David Mandel | Through the Shattered Lens

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 Miami Vice, which ran on NBC from 1984 to 1989. The entire show can be purchased on Prime!

This week, the fourth season begins with a whimper.

Episode 4.1 “Contempt of Court”

(Dir by Jan Eliasberg, originally aired on September 25th, 1987)

It’s time for season 4! Crockett has longer hair! Tubbs has a beard! Otherwise, they’re still somehow doing the undercover thing, despite making no effort to maintain their undercover identities. This episode finds them both in court and, later on, pulling their guns on a mob boss in broad daylight. How exactly there is anybody in Miami who does not know that Burnett and Cooper are actually Crockett and Tubbs, I do not know.

This was kind of a boring episode, which does not bode well for the rest of the fourth season. Mob boss Frank Mosca (Stanley Tucci) is on trial but, because the case hinges on information supplied by an informant, Crockett is faced with making the decision about whether or not to name Jack Rivers (Steven Keats) as the informer. For Jack’s own safety, Crockett refuses but Mosca figures it out anyway. Jack is stabbed to death while a helpless Crockett watches. (Crockett’s in jail on a contempt of court charge.) Later, Jack’s teenage son, Terry (Richard Panebianco), tells Crockett, “I had no idea you were a cop.” Really? What a stupid kid.

Anyway, after Mosca frames a juror for taking bribes and a mistrial is declared, Terry pulls a gun on Mosca as he and his men are walking out of the courthouse. For once, Crockett and Tubbs are able to convince someone not to open fire. I think this is the first time, in Miami Vice history, that Crockett and Tubbs have managed to prevent an assassination. Still, Terry does fire his gun in the air. Mosca smirks and leaves. What’s weird is that no one else reacts to Terry shooting he gun. I mean, he’s on the steps of the courthouse. Why are there no guards rushing out? Why are Crockett and Tubbs the only cops around? Seriously, it makes absolutely no sense.

This episode had some worthy guest stars. Stanley Tucci appeared to be having fun as the cartoonishly evil Mosca. Meg Foster played the district attorney. Philip Baker Hall was the judged who ordered Crockett to name the informant. That said, the episode itself got bogged down in all of the legal wrangling going on inside the courtroom. For the past three seasons, Miami Vice is a downbeat cop show, not a show about lawyers objecting and debating the point of law. The fourth season premiere felt off.

I’ve read bad things about this upcoming season and this episode did little to generate any feeling of optimism or hope. Both Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas looked bored and even Edward James Olmos’s Castillo is starting to get a little …. I guess annoying would be the world. Seriously, make eye contact with someone!

Well, we’ve got a long season ahead of us. Let’s hope for the best.

This week, Bill Paxton and Wesley Snipes walk the streets of Miami!

Episode 3.10 “Streetwise”

(Dir by Fred Walton, originally aired on December 5th, 1986)

I was excited to see that this week’s episode of Miami Vice featured guest turns from not only Wesley Snipes but Bill Paxton as well! Then I remembered that guest stars never survive their episode and I felt a little bit sad. I know what was coming. Miami Vice is not a show that features happy endings. Anyone who gets involved in Miami’s vice trade is destined to end up dead, regardless of how innocent or guilty they may be. It’s a dark world in Miami.

Paxton plays Vic Romano, a vice cop from a neighboring precinct who is arrested during a prostitution bust. Romano has been having an affair with Carla Cappoletti (Alice Adair), an emotionally fragile prostitute who is abused by both her pimp, Silk (Wesley Snipes), and almost all of her clients. She knows that Vic is a cop and Vic knows that she’s a prostitute but neither one of them cares. As Vic puts it, they’re in love.

The Vice Squad is shocked to find that Carla is carrying cocaine that is almost totally pure. Trying to track down who is supplying Silk with the cocaine, the squad discovers that neither Carla nor Vic want to cooperate. While Vic tries to explain things to his wife, Tubbs goes undercover as a pimp. He bails Carla out of jail and tells her that she works for him now. When Silk shows up to object, Tubbs easily beats him up. Silk may talk tough but, without a gun to back him up, he’s not much of a fighter.

When Tubbs demands that Carla go to Silk and find out where he’s been getting his cocaine from, Carla refuses. Tubbs, still pretending to be a pimp, proceeds to yell at her and tear up a hotel room. A sobbing Carla begs Tubbs not to hurt her “too much,” and Tubbs realizes that he’s gone too far in trying to maintain his cover. He shows Carla his badge. It’s always kind of easy to laugh at the way that Tubbs trots out his fake Caribbean accent whenever he’s pretends to be Rico Cooper but Thomas does a really good job in this episode and he is genuinely frightening when he starts yelling at Carla. I found myself wondering just how far Tubbs actually would go to maintain his cover and I was actually relieved when he pulled out that badge.

It ends, as things often do with this show, in a shootout. Silk is gunned down by Crockett and Tubbs but not before Romano is shot by Silk. Romano dies in Carla’s arms and I felt a little teary-eyed. Bill Paxton was a wonderful actor and he gave a likable and sincere performance as Vic Romano. Watching the episode, I never once doubted Romano’s love for Carla. Both Snipes and Paxton were well-cast as their doomed characters. Neither one survived the hour but I doubt anyone who watched the show ever forgot them.