Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 3.5 “Death Watch”

Posted on January 20, 2025 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 Prime!

This week, someone dies! OH MY GOD!

Episode 3.5 “Death Watch”

(Dir by Barry Crane, originally aired on October 13th, 1979)

Dennis (Christopher Stone) is a veteran movie stunt driver who has never gotten over the tragic death of his child and the way he was treated by a heartless insurance company. He now drives up and down the freeway, looking for drivers who look like they have good insurance. Using his stunt skills, he causes accidents and then, under one of many assumed names, he files an insurance claim. Dennis’s wife (played by Dee Wallace, who was married to Stone at the time) thinks that Dennis is taking things too far but Dennis is convinced that he’s earned the right to commit insurance fraud. As he puts it, the companies have enough money that it’s not going to hurt them if he steals some of it.

Unfortunately, his latest attempt to cause an accident results in a delivery van swerving to the side of the road and striking two policemen who have pulled over a drunk driver. One of the policeman is series regular Bear (played by Brodie Greer). The other is a guy named Steve (Stephen Parr) who we’ve never seen before but who is quickly established as being everyone’s best friend. Or, I guess, he was everyone’s best friend as he dies shortly after being taken to the hospital. I have to admit that Steve dying was a bit jarring. It’s rare that anyone on CHiPs is seriously injured, much less killed.

The highway patrol officers are shaken by Steve’s death. Ponch and Baker go to the station’s gym and work off their frustration. Jon lifts weights. Ponch takes off his shirt and starts hitting a punching bag and, despite the tragedy of the situation, it was hard not to laugh at the show using it as an excuse for Erik Estrada to once again take off his shirt.

The members of the highway patrol attend Steve’s funeral. It’s pretty somber until Bear rolls into the church in his wheelchair and everyone breaks out into a huge smile. They’re happy that Bear survived but I do have to wonder how Steve’s family felt when they saw all those smiles and heard the officers joking amongst themselves. I guess they should have been happy that Ponch actually wore pants and a shirt to the funeral as opposed to showing up in a speedo. Seriously, if anyone would do that, it would be Ponch.

All of the bad drivers are brought to justice. The driver of the delivery van loses his job. Dennis goes to prison. By the end of the episode, everyone’s in a good mood again. Rest in peace, Steve!

This episode deserves some credit for trying to deal with a serious issue. Death is a big deal. Unfortunately, CHiPs really isn’t the best format for heart-rendering drama. Even after Steve was killed, the show still teased the audience with the promise of another crash. In the end, the main message seemed to be that it was better to lose Steve than Bear …. or, God forbid, Ponch!

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: CHiPs 2.23 “The Greatest Adventures of CHiPs”

Posted on December 2, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, the second season of CHiPs comes to a close. Now, if you don’t remember much about what happened during the first two seasons of the show, don’t worry. This finale has got you covered. But first, let’s watch the opening credits and chair dance to the CHiPs theme song.

Episode 2.23 “The Greatest Adventures of CHiPs”

(Dir by Don Weis, originally aired on May 12th, 1979)

With Ponch and Baker absent from the morning briefing because they’ve gone to Bakersfield to teach a class, Sgt. Getraer announces to the assembled members of the High Patrol that they have been nominated for an award for going beyond the normal call of duty. Everyone’s totally excited for Ponch and Baker. Armed with a bulky 70s tape recorder, Grossie asks everyone for their favorite Ponch and Baker stories so that he can write a speech honoring them….

Yep, it’s a clip show.

It’s not just any clip show, either. It’s a 90-minute clip show. Of course, there’s only about fifteen minutes of new footage. The rest of it is made up of scenes of Baker yelling at motorists and Ponch smiling. Even when CHiPs attempts to show why both of them deserves a reward, it’s obvious that Baker does all the work and Ponch gets all the credit.

I understand the logic behind clip shows. They’re cheap and it allows almost everyone to have the weekend off. They’re not very entertaining to watch, though perhaps they carried more weight in the days before streaming and DVRs ensured that you could rewatch your favorite scenes whenever you wanted to. They are, however, very easy to review.

This clip show marks the end of the show’s second season. A clip show always seems like a weak way for a season (much less a show) to go out but again, I get it. Everyone’s tired. Everyone wants to head to Cabo for the summer. Get us out of here! CLIP SHOW!

