Retro Television Reviews: Hang Time 4.19 “Rocky Road To The Playoffs” and 4.20 “Kristy Nightingale”

Posted on May 15, 2023 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 Hang Time, which ran on NBC from 1995 to 2000. The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

The championship is approaching, yet again! Hang time!

Episode 4.19 “Rocky Road To The Playoffs”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on November 14th, 1998)

It’s that time of year again! The team just has to win one more game to make it to the playoffs. Unfortunately, because Michael has been distracted, it’s starting to look like it might not happen. It turns out that Michael has gotten a really bad report card, one that has more C’s than B’s. His father has said that Michael can only play basketball as long as he keeps his grades up. Technically, C’s are passing so I’m not really sure what the problem is but whatever.

After Michael has a shouting match with his father, Coach K says that, while he sympathizes with Michael, he can’t let him play in the big game because Michael has got too much on his mind. As a result, the Tornadoes finish the first half of the game with the score tied! Fortunately, Michael’s father shows up during halftime and has a conversation with his son. Michael agrees to go to summer school and his father says that Michael can keep playing. Michael enters the game during the second half and — yay! The Tornadoes win!

Actually, that’s not a surprise. The Tornadoes haven’t lost an important game since the second season.

While this is going on, Mary Beth and Kristy play a game of one-and-one basketball in order to win a car. It wasn’t a terrible B-plot. Megan Parlen and Amber Barretto were always at their best when they got to do something ridiculous together.

This wasn’t a bad episode. I don’t think there was ever any doubt that the Tornadoes would win that game but the episode finally gave Adam Frost something to do and Frost proved himself to be a better actor than one might have previously expected. All in all, this was a good episode. Even Julie was a little less self-centered than usual. Way to go, Hang Time!

Episode 4.20 “Kristy Nightingale”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on November 14th, 1998)

Meanwhile, back at the camp….

KRISTY NEARLY KILLS RICO!

Well, seriously, can you blame her? I mean, what do we know about Rico? First, he got addicted to marijuana. (Seriously, do you have any idea how much weed you have to smoke to get addicted to a non-addictive drug?) Secondly, he freaked out because he was dating a tall girl. Finally, at camp, Rico got stung by a bee. Kristy, who is apparently now working as the camp’s nurse, removes the stinger but she doesn’t realize that you’re supposed to keep an eye on someone after they get stung by a bee. Instead, she sends Rico back to his cabin, where Rico nearly dies as a result of an allergic reaction! Luckily, there’s a real doctor at the camp and she gives Rico a shot that saves his life.

Kristy feels terrible. Everyone tells her that she’s being too hard on herself, despite the fact that Kristy did nearly kill someone. Kristy worries that she might not be cut out to be a doctor and, again, that would seem like a fair assessment considering that she nearly killed someone. Still, all the members of the team start faking injuries so that Kristy can fix them. Awww, that’s nice of them! Unfortunately, Kristy overhears everyone talking about how they faked all of their injuries and she loses her confidence again. Fortunately, Michael makes himself useful by breaking his arm for real and Kristy gets to help him and regain her confidence.

WAY TO GO, MICHAEL!

While all of this is going on, the counselors engage in a prank war and remind me of why I’m glad to have never gone to any sort of camp.

As far as the basketball camp episodes are concerned, this was an okay one. But Hang Time is a show that is at it’s best when it focuses on high school. Hopefully, this is the last of this season’s camp episodes.

We’ll find out next week!

Retro Television Reviews: Hang Time 4.17 “Sharing The Spotlight” and 4.18 “New Girl In Town”

Posted on May 8, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Hang Time! This week, YouTube once again tries to keep me from watching every episode of Hang Time.

Episode 4.17 “Sharing the Spotlight”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on November 7th, 1998)

Julie is told that unless she does better in her Math class and passes her upcoming exam, she might not be eligible to play basketball. OH NO! I hope everything worked out….

Unfortunately, this is one of the two episodes of Hang Time that are not available on YouTube. So, I have no idea if Julie learned a lesson about the importance of balancing academics with her extra-curriculars but I’m going to guess that she probably did.

Let’s move on to an episode that actually is on YouTube….

Episode 4.18 “New Girl In Town”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on November 7th, 1998)

Meanwhile, at the basketball camp….

Like I’ve said before, it’s not surprising that NBC showed these episodes out of order because, in the 90s, there were no continuity nerds around to call them out online. Still, it’s hard not to get a little annoyed at how little NBC apparently cared about whether or not it was possible to follow the storyline from one episode to another. Even though I can’t watch the previous episode, I can read the imdb plot description and know that it featured Julie in school. Now, suddenly, Julie is a counselor at a summer camp. Admittedly, I tend to be a bit over organized but messiness like this just drives me crazy.

Anyway, at camp, Mary Beth and Kristy get their hands tangled in a basketball net. Julie watches them and refuses to help because she’s having too much fun reminding everyone that she’s not a “bonehead.” Finally, Julie decides to help but soon, she gets tangled in the net as well. “Now I’m a bonehead!” Julie declares.

