This week, I was super-excited to discover the original Unsolved Mysteries on Tubi! I’ve been listening to Robert Stack as he talks about unsolved crimes and a paranormal mysteries and I have to say that Mr. Stack was truly an American treasure! I like that most of these episodes have updates and it looks like they’re still being updates. That said, I find the mysteries with no updates to be the most intriguing.
In other news, Case and I are nearly finished with Dark. We’ll be watching the final episode next Tuesday.
I am now caught up on Kitchen Nightmares. Chef Ramsay is saving restaurants that don’t really deserve to be saved. I don’t care if Gordon showed them their aware of their ways. There’s no way I’d eat in any of those places!
I watched a good deal of the news stations — BBC, FOX, C-SPAN, CNN, a little MSNBC, though that network is kind of annoying and whiny right now — this week. I won’t go into too much detail but I think I’m starting to become a news junkie.
I went over to Pluto TV this weekend and I turned on Dr. Phil for background noise. This poor woman was convinced that she was married to Tyler Perry.
King of the Hill on Hulu has definitely been my comfort show this week. It’s a Texas show and I’m a Texas girl.
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 can be purchased on Prime.
Wedding bells are ringing!
Episode 4.21 “Ooh Ooh, I Do: Part Two”
(Dir by Norman Abbott, originally aired on May 25th, 1979)
Horshack’s getting married!
For some reason, the Sweathogs throw him a bachelor party in Barbarino’s trashy apartment. Barbarino isn’t there. I assume he’s at work or maybe he finally moved back in with his family after realizing just how ugly and depressing his apartment was. Seriously, I will never understand why a show would try to get viewers invested in such an ugly location.
Anyway, the bachelor party is a bust. Epstein dresses up in drag and dances for Horshack. The Sweathogs love it. Horshack loves it. But then the Sweathogs make a joke about how Horshack and Mary Johnson are going to be so poor that Mary is going to have to get a job washing bricks to support them. Horshack realizes that they’re right. He’s getting married in high school and he has absolutely zero marketable skills. In fact, he’s such a weirdo that most people go out of their way to avoid him. How is he going to support Mary?
Horshask freaks out and runs away. After Mary shows them the note that Horshack left, in which he said that he was running away to become the type of man who could support her, the Sweathogs search all over Brooklyn for him. Epstein goes to a Marine recruiting station. Washington and Beau …. eh, I watched this show like 20 minutes ago and I’ve already forgotten what they did. That’s how well-written this episode was. Mary, however, knows that Horshack’s favorite movie is Wuthering Heights so she finds him at the local move theater.
They get married! The ceremony is small and pathetic. I don’t think a single member of Horshack’s family showed up. Gabe does show up and, when the Sweathogs realize that Horshack needs a ring to give Mary, Gabe gives up his own wedding ring. Julie approves. They’re probably going to get divorced as soon as the show ends.
Gabe, who is usually portrayed as being very concerned with the future of his students, is totally cool with Horshack getting married while still a high school student. At no point does he suggest that Horshack might be rushing into things or that a stunted manchild who can’t get a job might not be a good husband. This was one of Kaplan’s rare appearance during the final season of the show but he doesn’t act much like the Mr. Kotter that we got to know over the previous three seasons. It’s kind of like when Steve Carell came back for The Office finale and only said one line. It just doesn’t feel right.
Apparently, this episode was meant to a backdoor pilot for a series that would have focused on Horshack and Mary. I can’t imagine that working, though I would say that Mary and Horshack do look cute together at the end of the episode.
Speaking of endings, there are only two more episodes left! Will the Sweathogs finally graduate? We’ll find out!
George Foreman was one of those guys who I expected would be around forever.
When I was growing up, I knew George Foreman as the good-natured boxer who would throw punches for 12 rounds and then make jokes immediately afterwards. On HBO, he was usually the commentator who showed the most concern for the well-being of the fighters in the ring. On that infamous night in 1997, when Oliver McCall had an apparent mental breakdown while facing Lennox Lewis in the ring, while the other ring announcers spent their time talking about how bad the night was for the sport and how Don King was destroying the integrity of HBO Boxing, George Foreman was the only one to express any concern about what was happening in Oliver McCall’s head and to say that he hoped McCall would be okay once the fight ended. That made a big impression on me. George Foreman may have fought for a living but he never gave up his humanity.
