Retro Television Reviews: Miami Vice 1.16 “Rites of Passage”

Posted on January 1, 2024 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 Miami Vice, which ran on NBC from 1984 to 1989. The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi!

This week, Pam Grier and John Turturro show up in Miami!

Episode 1.16 “Rites of Passage”

(Dir by David Anspaugh, originally aired on February 8th, 1985)

This week’s episode of Miami Vice opens with a 5-minute mini-movie. Before we even get to the opening credits, we have watched as young and innocent Diane Gordon (Terry Ferman) arrives in Miami from New York, takes her first walk on a Florida beach, has a “chance” meeting with a smooth-talking guy named Lile (David Thornton), and ends up at a party being held at a mansion belonging to David Traynor (a young John Turturro). Traynor tells Diane that he runs a modeling agency and that he would love to put her under contract.

It’s a stylish and rather brave opening. For five minutes, we don’t see or even hear about any of the regular characters. Instead, we’re introduced to world where image is everything, from the bodies on the beach to Traynor’s art deco mansion to the beautiful women who have been paid for by considerably less attractive men. In those five minutes, Diane wins our sympathy and we also see how she (and so many others) have fallen into the trap set by the David Traynors of the world. For those five minutes, we are reminded that this is a show about more than Sonny Crockett and Ricardo Tubbs. It’s about more than even Miami. This is a show about America.

After the opening credits, we watch as the police retrieve the body of one of Traynor’s girls from a lagoon. She committed suicide. In the crowd watching is Diane’s sister, Valerie (played by the legendary Pam Grier). Valerie is a New York cop. When she goes to the Vice Squad to ask for Castillio’s help in searching for her sister, we learn that she is also Tubbs’s former (and soon current) lover.

In many ways, the rest of this episode is traditional Miami Vice. Zito and Switek provide some comic relief when they disguise themselves as exterminators and invade one of Traynor’s parties. Crockett and Tubbs once again go undercover as Burnett and Cooper, infiltrating Traynor’s mansion so that they can rescue Diane. Diane has been so brainwashed by Traynor and Lile that, even after she’s been reunited with her sister, she still can’t bring herself to admit that Traynor was using her. She calls Traynor and tells him that she’s decided to go back to New York City. In a montage that is rather creepily scored to Foreigner’s I Want To Know What Love Is, scenes of Valerie and Tubbs making love are mixed with scenes of Lile giving Diane an intentional drug overdose.

Technically, this is a Tubbs episode. For once, of the two main detectives, Tubbs is the one who has a personal reason for wanting to take Traynor down while it falls to Crockett to deal with Castillo’s withering stare of concern. That said, Rites of Passage is Pam Grier’s show all the way. From the minute that Grier shows up, she controls every scene in which she appears. Just as in Coffy, Grier plays an avenging angel. This episode ends, as Miami Vice often did, with a shoot out but this time, it’s Grier who guns down Lile and Traynor. “Read me my rights,” Valerie says to Crockett as the episode ends.

Again, the storyline may have been typical Vice but the performance of Pam Grier and the stylish direction of David Anspaugh elevated the episode. This episode presents Miami as being beautiful but heartless, a place where innocents come to pursue the American dream but instead find themselves being used and abused by sleazy but wealthy men. (At one point, it is mentioned that Traynor specializes in finding women for diplomats, meaning that most of his clients have diplomatic immunity.) Traynor’s mansion is a brilliant combination of the sleek and the tacky and Turturro plays Traynor as being a not particularly clever man who has gotten rich because he understands that everyone ultimately driven by the same desire for power and pleasure without consequences.

Next week …. it’s another Tubbs episode! Can Tubbs defuse a hostage situation, despite not having an ex-lover around to help him? We’ll find out!

Retro Television Reviews: Miami Vice 1.16 “Smuggler’s Blues”

Posted on December 25, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Crockett and Tubbs head down to Colombia and learn about the smuggler’s blues!

Episode 1.16 “Smuggler’s Blues”

(Dir by Paul Michael Glaser, originally aired on Feb. 1st, 1985)

Someone is blowing up drug dealers and their families in Miami. Homicide Detective Jones (Ron Vawter) doesn’t know why anyone cares about a bunch of smugglers being killed but DEA Agent Ed Waters (a youngish Richard Jenkins) is concerned that a vigilante is on the loose.

