Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 2.8 “The Grudge”

Posted on July 1, 2024 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 Mondays, I will be reviewing CHiPs, which ran on NBC from 1977 to 1983. The entire show is currently streaming on Freevee!

This week, Ponch and Baker face their greatest enemy …. frat boys with a grudge!

Episode 2.8 “The Grudge”

(DIr by John Florea, originally aired on November 11th, 1978)

When Baker and Ponch attempt the warn the driver of an RV about the fact that his vehicle won’t be able fit through a tunnel, the driver reacts by trying to speed away. That’s because the driver is a frat boy and the RV is full of marijuana (or “Cannabis Rex!” as another frat boy puts it). This leads to the RV not only crashing in the tunnel but also Baker and Ponch busting all of the frat boys for possession.

A few months later, the frat boys are horrified when, despite only getting probation, they are still suspended from college and their fraternity is kicked off campus. The frat boys decide to get revenge on Baker and Ponch by playing a series of practical jokes. They send Baker and Ponch mysterious letters. They toss a bunch of fake money on the highway, causing a slow motion wreck. They try to disrupt the CHiPs open house, over which Baker and Ponch have been put in charge.

This was a bit of a silly episode. The frat boys somehow had the ability to always know exactly where Ponch and John were. For some reason, Ponch and John didn’t do the obvious and bust the frat boys for violating their probation. Sgt. Getraer, meanwhile, spends almost the entire episode being a jerk. He puts Ponch and Baker in charge of the open house and then gets mad at them for working on it while on the clock. Well, when are they supposed to work on it?

The episode did feature one good car crash. In fact, not only were multiple vehicles destroyed but it all happened in slow motion. That made up for a lot. Still, in the end, The Grudge was just a bit too silly to really work.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: CHiPs 1.14 “Rustling”

Posted on February 12, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, CHiPs makes me cry!

Episode 1.14 “Rustling”

(Dir by Phil Bondelli, originally aired on January 12th, 1978)

This week’s episode of CHiPs featured a scene that brought tears to my mismatched eyes.

A drunk driver (played by G.W. Bailey) swerves across the highway and causes another car to flip over. While Ponch chases after the driver, Baker goes to investigate the crash. He discovers that the car’s driver is a 17 year-old girl named Susie (Pamelyn Ferdin) and she has been pinned under the wreckage. He manages to free her and carry her away from the car before it explodes. YAY! Another life saved by Jon Baker, right?

That’s when Susie says that she can’t feel her legs.

That scene got to me. It was far more well-acted than anything that I think one would normally expect to find on a episode of CHiPs, with both Ferdin and Larry Wilcox bringing a lot of emotional sincerity to their roles. Susie realizes that she may never walk again. Baker realizes that, just because he saved her from the car, he can’t save Susie from the other consequences of the accident. I wanted to cry. Actually, I did cry.

Now, I should admit that I’m recovering from a sprained ankle and I was doing my ankle exercises while watching this scene. So, not only did I already have tears in my eyes (seriously, some of those exercises hurt!) but I was also feeling pretty emotional. But still, even if I was just watching this scene while sitting on a couch, I think it would have had the same effect on me.

Of course, for the record, Ponch does capture the drunk driver (and the driver starts to sob when he realizes what he has done). And, by the end of the episode, Baker is informed that Susie is going to be okay. I was happy about that.

Excuse me, I’m starting to cry again….

Okay, believe it or not, that was only a small part of the episode. The main storyline featured the great L.Q. Jones as a cattle rustler who, when he’s not driving his truck full of stolen cattle, rides a motorcycle. Fortunately, after a lengthy chase, Baker and Ponch are able to capture him and his accomplice (Paul Tuerpe). It was a pretty simple story but, at the same time, L.Q. Jones was one of those brilliant character actors who make even the most mundane of characters interesting.

