Category Archives: TV

Retro Television Review: St. Elsewhere 3.19 “Red White Black And Blue”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing St. Elsewhere, a medical show which ran on NBC from 1982 to 1988.  The show can be found on Daily Motion.

St. Elsewhere gets political!

Episode 3.19 “Red White Black and Blue”

(Dir by Eric Laneuville, originally aired on February 13th, 1985)

This week, on St. Elsewhere!

  • The First Lady is coming to Boston!  Though she’s going to be visiting Boston General, St. Eligius has been designated as a backup hospital.  While she’s in the area, the Emergency Room will be closed to everyone but her.  As well, some members of the hospital staff have been flagged as security risks — including Dr. Craig!
  • Dr. Craig is not happy about that but eventually, he’s cleared.  It turns out that his wife was the security risk because she once defended the Black Panther Party.
  • Betty White plays Captain Gloria Neal, a doctor who is on the First Lady’s security team.  She is an old friend of Dr. Westphall’s.  At first, it seems like she and Westphall might pursue a romance but it doesn’t happen.  I’m going to guess this is because Gloria realized that Dr. Westphall is the most depressing man on the planet.
  • When a severely injured man is rushed to St. Eligius, Neal refuses to open the Emergency Room.  So, Dr. Craig takes it upon himself to overrule her.  The man dies on the table.
  • Dr. Jacqueline Wade (Sagan Lewis) follows Captain Neal around, complaining about the president’s policies.  In fact, the entire hospital seems to be full of Democrats!  Wow, this President sure must have been unpopular.  Let’s see who it is …. hey, Ronald Reagan!  Three months before this episode aired, Reagan was reelected with 58% of the vote.  He carried 49 states, including Massachusetts.  Apparently, everyone who voted for Walter Mondale worked at the same hospital.
  • Mrs. Hufnagle is back at the hospital.  She is having heart problems.  Dr. Westphall glumly tells the doctors that they have been neglecting her because of her terrible personality.  However, not even Westphall can handle talking to her.  He passes the case over to Dr. Craig.
  • Fiscus has dinner with Shirley Daniels, who says that she hopes she goes to prison for shooting Dr. White.  The next day, Shirley is admitted to the hospital with appendicitis.
  • Victor Ehrlich wrong believes that a child has been abused by his mother.  He gets social services involved.  Later, Westphall sighs with regret and tells Victor that he did the wrong thing.  Westphall is being kind of a prick here.  Legally, if Ehrlich thinks that there’s been abuse, he’s required to report it.  Westphall seems to be upset that Ehrlich can’t read minds.
  • Finally, chronic homewrecker Nurse Rosenthal has to spend the day at the hospital so her lover, Richard, spends the day with her annoying children.  Well, I guess he certainly wasn’t going to spend it with his wife.  I will never understand why this show felt it was necessary to spend so much time with this particular family.  They were all annoying, every single one of them.

This episode opened with a homeless man using an American flag as a blanket and then went on to feature a man selling American flags getting attacked.  That’s about as subtle as things got.  It’s interesting that the show previously established Dr. Craig as being a Republican but apparently, with this episode, viewers were expected to believe that he was not a fan of Ronald Reagan’s.

In other words, this was not a great episode.  This felt like the medical equivalent of one of those Law & Order episodes where all of the salt of the Earth cops start talking about how they never miss Morning Joe.  

Finally, I feel bad for Mrs. Hufnagle,  Even annoying people deserve good medical treatment!

Late Night Retro Television Review: Hunter 1.4 “A Long Way From L.A.”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Thursdays, I will be reviewing Hunter, which aired on NBC from 1984 to 1991.  The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi and several other services!

This episode makes the mistake of pretending to leave California.

Episode 1.4 “A Long Way From L.A.”

(Dir by Arnold Laven, originally aired on October 26th, 1984)

Bleh.  This episode annoyed me.

Wally Wallerstein (Paul Eiding), a pickpocket wanted in Los Angeles, is arrested in Texas.  Because he needs a break from them, Captain Cain sends Hunter and McCall to retrieve him.  Wally turns out to be a nice guy but, when Hunter’s car breaks down in Wilson County, Texas, Wally is accused of attacking a local waitress and is then killed by a sniper.  The real culprit is pretty obviously Sheriff Jake Cutter (Bo Svenson), who is the stepson of Chuck Easterland (Morgan Woodward), the richest man in town.