If there is a vigilante on the loose, who could it be? Well, we know that it’s not going to be any of our regular cast members, even if Castillo does seem to be kind of tightly wound. So, that really leaves Jones and Waters as our only two suspects. Looking over the notes that I trotted down for this episode, I see that I immediately said that Waters had to be the killer because, when the killer anonymously called the Department towards the end of the episode, I instantly recognized Richard Jenkins’s voice. Of course, it turned out I was totally wrong. Detective Jones turned out to be the killer and apparently, I have no idea what Richard Jenkins actually sounds like.

Anyway, before Detective Jones can be revealed as the murder, Crockett and Tubbs have to go to Colombia so that they can go undercover as dealers and purchase a large amount of cocaine. The idea is that the vigilante will target either Crockett and Tubbs or they’ll go after Trudy, who is undercover as Tubbs’s wife. Working on their own, Crockett and Tubbs recruit a pilot named Jimmy Cole (Glenn Frey) to fly them to Colombia.

Former Eagle Glenn Frey was specifically cast in this episode because the plot was largely based on a song that he had written, Smuggler’s Blues. (The episode’s script was written by Miguel Pinero, who played Calderone earlier in the season.) The song is played throughout the episode, the lyrics hammering home one of Miami Vice‘s key themes. The war on drugs can never be won because there’s way too much money to be made in smuggling and selling.

It’s a good episode, one that features a likable guest turn from Glenn Frey and plenty of action. When Crockett and Tubbs land in Colombia, they find themselves having to fight off both enforcers and cops. Their only ally is Cole, a man who they would normally be expected to arrest, (In a nicely acted scene, Tubbs and Cole bond over the fact that they both served in Vietnam.) Back in the United States, Crockett, Tubbs, and Cole have to fight off a thief, played by Richard Edson. And after all that, it’s still up to Tubbs and Crockett to save Trudy from being blown up in a trailer and this leads to wonderfully tense bomb disarming scene. In the end, Crockett and Tubbs score a victory but we are left with little doubt that it will only be a temporary one. That’s the politics of contraband, to quote both the song and the show.

Retro Television Reviews: Miami Vice 1.15 “Golden Triangle: Part Two”

Posted on December 18, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week’s episode is all about Castillo!

Episode 1.15 “Golden Triangle: Part Two”

(Dir by David Anspaugh, originally aired on January 18th, 1985)

Last week’s episode revealed a little bit about Castillo’s past and what actually goes on underneath his stoic facade. This week’s episode exposed even more of Castillo …. literally!

Part two of Golden Triangle opens with Castillo very much out of uniform as he strips down to a black speedo and swims in the ocean. To be honest, it was a bit strange to see because …. well, he’s Castillo. Castillo shows no emotion. Castillo never smiles. Castillo, up until last week, had no life outside of his work. Now, suddenly, the viewer learns that Castillo has kept himself in pretty good shape. It’s weird to see someone with that good of a body and that strange of a mustache.

After his swim, Castillo meets with Crockett and Tubbs. They tell him that they are searching Miami for both Lao Li and May Ying. Castillo tells them not to, saying that “This department is not my private detective agency,” but Crockett and Tubbs insist on being allowed to help. As they explain it, Lao Li is a heroin dealer so they’re actually doing their job by searching for him.

It turns out to be much easier to track down Dale Menton (John Santucci), a former CIA agent who knew Castillo in Thailand and who was Lao Li’s handler. Menton reveals that Lao Li and his entire family is in Miami and they’re all hiding in plain sight. He even gives Lao Li’s phone number to Castillo. Menton also mentions that he was the one who, years ago, informed Lao Li that Castillo was planning on raiding one of his drug shipments. As a result, most of Castillo’s men were killed and, after his house was blown up, Castillo wrongly believed that May Ying had been killed.

Castillo meets with Lao Li (Keye Luke), who explains that he is only in Miami because he is retired and that he’s no longer in the drug business. (Needless to say, Castillo sees right through him.) Castillo also meets May Ying (Joan Chen) and discovers that she is now remarried and has a son. Somewhat touchingly, Castillo is happy for her. However, Castillio also knows that May Ying and her husband have been brought to Miami to serve as hostages. If he goes after Lao Li (or Menton), May Ying will be killed.

