Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Saturdays, I will be reviewing Welcome Back Kotter, which ran on ABC  from 1975 to 1979.  The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi!

This week, Barbarino must decide between the Sweathogs and his new girlfriend!

Episode 3.10 “Barbarino In Love: Part Two”

(Dir by Bob Claver, originally aired on November 10th, 1977)

This week’s episode of Welcome Back, Kotter picks up where last week’s left off.

Because he is now dating Cassy, Barbarino has left Three Do’s and a Don’t.  The Three Do’s are now trying to figure out how to turn their quartet act into a trio triumph and needless to say, they are happy with neither Barbarino nor Cassy.  They’re angry at Barbarino for leaving them and they blame Cassy for distracting him from the talent show.  For her part, Cassy is not happy to learn that the Sweathogs now hate her and she tells Barbarino that, just because they’re dating, that doesn’t mean that they can’t compete against each other in the talent show.

Gabe takes Barbarino down to the local diner where he attempts to explain why everyone’s mad.  He places three empty glasses on the table in front of them and tells Barbarino to imagine that the glasses are the Sweathogs.

“Which one’s Horshack?” Barbarino asks.

“This one,” Gabe replies, pointing at the third glass.

“That don’t look like Horshack,” Barbarino says, “That looks like Epstein….”

And so it goes.

The important thing is that Barbarino eventually decides that it’s his duty to be the Don’t in Three Do’s and a Don’t.  The majority of the episode is taken up with the group performing at the talent show and, just as last week, it’s hard not to notice that their act seems a bit old-fashioned.  How many juvenile delinquents start a barber shop quartet?  That said, with the return of Barbarino’s winning smile, they’re a hit with everyone but Mr.  Woodman.

And that’s the end of that.  It’s a bit of a silly episode and I’m not really sure why it needed to be split into two parts.  The Sweathogs getting angry at Barbarino and Gabe helping Barbarino realize that he’s not the center of the universe is one of those plots that this show used a lot.  You would think that, at some point, Barbarino would finally learn his lesson and stop doing stuff like this but you would be wrong.  Of course, Barbarino’s whole thing is that he’s cute but dumb.

And he’s lucky that he’s being played by a young John Travolta, who had the hair and the smile and the attitude and the charisma to make Barbarino far more likable than he really had any right to be.  Some people just have that star quality and one need only look at the scenes where Travolta acts opposite Gabe Kaplan, Marcia Strassman, and Ron Pallilo to understand why John Travolta was the one who ultimately walked away from this show as a star.

Next week, Gabe is tempted to sell out and become vice principal!