It was only later that I saw the clips of young George Foreman, fighting Ali in Zaire, and I realized how intimidating Foreman had been before he made his comeback in his 40s. Foreman said that losing Ali in Zaire hurt, both because of the defeat and also Ali’s constant taunting. Foreman, who famously declined to join in the protests when he was on the 1968 U.S. Olympic team, resented Ali’s claim that Foreman was a sell-out. (These were the same accusations that Ali tossed at every opponent that he fought but for Foreman, someone who had struggled with poverty when he was younger and who credited boxing with saving him from a life of crime and prison, they especially stung.) Foreman could have joined Joe Frazier in spending his entire life bitter over his treatment by Ali but Foreman forgave him. When the documentary about the fight, When We Were Kings, won the Oscar for best documentary, Foreman was at the ceremony with Ali and helped his former opponent step up the stairs to the podium.
George Foreman in Zaire
It’s always hard to believe that the scowling and uncommunicative Foreman of the 70s was the same George Foreman who became an American institution, selling the George Foreman Grill and proving that he still had what it took to be a champion at age 45. Foreman credited finding religion with giving him a new outlook on life. At the same time he was making his comeback in the ring, Foreman was working as a minister and working with at-risk youth in Houston. He was a man who found success but he was also a man who gave back.
Foreman didn’t win every fight. He lost to Ali in Zaire and to Jimmy Young in Puerto Rico. After he made his comeback, he lost to Evander Holyfield, Tommy Morrison, and Shannon Briggs. Holyfield and even Morrison won their fights fair and square. (Morrison was booed after he won not because he didn’t deserve the victory but because he was Tommy Morrison.) A lot of people, including me, felt that Foreman was robbed by the judges when it came to the Briggs fight but Foreman accepted the decision with grace. As I get older, I feel more and more appreciation for what George Foreman accomplished. He made a comeback when most people had written him off and he did it with humor and humility.
Yesterday, Big George Foreman passed away at 76. I’ll miss him.
Welcome to Late Night 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 Friday the 13th: The Series, a show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The entire series can be found on YouTube!
This week, Johnny screws up, making the type of mistake that Ryan never would have!
Episode 3.7 “Hate On Your Dial”
(Dir by Allan Eastman, originally aired on November 6th, 1989)
This week’s cursed antique is an old car radio from 1954. Smear it with the blood of someone who has just died and the car will transport you back to …. 1954. That seems like an oddly specific curse and a kind of pointless one. What if the car radio ends up in the possession of someone who doesn’t care about 1954?
(And, to make clear, Jack does specifically state that the curse involves going back to 1954.)
The car radio does end up in the possession of Ray Pierce (Michael Rhoades), a racist auto mechanic who uses the car to go back to 1954 so that he can hang out with his father in Mississippi. His father (Martin Doyle) is a member of the Klan, along with his friend, Joe (played, in an early performance, by Henry Czerny). The 1954 scenes are filmed in black-and-white. When the show travels back 1954, the first thing we see is an “I Like Ike” billboard, featuring Dwight Eisenhower and a Confederate flag. Obviously, someone in the show’s Canadian writer’s room didn’t know who supported segregation in 50s and who didn’t. There was a political party wrapping itself in the Confederate flag in 1950s Mississippi but it wasn’t the Republicans and their candidate wasn’t Dwight Eisenhower.
This episode features Johnny making another one of his trademark mistakes, this time selling the cursed radio to Ray’s “slow” brother, Archie (played by Cronenberg regular Robert A. Silverman). Only after Johnny sells it does he realize it was probably cursed. Micki yells at him for not checking the manifest before selling it. Then Jack yells at him too. Jack remains angry with him for nearly the entire episode. It’s understandable that Jack would be upset but then again, maybe they shouldn’t have left inexperienced Johnny alone in the shop in the first place. Maybe they shouldn’t even be selling antiques at all. That would definitely solve the problem.