Lao Li is very clever but his dumbass grandsons (played by Peter Kwong and Kevin Gray) are not. They ignore Lao Li’s order to lay low and instead, they start dressing like Sonny Crockett and driving around town in a White Lamborghini. When they’re arrested while in the middle of a drug deal, Castillo realizes that he finally has the leverage to take Lao Li down.

This episode was pretty much a showcase for Edward James Olmos, who played Castillo has being the one man in Miami who was not willing to compromise his values. At the end of the show, Lao Li suggested that there might be a mutual respect between him and Castillo just for Castillo to inform him that no, Castillo had absolutely no respect for Lao Li. The episode ended with Castillo watching as May Ying and her husband returned to Thailand, happy to know that she was alive and doing well but also resigned to the fact that she could no longer be with him. It was an emotionally powerful moment.

Next week, Crockett and Tubbs head to Colombia!

Retro Television Reviews: Miami Vice 1.14 “Golden Triangle: Part One”

Posted on December 11, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Castillo opens up!

Episode 1.14 “Golden Triangle: Part One”

(Dir by George Stanford Brown, originally aired on January 11th, 1985)

Okay, things are going to get a little complicated here. This is one convoluted episode.

Crockett and Tubbs’s latest assignment has them pretending to be the head of security for a Miami hotel. Castillo wants them to catch two crooked cops who are shaking down the prostitutes who use the hotel as their office. Tubbs and Crockett aren’t happy about it because it makes them feel like they’re working for Internal Affairs but Castillo makes it clear that he has no patience for any dirty cops.

Unfortunately, they’re not having much success with the security gig. The episode opens with Crockett and Tubbs subduing a guest who is freaking out on Angel Dust. “Attack the whack!” as the Disco Godfather once put it.

Crockett decides to put on a pair of thick glasses and a pocket protector and sit by the pool. He’s approached by Candy James (Robin Johnson), a high-class escort who asks Crockett if he wants to party. Crockett promptly arrests her.

After Candy agrees to help Crockett and Tubbs (in return for her criminal record being wiped out of the system), Crockett and Tubbs decide to go undercover as pimps while still pretending to be hotel security guards. When a guest named Albert Szarbo (John Snyder) and his unnamed Thai associate see Tubbs setting Gina up with her date (who is actually Zito), they decide that Crockett and Tubbs must be using the hotel as a front for their own prostitution operation. Szarbo approaches Crockett and explains that he wants to rob all of the hotel’s safe deposit boxes.

With Candy’s help, Crockett and Tubbs discover that the crooked detectives are Herb Ross (Paul Austin) and Dan Garcia (Gary Jellum). Ross and Garcia are arrested but are released just a few hours later. Because they were not actually arrested by Crockett and Tubbs, they assume that Crockett and Tubbs are still just the hotel security guys but they also assume that Crockett must have snitched on them to the police and….

Wait? What? Seriously, how does everyone in Miami not know, at this point, that Crockett and Tubbs are cops? They make no effort to hide the fact that they’re cops. Even when they’re undercover, they refer to each other by their real names and spend half of their time talking about what’s going on back at the station. Even if the criminals don’t know that Crockett and Tubbs are working undercover, you would at least expect their fellow police officers to know.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, Candy. Candy said she would leave Miami after Ross and Garcia were busted but, instead, she shows up back at the hotel. Crockett is not happy about this but then he finds himself being confronted by Szarbo and Ross, who claims that Crockett is a snitch. Candy steps up and announces that she’s the snitch, saving Crockett and Tubbs’s case.

However, it turns out that Szarbo was lying to Crockett about wanting Crockett and Tubbs to be present when he robbed the safety deposit boxes. Instead, he was just using Crockett so that he could get a look at the vault before breaking in. Szarbo and his associate pull off the robbery and are then murdered by whoever hired them.

Castillo takes one look at the body of Szarbo’s Thai associate and realizes that he was tortured to death by associates of Chinese General Lao Li, a drug lord who Castillo tangled with before he joined the Miami PD. The normally stoic and unemotional Castillo opens up a little and reveals that he spend three years working undercover in Thailand for the DEA. Castillo says that they need to discover why Lao Li wanted whatever was in the safety deposit boxes.

