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

Posted on June 27, 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, 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!

Retro Television Review: Baywatch 2.8 “Thin Or Die”

Posted on June 20, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Mitch rescues a dog and Shauni and Eddie rescue an outsider.

Episode 2.8 “Thin or Die”

(Dir by Douglas Schwartz, originally aired on November 4th, 1991)

Mitch rescues an adorable dog that is swimming in the middle of the ocean! Awwww!

The dog is so cute! But Mitch has a date that night and the dog seems to be determined to ruin it. Can Mitch adopt the dog? Actually, didn’t Mitch already adopt a dog? Didn’t almost this exact same thing happen during the first season? Seriously, whatever happened to the first dog!?

Fortunately, the dog helps Mitch track down its owner. It turns out that she’s being held hostage on her own boat. This, of course, allows for a minor action sequence. One thing that I always find interesting about Baywatch is that the lifeguards were apparently also cops. Garner Ellerbee may have been actual badge-carrying cop but he still didn’t do anything without asking a lifeguard to accompany him.

While Mitch is dealing with the dog situation, Eddie and Shauni are having relationship issues. When Shauni claims that she and Eddie don’t have anything in common, Eddie decides to ask out Nicole, the woman who works at his message service. (Apparently, message services were an early 90s thing.) Eddie has never met Nicole. He just knows that he digs her sultry voice and apparently, he’s sick of Shauni always yelling at him. Hey, remember when Eddie and Shauni got engaged? The show just kind of forgot about that.

Nicole (Melinda Reimer) shows up on the beach and she’s fat! I don’t include the exclamation mark to be cruel. I include it because that’s how the show presents her weight issue. Not only is Eddie kind of cheating on Shauni but he’s also doing it with a fat girl! Feeling insecure on the beach, Nicole later tries to walk into the ocean. Can Eddie and Shauni help her realize that she shouldn’t give up hope? Of course, they can! That said, it’s pretty safe to say that Nicole will never show up on another episode of Baywatch. You do have to feel a bit sorry for actress Melinda Reimer, who gives about as good a performance as anyone could with a Baywatch script. That said, the show definitely makes clear that the main lesson is that you should never judge anyone solely by their voice. Because they might be fat.

This episode was basically two half-baked stories mashed together. Yes, there was the hostage situation. And there was Nicole’s weight problem. But despite all of that, there really wasn’t any drama. Everything played out a low-key, laid-back pace. This was an episode that understood the assignment: Come up with just enough of a story to justify your existence but mostly just feature hot people on the beach.

Retro Television Review: Baywatch 2.7 “Sandcastles”

Posted on June 13, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, it’s Eddie vs Hector the Collector!

Episode 2.7 “Sandcastles”

(Dir by Monte Markham, originally aired on October 28th, 1991)

Eddie is freaking out because there’s too many homeless people on the beach. As he explains it to Shauni, he’s always feared that he could end up homeless. When Shauni suggests that maybe the homeless could live on a deserted army base, Eddie says that people like that are never willing to accept help. Eddie is really not a fan of the homeless!

Of course, in Eddie’s defense, he does get stabbed in the shoulder by a homeless man at the start of this episode. Hector the Collector (Ron Howard George) not only breaks into Eddie’s lifeguard tower but he also tries to steal a framed photograph of Shauni. When Eddie tries to stop him, Hector plunges a shard of glass into Eddie’s shoulder!

Hobie, meanwhile, is having a far better experience with the homeless. He meets Charlie (played by a young Nikki Cox), who is living in an abandoned power plant with her mother (Wendy Robie, who played the one-eyed Nadine on Twin Peaks). When Charlie’s mother disappears, Hobie helps Charlie look for her. When Hector the Collector steals Charlie’s journal, the entire Baywatch crew is there to help her get it back. Fortunately, Mitch is also there to save Charlie when she gets shoved into the ocean by Hector.

WOW! What is Hector’s problem!?

“Mine! Mine!” Hector hisses whenever anyone tries to take back any of the stuff that he’s stolen.

Calm down, Hector!

Meanwhile, Harvey needs a new place to live. Harvey? Oh yeah, he’s the new goofy lifeguard. He can’t sleep in his tower. He can’t live with Mitch. However, Harvey finds a big house with a pool and immediately imagines hundreds of swimsuit-clad women beckoning him to swim with him. This episode has two musical montages, one involving the homeless and one involving Harvey and a bunch of imaginary women. I’m getting the feeling that Baywatch really wasn’t that concerned with the problem of homelessness in Los Angeles.