Not a single small town stereotype went unused in this episode.  As a Texan, I was annoyed by the fact that everyone had a Southern (as opposed to a Southwestern) accent.  And while I understand that the show probably didn’t have the budget or the time to shoot on location, it was still hard not to smirk at the sight of a very California mountain range in the background.  This is the flatlands, folks.  We don’t have mountains like that in Texas.

Hunter and McCall need to stay in Los Angeles.

Retro Television Review: Decoy 1.30 “The Gentle Gun-Man”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Thursdays, I will be reviewing Decoy, which aired in Syndication in 1957 and 1958.  The show can be viewed on Tubi!

In this episode, Casey goes after a gun dealer.

Episode 1.30 “The Gentle Gun-Man”

(Dir by Michael Gordon, originally aired on May 5th, 1958)

After a man is shot dead while committing a liquor store robbery, Casey goes undercover as his widow.  The police don’t just want the man’s accomplice.  They want to know where the man got his specially-modified gun.  The accomplice turns out to be a rather gentle deli owner named “Knish” Levin (Ludwig Donath).  And the gun dealer turns out to be Mr. Johnson (James O”Rear), the same gun dealer who sold Casey her first gun.  (This episode implies that members of the police force have to buy their own guns, which sounds a bit odd.)  Needless to say, when Casey convinces Knish to introduce her to his dealer, Johnson immediately recognizes her.

This episode had a lot of New York location footage.  The scene where Knish leads Casey to Johnson took us from Wallstreet to the waterfront.  Indeed, the locations shots were the best thing about this episode.  The acting in this episode was, by Decoy standards, subpar, with even the usually reliable Beverly Garland struggling to sell her lines.  Unfortunately, this episode’s plot required Casey to make a lot of foolish mistakes, like going to see the gun dealer without proper backup.  I liked the fact that Knish wasn’t portrayed as being a typical thug but otherwise, this episode just didn’t work.

Late Night Retro Television Review: 1st & Ten 3.13 “Championship Jinx”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night 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 1st and Ten, which aired in syndication from 1984 to 1991. The entire series is streaming on Tubi.

This week, season 3 comes to an end.

Episode 3.13 “Championship Jinx”

(Dir by Bruce Seth Green, originally aired on December 16th, 1987)

Things have a way of working themselves out on 1st & Ten, especially when the season ends and a lot of plotlines need to be hastily wrapped up.

Last week, TD Parker (OJ Simpson) was arrested under suspicion of ticket scalping.  This episode, it turned out that 1) ticket scalping isn’t illegal and 2) TD’s ex-mistress quickly figured out that her boyfriend was trying to frame him.  Someone trying to frame OJ Simpson!?  Like anyone would ever buy that.  Anyway, the main theme here seemed to be that it was a good thing TD cheated on his wife because otherwise, no one would have been around to exonerate him.

Last week, Yinessa was letting fame go to his head.  This week, his father died and the funeral was a media circus.  Yinessa decided to focus on playing football. That’s a good thing, seeing as how the Bulls had yet another championship game coming up.

Zagreb was concerned that he was a jinx after he appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated.  (Yinessa told him that players who appeared on the cover often lost the spark afterwards.) Luckily, Cliff and Jethro brought in a voodoo priestess (Roxie Roker) to exorcise the jinx.

Before the game, Jill told the team that they weren’t only playing for themselves.  They were playing for the memory of Tom Yinessa’s father.  Unfortunately, the Bulls lost the game at the last minute when Billy Cooper’s game-winning catch was reviewed by the booth and declared to be out of bounds.  So, I guess Yinessa’s father is in Hell now.

And so ends the rather odd third season.  Coach Denardo left after the first episode.  Delta Burke left about halfway through the season, just to be replaced by a new female owner who gave a pre-game speech that referred to all of the previous times she had gone to the Championship Game with the Bulls just to see them lose, despite the fact that she wasn’t even a part of the show’s cast during the previous two seasons.  The season began with a player dying of steroid abuse and ended with OJ Simpson proving his innocence.  Oh!  And Zagreb discovered his father was a CIA agent and then he got married.

