Jack Rader | Through the Shattered Lens

Welcome to Late Night 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 CHiPs, which ran on NBC from 1977 to 1983. The entire show is currently streaming on Freevee!

This week, the second season begins.

Episode 2.1 “Peaks and Valleys”

(Dir by Phil Bondelli, originally aired on Sept. 16th, 1977)

The second season premiere of CHiPs brings some changes.

Most noticeably, the theme song has been redone and now, instead of being driven by the horn section, it now features a bass-driven disco beat. From the minute the new version of theme song begin, you know that you’re watching a show that was filmed in the heart of the 70s.

Secondly, the second season premiere is considerably less gritty than any of the episodes that aired during the first season. If the first season concerned itself with showing the day-to-day duties of the members of the California Highway Patrol, from the mundane to the occasionally exciting, the second season announces from the start that it’s about fast cars, fast motorcycles, and slow motion crash footage.

Ponch is considerably more competent in this episode than he ever was during the first season. For his part, Getraer no longer seems to dislike Ponch as much as he did just a few months ago. No mention is made of Ponch being on any sort of departmental probation. Now, Ponch is as professional and competent as Jon Baker.

Finally, the California High Patrol now has a new chief mechanic. Harlan Arliss (played by Lou Wagner) is short, sarcastic, and wears a tie along with his white mechanic coat. Arliss is not impressed with the way Baker and Ponch treat their motorcycles, though he seems to reserve most of his ire for Baker. (“Your tire pressure is low!”) Arliss may seem like he is overly critical but he also keeps a really cute dog at the garage.

That said, some things remain the same. As always, Baker finds himself feeling unappreciated. The episode opens with a camper the crashes in slow motion. The driver, Bob Niles (a bearded Troy Donahue), suffers a spinal injury as the result of someone moving him after the accident. Niles can’t remember exactly who moved him and it appears that Baker, Ponch, and the Highway Patrol might get sued.

Then Baker burns his hand saving a man from a burning vehicle. And a little child shoots a toy gun at Baker. And then two rednecks call in a fake emergency so that they can shoot up a police car. Is it any surprise that both Baker and Ponch are tempted to quit the force and take a job selling used cars for Baker’s high school friend, Stan Bosca (Richard Gates)?

Fortunately, Bob does get his memory back and remember that it was a bunch of construction workers who moved him. So, it sucks for those well-intentioned workers (hello, lawsuit!) but at least Baker and Ponch are off the hook. And, after seeing how sleazy the used car business is, Baker and Ponch decide to remain on the force and go disco dancing instead!

Actually, Ponch dances. Baker watches and smile awkwardly. It’s interesting that the majority of the episode is centered around Baker having an existential crisis but it all ends by highlighting Ponch on the dance floor. If nothing else, it proves that the people behind the show understood that Wilcox was the actor while Estrada was the one with the big personality.

I enjoyed this episode. The scenery was nice. The show made good use of slo mo of doom when Niles crashed his vehicle. The dog was cute. And the opening theme song was so catchy that I’m still hearing it hours after watching the show. With this episode, the second season got off to a good start.

Chuck Fucking Norris, dude. Chuck Norris is so cool that continuity bends to his will and thanks him for the opportunity.

Need proof?

Just watch Braddock: Missing in Action III.

The third Missing in Action film starts in 1975, with the fall of Saigon. The communists are taking over. The Americans are fleeing Vietnam. Colonel James Braddock (Chuck FUCKING Norris) is determined to bring his Vietnamese wife to America with him but, when she loses her papers and is not allowed to make her way to the American embassy, Braddock believes that she had been killed. (Keep an eye out for Keith David as the Embassy guard. Only Chuck Norris could overshadow Keith David in a movie.) Heartbroken, Braddock returns to the United States.

Every fan of the Missing in Action franchise knows better. We all know that Chuck was in a POW camp when Saigon fell. In Missing in Action 2, he and his fellow prisoners did not even know if the war had ended. Also, Chuck mentioned having a wife waiting for him back in the United States. What gives?

I can think of only two possible explanations.

Either Chuck Norris and Cannon Films did not care about continuity

Chuck Norris is so cool that, in order to prevent his collected coolness from knocking the Earth off of its axis, the U.S. Army split Chuck’s coolness in half by creating a clone. One clone spent ten years in a POW camp. The other clone escaped during the Fall of Saigon but had to leave behind his wife.

Thirteen years later and back in the U.S., Chuck is contacted by Reverend Polanski (Yehuda Efroni), who tells him that his wife is still alive in Vietnam and that he has a 12 year-old son. Chuck’s boss at the CIA tells him that, under no circumstances, is Chuck to go to Vietnam.

Anyone who thinks they can tell Chuck Norris what do is a fool.

Chuck goes to Vietnam and is reunited with his wife and son. Unfortunately, when Chuck tries to get his new family out of the country, they are captured by sadistic General Quoc (Aki Aleong). Again, Braddock must escape from a Vietnamese prison camp.

Braddock: Missing in Action III was co-written by Chuck Norris and it was directed by his brother, Aaron. It’s a Norris production all the way, which means a lot of heroic shots of Chuck and a lot of bad guys wondering why Chuck is so much better than them.

Braddock was released four years after the first Missing in Action but, more importantly, it was released two years after Oliver Stone’s Platoon changed the way that movies dealt with the war in Vietnam. By the time that Braddock came out, films in which lone American refought and single-handedly won the war were no longer in fashion. Braddock was a flop at the box office and it ended the franchise. However, continuity errors aside, Braddock is actually the best of the Missing in Action films. It features Chuck’s best performance in the series and Chuck searching for his wife and child gives Braddock more emotional weight than the first two Missing in Action films. Maybe Chuck should have co-written and selected the director for all of the films he made for Cannon.

Chuck Norris, dude.

Chuck Fucking Norris.