Anyway, this episode featured some of the worst Southern accents that I’ve ever heard and it also featured a cursed objects that didn’t make much sense. Johnny learned an important lesson about being careful about selling things and I guess that’s a good thing. That said, Ryan never would have made that mistake!
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 Hulu and, for purchase, on Prime!
It’s time to go under the knife in Boston.
Episode 1.16 “The Count”
(Dir by Kevin Hooks, originally aired March 8th, 1983)
Harold Beaumont (Michael Halsey), an adult film actor better known as The Count, has checked into St. Eligius. Of course, Dr. Samuels immediately recognizes him because Samuels is obsessed with porn. Dr. Annie Cavanero does not recognize him but, once she learns what he does for a living, she has to tell him that she finds his work to be offensive because Dr. Cavanero’s entire personality pretty much revolves around getting offended by stuff.
It’s not much of a plot. There’s a process server (William G. Schilling) who wants to serve the Count with a courts summons so Samuels and Cavanero help the Count hide and disguise his identity. It’s silly and dumb story that involves the two of the least likable members of the show’s regular cast.
Meanwhile, Dr. Wendy Armstrong (Kim Miyori) comes to suspect that one of the hospital’s heart surgeons, Dr. Larry Andrews (Peter Michael Goetz), is giving pacemakers to people who don’t actually need them. She takes her concerns to Dr. Craig. Craig, an old friend of Dr. Andrews, is initially dismissive but he later confronts Dr. Andrews and finds out that Armstrong was correct. Dr. Andrews explains that it takes a lot of money to fund his lifestyle. This story was an improvement over the Count but it perhaps would have had more power if it had been someone like Dr. Ehrlich who suspected that Dr. Andrews was giving people pacemakers that they don’t need. Ehrlich actually has a complicated relationship with Dr. Craig and his own less-than-stellar record as a resident would have added some ambiguity to storyline. Dr. Armstrong, on the other hand, has been portrayed as being hypercompetent and a bit self-righteous and, if we’re going to be honest, she’s kind of a boring character.
Speaking of Dr. Ehrlich, he is getting fed up with living with Fiscus. Howie Mandel is driving someone crazy? Who could have seen that coming?
This week’s episode was pretty forgettable. The story involving Dr. Andrews had potential but choosing to make the show’s least interesting characters the center of an entire episode was a decision that really didn’t pay off.
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 Highway to Heaven, which aired on NBC from 1984 to 1989. The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi and several other services!
This week, Jonathan and Mark go back to high school, just in time for prom! I went to four proms over the course of my high school years and I loved every one of them. There is no greater American tradition!
Episode 3.17 “A Night To Remember”
(Dir by Michael Landon, originally aired on January 28th, 1987)
It’s time for the prom!
Danny (Mitchell Anderson) wants to ask out Melanie (Kimberly MacArthur) but can’t bring himself to do it because he’s feeling insecure about the fact that his father lost his engineering job and is now working at a gas station. Danny makes extra money working at the local pizza joint but he loses his job when he throws a punch at bully Richard Davies (J. Eddie Peck, future star of Lambada).
Sammy (Joel Hoffman) wants to ask his lifelong friend, Kate (Susan Savage). But Sammy feels insecure because he’s short. When he tries to buy lifts to make himself taller, Richard calls him out right when he’s about to ask out Kate. Sammy is an aspiring stand-up comedian and he’s on the verge of dropping out of school all together. “I can be a comedian or a teenager but I can’t be both!”
Don’t worry, though. Jonathan is their new social studies teacher. And Mark is the coach of the girl’s volleyball team because every assignment is designed, in some way, to humiliate Mark. In this case, Mark takes a volleyball to the nose and spends the entire episode worrying that it’s broken. Mark really can’t catch a break (heh) on this show. He has to drive everywhere. He’s usually the one who has to do all of the hard physical work while Jonathan just appears wherever he wants. Unfortunately, there doesn’t appear to be a union for human angel helpers but then again, it’s not like Mark ever seems to get paid for all of his hard work.