Was it a good season?  Not really.  This isn’t a good show.  But season 3 was definitely a lot stranger than the previous two seasons and that’s definitely a point in 1st & Ten‘s favor.

Next week, we start season 4!

Retro Television Review: The Love Boat 7.18 “Ace in the Hole/Uncle Joey’s Song/Father in the Cradle”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

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!

This week, the Love Boat gets a new photographer!

Episode 7.18 “Ace in the Hole/Uncle Joey’s Song/Father in the Cradle”

(Dir by Richard Kinon, originally aired on January 28th, 1984)

This episode featured the usual three story structure.  One story I was indifferent too.  One story kept me entertained.  And one story made me cry.

The story made me cry featured Barnard Hughes as Joseph Stobble, a former kids’s show host who has retired because he feels too old for kids to relate to.  Isaac grew up watching Uncle Joey and even gives Uncle Joey a replica of Flapjack, the sock puppet that served as Uncle Joey’s sidekick.  Uncle Joey meets Scott Russell (David Faustino), a child who has recently lost his father.  Uncle Joey helps Scott deal with his emotions by assuring him that it’s okay to cry.

I cried!  Hell, I’m crying just typing this up.  Now, I should clarify that I have a reason for crying.  The end of May will also be the two-year anniversary of the auto accident that eventually led to my father’s passing on August 19th, 2024.  To  be honest, there hasn’t been a day over the past two weeks that I haven’t cried at some point.  When my father died, I threw myself into taking care of my aunt.  After  my aunt died (and she died exactly one year after my father), I threw myself into trying to make the holidays perfect for my sisters.  And, after that, I threw myself into cleaning the house.  Looking back, I understand that I kept throwing myself into new activities because I was trying to outrun just how sad I was.  It’s only now that it’s finally all hitting me.

Would I have cried over Uncle Joey’s story if I wasn’t currently feeling sad?  I think I would have.  It was a sweet story featuring good work from Hughes, Faustino, and the always reliable Ted Lange.

As for the indifferent story, it featured Larry (Michael Spound) getting upset when he meets his mother’s (Lee Meriwether) new husband (Dean-Paul Martin).  It turns out the son and the stepdad are both the same age!  It was kind of boring, to be honest.

Finally, the third story featured Ted McGinley — yay! — as Ashley “Ace” Covington Evans, the new ship’s photographer!  Gopher hired him but he soon regrets it when all the women on board fall for Ave instead of Doc and Gopher.  However, Ace has a problem.  He’s a good photographer but he doesn’t know how to develop film!   (My first thought was that surely someone on the ship had to have a laptop and a printer but then I realized that this was apparently before the age of even digital cameras.)  The ship’s passengers and Stubing are curious as to why Ace hasn’t put up any of the pictures that he’s taken.  Vicki and Julia help out by putting up a bunch of pictures from a past cruise….

(Uhmm, how would that help?  I would assume that the passengers would expect to see pictures of themselves.)

Ace comes clean to the Captain and offers to spend three weeks learning how to develop film.  “Then we shall see you in three weeks,” a very understanding Stubing replies.  (Stubing perhaps knows that Vicki would never forgive him for firing Ace.)

Why did this story work so well?  Ted McGinley, that’s why!  And now, apparently, Ted’s a new cast member.  YAY!  The Love Boat is going to be better than ever!

Late Night Retro Television Review: Pacific Blue 4.2 “Treasure Hunt”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing Pacific Blue, a cop show that aired from 1996 to 2000 on the USA Network!  It’s currently streaming everywhere, though I’m watching it on Tubi.

This week, cliffhangers are abandoned and emotions run wild.

Episode 4.2 “Treasure Hunt”

(Dir by Terence H. Winkless, originally aired on August 2nd, 1998)

When last we checked in with Pacific Blue, we had a bit of cliffhanger going on.  Bobby Cruz was still considering whether or not to become a bicycle cop.  Detective Monica Harper was preparing to go back to her usual department.  And TC had just announced to Strickland and Granger that he wasn’t sure whether or not they would be continuing as bike cops.