(That said, this clip show does get some credit for including some pretty groovy disco footage! SOLID! Estrada gets to do his Travolta impersonation while everyone watches and claps.)

The second season of CHiPs was actually pretty entertaining, even if it is kind of silly just how much the show highlights Ponch over Baker. Technically, of the two of leads, Larry Wilcox was the better actor but Erik Estrada always seemed like he was having more fun. The second season had a few dud episodes but it also had its share of spectacular stunts and a lot of lovely California scenery. Sindy Cahill being perfect at everything got old pretty quickly but at least Arthur “Grossie” Grossman was around to provide some comic relief.

Well, that’s it. There’s not too much you can say about a clip show. Next week, we’ll start season three!

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 2.22 “Ride the Whirlwind”

Posted on November 25, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Baker takes charge!

Episode 2.22 “Ride The Whirlwind”

(Dir by Larry Wilcox, originally aired on March 10th, 1979)

Just as with the week’s episode of Miami Vice, I am going to do a bullet-point review of this week’s episode of CHiPs because, quite frankly, it’s the holidays and I’m pressed for time.

In order to combat a crime wave that has apparently broken out in the nearby California hills, Baker has suggested creating a three-person dirt-bike team. His hope is that the team will be made up of him, Ponch, and Sindy. However, when Sindy gets delayed while helping a stranding motorist and ends up missing the morning briefing, Baker is forced to pick Grossman (Paul Linke) instead.
“Yay!” you might be saying. Seriously, Grossman is a far more entertaining character than Sindy. However, Ponch, Baker, and Sindy are not happy about it. My personal feeling is that if riding a dirt bike was that damn important to Sindy, she should have arrived on time.
Ponch pays Grossman forty dollars to fake an injury so Sindy can take his place. Grossman takes the money and then explains that he would have done it for free, just because he can tell who much riding a dirt bike means to Sindy. If it meant so much to her, she could have showed up on time!
The dirt bike patrol is a huge success. One guy rides through an old woman’s lettuce patch on his bike. Baker tracks down the miscreant and not only gives him a ticket but also gets a date with the guy’s girlfriend.
Larry Wilcox also directed this episode, which perhaps explains why, for once, Baker’s the one who gets a date as opposed to Ponch.
Ponch busts a city councilman who later explains that he was just riding his bike recklessly because he was having a midlife crisis.
Sindy busts a punch of PCP dealers. It takes her two tries, however. The first time she chases them, she falls off her bike and sprains her ankle. The second time, she proves that she belongs on a bike.
That’s good because Getraer is in a total panic about putting a woman on any sort of motorcycle, even just a dirt bike. “If she gets injured,” Getraer warns Baker, it’ll be bad news for the entire department. Getraer, I guess, hasn’t noticed that the entire second season had pretty much centered on just how hyper-competent Sindy is.
The stars of this episode were the California scenery and the stunt people. The members of the dirt bike patrol all wear bulky uniforms and face-obscuring helmets, in order to disguise the fact that Larry Wilcox, Erik Estrada, and Brianne Leary are clearly not the ones who are actually riding the bikes.
Noted character actor Paul Koslo appears as one of the PCP dealers. He’s believably redneck-y.
This episode featured some impressive stunts, which is really the main thing that most people ask for when it comes to a show like this. That said, I do think the episode would have been more with Grossman as a member of the team.

Next week: Season two ends!

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 2.21 “CHP BMX”

Posted on November 18, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Ponch saves us all.

Episode 2.21 “CHP BMX”

(Dir by John Florea, originally aired on March 3rd, 1979)

The California Highway Patrol is sponsoring a BMX racing team! Sindy and Baker are the coaches while Ponch is …. well, Ponch is mostly just hanging out. He does find time to flirt with Ms. Ramirez (Mina Vasquez), a teacher who hopes that joining the team could help out an at-risk student named Danny (Kirk Calloway). Danny likes to vandalize things. He’s on his way to juvie if Ponch can’t reach him …. hey, you know the drill. By this point, we all know how this show works. Of course, Ponch is going to reach the kid. With that dazzling smile, Ponch can do anything.

It’s Getraer who has the most to deal with during this episode. After his son is struck by a car, Getraer becomes so distracted on the job that he messes up the arrest of a drug dealer (Henry Olek). Told by his superiors to take a week off while his son recovers, Getraer instead starts to tail the dealer on his own. Getraer is determined to put the man in jail. Fortunately, Ponch is there to help catch him. Is there nothing that Ponch can’t do?