Leaving his office and helping Tubbs and Crockett with their investigation, Castillo stuns everyone by revealing that he’s actually a total badass who speaks Thai, knows martial arts, and can handle himself in a fight. A search of all of Miami’s Thai restaurants eventually leads Castillo to Lao Li’s assassin. After an exciting fight with Castillo, the assassin purposefully commits suicide by swallowing his own tongue.

Back at police headquarters, Castillo, Crockett, Tubbs, Zito, and Switek takes a look at some of the items that were recovered from Szarbo’s hotel room. Castillo has deduced that Lao Li has come to the United States and his immigration visa was probably in one of the safety deposit boxes. He then looks at a picture of an attractive Chinese woman. (Some viewers will recognize her as being actress Joan Chen.) When asked who the woman is, Castillo replies, “My wife.”

This was a great episode, with a wonderfully twisty plot and a great fight scene between Edward James Olmos and Paul Tenn. After spending the past few episodes as a glowering figure who spent most of his time standing in his office and glaring at Crockett, Castillo revealed a bit about himself and it was fun to discover that this stoic figure was actually a total badass.

Next week: Part two of Golden Triangle!

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Monsters 1.10 “Pillow Talk”

Posted on December 6, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991. The entire show is streaming on Tubi.

Tonight, a bed demands to be fed.

Episode 1.10 “Pillow Talk”

(Dir by David Odell, originally aired on December 24th, 1988)

Miles Magnus (John Diehl) is one of the most successful horror authors in the world, writing best seller after best seller. All of his books seem to involve a “master” who forces other people to do something terrible. This episode opens with Miles bringing home his date, Barbara (Ruth de Sosa), and immediately taking her to his bedroom.

Barbara is impressed, especially with the fact that Miles keeps all of his books in his bedroom. Miles is more interested in pointing out his rather large bed. Miles tells her that, like Marcel Proust, he does all of his writing in bed. Barbara’s reaction indicates that she’s not sure exactly who Marcel Proust is. Despite the fact that Miles is kind of awkward and geeky, it’s not long before Barbara has stripped down to her underwear, rolled around on the bed, and invited Miles to join her.

Then the bed eats her.

Seriously. The mattress opens up like a mouth and two rather phallic tentacles wrap around Barbara and pull her into the gaping hole. All that’s left behind are her high heels because, apparently, the bed does not like shoes.

It turns out that Miles has been using the old trick of writing about what you know. Miles does have a master and it’s his bed. Of course, the bed itself is possessed by a creature that Miles describes as being the last of “the Great Old Ones.” So, Miles’s bed is possessed by Cthulhu?

The next night, Miles brings home another woman. Vicki (Mary Woronov) is a writer herself. She writes romance novels and she tells Miles that she feels as if they are kindred spirits because her novels also often feature a master/servant relationship. Miles tries to maneuver Vicki over to the bed but, instead, Vicki finds Miles’s diary and leaves with it.

Vicki later calls Miles and tells him that she hasn’t been able to put down his diary, which she apparently believes to be a rough draft of his newest novel. She invites him over to her apartment so they can discuss it. Mostly wanting to get back his diary so his secrets are not revealed, Miles goes over to Vicki’s place. Vicki says that she thinks they should collaborate on a new novel and more. After checking to make sure that Vicki’s bed is not alive, Miles agrees.

Ha! The joke’s on Miles. Vicki’s bed may not eat people but her refrigerator does! When Miles gets a beer, he’s dragged into the refrigerator by a familiar set of tentacles and only his shoes are left behind. Cthulhu really does not like footwear!

This was an enjoyable piece of Lovecraftian-style whimsy, with John Diehl giving an effectively jittery performance and Mary Woronov stealing the entire episode with her more cool and icy turn as the femme fatale, Vicki. Just as being confined to bed gave Proust the time to perfect his talent, having to feed his bed has made Miles into both a successful author and a mental wreck. More than just being a show about a bed that eats people, this is also a story about the isolation of being an artist. In order to keep his talent and inspiration from fading, Miles has to literally destroy every human relationship that he has. He can blame it on Cthulhu all the he wants but, in the end, Miles is the one who made his bed and must now sleep in it.

Retro Television Reviews: Miami Vice 1.13 “Milk Run”

Posted on December 4, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Crockett and Tubbs fail to observe movie line etiquette.