Anyway, the stakes aren’t particularly high in this episode. Both Danny and Sammy eventually find the courage to ask their dates to the prom, though Danny doesn’t do it until he’s actually at the prom. And both of them take some time to tell off Richard. “Still wearing your mother’s underwear?” Sammy asks and Richard turns a dark shade of red as if Sammy has accidentally guessed his greatest secret.
I actually always like these episodes where Jonathan and Mark become teachers. They’re not as depressing as the ones where they end up working at a shelter or a retirement home. This episode was just about giving the students the best prom ever and that’s okay. Not everything needs to be a huge drama! Sometimes, you just need a night to remember.
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 Malibu CA, which aired in Syndication in 1998 and 1999. The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!
Yes, this is from the first season. I don’t care. I refuse to waste my time looking for a second season advertisement.
Eh, this show. I’m never looking forward to having to watch this show.
Episode 2.6 “Dancing Fools”
(Dir by Gary Shimokawa, originally aired on November 13th, 1999)
Here’s how the imdb describes the plot of this week’s episode of Malibu, CA:
Lisa receives a gift (a human skeleton!) from a secret admirer. Scott finds out that Murray is the one who sent it to her. Lisa needs an additional $1800 for tuition. Jason tells her about the swing dance contest at the Malibu Country Club with a prize of $2000. When she finds out Murray and family are all members, she gets him to be her partner for the contest.
Wow, that sounds stupid! In fact, it sounds so stupid that I’m relieved that it’s one of the few episodes of this show that has not been uploaded to YouTube. I’ll keep this post here as a placekeeper in case I ever do get to see the episode but I’m not really planning on spending a lot of time looking for it, to be absolutely honest. I’ve seen enough Peter Engel-produced sitcoms that I can imagine how this went. Murray has a crush. Lisa (the character, not me!) is dismissive until he dances with her at the Country Club and then she realizes that he actually is a great guy. “Awwwwww!” the audience says.
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 Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991. The entire series is streaming on YouTube.
Let’s celebrate Christmas early with Monsters!
Episode 3.12 “A New Woman”
(Dir by Brian Thomas Jones, originally aired on December 16th, 1990)
It’s the day before Christmas and businessman Tom (Thomas McDermott) is dying. His wife, Jessica (Linda Thorson), want him to sign over the deed for several building that he owns so that she can kick out everyone who isn’t paying their rent. His son (Dan Butler) thinks that is an inhumane thing to do on Christmas. Tom’s doctor (Mason Adams) informs Jessica that she will be visited by three spirits that will help her change her ways….
And indeed, she is! But these aren’t the ghosts that Charles Dickens made famous. Instead, they’re horrifying zombies that are being led by Tom’s vengeful spirit. That’s enough to scare Jessica into changing her ways. She doesn’t want to become a zombie! Who would? It’s a Merry Christmas for all!
Monsters’s take on A Christmas Carol actually isn’t bad. It takes a while to get going but the zombies are effectively frightening and Jessica’s terrifying night is full of ominous atmosphere and effective scares. I guess my main problem with this episode was that the pacing was odd. It seemed to take forever to get around to that doctor telling Jessica she would receive visitors from the other side. And when the visitors did arrive, it was effective but it still felt a bit rushed.
Still, it was nice to see Monsters not only do a Christmas episode but also, in a rarity for this show, one that had a happy ending.
Episode 12 opens with Shane (David Carradine) and Rufe Ryker (Bert Freed) looking over a beautiful Appaloosa colt. Shane wants to buy it for Joey (Christopher Shea) and offers Ryker $50. Ryker gets a good laugh at that, but he does make Shane a counteroffer: if Shane will work at his cattle ranch for one month, he’ll then let Shane have the colt for $50. Shane doesn’t really want to do it, but it’s important to him to get Joey the colt, so he agrees. Ryker allows Shane to go ahead and take the colt to the Starett ranch and give him to Joey. Of course, Joey is ecstatic and can’t wait to start taking care of him. Marian Starett (Jill Ireland) isn’t that happy with Shane about the deal to work for Ryker for a month, but it’s soon clear that no amount of protesting from her will stop Shane from doing this for Joey.