Also, over the course of the episode, Ponch and Baker deal with an irate driver (Mill Watson) who claims that he was only speeding because his gear shift failed. In court, Ponch is able to prove that the gear shift didn’t break by pointing out that the brake lights would have come on in that case. (“Your honor,” the defense attorney says, “my client would like to change his plea to guilty.”) Ponch and Baker also stop a magician and his assistant and are so fascinated by the magician’s tricks that they nearly forget to write his assistant a ticket.

Finally, Ponch arranges for everyone to meet at Baker’s apartment to throw him a surprise birthday party. Whoops! Baker’s birthday isn’t for another three months. Ponch looked at Baker’s personnel file and misread his employment number as being his birthdate. Oh, Ponch! Still, the party is a success. Getraer shows up with zucchini. The magician shows up and performs a trick that involves tossing milk on Ponch and Baker. What? Well, whatever.

What’s important is that one scene that brought tears my eyes. The rest of the episode may have been generic but that one scene was beautifully done and I’ll never forget it.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: CHiPs 1.9 “Hustle”

Posted on January 8, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Ponch gets bowling fever!

Episode 1.9 “Hustle”

(Dir by Georg Fenady, originally aired on November 24th, 1977)

Life is a hustle when you work for the California Highway Patrol.

Ponch and Baker deal with a lot of things over the course of this episode. While pursuing two motorcycle riders who are suspected of holding up a grocery store, Ponch gets a cigarette tossed on him by a passing motorist. The suspects turn out to be two women who were just out for an afternoon ride. They seem to be pretty amused by the whole thing, despite the fact that Baker roughly frisked them as soon as they pulled over. Luckily, the sight of the hole that was left on Ponch’s uniform by the cigarette (and the boxers underneath) gives everyone an excuse to laugh.

This is not the best time for Ponch to have a wardrobe malfunction because he’s due in court. Ponch gave a ticket to Sidney Engelhart (Marty Ingels) but Sidney claims that the only person who is guilty of reckless driving is Ponch. Sidney tries to prove his point by basically stalking Ponch while he does his job.

While Ponch deals with his stalker, Baker pulls over a car being driven by veteran screen actor Broderick Crawford. Ponch is totally excited to see Crawford but Baker is fairly nonchalant about the whole thing. When his pen runs out of ink, Baker borrows Crawford’s gold fountain pen and then forgets to return it to the actor, which leads to Baker getting called out at the next morning briefing.

Meanwhile, there’s a huge car accident that leads to Ponch and Baker saving a mother and her baby from a live electrical wire. Baker also pulls over a man driving a car that only has three wheels and, of course, there are the grocery store robbers to deal with.

And yet, for everything going on, Ponch’s main concern remains the department’s bowling tournament. As has been a consistent theme so far during the first season of CHiPs, Ponch’s main concern continues to be doing things that don’t have much to do with his actual job. Whereas Baker comes across as if nothing makes him happier than writing a speeding ticket, Ponch often seems to view policework as something to do until something better comes along. On the one hand, this does not make Ponch a particularly effective cop. We’re only 9 episodes into the series and I’ve lost count of the number of times that he’s had to go back to the trailer park to change his uniform. On the other hand, it is probably a realistic portrayal of how most people view their jobs. Ponch does enough to get by.

As for the episode itself, this was another “day-in-the-life” style episode. So far, the first season of CHiPs has been dominated by rather loose plotting. Ponch and Baker just ride and see what type of trouble they can find on the highways. As for the bowling subplot, Baker turns out to be a surprisingly competent bowler and Ponch plots to win a lot of money from his fellow officers. But then Baker sprains his bowling fingers and it looks like Ponch is once again out of a small fortune. Poor Ponch, he is fortune’s fool!

(I actually have gone bowling a few times. I’m not any good at it but I’ve been told that the important thing is to jump up and down regardless of what happens.)

This Hustle, I would give a solid B. The scenery was nice. There was an exciting motorcycle chase at the start of the show. The episode was a pleasant-enough diversion, albeit not one that leaves a huge impression afterwards.