Episode 1.13 “Milk Run”

(Dir by John Nicolella, originally aired on January 4th, 1985)

At Miami International Airport, Tubbs is sweating buckets (one thing I do appreciate about Miami Vice is that it captures that Yankees never seem to get used to Southern humidity) while Crockett watches and smiles at a woman in a miniskirt. Not surprisingly, ZZ Tops’s Legs is playing on the soundtrack. Having good legs is definitely a plus in life. They’ve certainly helped me out.

Anyway, Crockett and Tubbs notice that two teenagers have just paid for a ticket to Colombia in cash. Crockett and Tubbs confront them in the airport cafeteria, causing both Louis Martinez (Evan Handler) and his friend, Eddie Rivers (Al Shannon), to make a run for it. They manage to outrun both Crockett and Tubbs. Louis and Eddie may not be as streetwise or experienced as the two cops but they’re definitely a lot younger and a lot quicker.

Louis is enthusiastic about Eddie flying down to Colombia and smuggling cocaine-filled statues into the United States. Eddie is more nervous about it and keeps saying that he wishes he could just go home and pretend like they never agreed to help this week’s villains, the Moya cousins.

Not surprisingly, at least to anyone who has watched this show, Crockett and Tubbs just happen to be investigating a drug warehouse that belongs to the Moyas. After the warehouse blows up, they discover a locker full of the statues and they also find out that the Moyas are into Santeria. This leads to a scene where they attempt to interrogate one of their informants (played by Rainbow Harvest), a Santeria high priestess who works at a “punk rock movie theater.” (Don’t ask me, I didn’t write the episode.) While Crockett keeps bothering her at work, Tubbs has a tense conversation with her boyfriend, who is played by a youngish Eric Bogosian!

The two stories eventually link back up. Eddie flies to Colombia but he and Louis are arrested by Crockett and Tubbs as soon as he returns to America. While Louis continues to play tough, Eddie talks about how he wishes that he could just go back home and not get involved in any of this. Crockett promises Eddie that he’ll make sure he gets home safely. Can you guess who ends up getting gunned down the cartel at the end of the episode?

Milk Run was an episode about which I had mixed feelings. At first, it was hard for me to have much sympathy for either Louis or Eddie. But, at the same time, I also had a hard time having much sympathy for Crockett and Tubbs. Whether they were holding up a line to interrogate a ticket agent at the airport or holding up the line to interrogate the Santeria priestess at the movie theater, they ended up holding up a lot of lines and that’s a pet peeve of mine. But, by the end of this episode, I felt sorry for Eddie and the dark conclusion drove home the episode’s point. There’s no way to escape your decisions. Of course, by this point, we pretty much know what’s going to happen whenever Crockett promises to keep someone safe but that didn’t make the ending any less effective.

This was an okay episode. The ending was powerful and it featured a strong supporting turn from John Kapelos in the role of a sleazy attorney. In the end, the message was clear. Don’t get involved with a shady business unless you’re totally prepared to deal with the consequences.

Retro Television Reviews: Miami Vice 1.12 “Little Prince”

Posted on November 27, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Crockett and Tubbs once again end up with a case that leaves them wondering what it all means.

Episode 1.12 “Little Prince”

(Dir by Alan J. Levi, originally aired on December 14th, 1984)

If nothing else, this episode of Miami Vice has a brilliant opening.

As Relax by Frankie Goes To Hollywood plays on the soundtrack, Gina and Trudy stumble down a Miami street. Trudy is shaking and sobbing and saying that she desperately needs a fix. A drug dealer named Luther (played an amazingly young and charismatic Giancarlo Esposito) steps out of the shadows and invites them to come back to his shooting gallery for a fix. Gina accuses Luther of being a cop. Luther smiles and points to a tear drop that’s been tattooed under his eye.

Gina and Trudy go to Luther’s shooting gallery, which they discover is full of strung-out people. (Luther calmly mentions that there’s at least two dead people in the apartment.) Of course, Gina and Trudy aren’t there to score drugs. They are there to make a bust, which they do as soon as Tubbs and Crockett arrive. (Tubbs and Crockett had to beat up an informant to find out where Luther’s shooting gallery was and, as a result, they’re running a little late.) Guns are fired. Gina gets to shoot yet another man. (Go Gina!) One junkie jumps out a window. Crockett says that the junkie probably landed on the fire escape. He looks out the window.

