team made up mainly of retired military and police officers and young officers in training.

MOA has its own K-9 unit with three bomb-sniffing dogs and is the only non law-enforcement agency licensed to train its officers in an unnamed but elite form of martial arts self-defense.

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