Baywatch was (and, since it’s been revived for the upcoming television season, is) a very odd show. This episode deals with a very real social problem and David Hasselhoff is so earnest in the scenes that he shares with Nikki Cox that you can’t help but feel that maybe the Hoff’s heart was in the right place. But the show itself always seems more concerned with getting to the next beach shot. Watching this episode, you can hear the producers whispering, “Don’t worry, we’re not going to spend too much time with these homeless people….”

Anyway, the important thing is that everything works out for the best. Harvey moves in with some flight attendants. Charlie is reunited with her mother. And Hector the Collector gets the help he needs. Don’t you worry, Baywatch will be always there.

Retro Television Review: Baywatch 2.6 “Point Attack”

Posted on May 30, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Eddie tries to change a young man’s life.

Episode 2.6 “Point Attack”

(Dir by Alan Myerson, originally aired on October 21st, 1991)

Cort returns!

When the syndicated version of Baywatch first aired, John D. Cort (John Allen Nelson) was among the first season cast members who were no longer on the beach. His absence was not addressed. With this episode, we learn that he’s been in either South America, Kuwait, or Asia. No one’s sure. To me, it sounds like Cort’s a drug smugler.

Anyway, Cort shows up on the beach, just in time to help Eddie break up a gang fight! Eddie, remembering his own tough past in Philadelphia, arranges for the gang members to become a part of W.A.T.A.R., a lifeguard-run program for troubled youths. This the second episode of Baywatch’s second season to feature a gang subplot. It’s hard not to notice that whenever anyone who isn’t white shows up on this show, they’re always portrayed as being 1) poor and 2) affiliated with a gang.

Eddie hopes that he can convince gang leader Memo (Richard Coca) to change his ways. Unfortunately, Memo’s father (Danny Trejo) wants his son to follow in his footsteps as a gang member.

When told that Memo is facing jail, his father says that’s no big deal and adds, “I did time!”

“So did I,” Eddie replies.

Eddie — do you really want to challenge Danny Trejo on the subject of prison?

On the one hand, it’s always good to see Danny Trejo and there’s a definite authenticity to his performance that the rest of this episode lacks. At the same time, having Trejo around makes it all the more clear just how miscast Billy Warlock was a former juvenile delinquent-turned-lifeguard. Watching this episode, I could buy Billy Warlock as someone who could save me if I was drowning. (Thanks, Billy!) But seeing him a graduate of the hard streets of Philadelphia? That was a step too far.

As for the rest of this episode, Cort is far less of a rogue in this episode and he even helps out with the W.A.T.A.R. program. (If anything John Allen Nelson seems to get all the lines that would usually have gone to David Hasselhoff, who is barely in this episode.) When Eddie catches Memo trying to steal from the locker room, there’s a chase scene that goes on for so long that I was literally wondering if Eddie and Memo were eventually going to end up back at Baywatch Headquarters. I’m all for a good action scene but this chase went on for so long that it verged on parody and left me wondering if maybe the show’s director realized, at the last minute, that the episode needed padding.

Unfortunately, Danny Trejo and David Hasselhoff don’t share any scenes in this episode. As mentioned earlier, the Hoff is barely in it! That seems like a missed opportunity to me.

Retro Television Review: Baywatch 2.3 “The One That Got Away”

Posted on May 9, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, you can do anything in a montage!

Episode 2.3 “The One That Got Away”

(Dir by Gus Trikonis, originally aired on September 30th, 1991)

After Megan (Vanessa Angel), a lifeguard who we’ve never seen before, is attacked by a maniac (Rick Dean), she has to conquer her fears of being attacked again so that she can lure him out of hiding so that he can be arrested.

Meanwhile, Shauni is burned out on being a lifeguard so she and Eddie spend a weekend just enjoying the beach and presumably ignoring anyone who might be drowning.

This is pretty much the epitome of a syndicated episode of Baywatch and it’s interesting to see that the formula was pretty much determined and locked in even this early into the show’s syndicated run. There’s a serious storyline about a maniac attacking women on the beach but the cameraman spends as much time leering at Vanesa Angel as the man stalking her. Shauni is tired of doing her job and instead of telling her to find a new job, it’s suggested that she just spend a weekend looking at the sunset with her boyfriend.

But the most important thing is that, regardless of the beach maniac and Shauni’s depression, there’s plenty of time for endless musical montages. That’s what this episode is really all about. Shauni gets a frustration montage. She gets a happy montage. Lifeguard Harvey gets an acting like a jackass montage. Each montage takes up about five minutes of screentime so that probably definitely helped when it came to writing the script for this episode.

David Hasselhoff, oddly enough, is barely in this episode. It’s only the second episode of the show’s syndicated run and the Hoff was already taking the week off? I guess you can do that when you’re syndicated.