“Awww geez,” Coach K. says as he walks up with Eve (Alexana Lambros), a new girl at the camp. I haven’t mentioned it before because it was too stupid but “Awww geez” is Coach K’s catch phrase.

Eve is really excited to meet Julie but then again, everyone on this show is always excited to meet Julie. Eve says that Julie inspired her to play basketball but everyone always says that to Julie. Personally, I’m more interested in the fact that this new girl is named Eve. We’ve all seen All About Eve, haven’t we?

And, indeed, it does turn out that Eve will do anything to look good on the court and to show up Julie. Apparently, college scouts are coming to the camp and, since Eve is from a small high school, this might be her only opportunity to impress them. It’ll be difficult to do that with Julie hogging the spotlight. Now, if I was Eve, I would just point out to the scouts that Julie has been in high school for five years. Instead, Eve tries to sabotage Julie by 1) flirting with Julie’s ex-boyfriend, 2) cutting Julie’s shoe laces, 3) spilling bleach on Julie’s clothes, and 4) locking Julie in a storage shed.

GO, EVE!

Okay, admittedly, Eve isn’t going about things the right way but, after four seasons of Julie always being right and perfect, it’s kind of hard not to appreciate Eve as a force of chaos. Eve seems to be having so much fun being bad that it reminds us of just how boring a character Julie really could be. The audience applauds when Eve gets her inevitable comeuppance but I have a feeling that a lot of them were secretly on her side.

Anyway, it all works out. Coach K sends Eve home. The University of Connecticut says that they’ll probably still offer Julie a scholarship. Of course, Julie would have to actually graduate high school first and that’s not going to happen for a while. Hopefully, someone still offered Eve a scholarship. Sportsmanship is overrated.

Next week: the team once again prepares for the play-offs!

Retro Television Reviews: Half Nelson 1.9 “Beverly Hills Princess”

Posted on May 5, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing Half Nelson, which ran on NBC from March to May of 1985. Almost all nine of the show’s episodes can be found on YouTube!

Today, we close the book on the adventures of Rocky Nelson in Beverly Hills.

Episode 1.9 “Beverly Hills Princess”

(Dir by Bernard McEveety, originally aired on May 10th, 1985)

The hottest new thing in Beverly Hills is a movement called Emotional Awareness. Led by the slick Dexter Breen (played by Marjoe Gortner, who was himself a former child evangelist) EA is a self-improvement cult that definitely should not be mistaken for Scientology. Not surprisingly, EA is a scam. Dexter and his people encourage the rich and the powerful to confess all of their secrets during “Awareness Sessions” and then use those secrets to blackmail their followers.

Businessman George Farrell (Dick Van Patten) is sick of being blackmailed. However, when George tries to confront Dexter, he gets into a struggle with one of Dexter’s goons. The goon has a gun, which goes off. Fear not, George is not wounded. However, he is arrested for murder when the goon drops dead. Because George doesn’t want to admit that Dexter was blackmailing over him over an affair he had with a congresswoman, George finds himself sitting in prison.

Fortunately, George Farrell is a client of Beverly Hills Security! After being approached by George’s 14 year-old daughter, Leslie (Sydney Penny), Rocky (Joe Pesci, who was shorter than Sydney Penny) makes it his mission to prove that George didn’t mean to kill anyone. To do this, he’ll visit two more of Dexter’s victims (played, in this week’s cameos, by Rich Little and Lyle Waggoner). He’ll also steal several cars, including a police car. Why is Rocky stealing cars? Because he keeps wrecking them, of course! Detective Hamill (Gary Grubbs) isn’t happy about all of the wrecked cars. When he demands to know why Chester (Fred Williamson) keeps Rocky employed despite all of Rocky’s mishaps, Chester replies, “Because he cares!”

As usual, Rocky recruits Beau (Dick Butkus), Kurt (Bubba Smith), and Annie (Victoria Jackson) to help him out. When Rocky discovers that one of Dexter’s victims is holding auditions for a drag revue, Rocky decides that Annie should audition. “But I’m a real woman!” Annie replies. At this point, I was expecting thing to get pretty cringey but, by the standards of when the show was produced, the whole drag revue subplot was handled with maturity and with a relative lack of cheap jokes. I sat there dreading the moment that Bubba Smith and Dick Butkus would put on ball gowns and start speaking in falsetto but it didn’t happen. Instead, they just mentioned how talented all of the performers were. It was pretty clear that the director of the revue was being blackmailed because he was gay but, again in contrast to a lot of shows and movies from the period, both the show and Rocky treated the character with respect. It was an unexpected moment in a show that many would probably dismiss as just being another generic detective series.

While Rocky is stealing cars, Dean Martin is searching for his. No, Rocky didn’t steal Dean’s car. According to Dean, Sammy Davis, Jr. stole it. In this episode, Dean shares all of his scenes with Fred Williamson. Because this was Half Nelson‘s final episode, this was also Dean Martin’s last onscreen moment. Dean passed away ten years later.

Yes, this was indeed the final episode of Half Nelson. In fact, towards the end of the episode, Rocky crashes Chester’s car and then comments that he’s probably going to get fired as a result. Since this was the final episode, I guess we can assume that, once George got out of prison, Rocky was unemployed and on the next flight back to New York City. I hope he got to take the dog with him.