Seriously, when I watch an episode like this, I can understand why Larry Wilcox apparently did not enjoy working with Erik Estrada on this show. While Baker humbly does his job without asking for any special recognition, Ponch is portrayed as being so perfect that you half-expect him to start walking on water. The theme of this episode — and really, the theme of much of the second season — has been that Ponch can ultimately do no wrong. Even when it looks like Ponch has screwed up, he ultimately turns out to be infallible. He’s more than just a member of the California Highway Patrol. He’s St. Ponch of Los Angeles, saving souls while riding his motorcycle amongst the heathens.

It probably sounds like I’m being critical of this episode but I actually enjoyed it, for much the same reason that I enjoy most episodes of CHiPs. The car and motorcycle stunts were spectacularly filmed and the scenery was nice to look at. Even though it rains through a good deal of this episode and Getraer, Baker, and Ponch aren’t exactly hanging out in the most glamorous sections of Los Angeles, this episode still manages to make L.A. look like the loveliest city in the world.

And really, even Erik Estrada is entertaining. It’s easy to laugh at his big smile and his less-than-subtle acting technique but that’s just Estrada being Estrada and, in the world of CHiPs, it works.

The important thing is that everything works out. Danny wins his race. Getraer’s son gets out of the hospital. And maybe Baker will get to do something more than smile at Ponch next week. We’ll see!

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 2.19 “Bio-Rhythms”

Posted on November 4, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, it’s all about bio-rhythms!

Episode 2.19 “Bio-Rhythms”

(Dir by Don Weis, originally aired on February 17th, 1979)

The Davis family is back!

Now, if you don’t remember the Davises. they were the family of independent truckers who appeared in an episode called The Volunteers. Patriarch Charley Davis (Tige Andrews) is taciturn and protective. Their friend, Sam (Steve Franken), is taciturn and protective …. actually, to be honest, he and Charley are kind of interchangeable. Daughter Robbie (Katherine Cannon) is in charge of the business and is being pressured by another trucker (Michael Conrad), who is willing to resort to sabotage to keep Robbie from making her deliveries. It’s a good thing that Robbie has got Ponch on her side!

Technically, Robbie also has Baker on her side but this is definitely a Ponch episode. Baker is present but he does very little. Instead, it’s Ponch who flirts with Robbie. It’s Ponch who stops by Robbie’s apartment and uses her shower. It’s Ponch who spends an extended period of time wearing just a towel. Somewhat inevitably, Charley shows up around the same time that Ponch steps out of the shower. Ponch is kicked out of the apartment and his clothes are tossed out the window. Ponch loses his towel while retrieving his clothing. Cue the close-ups of an old woman staring at him with a impressed look in her eyes and Erik Estrada flashing his Estrada smile. It’s not that Erik Estrada wasn’t nice to look at. It’s just that he was so obviously aware that he was nice to look at that the whole scene ends up feeling rather smarmy. One gets the feeling that there was a clause in Estrada’s contract specifying that he, and only he, would be allowed to show off on the show.

While Ponch helps Robbie deal with her rivals, he also learns about biorhythms, the pseudo-science that says that, by calculating how long someone’s been alive, it can be determined which days are going to be good for them and which days are going to be bad. Sindy Cahill is doing a study on biorhythms for her master’s degree. Getraer tells his squad that the department is also very interested in whether or not biorhythms effect an officer’s productivity. Baker is skeptical about biorhythms but Ponch believes in them and even buys a biorhythm calculator.

Believing the Baker’s biorhythms have him at peak physical perfection, Ponch arranges for Baker to play handball against Getraer. Ponch even takes bets. Unfortunately, Ponch spent so much time figuring out Baker’s biorhythms that he never stopped to consider Getraer’s. The episode ends with Getraer on his way to victory and Baker looking embarrassed.

Handball? Biorhythms? Corrupt labor unions? Could this episode be more Californian?

This episode was fairly dull. A huge problem was that the Davis family and their drama are never as interesting as the show seems to think that they are. Much as with The Volunteers, I felt like I was watching a backdoor pilot for a show about the Davises when I really just wanted to watch a show about the Highway Patrol. This episode didn’t do much for me. Maybe everyone’s biorhythms were off when they filmed it.