Retro Television Review: Baywatch 1.21 “The End?”

Posted on April 25, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, we finish off the first season of Baywatch.

Episode 1.21 “The End?”

(Dir by Reza Badiyi, originally aired on April 6th, 1990)

This the end, my only friend, the end….

Earthquake! The ground shakes in Los Angeles and the result is pure chaos. While Mitch oversees the rescue operations, Shauni tries to get over her fear of natural disasters, Eddie helps a pregnant woman deliver twins in his lifeguard tower, Gina finds herself pinned under a shelf at the loft, and Craig and Cort are trapped in an underwater cave. Have none of these people noticed that hanging out with Cort always leads to stuff like this happening?

We see a news report that says that five people died in the earthquake. Fortunately, none of those people were a character on Baywatch. (Though, now that I think about it, when was the last time anyone saw Trevor?) The LAPD dive team saves Cort and Craig. Hobie helps Gina get out from underneath that shelf. Eddie and Shauni work together to help deliver those twins and then, as the sun sets behind them, Eddie asks, “Will you marry me?” Shauni nods as the theme music starts up….

Was this the end? It was meant to be. After a season of declining ratings and raising production costs, NBC decided to cancel Baywatch. I guess the executives figured that, if even a shark attack failed to get people to watch, it was best just to move on. Baywatch decided to go out with an episode about an earthquake because it was a California show and California is all about the ground moving under your feet. It actually turned out to be one of the better episodes of the first season, specifically because it focused on lifeguards and other first responders doing their job. There were no silly plots about gamblers or Mitch’s love life or anything else. This was Baywatch the way it probably should have been. But it was too late to keep the show alive on network television.

That said, the Hoff believed in Baywatch and, working with the show’s producers, he brought it back in syndication. This episode was the end of Baywatch on NBC but it was just the beginning of the show that would go on to epitomize a decade.

We’ll start season 2 next week.

Retro Television Review: Baywatch 1.20 “Old Friends”

Posted on April 18, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week …. oh, who cares? Season one is nearly over.

Episode 1.20 “Old Friends”

(Dir by Douglas Schwartz, originally aired on March 30th, 1990)

Cort is shocked when he thinks he sees his old friend, Lance (Jeff Lester), piloting a boat. But Lance is dead! Nope, it turns out that Lance faked his death and now he wants Cort to help him commit insurance fraud. Cort doesn’t want to do anything of the sort but he is kind of in love with Lance’s sister (Susan Diol).

Oh, who cares? It’s a typical Cort story. Apparently, Cort is some sort of international bad boy, even though he just comes across as being a beach bum. Cort stories are always kind of boring because Cort has never made much sense as a character.

Meanwhile, Mitch, Craig, and Garner go camping. Mitch goes hang gliding. He ends up crashing into a tree and then getting attack by a snake. Craig uses his hang glider to search for Mitch. Craig finds him but his radio breaks down so Garner — who has never hang glided before — decides to use the one remaining hang glider to search for his friends. A gust of wind takes Garner from the mountains to the beach. Eventually, Mitch and Craig are rescued. No one dies. Snake bites aren’t that dangerous, I guess.

This was a weird episode. The first season of Baywatch premiered on NBC. NBC cancelled the show after the first season and this episode definitely feels like a show on its way out. The whole episode looks and feels cheap. There’s a noticeable lack of extras on the beach. The hang gliding scenes are not particularly convincing. Everything about the episode practically shouts, “Nearly bankrupt!” Even Hasselhoff apparently didn’t want to do too much with this episode as he spends almost the entire running time delirious from the snake bite.

This episode had one funny moment. Mitch, losing control of his hang glider, yells into his radio, “Is anyone there!?” Cut to Craig and Garner at the campsite, totally ignoring the radio. I guess it makes sense. Why would a lifeguard pay attention when someone was doing something that could potentially get him killed?

Next week — season one ends!

Retro Television Review: Baywatch 1.19 “The Big Race”

Posted on April 11, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Cort needs money!

Episode 1.19 “The Big Race”

(Dir by Kevin Inch, originally aired on March 16th, 1990)

This episode opens with Cort trying to impress a woman who is convinced that he’s rich. He and Eddie illegally break into someone else’s yacht and Eddie dressed up in a tuxedo so he can pretend to be Cort’s butler. The meeting goes well into the woman asks Cort to donate $10,000 to a retirement home and Cort impulsively says yes.

Now, he has to come up with $10,000!

Luckily, there’s a water ski race coming up and the grand prize is $15,000. Cort, Mitch, and Craig enter and …. well, do you need me to tell you that they win despite the efforts of a bunch of snobby vandals?