As for the episode itself, it wasn’t a bad way to wrap things up. Everyone got to do something. Chester defended Rocky, for once. Victoria Jackson got to sing a song. Joe Pesci got one final chance to make a joke about his height, snapping that he was “5’4,” when he heard a report that a car had been stolen by a man standing “5’2.” Dean Martin was clearly unwell during filming but he still had a devilish twinkle in his eye. As always, Marjoe Gortner was a good villain. On the negative side, Rocky didn’t so much solve the mystery as he just stumbled into solutions and Detective Hamill’s intense dislike of Rocky never made any sense. As well, Hamill and Annie were dating in the previous episode but they barely even acknowledged each other in this one, which leads me to suspect that this episode was originally meant to air earlier than it did.

Having now watched the entire show, it’s easy to see why Half Nelson failed to attract a regular audience, despite it’s strong pilot. The show never really found the right balance between comedy and drama and, far too often, it turned into a retread of Beverly Hills Cop. The ensemble often felt underused, with Jackson and Williamson spending far too much of their time sitting in the office. The show had a great star in Joe Pesci but many episodes got bogged down with the antics of Bubba Smith and Dick Butkus.

Here’s the thing, though. The show was always interesting, specifically because it did star Joe Pesci. There was something undeniably fun about having stolid TV actors — like Robert Reed and Dick Van Patten — appearing opposite a combustible force of nature like Joe Pesci. Though there were a few times that Pesci did seem a bit bored with going through the detective show motions, he was still a force of chaos and, by his very presence, he made Half Nelson into something more than just another generic crime show.

Next week, we start Freddy’s Nightmares!

Retro Television Reviews: Hang Time 4.15 “The Tall And The Short Of It” and 4.16 “Just Friends”

Posted on May 1, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today, YouTube makes watching Hang Time difficult!

Episode 4.15 “The Tall and the Short Of It”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on October 31st, 1998)

Rico has finally got a girlfriend! She loves video games and basketball almost as much as he does! The problem, as far as Rico is concerned, is that Rico is short and Gail (Bree Turner) is tall. Rico is worried that the team will make fun of him because of the height difference and, from what we’ve seen of the team, he’s probably right. Then again, Rico was addicted to marijuana just a few weeks ago so maybe he’s still having episodes of paranoia.

When the team starts to suggest that Rico is lying about having a girlfriend, Rico decides that the best possible solution would be pay his cousin, Lisa (Constance Zimmer, who later starred on Unreal), ten dollars to pretend to be his girlfriend. Knowing Rico, that’s probably not the first time he’s paid a cousin to make out with him. Needless to say Gail sees Rico with Lisa (who, at least, has a good name) and she breaks up with him. But then Rico apologizes and dances with her at the school’s 70s party so I guess everything’s resolved.

Honestly, who cares? It’s Rico. Rico makes Vince seem like an interesting character.

While this was going on, Mary Beth searched for Hammer’s lucky jacket, which she lost after he gave it to her for safekeeping. Don’t worry. She found it.

Episode 4.16 “Just Friends”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on October 31st, 1998)

In this episode….

OH MY GOD! IT’S NOT ON YOUTUBE!

Yep, it’s sad but it’s true. As far as I can tell there are only two episodes of Hang Time that can’t be found online and this is one of them. Obviously, I can’t review this episode but I can tell you what apparently happened.

According to the imdb, this episode found the team working, once again, as counselors at a basketball camp. You may remember that Coach Fuller bought the camp last season. Fuller’s gone but apparently, the camp is still a thing and now Coach K. is in charge of it. Did Coach K. buy the camp or did Fuller ask him to keep an eye on it? I can’t tell you because I can’t watch the episode but, from my knowledge of Hang Time, I have a feeling this question was probably never even addressed.

Anyway, it appears that this episode featured Julie kissing some other guy and realizing that she and Michael were better as just friends. Poor Michael! What’s funny is that, at this point, I’m so used to Julie cheating on her boyfriends and then making them feel as if it’s their fault that I feel as if I’ve seen this show without having seen it.

Retro Television Reviews: Half Nelson Episode 1.8 “Malibu Colony”

Posted on April 28, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last week, I took a look at the sixth episode of Half Nelson, which was called Nose Job and which featured Rocky (Joe Pesci) dealing with an obsessed plastic surgeon who was stalking a former girlfriend. That episode featured not only two villains (it turned out that the plastic surgeon wasn’t the only homicidal stalker in Hollywood) but is also ended with Victoria Jackson’s Annie O’Hara starting a romantic relationship with Gary Grubbs’s Detective Hamill.

Nose Job was followed by an episode called Chariots For Hire. It apparently aired on April 26th, 1985 and that’s really all I can tell you about the episode. Chariots For Hire is the only episode of Half Nelson that has not been uploaded to YouTube. I can’t even find a plot summary for it on the imdb. Chariots For Hire is apparently the lost episode of Half Nelson.

Fortunately, the eighth episode of Half Nelson is on YouTube. So, let’s pick up the adventures of Rocky Nelson in Malibu Colony!