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 2.18 “Rally ‘Round The Bank”

Posted on October 28, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Ponch’s mom comes to visit! Will she get on a motorcycle? Uhmm …. no. She doesn’t. It probably would have been cool if she had. She could have helped chase down this week’s set of bad guys. This seems like a missed opportunity. It’s still a good episode, though.

Episode 2.18 “Rally ‘Round The Bank”

(Dir by Barry Crane, originally aired February 3rd, 1979)

Ponch is nervous because his mom, who is deathly afraid of flying, has boarded an airplane and flown from Chicago to Los Angeles to visit him. (In this episode, we discover that Ponch’s family apparently got rich and moved to Chicago sometime between the end of the first and the start of the second season.) Why is Ponch’s mother visiting? Ponch isn’t sure. He spends a lot of time worrying but, in the end, it turns out that his mother (well-played by Anna Navarro, no relation to that annoying woman on The View) came to town because Baker and Getraer called to tell her that Ponch would be receiving a special safety citation from Getraer.

Awwwww!

Apparently, Ponch has gone a whole year without crashing his motorcycle. I’m pretty sure I saw Ponch crash his motorcycle just a few episodes ago but whatever. The important thing is that this is actually a good Ponch episode. For once, Erik Estrada’s tendency to overact is not a distraction and his relationship with his mom is actually really sweet. When I watched this episode, my first thought was that Navarro looked way too young to be Estrada’s mother. If anything, she actually looked like she might be a few years younger than him. Then I checked with imdb and discovered that Navarro actually was sixteen years older than Estrada.

(I will admit that Anna Navarro — again, the actress and not that annoying woman who hosted a day of the Democratic National Convention — reminded me a lot of my own mom, which is maybe one reason why I liked this episode more than I thought I would.)

Ponch and Baker also find time to chase after two bank robbers, played by Frank Ashmore and Ron Hajak. Because the robbers are a part of a nation-wide rally race that is passing through Los Angeles, Ponch and Baker get to know some of the other racers. Two women invite Ponch and Baker to a square dance. Baker has to decline so Ponch brings Getraer instead. Getraer turns out to be a surprisingly good dancer. Ponch’s mom comes to the square dance as well and, for a few minutes, I thought maybe she and Getraer were going to announce to the world that they were in love. That would have been a great CHiPs moment but it didn’t happen. That’s another missed opportunity.

Missed opportunities aside, this was a good episode. It was fun and it was sweet and it made me smile.

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 2.17 “The Matchmakers”

Posted on October 21, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Jon and Ponch play matchmaker!

Episode 2.17 “The Matchmakers”

(Dir by Harvey S. Landman, originally aired on January 27th, 1979)

Cora (Jenny O’Hara) is an eccentric woman who lives in an old farmhouse with a bunch of animals. Her landlord is evicting her and the county is planning to not only bulldoze her home but also take and possibly destroy all of her animals unless she can find a new place for them. Twice, she tries to commit suicide by driving her truck recklessly. Both times, she is saved by Ponch and Baker.

Dirk Hutchins (Gregory Walcott) is a crotchety old man who has served with the Highway Patrol for 30 years and is now on the verge of forced retirement. He doesn’t know what he’s going to do with himself once he’s no longer on the job. Hutchins spends his last work week taking outrageous risks, leading Ponch and Baker to worry that he’s trying to go out in a blaze of suicidal glory.

What solution do Ponch and Baker come up with for Cora and Dirk? They decide to play matchmaker! Cora ends up moving onto Dirk’s property (and brings along all of her animals) and maybe Dirk will end up falling in love with Cora. And then, they’ll both have a reason to live!

Listen, this episode’s heart is in the right place. I’m certainly not going to fault the intentions of any episode that features Ponch and Baker trying to help two suicidal people. But, seriously, Cora was such an annoying character! The show portrayed her as being so unhinged and so emotionally unstable that you couldn’t help but wonder if having her move in with grumpy old Dirk was really the best way to go about things. Cora really did seem like she needed professional help, the type that went way beyond having a place to keep her animals.

As for Dirk, I was happy to see that he was played by Gregory Walcott. As many of you already know, Walcott’s greatest claim to fame was starring in Ed Wood’s Plan Nine From Outer Space. Walcott survived Plan Nine and went on to become a durable character actor, appearing in westerns and war films. Walcott gives a believably ruggedly performance as Dirk, even if the character himself is not exactly someone you would want to get stuck on an elevator with.