Meanwhile, Shauni is scared to get in the water. She’s haunted by slow motion flashbacks of Jill getting attacked by that shark. (This is the rare episode of Baywatch that actually acknowledges that something that happened in another episode.) I guess Shauni’s going to have to quit being a lifeguard now. Oh wait — luckily, someone almost drowns and Shauni’s instincts overpower her fear. With the help of Michael Newman — NEWMIE! — Shauni finds the courage to do her job.

At least Shauni is still mourning Jill. No one else seems to care. Seriously, if you think about it — two lifeguards have died in the line of duty over the past two weeks and no one really seems that upset about it.

No wonder some people stand in the darkness.

Retro Television Review: Baywatch 1.18 “Shark Derby”

Posted on April 4, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, a lifeguard dies!

Episode 1.18 “Shark Derby”

(Dir by Gregory J. Bonann, originally aired on March 2nd, 1990)

Hey, remember Jill?

Jill, played by Shawn Weatherly, was a major character at the start of the season. She was the tough, seasoned lifeguard who was one of Mitch’s best friends. She was also Shauni’s mentor. If Shauni was often silly and superficial, Jill was all business. She also had a brief flirtation with Trevor, before Trevor vanished from the show.

As the first season progressed, Jill became less and less important. In this week’s episode, Jill finally gets to do something, She dies! She dies after being attacked by a shark who was drawn to the beach by an unethical restaurant owner (Peter Brown) who has been pouring chum into the ocean and who has also placed some sort of transmitter underwater that sends out a high-pitched tone that only sharks can hear. The restauranter is just doing it to promote his annual shark derby. However, when one of the sharks attacks a raft full of school children, Jill swims out into the ocean to save them. And she ends up getting bitten by a shark. She doesn’t lose any limbs. In fact, we don’t see any blood at all. But, at the hospital, it’s announced that Jill has over two hundred sutures. Yikes!

Despite getting chomped by a shark, it first appears as if Jill will survive. But towards the end of the episode, even as she’s preparing to leave the hospital, she develops a blood cot that kills her, off-screen. David Hasselhoff gets to show off his ability to cry onscreen. To be honest, that’s the main reason this episode works. We don’t really know enough about Jill to get too emotionally involved in her situation. But Hasselhoff is so incredibly earnest and sincere in his grief that he gets to you. Jill must have been someone amazing if the Hoff is crying.

This episode was shameless and emotionally manipulative and it was pure Baywatch. This episode also featured a record number of slo mo of doom scenes. The shark attacked in slow motion. Jill and Craig yelled at people to get out of the water in slow motion. Is it really slow motion if no one yells? I’m not sure.

So, Jill is dead. But the Hoff and the rest are still alive and ready to save swimmers across California.

Retro Television Review: Baywatch 1.15 “Muddy Waters”

Posted on February 28, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The drudgery of season 1 continues.

Episode 1.15 “Muddy Waters”

(Dir by Paul Schneider, originally aired on February 2nd, 1990)

It’s a busy couple of days in Malibu!

Hobie has been getting into fights at school. Is it because the kids refuse to believe his amazing stories about his lifeguard father or is it because he has a crush on his teacher, Amanda Keller (Sherilyn Wolter)? Amanda wears glasses but takes them off whenever Mitch comes into the room so we all know what that means. Mitch is about to get a girlfriend.

Meanwhile, a picture of Shauni appears in a cheap calendar, posing in her official Baywatch bathing suit. The Captain (Monte Markham) wants to fire her but Craig proves that Shauni isn’t lying about the picture being used without Shauni’s knowledge. Not only does Craig print a calendar with the captain as “Miss March” but he also tricks the Captain into signing a release form. Shauni is vindicated. Craig’s wife complains about how sexist the calendar was. This storyline felt a bit hypocritical for a show run people who reportedly spent hours obsessing on how everyone looked in their swimsuits.

Finally, Cort and Eddie are training the junior lifeguard at the water park. An angry man who always wanted to be a lifeguard keeps loosening the bolts on the water slide. Cort, Eddie, and Garner catch him but the trouble’s not over yet! The ex-boyfriend of one of the lifeguards is making trouble and vandalizing park property. He’s captured after a dramatic chase up a water slide. Even though Cort is chasing the guy up the water slide, people keep sliding down. It felt kind of dumb, to be honest. Why not just climb the stairs to the top so that you can be there whenever the guy gets there? Why not position one lifeguard at the top and one at the bottom so the guy will eventually be caught no matter which way he climbs or slides? It seems like Eddie and Cort put a lot of people in danger for no good reason.

This episode was forgettable and dumb. That’s kind of the standard when it comes to the first season of Baywatch. Some people stand in the darkness for good reason.