Their opinion may be based on reading about actual encounters in the present day world. Police cheerleaders always raise the strawman of Hollywood movies as a way of deflecting any criticism of police, as if it's impossible to arrest someone without turning them into Swiss cheese. In the non-Hollywood world, police work is not even in the top ten of dangerous occupations, and federal law enforcement, intel and military police, who are tasked with arresting subjects alive, often cope with armed suspects without unleashing a hail of gunfire. The idea that police are immune to criticism from the people they work for is malarkey.