Well, apparently, that all got worked out between episodes.  Strickland and Graner are still bike cops and they no longer appear to be living in that funky loft they were occupying during the previous episode.  Bobby is now a bike cop.  And Monica is a bike cop too because apparently, she got transferred to Pacific Blue.  She explains to Bobby that she goes wherever she’s sent but she’s not real happy about being a bike cop.  Hey, Monica, we’ve already got a whiny character on this show.  We don’t need another.

That whiny character — and yes, it is Chris Kelly — wants to be a sergeant.  So does Cory.  Both Chris and Cory take the sergeant’s exam.  Chris scores higher, though only by five points.  However, TC offers the sergeant’s position to Cory.  Chris, of course, whines about his decision.  TC replies that Cory’s been with the department longer and, unlike Chris, she’s never been written up for having a bad attitude.  TC feels that Cory will be a better role model for the new recruits and he’s probably right.  I mean, one of the few consistent things about Pacific Blue has been that Chris is generally thin-skinned and fairly rude to the people that citizens that she’s supposed to be protecting.  Chris is the bike cop who always seemed to be annoyed whenever she actually has to talk to anyone who doesn’t ride a bicycle.

One reason that is not mentioned for TC not promoting Chris is that Chris and TC are now married and I have to wonder how it would look if TC’s first action as commander was to promote his wife.  Honestly, how are TC and Chris even working together now?  This seems like a textbook case of conflict of interest.

As for the rest of the show, Strickland killed her first bad guy.  Shaken after shooting a convenience store robber, Strickland goes to a bar and gets drugged!  It turns out that someone is slipping GHB into the drinks on the boardwalk.  Could it have something to do with two obnoxious radio hosts who are broadcasting from the pier?  Bobby Cruz is not happy when he discovers that his 15 year-old sister is apparently a fan of their program….

Yes, Bobby Cruz is a Mexican-American bicycle cop from a tough neighborhood who is very protective of his younger sister.  Wasn’t that Victor Del Toro’s character as well?  Being from Texas, I’ve always been very aware of how television has always stereotyped any character who happens to have a Spanish last name.  With Pacific Blue, it looks like they just crossed out Victor Del Toro’s name in their scripts and wrote in Bobby Cruz instead.

Finally, Monica is looking for a new apartment.  Cory tries to keep Monica from finding out that there’s an apartment available in her building because …. Cory’s a bitch, maybe?  I don’t know.  It’s very out-of-character for Cory.  How is Cory going to be a sergeant if she gets this upset and petty over a new person being assigned to Pacific Blue?

Oh!  Also, Cory’s pregnant!  So far, only Chris knows.  Why would anyone tell Chris anything?  Chris is like hella mean….

Wow, a lot happened in this episode!  In fact, I’d say almost too much happened in this episode.  One got the feeling that the show’s writers wanted to focus on the newer members of the squad but, at the same time, they knew they had to come up with something for Chris to whine about.  In the past, Pacific Blue often felt understuffed.  This episode was definitely overstuffed.

Something is going to have to give.

Retro Television Review: Saved By The Bell: The New Class 2.1 “The Return of Screech”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing Saved By The Bell: The New Class, which ran on NBC from 1993 to 2o00.  The show is currently on Prime.

This week, we start the 2nd season of Saved By The Bell: The New Class!

Episode 2.1 “The Return of Screech”

(Dir by Don Barnhart, originally aired on September 10th, 1994)

After the disappointing reviews and ratings of the first season, Saved By The Bell: The New Class rebooted itself for the second season.  Robert Sutherland Telfer, Isaac Lidsky, and Bonnie Russavage were all fired and the characters of Scott, Weasel, and Vicky were dropped from the show. (No mention was ever made of where they had gone.  They just vanished.)

