James Dybas | 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, Miami Vice takes an unwelcome detour.

Episode 4.2 “Amen …. Send Money”

(Dir by James Quinn, originally aired on October 2nd, 1987)

This was pretty dumb.

Tubbs, working undercover, busts Leona Proverb (Anita Morris), who just happens to be the wife of Billy Bob Proverb (Brian Dennehy). Billy Bob is a television preacher who continually asks his followers to send him cash so he can live the lifestyle that he says God wants him to live. On paper, this sounds like a great role for Brian Dennehy but this episode’s script lets him (and, for that matter, everyone else in the cast) down. Somehow, the fact that the guy is named Billy Bob Proverb is the least heavy-handed aspect of this episode.

Faye Nell (Jo Anderson), who is one of Billy Bob’s followers, calls Tubbs to the studio and says she has information on what the Proverbs are doing. As soon as Tubbs shows up, Faye tosses herself on him, rips her dress, and starts to yell, “Rape!” Tubbs finds himself being investigated by Internal Affairs while Faye claims that God told her to call Tubbs down to the studio and she even passes a lie detector test.

“I’m being set up by a preacher!” an angered Tubbs says but it turns out that Billy Bob Proverb is not the one behind all of Tubbs’s problems. In fact, Billy Bob is actually sincere, in his own strange way. Instead, the villain turns out to be another television preacher, Mason Mather (James Tolkan). Mather has the ability to make himself go into a coma, which makes it difficult to arrest him.

Before I started watching this season, I read online that season 4 featured some of Miami Vice‘s worst episodes. Amen …. Send Money feels almost like a parody of Miami Vice. The episode itself is meant to be largely comedic and perhaps if this episode had centered on Switek and Zito instead of Crockett and Tubbs, it would have worked. Unfortunately, the show killed off Zito last season so instead, it’s Crockett and Tubbs making odd jokes and rolling their eyes in shock. The thing is, Miami Vice has — up until this episode — been a show about ruthless dealers and the futility of the War on the Drugs. The thing that set Miami Vice apart from other 80s cop shows was that it was thematically dark, the endings were frequently unhappy, and Crockett and Tubbs were always the epitome of cool, no matter what happened. This episode features cartoonish villains and a silly plot and both Crockett and Tubbs come across as being a little …. well, dorky.

(On the plus side, the show does continue its tradition of featuring future stars by giving Ben Stiller a small role as a con artist.)

Oh well. Not every episode can be a great one. Hopefully, next week will be an improvement.

This week, the one hand doesn’t know what the other one is doing. That’s life in Miami.,

Episode 3.21 “Knock Knock …. Who’s There?”

(Dir by Tony Wharmby, originally aired on March 27th, 1987)

An drug buy that Crockett and Tubbs (as Burnett and Cooper) set up with Esteban Montoyo (a miscast Ian McShane), falls apart when a group of DEA agents show up. Or, at least, they say that they’re DEA agents. Oddly, they just take the money and the drugs and then leave, saying that Miami metro will take care of the rest.

It quickly becomes apparent that the DEA agents were fake but Crockett and Tubbs have no way to confirm that because the DEA refuses to share any information about their activities with the Vice Squad. Even though the DEA and detectives are all after the same people and are supposedly soldiers in the same war, they don’t trust each other and they don’t share information. Meanwhile, Internal Affairs is convinced that Crockett and Tubbs stole the money and the drugs for themselves and are determined to prove it. Apparently, it doesn’t matter that Crockett and Tubbs have killed a variety of different drug lords over the past three seasons. No one in Miami trusts anyone!

As for the fake DEA busts, they’re being set up by an agent named Linda Colby (Elizabeth Ashley). Linda’s husband (Jimmie Ray Weeks) is a former agent who is now in a wheelchair and who is a friend of Crockett’s. Their son is in the hospital, fighting for his life. Linda’s crimes are helping her to pay for his treatment. It’s not greed that motivates her, or at least greed isn’t the only thing. She’s also motivated by love.

Of course, in the end, she still gets shot during a showdown between Crockett, Tubbs, and Montoya. Unlike the majority of Miami Vice‘s guest stars, Linda survives being shot. But, as she’s lying on the stretcher, Crockett has to arrest her. Linda says that Crockett would have done the same thing for his son. With tears in his eyes, Crockett proceeds to recite Linda’s Miranda rights. Though Crockett doesn’t say it, he knows that she’s right but he’s also a cop and he has no choice but to arrest her. Now, her son will no longer receive medical treatment and his mother is going to be in jail. Wow, Miami Vice, depressing much?

Of course, happy endings were a rarity on Miami Vice. That was one of the show’s strengths. No one ever got a truly happy ending. Every drug lord that Crockett and Tubbs took down would be replaced by someone else. Anyone who ever tried to help usually fell victim to a bullet. People like Linda did things for desperate reasons and paid the price, all in the service of an unwinnable war.

This episode was uneven. Ian McShane was not a particularly interesting villain and Crockett getting his cover blown happens so frequently that it’s no longer a shock. But that final scene definitely packed a punch. Never have the Miranda rights sounded so hollow.

Next week …. it’s Crockett and Tubbs vs. a motorcycle gang! We’ll see what happens. It can’t be any more depressing than this episode.