Episode 1.8 “Malibu Colony”

(Dir by James Sheldon, originally aired on May 3rd, 1985)

Rocky, Annie, Beau (Dick Butkus), and Kurt (Bubba Smith) have been assigned to guard what Rocky claims is “one of the most valuable art collections in the world.” Fortunately, this job means that they get to spend a few days hanging out in a fabulous beach house in Malibu! Standing out on the deck of the beach house, Annie looks out at the ocean and says that she can hardly believe that China is on the other side of it.

“I wonder how the egg rolls stay fresh crossing over from that far,” Kurt says.

Before anyone can ponder that question for too long, a half-naked woman runs screaming down the beach while being pursued by two thugs in suits. Rocky saves the woman from the thugs and sends her into the beach house so that she can borrow some clothes from Annie. Once dressed, the woman explains that she’s Nancy Norton (Shari Shattuck) and that she was fleeing from a nearby yacht club. She claims that the owner of the club has some naked pictures of her and she needs to get them back. Rocky, deciding that the art can protect itself, helps Nancy sneak back into the club so that she can retrieve her photographs. However, when she sees the club’s president, Crane (John Beck), she suddenly holds up a gun and shoots at him. Rocky is able to push Crane out of the way of the bullets and then he chases after Nancy.

Fortunately, both Rocky and Nancy make it out of the club without anyone realizing that they’re together. Despite the fact that she nearly made him an accessory to murder, Rocky still wants to help Nancy. Nancy explains that there are no pictures and she wasn’t trying to kill Crane. (“I just wanted to scare him.”) Nancy’s father lost a lot of money while playing poker with Crane and now Crane is threatening to kill him if he doesn’t pay. But Nancy is convinced that the poker game was rigged. The reason she was in club earlier was to take a look at Crane’s cards.

(For some reason, she thought it would be smart to do that while wearing a bikini, the top of which was somehow lost while she was fleeing Crane’s guards. That explains that partial nudity, which I am sure was definitely viewed as being important to the plot and not just as an attempt to boost the show’s ratings.)

Having saved Crane’s life, Rocky is able to get Annie, Kurt, and Beau jobs at the club. Annie models clothes. Kurt and Beau work as waiters. Rocky’s boss, Chester (Fred Williamson), shows up at the club with Dean Martin and is shocked to see all of his employees working there. Dean demands that Chester give them all raises so that they can quit their second jobs.

Eventually, Rocky finds his proof that Crane is a criminal and, with Chester’s help, he takes Crane down. After being stuck in the office for the past few episodes, Chester actually gets to do something in this episode. It’s always nice to see Fred Williamson in action and making it even better is that he smokes a big cigar while he’s taking down the bad guys. Finally, after eight episodes, Half Nelson reminded everyone of why Fred Williamson was so cool to begin with.

This episode definitely earns some points for allowing the entire supporting cast — from Fred Williamson to Victoria Jackson to Dean Martin — to play a role in solving the case of the week. One of Half Nelson‘s biggest flaws was that the appealingly quirky supporting characters often felt underused and Malibu Colony finally gives them a chance to show what they could have done as an ensemble. The mix of Pesci’s wise guy nerve, Jackson’s spaciness, Williamson’s effortless coolness, and Butkus and Smith’s comedic relief is actually pretty entertaining. Unfortunately, as good as the heroes are, Crane is pretty boring villain and the case of the week isn’t particularly interesting. In particular, Nancy’s actions never really make that much sense.

Oh well. This was a flawed episode but it still offered up a hint of what Half Nelson could have been. Next week, I will be reviewing this show’s final episode. Until then, L.A. — you belong to me!

Retro Television Reviews: Hang Time 4.13 “Nothing In Common” and 4.14 “And Then There Were Nuns”

Posted on April 24, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Hang Time! This week, we learn about geography.

Episode 4.13 “Nothing in Common”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on October 24th, 1998)

We’re back in Indiana! I guess the San Antonio trip is over. Yay.

Michael, Silk, and Rico panic when they see Coach K. walking around their favorite after-school hangout, The Stadium. It turns out that Coach K. wants to buy the place and make it more friendly to older customers. Michael, Silk, and Rico totally freak out and I don’t blame them. No one wants to see their teachers outside of school. Anyway, they come up with the brilliant idea of having Rico’s uncle pretend to be a health inspector so that he can scare off Coach K. It doesn’t work because Rico’s uncle asks how Rico is doing on the team but Coach K. still decides not to buy the Stadium because this is a silly show where plot developments are brought and abandoned at random.

Meanwhile, Mary Beth is upset when Hammer resists her attempts to change him. Mary Beth wants to go to an art exhibit. Hammer wants to go to a boxing match. (Personally, I’m probably an even bigger culture snob than Mary Beth and I would be happy to go to either of those. I love museums but a boxing match is a good excuse to wear something nice and show off your cleavage.) Mary Beth wants Hammer to go sailing. Hammer wants to spend his time at a biker rally. Realizing that she’s trying too hard to change Hammer, Mary Beth dresses up in leather and hangs out at a biker bar. She teaches the bikers all about the proper utensils to use at a formal dinner. It was actually pretty cute and, in the end, Hammer and Mary Beth agreed that they didn’t have to like the same things as long as they liked each other. Awwwwwww!