Suddenly, Megan and Lindsay’s best friend was Rachel Meyers (played by Sarah Lancaster, who appeared once during the first season).  Meanwhile, Swiss exchange student Brian Keller (played by a German actor named Christian Oliver) became the new head schemer while Bobby Wilson (Spankee Rodgers) became the new annoying sidekick with a crush on Megan.  From the start of the second season, everyone acted as if Brian and Bobby had always been there.  As for Lindsay and Tommy D, they continued to date.  And because Brian had a crush on Rachel, there was no longer anyone around trying to break the two of them up.

Mr. Belding was still the principal but now, he had a much bigger office with a window.  He also got a new administrative assistant, an education major who was on a work/study program with Cal U.  As you probably already guessed from this episode’s title, that administrative assistant turned out to be Screech Powers (Dustin Diamond).

Now, to give credit where credit is due, neither Screech nor Diamond are quite as annoying in this episode as they would eventually become.  By the end of the series, Diamond was giving such a broad performance as Screech that it almost came across as being deliberately self-destructive.  In this episode, though, Diamond just plays Screech as being overly earnest and too eager to please.  He may get on everyone’s nerves but at least he’s not doing the weird voices or the twisted facial expressions that would later come to typify his performance.

As for the plot of this episode, it’s dumb.  Rachel needs $700 so she can replace the jacket that she borrowed (without permission) from her mother.  Brian throws a party and sells tickets to help her raise the cash but when it turns out that Bobby’s house is not available for the party, Brian tricks Screech into unlocking the gym and allowing the party to be held in there.  When Belding shows up and demands to know what’s happening, Screech takes the blame and decides that he should return to Cal U.  And, really, he probably should have.  I mean, after all the years he spent with Zack, Screech should have been able to see that he was being manipulated.  What a moron.

But Brian does the right thing and tells the truth to Belding.  Brian and the Gang all get two-weeks detention.  Belding tells Screech that the students respect him and that he taught them an important lesson about the telling the truth.  I’m not sure how accurate any of that is but the important thing is that Screech stays at Bayside.

This episode was actually not as bad as I was expecting it to be.  Brian is a bit more likable than the first season’s Scott and this episode didn’t feature any of the mean-spiritedness that seemed to typify so much of the first season.  Even Screech was tolerable!

Don’t get used to it, though.  The season’s just getting started.

 

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 5.18 “In The Best of Families”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Mondays, I will be reviewing CHiPs, which ran on NBC from 1977 to 1983.  The entire show is currently streaming on Prime!

This week, it’s all about sibling rivalry and crashing cars.

Episode 5.18 “In The Best of Families”

(Dir by John Florea, originally aired on February 21st, 1982)

Getrear is not in a good mood.

He’s got a big inspection coming up but the members of the Highway Patrol keep screwing up.  Bonnie’s patrol car is stolen while she’s on a coffee break.  Baricza’s car is stripped of its lights and its CHP insignia.  Ponch and Baker chase the thieves but somehow never manage to catch them.  Finally, someone breaks into Getraer’s dry cleaner’s place and steals two of Getraer’s uniforms.

The Highway Patrol is squabbling, as all families do.  They worry that Getraer is angling for a promotion and that they’ll have to “break in a new sergeant.”  Fortunately, Getraer isn’t planning on going anywhere.  Ponch, Baker, Bonnie, Turner, Grossie, Harlan, and Bear all get to keep their surrogate father figure.

Meanwhile, a real family is fighting.  Anne Francis has planned the perfect armored car robbery.  Now, she just needs her teenaged sons (Michael  Morgan and Timothy Patrick Murphy) to steal a patrol car and some uniforms….

This episode had a pretty silly story but that doesn’t matter because it also featured some truly spectacular stunt work.  The first crash occurs on a freeway and involves so many cars that it almost becomes a symphony of destruction.  A reporter assures us that no one was killed or even seriously injured in the accident but having watched it (in slow motion), I’m not really sure how that could be true.  Later, Turner’s car goes flying over a hillside and again, it’s such a spectacular crash that I’m shocked Turner was able to step out of the wreckage.

This was definitely an episode for those of us who enjoy watching spectacular car destruction.  This was a pure demolition derby and entertaining in the mindless way that those often are.  Even the best families enjoy automotive mayhem.

