Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986!  The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!

Come aboard, we’re expecting you….

Episode 7.12 “Dee Dee’s Dilemma/Julie’s Blind Date/The Prize Winner”

(Dir by Richard Kinon, originally aired on December 3rd, 1983)

A detective (Don Gordon) tells Isaac and Gopher that he suspects a woman named Doris will be boarding the boat.  She’s supposed to testify in a high-profile divorce case and she’s been dodging the process servers.  The detective mentions that there’s a reward for turning Doris in.  That definitely get Gopher and Isaac’s attention.

And Doris (Markie Post) is on the boat!  Except she is pretending to be a teenager named Dee Dee and she’s speaking in an annoying squeaky voice.  Jerry Howard (Clark Brandon) meets Dee Dee and develops a crush on her.  Meanwhile, Jerry’s father, Phil (Geoffrey Scott), meets Doris and develops a crush of his own!  In the end, Doris falls in love with Phil and Jerry …. well, Jerry gets his heart broken but he claims not to care.  Phil is amused.  As for the divorce case, it’s settled so Doris doesn’t have to testify after all!

(And no, there’s no reward for Isaac and Gopher.  In fact, Stubing threatens to fire them.)

While that’s going on, author Daniel Baker (Tom Poston) wants to enjoy a romantic cruise with his wife (Abby Dalton) but he’s being blackmailed by his assistant, Wendy  (Leslie Easterbrook).  Wendy knows that Daniel plagiarized sections of his book and she threatens to reveal the truth unless Daniel has an affair with her.  This is one of those storylines that would have worked better if some different casting choices had been made.  As it is, noted sex symbol Tom Poston feels miscast.

Finally, Julie has a blind date boarding the boat.  He turns out to be a nerdy, overweight guy named Leonard Gluck (Walter Olkewicz).  Julie has nothing in common with Leonard and is planning on dumping him.  But then Leonard dumps her first and Julie has a crisis of confidence.  This story had the potential to reveal a new side of Julie but, in the end, Leonard revealed that he only dumped Julie to make her like him and Julie’s confidence was restored, along with her rule about not dating fat guys.

This was not a great cruise.  It took me two minutes to get sick of Dee Dee’s voice.  Oh well — not every trip can be a winner!