There is a subplot involving a private investigator (Danny Wells) who had been hired to kidnap a kid and bring him back to his no-good father. And there’s a fairly well-done scene where Dirk and Getraer work to keep a truck from turning over on top of a car. There is a little action but still, this episode didn’t quite work.

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 2.15 “MAIT Team”

Posted on October 7, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This episode was a tough one.

Episode 2.5 “MAIT Team”

(Dir by John Florea, originally aired on January 13th, 1979)

On a desolate stretch of highway, several cars sit totaled. At least two are in flames. A truck sits stalled in the middle of the road, the bloody body of the driver still behind the steering wheels. A woman screams that her father is having a heart attack. Sitting off the road, in a ditch, is an overturned police car. Officer Sindy Cahill is unconscious in the wreckage.

This hardly a typical episode of CHiPs. This show has featured many spectacular crashes but this episode is the first to feature fatalities. And its not just one person who dies in the crash. Eleven people die, including the driver of the truck and the man having a heart attack. The sight of Ponch looking at the dead bodies is jarring because it’s not what we expect from a show like CHiPs.

And, I have to admit, it was jarring for me on a personal level. In May, my Dad was in a serious car accident, one that ultimately involved four vehicles. He broke his shoulder and, afterwards, had to learn how to walk again. He spent a week in a hospital. (That was the week that we didn’t have any power due to the storms so I couldn’t even call to get an update on his condition.) He spent a month in a rehab facility, staying there until his insurance company kicked him out. Severely weakened by the stress and Parkinson’s, he came home and died a month later. I still find myself thinking about how, if he just hadn’t gone to the store that Sunday, he never would have been in that accident and he would still be alive today. Did I say that I merely think about it? It’s actually something that I’ve been obsessing on, even since the hospital first called me to tell me what had happened. I had a hard time watching this episode of CHiPs and I’m having a hard time writing about it right now.

It’s a good episode, even if it is very different from the episodes that came before it. Ponch, Jon, and a group of experts (known as the MAIT Team) attempt to determine what caused the accident. With a lefty state senator (played by Victor Newman himself, Eric Braeden) and an insurance investigator (Michael Bell) both eager to put the blame on Cahill, it falls to the MAIT Team to figure out what caused the accident and to assign blame. In the end, just as with my Dad’s accident, they discover that no one was truly at fault. The setting sun reflected off a distant mirror and temporarily blinded the driver. Cahill ended up in a ditch after she swerved to avoid him. The other drivers were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Life is like that sometimes.

The emphasis here was on everyone working together to get to the truth. Even the state senator and the insurance investigator played an important role in discovering what happened. By being skeptical, they forced the MAIT Team to question everything and truly uncover the facts of the accident. As this episode made clear, the MAIT Team wasn’t formed just to exonerate Cahill. Instead, the MAIT Team was all about getting to truth, no matter what that truth might be.

Though this episode was not an easy one for me to watch, it was a good one.

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 2.14 “Repo Man”

Posted on September 30, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Jon Baker takes on …. THE REPO MAN!

Episode 2.14 “Repo Man”

(DIr by Alex Grasshoff, aired on January 6th, 1979)

This week features a truly memorable villain.

Doyle Ware (Mills Watson) is a repo man. When people fall behind on their car payments, Doyle is the guy who shows up to repossess the vehicle. That he’s a sleaze shouldn’t come as a surprise. I mean, who likes a repo man, right? But, as Baker and Ponch discover, Doyle is more than just a repo man.

He’s a criminal mastermind!

He steals cars and then informs the owner that the car has been destroyed in an accident. Doyle offers to buy what little is left of the vehicle. However, the truth is that the car hasn’t been destroyed. And once Doyle gets the title, he proceeds to sell the car under the original owner’s name. Then, once the buyer falls behind on their payments, he repossesses the car and sells it again. What a sleazy guy!

When Baker and Ponch prevent Doyle from repossessing an old couple’s trailer, Doyle reacts by trying to destroy their credit. He plants false reports that Baker and Ponch owe money. Baker tries to buy an expensive saddle, just to be humiliated when the clerk (played by future playwright Terrence McNally) informs him that his credit score is awful. Ponch starts to get notices at the police station, telling him that he owes money. Getraer offers to help Baker but not Ponch. Getraer can’t stand Ponch.