“No fire escape,” he says.

It’s a great opening. Unfortunately, it’s pretty much all downhill from there. This is the first episode of Miami Vice that just didn’t work for me.

One of the junkies arrested at the shooting gallery turns out to be Mark Jorgenson, Jr. (Mitchell Litchenstein), the son of the very wealthy Mark, Sr. (Paul Roebling). Mark, Jr. loves to play polo and he’s hooked on heroin. Because they’re convinced that he can be intimidated into giving up his dealer, Crockett and Tubbs put pressure on him. Crockett starts showing up at all of Mark, Jr.’s polo matches. He even meets Mary McDermott (Maryann Punkett), who is Mark Sr’s girlfriend and the closest thing that Mark Jr. has to a mother.

Over the course of the investigation, Crockett and Tubbs come to realize that Mark, Sr. is actually a big-time money launderer and drug boss. When they raid one of his warehouses, they discover that Mary is the one who handles all of the business transactions. After Mary turns up dead, Mark Jr. agrees to help the cops expose his father. Mark Jr. wears a wire, just for his father to finally tell him that he loves him before confessing to Mary’s murder. Mark, Sr. is arrested and Mark, Jr.’s life is ruined and Sonny wonders if it was all really worth it.

As I said, this episode didn’t work for me. Neither Mark Jr. nor Mark Sr. were particularly compelling characters and neither actor could do much with their underwritten characters. In particular, Mark, Jr. came across as being so spoiled and whiny that I really didn’t care whether his life was ruined or not. Brilliant opening aside, this was a forgettable episode.

Retro Television Reviews: Miami Vice 1.11 “Give a Little, Take a Little”

Posted on November 20, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Tonight’s episode is a reminder that you don’t mess with Miami Vice!

Episode 1.11 “Give a Little, Take a Little”

(Dir by Bobby Roth, originally aired on December 7th, 1984)

Oh my God, this episode…. this episode put me through an emotional ringer. After two episodes that were somewhat light and airy, Give A Little, Take A Little is a return to the dark and surreal storytelling that was Miami Vice’s signature style.

Things start out on an energetic note, with a montage of Miami nightlife set to the tune of Tina Turner singing You Better Be Good To Me. For once, Gina (Saundra Santiago) and Trudy (Olivia Brown) are seen before Crockett and Tubbs, this time purchasing appropriately trashy (but stylish) outfits for their undercover prostitution sting. When Crockett and Tubbs are finally seen, they’re heading over to see their informant, Noogie (Charlie Barnett). The very high and very talkative Noogie tells them about a warehouse that is being used by a dealer.

At the warehouse, Crockett and Tubbs find a nervous watchman, Bob Rickert (Lenny Von Dohlen). The obviously terrified Bob explains that he’s just watching the warehouse for an old college friend of his. When Tubbs and Crockett open up a box and yank out several bags of pills, Bob admits that he knows his friend is a drug dealer but Bob also insists that he’s never sold any drugs in his life. Sonny takes sympathy on Bob and, after Bob gives them the name of his friend, he allows Bob to go home to his wife.

Bob’s friend is Sally Alvarado (a very young and smoldering Michael Madsen). After the expected car chase, Crockett and Tubbs arrest him. However, Alvarado’s lawyer — Richard Cain (Terry O’Quinn, of future Stepfather and Lost fame) — demands that Crockett reveal the name of his confidential source. (When Crockett meets with the lawyer, he insists on calling him, “Dick.”) The judge at Alvarado’s trial agrees that Alvarado has a right to know who has accused him of being a drug dealer and she orders that Crockett name his informant. When Crockett refuses, Crockett goes to jail.

Meanwhile, Gina and Trudy are working at Club Ocho, which is owned by Cinco (Tony Plana). They are both pretending to be sex workers who have just moved down to Miami from Philadelphia. Cinco sends them out to work the streets, where they are picked up every night by their fellow Miami Vice detectives, Switek and Zito. When Cinco’s boss, Lupo Ramirez (the great Burt Young), spots Gina at the Club, he promotes her to working directly for him. When Ramirez comes to suspect that Gina might be an informant, he invites her to his house late at night for a meeting and, off-screen, he rapes her.