The next day Shane is moving into Ryker’s bunkhouse for the month, and we begin getting a feel for the various men working for Ryker. The foreman Kyle (Jack Ging) immediately takes a disliking for Shane for no particular reason other than jealousy, I guess. He’s a real jerk, and he seems to have some kind of inferiority complex. In more modern times, it seems possible that Kyle might drive a big truck with swinging testicles attached to the trailer hitch. We also meet Jingles (J. Pat O’Malley), an older man who the other cowboys pick on for sport. He takes it because he doesn’t want to ruffle any feathers or get turned out by Ryker. Jingles tells Shane that this job is the only thing he has in life, and he doesn’t know what he’d do if he were to lose it. That night Ryker comes into the bunkhouse and tells Shane that there will be no fighting, and that if he puts his hands on one of his men, he’ll be fired and the deal for the colt is off. Shane just wants to keep his head down and work out his month and then get back to his life at the Starett ranch. Even though Shane works extremely hard and proves to be a good “hand,” it becomes clear that foreman Kyle is going to do everything he can to make his life a living hell. Will Shane be able to finish out a month at Ryker’s place and pay for Joey’s gift? Will Jingles tell the truth when Kyle picks a fight with Shane? Will Joey learn valuable lessons in life from the colt? Will Marian admit to Shane how much she misses him when he’s gone? All good questions: episode 12 has the answers!
While it may be a slight step down from the sheer awesomeness of the prior installment, episode 12, “The Silent Gift,” is another fine episode of the Shane TV series. I mention the name of the episode because its use of the word “silent” captures part of what I enjoy so much about the series. Shane doesn’t say a lot throughout the entire series, but he continuously lets his actions prove out who he is as a person. In this case, his love for Joey is on full display because of what he does for him in this episode. Now don’t get me wrong, words are important, and I still tell my wife and children that I love them daily. But words are hollow if they’re not backed up by actions. Shane always backs up his words. Shane’s motives are the antithesis of a person like the foreman Kyle, who’s outwardly all bluster and bravado, but whose actions are fueled completely by lies and deceit. The character of Jingles, who seems like a nice enough old guy, is also shown to be in sharp contrast to Shane. Jingle’s life is controlled by fear and his actions are all about self-preservation. The sad truth is the fact that there are a lot more Kyle’s and Jingle’s in this world than there are Shane’s. On a positive note, the character arc of Jingles ultimately gives us hope that it’s never too late for any of us to do the right thing.
The main guest stars in this episode, Jack Ging and J. Pat O’Malley, both caught my attention. Ging, who played foreman Kyle, looked very familiar to me. A look at his filmography shows he was the dad in WHERE THE RED FERN GROWS (1974) and appeared in three different Clint Eastwood films a few years after appearing in this episode. One of the first books I remember reading purely for pleasure was “Where the Red Fern Grows.” I loved it so much and watched the movie many times growing up. To be honest, I haven’t thought about it for years, but now I’m hankering for a rewatch. And O’Malley, who played Jingles, also has an interesting filmography. He provided voiceover work for many classic animated films like ONE HUNDRED AND ONE DALMATIONS (1961) and THE JUNGLE BOOK (1967). And what really amazes me is the fact that he voiced characters in Disney’s “Pirates of the Caribbean” attraction, including one of the prisoners coaxing the dog with the keys in his mouth. When you’ve been to Disney World as many times as I have, I now see O’Malley as a rock star!
Shane’s relationship with Marian has one really good moment in this episode. When Shane is visiting the Starett ranch one night, Marian tells him how much they miss him, how much SHE misses him, when he’s gone. I believe she would have been open to a big kiss if Shane would have gone for it, but instead he just said “that’s nice to hear” before saying goodnight. Here’s one time I don’t agree with the action Shane takes. With only five more episodes to go, the romantic in me is still hoping for a big-time payoff in love!
Through the Shattered Lens 