I liked this episode. Season 4 may not be as strong as the previous three seasons but the Hammer/Mary Beth relationship works surprisingly well. As far as I’m concerned, any episode that features more of Mary Beth and Kristy being wacky and less of Julie getting annoyed is a good one.

Episode 4.14 “And Then There Were Nuns”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on October 24th, 1998)

Oh hey, we’re back in San Antonio. Continuity be damned!

With only a few days left in Texas, Kristy suspects that she’s in love with Antonio. She tells Mary Beth and Julie that she can imagine a future with Antonio. Awwwwww! Antonio invites Kristy to a wedding …. in Mexico! Kristy agrees. Before leaving, she leaves a note for Julie and Mary Beth. Unfortunately, it’s a poorly-written note and Julie and Mary Beth are convinced that Kristy’s run off to Mexico to get married!

Because everyone on this show is stupid, they don’t tell Coach K or any other adults about what is happening. Instead, everyone except for Julie and Michael head down to Mexico and try to stop the wedding. I guess it’s lucky that they all happened to have their passports with them. (Either that or they crossed into Mexico illegally.) Of course, since they won the big Tri-state tournament. they have to get back to San Antonio by 4 p.m. so that they can get ready to do a media appearance. Michael and Julie are convinced that their friends can go to Mexico and come back while the Coach is taking an hour-long nap. Apparently, the show’s writers were under the impression that San Antonio is right on the border. It’s not. San Antonio is 155 miles away from the border and it appears that the wedding is taking place in a fairly small and remote village. In short, this trip is going to take a lot longer than an hour.

Admittedly, King of the Hill used to do the same thing. Hank Hill was literally an hour away from every location in Texas. But, in that case, it was obviously meant to be intentional and it was a fun in-joke for Texans. (It helped that Mike Judge was one of us.) But, in this case, it just feels incredibly dumb on the part of the Hang Time writers.

Anyway, Silk, Rico, Hammer, and Mary Beth arrive at the wedding but a nun tells them that this is a private ceremony. So, of course, they all dress up like nuns and sneak into the ceremony and….

….

Sorry, silently screaming.

The important thing is that it all works out in the end. Coach K. finds out where the team has gone so he, Michael, and Julie show up for the wedding. Meanwhile, Antonio promises Kristy that, someday, he will find her in Indiana. Awwwww! I’m going to guess that the media appearances were handled by the team’s non-starters, who probably talked about how much fun it was to spend every game sitting on the bench while Michael, Julie, Rico, Silk, and Hammer got all the glory.

What a stupid episode.

Retro Television Reviews: Half Nelson 1.6 “Nose Job”

Posted on April 21, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Rocky gets involved with a case that’s all about obsession!

Episode 1.6 “Nose Job”

(Directed by Arthur Allan Seidelman, originally aired on April 19th, 1985)

Way back in March, when I watched the pilot for Half Nelson, one thing that I immediately noticed was the chemistry between Joe Pesci and Victoria Jackson. In the pilot, it was pretty clear that Annie O’Hara (played by Jackson) had a crush on Rocky (played, of course, by Pesci) and it was actually kind of cute. The streetwise Rocky and the spacey Annie seemed like they could be an interesting couple and I was actually looking forward to seeing how that storyline developed.

Unfortunately, it didn’t develop. In the episodes immediately following the pilot, both Annie and Rocky’s boss, Chester (Fred Williamson), were sidelined so that the show could focus on Rocky interacting with Beau (Dick Butkus) and Kurt (Bubba Smith). Annie was relegated to staying at the office and answering the phone while Rocky flirted with each week’s guest star. That was definitely a missed opportunity. While Smith and Butkus both provided adequate comedy relief, it’s still hard not to feel that the show often focused so much on them that performers like Dean Martin, Fred Williamson, and Victoria Jackson were pushed to the side.

In this week’s episode, Detective Hamill (Gary Grubbs) asks Annie to go on a date with him and Rocky encourages her to accept, so I guess the potential Rocky/Annie romance is officially dead. At first, Annie doesn’t want to date Hamill because she thinks he’s “a jerk.” (Gary Grubbs, who is one of those actors that most people will immediately recognize even if they don’t know his name, has such an amiable presence that it’s hard to understand where Annie got that idea from.) However, in return for Hamill helping him out with this week’s case, Rocky convinces Annie to give Hamill a shot. Annie and Hamill are a couple by the end of the episode. Yay! Who doesn’t love a romantic ending?

As for this episode itself, it opens with Rocky, Beau, and Kurt providing security on the set of a film. The film appears to be about a revolution in Latin America. April Gray (Mary-Margaret Humes) is playing the lead role, a revolutionary who wears a red beret. (Seriously, it looks like a great film.) When April is nearly run over by an out-of-control truck, Rocky becomes convinced that someone is stalking her. When he discovers that the truck’s accelerator was rigged with surgical string, he decides that a plastic surgeon, Dr. Jonathan Gaines (Jon Cypher), is trying to kill her.