While dealing with his bad credit, Baker also becomes a local celebrity when he jumps, from a bridge, onto an out-of-control school bus. Baker’s face appears on the local news and soon, people are demanding his autograph. Baker is mortified. Ponch is thrilled because, for some reason, people want his autograph too. “Oh my God, you’re his partner!” someone says as they rush up to Ponch’s motorcycle. Seriously, Ponch didn’t do anything!

Meanwhile, Grossman (who, as played by Paul Linke, is the most consistently likable member of the show’s supporting cast) gets an article published in a magazine. Everyone at the station pretends like they haven’t read and enjoyed the article. Poor Grossie! Don’t worry, though. A news crew films Grossie putting out a fire and he soon replaces Baker as everyone’s favorite local hero. Baker’s happy to have both his good credit and his anonymity restored.

(This is actually a pretty big episode for Baker. He also gets a subplot in which a watchmaker, played by Ned Glass, destroys Baker’s watch after he bring it in to get the wrist band fixed.)

This was a good episode. The school bus rescue was genuinely exciting and Doyle Ware was a villain who was so sleazy that it was a lot of fun watching him get taken down. CHiPs did a good job with Repo Man.

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 2.12 “High Explosive”

Posted on September 16, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week’s episode is all about mistakes.

Episode 2.12 “High Explosive”

(Dir by Barry Crane, aired on December 9th, 1978)

This week’s episode features Jon Baker competing in a rodeo. That’s not really a surprise. Since the show began, it’s been established that Baker is a cowboy at heart and this episode is certainly not the first time that he’s mentioned growing up on a ranch in Wyoming. (Larry Wilcox, himself, grew up in Wyoming and had some real-life rodeo experience.) What is interesting is to listen to how the various actors pronounce the word rodeo.

Most of them, to their credit, pronounce it correctly. A rodeo — that is, an event involving cowboys, steers, clowns, and all the rest — is pronounced “road-ee-oh.” That’s how Larry Wilcox, Robert Pine, and the majority of the cast pronounce it. Erik Estrada and Paul Linke, however, both pronounce it “Roe-Day-Oh,” as in the famous street in Beverly Hills. Just a tip to any of our readers up north: Down here in the southwest, we pronounce it with a “dee” and not a “day.”

As for the rest of the episode, it’s all about mistakes. For instance, ambulance driver Brad Holmes (Steve Oliver) loses his job after he gets arrested for reckless driving. Desperate for money and not wanting to tell his wife that he lost his job, he agrees to transport a huge amount of old and unstable dynamite and he steals an ambulance with which to transport it! Not smart. Brad is an even worse driver with the explosives in the ambulance. Ponch and Baker chase him down and Brad crashes on a playground. While Ponch and Baker arrest Brad, a bunch of kids pick up the dynamite. UH-OH! Fortunately, Brad helps Ponch and Baker get the dynamite back. He asks Ponch and Baker to put in a good word with the judge.

(Yeah …. I don’t know how many good words you can really put in for someone who used a stolen ambulance to transport highly unstable explosives through a heavily populated area of Los Angeles.)

Meanwhile, 14 year-old Barry (Ike Eisenmann) accidentally shoots a car with his pellet gun. The car crashes. The driver, Mary Barnes (Roseanne Katon), survives with minor injuries but her sister nearly dies. Mary says that she wants to press charges against Barry. She doesn’t care that he’s only 14. Baker and Ponch arrange for Mary to spend the day at the rodeo with Barry, so that she can see that he’s just a scared kid who didn’t mean to hurt anyone. Barry is from Utah and lonely and Baker and Ponch feel sorry for him.

But you know what? The fact of the matter is that Barry is 14. He’s not some 10 year-old kid. He’s a teenager. He’s old enough to know better than to shoot a pellet gun around a busy highway. Barry is a lonely kid and that sucks. But again, he nearly killed someone and he caused a huge wreck. I’m on Mary’s side. Throw the book at Barry. Letting Barry get away with doing something that stupid isn’t going to be good for him or anyone else. Mary, however, disagrees with me. Barry’s off the hook and he even gets to go to the rodeo.

What a frustrating episode! Ponch and Baker let me down but at least one of them knows how to pronounce rodeo.