Retro Television Review: Crime Story 1.2 “Final Transmission”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Mondays, I will be reviewing Crime Story, which ran on NBC from 1986 to 1988.  The entire show can be found on Tubi!

This week, Torello and company search Chicago for a serial killer.

Episode 1.2 “Final Transmission”

(Dir by Leon Ichaso, originally aired on September 19th, 1986)

Mike Torello and the members of the MCU would really like to go after Luca and his crew but, unfortunately, there’s a serial killer on the loose in Chicago.  Realizing that the MCU is going to be tied up trying to track down Ray Pernell (John Snyder) before he kills again, Luca orders his crew to commit even more robberies.  Luca explains to a crestfallen Paulie that Luca will no longer be taking part in the robberies.  Luca is the boss and the boss doesn’t get his hands dirty.  Instead, Luca spends most of this episode meeting with Murray Weisbord’s man in Chicago, Max Goldman (Andrew Dice Clay).

This was an odd episode.  On the one hand, the show went out of its way to recreate Chicago in the early 60s.  The soundtrack was early rock and roll.  The cars all had tailfins.  The suits, the cigarettes, Luca’s haircut, all of the details screamed 1960s.  But then the episode revolved around a serial killer who thought his mother was addressing him through the television and who looked and dressed like a late 70s punk rocker.  I assume that Ray Pernell was based on Richard Speck, the notorious Chicago serial killer who, in 1966, murdered 8 student nurses.  Like Speck, Pernell had an identifying tattoo and both men were traced through the National Maritime Union.  That said, Pernell just seemed so out-of-place, with his sleeveless shirt and his punkish haircut that he just didn’t seem to belong in the world of Crime Story.

That said, I will give this episode some credit.  In the pilot, Luca often seemed like a clueless punk.  In this episode, he quickly realized that the MCU would be too busy hunting for Pernell to devote much time to him and he took advantage of that fact.  Luca’s not quite as dumb as he sometimes seems.  This episode also showed that he was capable of thinking ahead.  When he suspects that someone is listening in on his conversation with Goldman, he resists the temptation to burst into the room next door with his gun drawn.  (If he had, he would have run straight into Torello and Danny.)  This episode shows that Luca is learning and growing.  He not the buffoonish hothead that Torello originally assumed him to be.  In fact, he’s even more dangerous.

This episode ends with Pernell somehow (it’s not really clear how) taking an entire television news broadcast hostage.  Torello takes him down as the cameras roll and the entire city of Chicago watches.  It’s not a bad ending but it just doesn’t feel right for the show.  It’s a Miami Vice ending.  This is Crime Story!

Late Night Retro Television Review: Degrassi: The Next Generation 2.15 “Hot For Teacher”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Sunday, I will be reviewing the Canadian series, Degrassi: The Next Generation, which aired from 2001 to 2015!  The series can be streamed on YouTube and Tubi.

This week, JT is still alive.

Episode 2.15 “Hot For Teacher”

(Dir by Philip Earnshaw, originally aired on July 25th, 2003)

Class clown J.T. is given a week of after school detention with Ms. Hatzilakos.  J.T. discovers that Hatzilakos is more than just a hot teacher and Ms. Hatzilakos tells J.T. that he’s capable of being more than just an obnoxious kid.  They bond while taking care of a pregnant gerbil.  But then, during class, JT stuffs some balloons up his shirt and pretends to be Ms. Hatzilakos.  It gets a laugh from Jimmy but, when Ms. Hatzilakos catches him, she is not amused.

These early JT stories are always rather childish, largely because JT himself was a rather immature character.  Eventually, by the time season 5 rolled around, JT would have a pregnant girlfriend and a side hustle selling drugs and he would become a much more interesting character.  And, of course, he would eventually end up getting stabbed to death outside of Emma’s house.  But that’s all far in the future….

Seriously, though, it’s impossible to watch a JT episode without thinking, “Hey, that kid is going to die in a scene that was probably too graphic for a high school show.”

As for the B-plot of this adequate but not particularly memorable episode, Spinner and Jimmy decide to always be brutally honest with each other.  It doesn’t last for long.  They should have tried to get Marco in on the pledge.  Now, that would have been some drama!