However, before he can accuse Dr. Gaines, he has to find out if April has actually had plastic surgery. As opposed to just asking her, Rocky takes her out on a date. (Beau and Kurt come along as well, so that they can check out the other actresses in the cast and see if any of them had plastic surgery as well.) The only way that Rocky can convince her to go out with him is to take her to an exclusive club. But how can Rocky get reservations!? Fear not, it’s Dean Martin to the rescue! It turns out that Dean is co-owner of the club so he puts down his martini glass for a few minutes and makes a phone call. It’s kind of nice that Dean actually got to be involved in the case this week. Dean’s appearances on this show never last for more than a minute or two and it’s obvious that he wasn’t in the best shape when he filmed them but still, it’s fun to watch him and Pesci act opposite of each other. Pesci always seem to be in awe of Dean.

Before the date, Rocky has to teach Beau and Kurt how to discreetly look for surgery scars. This leads to him showing them how to peak behind someone ears while dancing with them. With the help of Annie, he shows how pretending to lose a contact lens can provide a chance to get on the floor check out someone’s legs for scars. (Unfortunately, the scene is rather awkwardly blocked and framed and, in a few shots, it appears as if Rocky is basically looking straight up Annie’s skirt.) Beau and Kurt are impressed. Chester is less impressed, especially when he catches Rocky crawling around Annie’s legs. Chester yells at Rocky and then goes in his office. And that concludes Fred Williamson’s role in this episode.

During the date, Rocky spots the surgical scars behind April’s ears, indicating that she’s had plastic surgery. It turns out that April not only got a nose job from Dr. Gaines but she also briefly dated him. Rocky realizes that Gaines is now trying to kill her but, as always, everyone tells Rocky that he doesn’t have enough evidence to prove anything. Let’s see. Gaines was on the set when the truck went out of control. The truck’s accelerator was tied down with surgical string. Gaines was the only person on the set with a job that would give him easy access to surgical string. It’s hard not to feel that everyone’s being too quick to dismiss Rocky’s suspicions here.

In fact, Dr. Gaines is so obviously guilty that it’s also pretty obvious that there has to be someone else involved as well. About halfway through the episode, we learn that the film’s director (played by Timothy Bottoms) also used to date April! In fact, he’s the one who paid for her nose job!

Half Nelson really has not turned out to be the lost classic that I was hoping it would be. The pilot was strong but the episodes after that have struggled to really establish a consistent identity for the show. Watching this show, one gets the feeling that the show’s producers couldn’t decide if they wanted to do a comedy or a drama. As I already mentioned, the focus on the antics of Dick Butkus and Bubba Smith pretty much left the rest of the talented cast with little to do. It’s easy to see why Half Nelson did not last longer than two months.

That said, this was actually a pretty good episode. Yes, there were plenty of detective show clichés but both Jon Cypher and Timothy Bottoms were convincing as the show’s two villains and Joe Pesci’s New York persona provided a nice contrast to the sleek phoniness of Hollywood and Beverly Hills. There was even an exciting car chase, which was entertaining even if it was ultimately a bit superfluous to the plot. Plus, the episode featured Rocky throwing a bomb more seconds before it exploded. This is what the explosion looked like:

Seriously, did Rocky just nuke L.A.!?

This was an entertainingly melodramatic episode. You could see hints of the show that Half Nelson could have been if only it could have maintained a consistent tone.

Next week, Rocky meets Marjoe Gortner!

Retro Television Review: Hang Time 4.11 “Restless Mary Beth” and 4.12 “Shoot Out”

Posted on April 17, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

When last we checked in with Hang Time, the Tornadoes were in San Antonio and the show was doing an absolutely terrible job of portraying Texas. Wow, I hope that’s over with! Let’s find out.

Episode 4.11 “Restless Mary Beth”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on October 17th, 1998)

Hey, we’re back in Indiana! I guess that stupid and insulting Texas storyline is over with. Yay!

Freaking out because she’s worried that she doesn’t have enough extra-curricular activities to get into the college of her choice, Mary Beth starts taking on every activity that she can. She joins the band. She rejoins the cheerleaders. She joins the Speech and Debate club. When she finds out that a special election is being held to select a new student council president, she decides to run. Julie, Hammer, and Kristy warn her that she’s taking on too much but Mary Beth laughs them off. One scene later and Mary Beth is having a nervous breakdown and sobbing in the locker room because she’s working herself to exhaustion.

No worries! Mary Beth ends up falling asleep and she has a dream where she’s competing against Kristy in a shopping spree. Mary Beth has more stuff in her cart but Kristy still wins because, as Hammer explains, Mary Beth didn’t make it to graduation because she tried to take on too much. So, I guess the implication is that Mary Beth is going to die if she takes on too many extra-curriculars? Wow, that’s dark!

That said, I could relate to this episode. I tend to take on too much as well. Despite a rather stupid B-plot about the team losing the Coach’s championship ring while lounging in the new hot tub, this was a pretty good episode and it made a good point about taking time to rest. Plus, it returned the action to Indiana, where it belongs.

Episode 4.12 “Shoot Out”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on October 17th, 1998)

The Tornadoes are in San Antonio for the Tri-state Tournament….