Crockett is released from jail, despite having not named his informant. He assumes that Lt. Castillo called in a marker but Castillo instead reveals that Bob felt so guilty about Sonny being in jail that he went to Cain and confessed to being the informant. He also agreed not to testify against Alvarez. While Sonny was still sitting in jail, Sally Alvarez was released from prison.

That night, Noogie introduces Sonny and Tubbs to another informant, Trick Baby (Henry Sanders). Impressed that Crockett went to jail to protect an informant, Trick Baby tells Sonny and Tubbs that Sally Alvarez is Ramirez’s second in command. He also reveals that Ramirez is sending Cinco to kill Gina.

Back at her apartment, Gina is being comforted by Trudy when Cinco shows up. Fortunately, Crockett and Tubbs show up at well. A chase and gunfight leads to Cinco being seriously wounded. Cinco promises that, if he lives, he’ll testify against Alvarez and Ramirez.

At Club Ocho, Alvarez is watching as Switek makes his debut as a stand-up comedian. Switek’s act is terrible but it provides the cover needed for Crockett and Tubbs to arrest Alvarez. After being told that Cinco has ratted him out, Alvarez agrees to rat out Ramirez.

The next morning, Gina and Trudy show up at Ramirez’s mansion. Gina draws her gun and tells Ramirez that he’s under arrest. Ramirez, who is holding the knife that he was using to make his breakfast, laughs and smugly says that Gina can’t arrest him after what “we’ve shared.”

And….

GINA SHOOTS HIM!

HELL YEAH!

Seriously, that was one of the most satisfying moments that I’ve experienced since I started watching this show. It’s also a reminder of how different the cops on Miami Vice were from most of the other cops who showed up on crime shows in the 80s and 90s. Just when you’re expecting Gina to sigh, lower her gun, and read Ramirez his rights because she’s a cop and a cop has to obey the law, she shoots him. And since Ramirez was dumb enough to act like a smug jackass while holding a knife, the shooting will undoubtedly be ruled as being justified.

This was an emotional episode and not always easy to watch but it all built to a powerful conclusion. While I did spend a lot of time playing “spot the famous guest star,” I was even happier that this episode finally gave Miami Vice‘s often neglected supporting cast to show what they could do. John Diehl, Olivia Brown, Michael Talbott, and especially Saundra Santiago all got their chance to shine in this episode.

Next week, Giancarlo Esposito plays a drug dealer decades before Breaking Bad.

Retro Television Reviews: Miami Vice 1.10 “Glades”

Posted on November 13, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Crockett and Tubbs leave Miami!

Episode 1.10 “Glades”

(Dir by Stan Lathan, originally aired on November 30th, 1984)

Episode ten opens with the Animals’s “We’ve Got To Get Out Of This Place” playing on the soundtrack and the camera tracking down some of the less glamorous sections of Miami. This is a far different part of the city than the viewer is used to seeing on Miami Vice. The sleek art deco architecture has been replaced by vacant lots, run-down apartments, and torn-up streets. It serves as a reminder that, while some people in Miami are getting very rich, others are still trapped in the cycle of poverty.

Joey Bramlette (Keith Szarabajka) is staying in a cheap motel room, courtesy of the Vice Squad. Joey is due to testify in court against his former boss, a Colombian drug lord named Ruiz. Joey’s testimony is the key to the entire case but, when he receives a mysterious letter, he escapes the safehouse and flees back to his home in the Everglades. Though it was Zito and Switek who allowed him to escape, Crockett and Tubbs are the ones who head down to the Everglades to find him.

That’s right …. Crockett and Tubbs aren’t in Miami anymore!

As Crockett and Tubbs soon discover, the Everglades is full of rednecks, smugglers, and enforcers. Safely hidden away from civilization, it’s a place where there is no law. After a group of rednecks (led by John Pankow) trick Sonny and Tubbs into getting lost in the wilderness (“Moss grows on the north side of a tree!” Crockett announces as he tries to figure out how to return to civilization), the two cops are found by Joey and his wife, Cassie (Margaret Whitton). Joey reveals that he still wants to testify but that Ruiz’s men have kidnapped his daughter. Working together with Joey and his family, Crockett and Tubbs have to figure out how to storm Ruiz’s heavily guarded compound and rescue Joey’s daughter.

