Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing Baywatch Nights, a detective show that ran in Syndication from 1995 to 1997.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

This week, it’s werewolf time!

Episode 2.16 “Zargtha”

(Dir by Rick Jacobson, originally aired on April 5th, 1997)

The discovery of a murdered teenage runaway on the beach leads to Mitch investigating a series of killings involving homeless teens.  The police think that the murders must be the result of a wild animal, a wolf of some sort.  Daimont Teague shows up to tell Mitch that he thinks the killer is a Zargtha, a type of Eastern European werewolf that has found its way to California.

Mitch declares that he’s seen a lot of things over the past few months but there’s no way that he’s going to buy into the idea of a werewolf from Eastern Europe.

Okay, let’s consider this.  Over the past few months, Mitch has

1. encountered numerous sea monsters,
2. been sucked into the past and hunted by an axe-wielding frontierman
3. gone to the future and been hunted by cannibal mutants
4. watched multiple animals explode after getting exposed to space dust
5. watched two 900 year-old Vikings come back to life and pick up their blood feud right where they left off,
6. discovered that the world is secretly controlled by the Knights Templar and,
7. fought an actual vampire!

That’s just some of what Mitch has seen since the start of the second season of Baywatch Nights.  And yet, after all that, a werewolf is just too out there!?  I know that Mitch is supposed to be a skeptic and I respect that.  I’m a skeptic myself.  But there’s a point where skepticism becomes stupidity.  I may not believe in vampires but that’s going to quickly change if I ever meet one.

After learning that there’s a group of homeless teenagers living in abandoned building, Mitch and the head of the local shelter, Cindy (Pamela Bach-Hasselhoff), try to find and warn them before the killer reaches them.  Complicating this matter is that a recent earthquake is threatening to make the building come crashing down and also, the killer is already in the building.  And yes, the killer is a werewolf from Eastern Europe.

This was actually a pretty good episode.  Though the werewolf makeup wasn’t that great, the creature’s ferocious growls and the relentless way that it would attack still made it far more effective than the usual Baywatch Nights monster.  As well, the abandoned building turned out to be a wonderfully atmospheric and creepy location.  For once, all the Dutch angles felt appropriate.  This episode played out like a nightmare and I imagine, back in 1997, it was probably quite scary to watch with the lights out and maybe a storm raging outside.

Pamela Bach-Hasselhoff was married to David Hasselhoff when this episode was filmed.  That may explain why Ryan is barely in this episode and, for the first time in a long time, there’s no scenes of Ryan and Mitch flirting.  Instead, Mitch spends this episode protecting Cindy and the kids.  That’s kind of sweet.  Good for the Hoff!