WAIT A MINUTE, THEY’RE BACK IN TEXAS!? They were just in Indiana, how are they back in Texas!?

The obvious answer is that NBC showed these episodes out-of-order. NBC tended to do that to all of their Sunday morning shows so it shouldn’t come as a shock that they would do it to Hang Time. Still, it always surprises me how blatant NBC was in its utter disregard for the three or four people who were actually paying attention to continuity back in the 90s.

Anyway, the team is back in San Antonio and, as always, they are just one game away from winning not only the tournament but also a trip to New York. Coach K is excited to learn that their next game will be against a team coached by his protegee, Rick. However, when the Coach discovers that 1) Rick is now in a wheelchair and 2) Rick might get an NBA job but only if his team wins, Coach K finds himself feeling a bit conflicted. The Tornadoes interpret this as Coach wanting them to throw the game! Fortunately, after a terrible first half, Coach K tells them that he doesn’t want them to throw the game and that deliberately losing is an insult to the other team. Just as with every other game they’ve ever played, the Tornadoes come back in the second half and win by one point. They win a trip to New York and Rick gets his NBA position regardless. Does the NBA regularly hire high school coaches?

While this is going on, Antonio (Jay Hernandez) begs Kristy to forgive him for not telling her that he could speak English. He eventually wins Kristy over, mostly because he’s totally adorable and, since this show was filmed in the 90s, no one mentions how messed up it was that Kristy automatically assumed that Antonio and his friends couldn’t speak English to begin with.

Ugh. This episode did a slightly better job of presenting Texas than the previous San Antonio episode did but there were still way too many people walking around wearing cowboy hats. Not everyone in Texas is a cowboy.

Anyway, I guess the team is going to New York now! If they can make it there, they can make it anywhere …. well, you know the rest.

Retro Television Reviews: Half Nelson Episode 1.5 “Diplomatic Immunity”

Posted on April 14, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

L.A. …. you belong to me….

Episode 1.5 “Diplomatic Immunity”

(Dir by Alan Cooke, Originally aired on April 12th, 1985)

Somebody is stealing luxury cars in Beverly Hills! Detective Hamill (Gary Grubbs) is pretty sure that he’s caught the responsible party, a teenager who was seen near one of the cars when it was taken. The teenager, who is in danger of losing his athletic scholarship, insists that he was just thinking about stealing the car but he didn’t actually do it. Instead, the car was stolen by some guy who arrived on the scene via a limousine. Why would a car thief be getting transported around in a limo?

That’s what Rocky Nelson (Joe Pesci) wants to find out! Just as in the previous episodes, everyone tells Rocky to not get involved. The police tell Rocky to stay out of the way. Rocky’s boss, Chester (Fred Williamson), tells him that it’s not his concern. Rocky’s landlord, Mr. Martin (Dean Martin), stops by the guesthouse to use Rocky’s phone and, though he doesn’t say not to get involved, it’s still pretty obvious that Dean Martin doesn’t care about the car thieves.

Only Rocky cares! Actually, Kurt (Bubba Smith) and Beau (Dick Butkus) care as well. In fact, in this episode, Kurt and Beau get almost as much screen time as Rocky. They follow Rocky around, hoping to learn how to become better detectives. As critical as I can sometimes be of Dick Butkus’s character on Hang Time, he was actually pretty funny on Half Nelson. He and Bubba Smith made a good comedy team and they seem to be having so much fun together that it makes up for the fact that neither one of them had much range as an actor. For instance, when Rocky goes to Beverly Hills High School to do some investigating, Kurt and Beau follow him. Kurt and Beau claim to be two new teachers at the school. “We got traded to this school from Harvard,” Beau says before Kurt explains that they got traded for another teacher and several draft picks. It’s a dumb joke but Butkus and Smith sell it with their enthusiasm.

Eventually, Rocky figures out that the car theft ring is being led by a diplomat (John Saxon) from Central America. Saxon pretends to be collecting money for charity but he’s actually just stealing cars and smuggling them out of the country. Rocky’s investigative techniques are not particularly complex. He “borrows” an expensive car from the studio and then hides in the trunk with his pitbull, Hunk. When Saxon’s henchman (Lewis van Bergen) steals the car, Rocky and Hunk jump into action. Hunk cripples the thief by biting his ankle and then Rocky and his dog run away as the car explodes. “Run, Hunk, run!” Rocky yells.

Rocky, Kurt, and Beau manage to catch Saxon right before he boards a plane to leave the country. The teenager is freed from jail. As he leaves his cell, he complains about the incompetence of the cops. Rocky yells at him for being disrespectful. It’s the best scene in the show, just because it feels spontaneous. It’s almost as if Pesci himself suddenly got mad and started yelling at the kid.

Rocky, Amanda (Victoria Jackson, who has been underused in every episode, with the exception of the pilot), and the rest of the Beverly Hills Security team throws a birthday party for Chester. Dean Martin does not show up. The end credits roll.

