Retro Television Review: Baywatch 2.10 “The Trophy, Part Two”

Posted on July 11, 2026 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 Saturdays, I will be reviewing Baywatch, which ran on NBC and then in syndication from 1989 to 2001. The entire show can be viewed on Tubi.

This week, Baywatch concludes the two storylines that began in the previous episode. Will Mitch get over his guilt? Will Eddie be able to keep his job? Who will star in this week’s slow motion monologue? These are the important questions that come with saving lives for a living.

Episode 2.10 “The Trophy, Part Two”

(Dir by Douglas Schwartz, originally aired on November 18th, 1991)

The beach is in chaos!

Bitter over being in a wheelchair and also being single, Turner continues to take dangerous risks. At one point, he decides to go hang-gliding to prove that not being able to walk doesn’t have to keep anyone from flying. At another point, we get one of those priceless Baywatch montages where Turner imagines himself being able run down the beach.

Mitch still feels guilty over Turner’s condition but eventually, even Mitch has to kneel down beside the guy and say that enough is enough. And really, that’s all it takes. Turner accepts that his ex, Megan, is now dating a hunky marine biologist named Ross and he moves on. Megan was played by Vanessa Angel and, according to the imdb, this was her final appearance on Baywatch. This was also Daniel Quinn’s final appearance as Turner. So I guess that storyline’s now over. Mitch still seemed to be feeling pretty guilty but he’ll have to learn how to deal with that on his own because Eric Turner is out of here!

(Quinn would go on to play two other characters on Baywatch and he also had a role in the Baywatch spin-off, Pacific Blue. I guess someone in the head office really liked him.)

Meanwhile, Eddie is bitter because, after being arrested for statutory rape, he’s been suspended from being a lifeguard. Well, Eddie, that’s life. That’s pretty much what would happen to any lifeguard in those circumstances. Eddie spends a lot of time on this show demanding to be treated like everyone else and then getting angry when it happens.

When Eddie’s accuser, Caroline (played by a young A.J, Langer), attempts to commit suicide by jumping off the pier, Shauni is there to rescue her. Having been rescued from drowning, Caroline confesses that she made up the story about Eddie because she wanted to impress her friends on the beach. Eddie is reinstated and Caroline says that she’s going to return home to Pennsylvania and get some psychiatric help.

This episode was pretty anti-climatic. For all the dramatic potential of Mitch’s guilt, Caroline’s accusations, and Eddie’s bitterness, both stories pretty much just ended with the sources of all the drama agreeing to live somewhere other than California. If only life was always that simple!

In the end, this episode was typical Baywatch. Yes, there was some drama. But the most important thing was always getting the next montage.

Retro Televison Review: Baywatch 2.9 “The Trophy: Part One”

Posted on June 27, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Eddie in trouble!

Episode 2.9 “The Trophy: Part 1”

(Dir by Douglas Schwartz, originally aired on November 11th, 1991)

Awkward teenager Caroline Larkin (A.J. Langer) doesn’t have any friends because her family’s poor and she’s from Ohio. The only person on the beach who shows her any kindess is Eddie the lifeguard. When Caroline tries to impress the rich girls on the beach by claiming to have been seduced by Eddie, the main mean girl makes sure that Caroline’s father finds out. Eddie is shocked when he’s arrested and charged with statuatory rape …. despite the fact the fact that almost the same thing happened to Craig during the first season of the show.

What makes thing particularly awkward is that Eddie is arrested just as he and Shauni are getting ready to go to a chairty gala. Shauni finally got Eddie into a tux and then Eddie gets the handcuffs slapped on.

Meanwhile, parapalegic lifeguard Eric Turner (Daniel Quinn) returns. He’s still in love with Megan (Vanessa Angel), the Australian lifeguard. But he’s also bitter about having to use a wheelchair. This is one of those stories that would be compelling if we had the slightest idea who Turner and Megan were before this episode aired. This is also one of those episodes where totally new people show up and everyone acts as if they were there from the start of the series. (In all fairness, Megan has appeared on the show before but her role has never been particularly large.) Everyone else know who Eric Turner but we, the viewers, have never heard of him before.