This episode was a bit of a change of pace but I enjoyed it. Some of that is because, when I was growing up, I spent a lot of time in the country and I’ve still got a lot of family out there, working on their farms and living in communities much like the one that Crockett and Tubbs visited in this episode. I may now be a city girl but I’ve still got my country side. I can still remember what it was like, walking around the tall grass while wearing short shorts and a tank top. Though I cringed a bit when it first appeared that this episode was going to portray rural Florida as being the equivalent of Deliverance, I was happy to see that it was ultimately a celebration of the resilience of country people.

There was an interesting subtext to this episode as everyone that Sonny and Tubbs met was a smuggler, either working for Ruiz or independently running marijuana into Florida. Later, one of the older smugglers mentioned that he used to run moonshine, therefore suggesting that there wasn’t much difference between the War on Drugs of the 1980s and the doomed effort at prohibition of the 1920s. Miami Vice is a cop show that often suggests that it’s sometimes best not to get too hung up on rigidly enforcing the law. That’s quite a contrast to most other cop shows that I’ve seen. Even modern cop shows tend to take the attitude that anyone who violates the law has to be punished in some way, whether by incarceration or death. Miami Vice may have been about law enforcement but its heart belonged to the libertarians.

Next week’s episode of Miami Vice guest stars Burt Young, Michael Madsen, Lenny Von Dohlen, and Terry O’Quinn!

Retro Television Reviews: Miami Vice 1.9 “The Great McCarthy”

Posted on November 6, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week is all about boats!

Episode 1.9 “The Great McCarthy”

(Dir by Georg Stanford Brown, originally aired on November 16th, 1984)

The people behind Miami Vice really liked speedboats.

That’s the best explanation that I come up with for The Great McCarthy, an episode in which the majority of the running time is taken up by scenes of people racing boats. Even after Crockett, Tubbs, and Zito (John Diehl, getting to do more than usual) figure out how Louis McCarthy (William Gray Espy) is using his boats to smuggle drugs into Miami, their main concern remains winning the race that they’ve entered.

And there’s certainly nothing wrong with that. After a run a grim and dark episodes, The Great McCarthy was a nice change of pace, a reminder that it’s okay to have a little bit of fun. For the most part, this was a light and airy episode, featuring scenes of boats skimming across the ocean while Born To Be Wild plays on the soundtrack. This episode also featured a very 80s party scene and not one but two weaselly informants!

The first informant was Izzy Moreno (Martin Ferrero), a talkative thief who, it turned out, had done some work for Louis McCarthy. The second informant was Dale Gifford (Charles McCaughan), a crooked accountant who is helping to launder money for not just Louis but also Louis’s girlfriend, Vanessa (Maria McDonald). Izzy will apparently be returning in the future. Gifford will not as he ended up getting shot in the back of the head. Crockett and Tubbs originally assumed McCarthy was the killer but, as Izzy reveals towards the end of the episode, it was actually Vanessa.

By this time, of course, Vanessa has already moved on from McCarthy and is now sleeping with Tubbs. Crockett warns Tubbs that he’s getting in too deep with Vanessa but Tubbs replies that he’s got it all under control, almost as if he doesn’t remember that almost the exact same thing happened when they went down to the Bahamas to take out Calderone. When the police show up to arrest Vanessa, Tubbs insists on doing it himself. “I have to,” he tells her. He’s a cop, after all.

Okay, so that ending was a little bit downbeat but, for the most part, this was just a fun episode of Miami Vice, one that didn’t require too much thought and which kept the existential dread to a minimum. Probably the best scene in the episode didn’t even involve McCarthy or Vanessa but instead centered around Gina and Trudy arresting a philosophy professor who sold cocaine on the side. (The professor was played by Richard Liberty, who also appeared in George Romero’s The Crazies and Day of the Dead.) Gina and especially Trudy have been underused on this show so it was nice to finally see them getting to do their jobs and proving themselves to be just as effective as Tubbs and Crockett.

I do have to admit that I’m still kind of confused as to how Crockett is managing to maintain his cover as a criminal when almost every other petty criminal in Miami knows that he’s actually a cop. If Izzy could figure it out, why not Louis McCarthy? Perhaps McCarthy wasn’t so great after all.