Half Nelson‘s main weakness is that, despite having an once-in-a-lifetime cast, the plots tend to feel somewhat generic. It just doesn’t feel right to have actors like Joe Pesci, Fred Williamson, Dean Martin, and even Dick Butkus and Bubba Smith dealing with the type of boring cases that any 80s TV detective could have solved. That said, compared to the previous episodes of Half Nelson that I’ve watched, this episode was okay. Pesci got to show off his streetwise attitude and, as always, he seemed to be happiest when acting opposite Dean Martin. John Saxon was stuck playing a one-note villain but it’s still always enjoyable to watch Saxon as he plots to do something bad. This episode was enjoyable if not exactly memorable.

Retro Television Review: Hang Time 4.9 “Love Triangle” and 4.10 “Texas Rose”

Posted on April 10, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, we have one decent episode and one episode that …. well, just read the review.

Episode 4.9 “Love Triangle”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on October 10th, 1998)

Finally, a decent episode!

At the start of this episode, Kristy informs Mary Beth that she has a crush on Hammer but she’s too shy to talk to him. Not surprisingly, Mary Beth takes it upon herself to set them up. She tells Hammer to be at the Stadium at a certain time so that he can meet his blind date. Hammer agrees but is shocked when the blind date turns out to be Kristy. After the date, he approaches Mary Beth and tells her that, while he thinks Kristy is great, she’s not the girl that he’s interested in. He’s interested in …. MARY BETH!

Now, you can probably guess that this leads to Mary Beth dating Hammer in secret. And you can probably also guess that Kristy eventually figures out what’s happening while they’re all at the latest school dance. Mary Beth and Kristy argue and then they make up and then everything’s fine. Mary Beth has a boyfriend, Hammer has a girlfriend, and Kristy …. well, okay. It kind of sucks for Kristy. That said, Mary Beth and Hammer are a cute couple.

This was a pretty simple episode and it almost felt like a throwback to the type of episodes that dominated the show’s first season. (Remember when Danny tried to date Julie before eventually realizing that Sam was perfect for him?) But it was kind of nice to take a break from all the basketball stuff and Megan Parlen and Amber Barretto did a good job with both the dramatic and the comedic moments of the episode. And, after a rough few episodes, Mark Famiglietti finally got to display some bad boy charm in the role of Hammer.

All in all, this wasn’t a bad episode.

Episode 4.10 “Texas Rose”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on October 10th, 1998)

*sigh*

This episode finds the team going to a basketball tournament in San Antonio, Texas so, of course, it opens up with stock footage of an oil derrick. From the minute I saw that cliché, I knew this would be a difficult episode for me. As a Texan, I’m very sensitive to all the silly stereotypes and clichés that television shows tend to fall back on whenever they try to tell a story about my part of the world.

The oil derricks were followed by a shot of the Alamo. That was good. The Alamo is a huge part of Texas culture. This was followed by the Tornadoes checking into their San Antonio hotel and, of course, everyone in the lobby is wearing a cowboy hat. I rolled my eyes so hard that I gave myself a headache. “Is it me or does everyone around here look like Garth Brooks?” Mary Beth says.

Oh c’mon, I muttered for neither the first nor the last time.

“I can’t wait to get on the court and kick some cowboy butt!” Michael declares.

So, I guess the point of this episode was to make sure no one in Texas ever watched another episode of Hang Time. I mean, we’ve got enough confidence down here to take a joke but that doesn’t mean we want to spend 30 minutes being made fun of by a bunch of people who think Indianapolis is a real city.

At the local restaurant, the boys go crazy watching some fat dude try to ride an electric bull while Kristy sees a handsome Latino and automatically assumes that he can’t speak English. She speaks to him in Spanish and, as we can see from the subtitles, her Spanish sucks. Still, Antonio (Jay Hernandez, of Crazy/Beautiful and Hostel fame) is so attracted to her that he doesn’t mention that he was born in America and he can speak English. Myself, I just find it interesting that Kristy and her friends assume that just because someone has brown skin in San Antonio, they must have been born in Mexico or Latin America and that they must not be able to speak English. I mean, did they not notice that the town itself is called San Antonio but it’s full of people who speak and understand both English and Spanish? Did they somehow never learn that Texas has a strong and politically active Latino community? Seriously, the whole world isn’t freaking Indiana.

(And they wonder why we dislike Yankee tourists down here….)

Meanwhile, Silk meets a girl named Rose and falls for her. However, Silk thinks that Rose is rich so he pretends to be rich in order to impress her. When Silk takes Rose to Coach K’s suite and tries to pretend that it’s actually his hotel room, it works until Coach K shows up. Oh well, Silk — that’s what you get!

The next day, as the team gets ready for their first game, Kristy is shocked to discover that Antonio is on the rival team and he can speak English! Kristy yells at him for not telling her that he could speak English. You know, Kristy, maybe you should have given him a chance to speak English before assuming that he couldn’t.

Things work out in the end. Silk discovers that Rose isn’t actually rich and then he commandeers the stage of the local country-western bar and sings her a country song. Wow, that’s stupid. The episode ends without any word as to whether or not The Tornadoes won their tournament. I really hope this doesn’t mean that I’m going to have sit through four more episodes about the Tornadoes in San Antonio.

*shudder*