Anyway, this is a two-part episode so neither storyline is resolved. Since I’m taking next week off for America’s 250th birthday celebration, Eddie’s going to have to wait in jail for a while. However, two weeks from now, we’ll see if Eddie can clear his name!

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Highway to Heaven 3.17 “A Night To Remember”

Posted on March 20, 2025 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 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.

Retro Television Reviews: Gidget’s Summer Reunion (dir by Bruce Bilson)

Posted on December 25, 2022 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 Sundays, I will be reviewing the made-for-television movies that used to be a primetime mainstay. Today’s film is 1985’s Gidget’s Summer Reunion! It can be viewed on Tubi!

Back in the 1970s, when the rest of the country was worrying about political corruption, inflation, and an out-of-touch president with an embarrassing family, Gidget, Jeff, and their friends were carefree California teenagers who spent all of their time either hanging out on the beach or running into the ocean with a surfboard. It was a time when they had not a care in the world and, obviously, it couldn’t last forever.

Nearly 10 years later, Gidget (Caryn Richman) and Jeff (Dean Butler) are now married and their surfboards have been safely stored away in the garage. Jeff works as an architect and it’s obvious that his new boss, Anne (Mary Frann), wants to make their professional relationship into something personal. Gidget, meanwhile, owns her own travel agency and, apparently, it’s a success even though Gidget rarely seems to spend much time at the office. Gidget is hyperactive and a bit self-absorbed and, as such, she usually only shows up at work long enough to tell her employees about her latest problems before then running out of the office in an impulsive attempt to fix everything.

What problems do Gidget and Jeff have? Well, for one thing, they live in a giant house despite the fact that they’re nearly broke. They’re both workaholics and, as a result, they don’t spend as much time together as they used to. They got married and then they became strangers. It’s been years since they last went down to the beach. When Gidget’s niece, Kim (Allison Barron), wants to learn how to surf, it doesn’t even occur to her to ask her aunt or her uncle. Instead, she ends up hanging out with a sleazy, beer-drinking surfer named Mickey (Vincent Van Patten).

Fear not! Gidget has a plan! Jeff’s birthday is coming up and Gidget decides that it would be a great idea to use her travel agent powers to get the entire gang back together again. She wants to bring all of the old surfers back to help celebrate Jeff’s big day. The only problem is that the old gang isn’t entirely easy to find. Plus, one of Gidget’s tour guides has to drop out of leading a tour in Hawaii. Gidget is forced to go in his place. Can she get back from Hawaii in time to save Jeff from Anne and Kim from Mickey? And even more importantly, will she ever be able to track down the old gang? Will the movie end with a bunch of balding guys surfing while the Beach Boys play on the soundtrack? Can you guess the answer?

The best thing that can be said about Gidget’s Summer Reunion is that the beach looked nice and the Hawaii scenes reminded me of the wonderful summer that my family and I spent in Hawaii. And the film is correct when it points out that adulthood is never as easy as we expected it to be when we were teenagers. However, the film suffers from the fact that a lot of Gidget’s problems could have been solved by Gidget actually taking a few minutes to think before acting. It’s one thing to be free-spirited and impulsive. It’s another thing to totally lack common sense. For instance, Gidget and Jeff’s old surfboards are stolen out of the back of Gidget’s convertible and, while you can certainly feel bad for Gidget’s loss, you do have to wonder what she was expecting when she basically just left them out in the open, where anyone could get their hands on them. Jeff isn’t off the hook either, as it was pretty much obvious to everyone but him that Anne was trying to get him to cheat on his wife. Gidget and Jeff are a cute couple but they don’t seem to have a brain cell between them.

Oh well. At least the beach looked nice!