Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Friday the 13th: The Series 1.16 “Tattoo”

Posted on January 26, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing Friday the 13th, a show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The show can be found on YouTube!

This week, a pair of tattoo needles cause trouble!

Episode 1.16 “Tattoo”

(Dir by Lyndon Chubbuck, originally aired on March 7th, 1988)

Tommy Chen (Leonard Chow) is a first generation Chinese-American who has a gambling problem. He owes several thousand dollars to the local gangsters and his grandfather, Lum Chen (Keye Luke), is no longer willing to help cover his costs.

However, Tommy thinks that he’s found the perfect solution for his problems. He has two cursed tattoo needles. All he has to do is tattoo something on someone’s body. That tattoo will come to life and, as long as the tattooed person dies, Tommy will win whatever game that he’s playing. With a gangster demanding that he pay his debts by the end of the night, Tommy is going from gambling den to gambling den, drawing tattoos and making money. Unfortunately, he owes so much that almost every dollar that he makes is taken away from him as soon as he receives it.

And, of course, he also has Ryan, Micki, and Jack trying to track him down as well.

I had mixed feelings about this episode. On the one hand, the tattoo needles are a totally impractical weapon because Tommy, who is a little bit on the small side, has to find a way to get his victims to lie still and not resist while he tattoos him. His first victim is a half-conscious woman at an Opium den and that’s at least believable. But, by the time Tommy is tattooing a gangster, you have to wonder if there isn’t a more practical way for him to make money.

On the other hand, the sight of the tattoos coming to life and crawling (or slithering) up their victims is definitely a frightening one. One tattoo turns into a giant spider. Another turns into a coral snake. One tattoo turns into a fist that bursts out of someone’s chest. (That made me jump.) The needles may be impractical but if you have a thing about spiders and snakes (as I do), it really won’t matter. They’re too frightening for the viewer to spend too much time worrying about the logic of how they actually work.

Fortunately, Ryan and Jack are able to recover the needles and use them to kill the latest tattoo before it can claim a victim. Unfortunately for Tommy, he’s playing Russian roulette at the time. Even more unfortunately for Micki, she’s standing close enough to get splattered by blood when Tommy’s gun turns out to have a bullet in the chamber. I have to admit that I’ve never gotten the appeal of Russian roulette. I’ve always assumed it must be a guy thing. Myself, I see the gun being traded back and forth and I say, “Yikes!”

Next week, a cursed electric chair falls into the hands of a dentist …. AGCK!

Retro Television Reviews: T and T 2.14 “The Contender”

Posted on January 26, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing T. and T., a Canadian show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The show can be found on Tubi!

This week, T.S Turner returns to the ring!

Episode 2.14 “The Contender”

(Dir by Alan Simmonds, originally aired on February 13th, 1989)

T.S. Turner meets Kevin Hart!

No, not that Kevin Hart.

Instead, the Kevin Hart in this show is a boxer and he’s played by an actor named Phillip Jarrett. (Kevin Hart, I immediately, noticed was very handsome for someone who made his living getting punched in the face by professionals. I checked with the imdb and I was not surprised to learn that Phillip Jarrett was a model before he went into acting.) Kevin Hart is a contender for the championship but his trainer has vanished. With the big fight coming up, Hart’s manager asks T.S. Turner to train him for the fight.

Kevin Hart turns out to be a boxer with an attitude. He shows up at Decker’s Gym with his entourage and is miffed to discover that Turner is running late. “What does T.S. stand for?” Hart demands to know, “Too Stupid?”

“Temporarily Sorry,” Turner says as he steps into the gym.

“Temporarily?”

“Yeah,” Turner growls, “I was sorry but now I’m not.”

Turner works hard to train Hart. Or, at least, it appears that he works hard. For the most part, we just see a montage of Hart doing physical stuff while Turner yells at him. Despite Turner’s efforts, Hart doesn’t even seem to care about the fight. He does care when someone takes a shot at him in the gym. Pressured by Turner, Hart finally confesses that he agreed to take a dive. He also says that all of his other fights were fixed as well. That’s why his former trainer ran away. He didn’t want to be involved with a boxer who was owned by the Canadian Mafia.

Turner doesn’t have any time for that attitude. He tells Hart that he has the talent to win the fight on his own. He also tells Hart that it’s time to fight like a man and win. Inspired by Turner’s words, Hart does just that. By the end of the show, Hart is the champ. I imagine he’s got the mob after him now but oh well. I mean, Sonny Liston reportedly upset the mob and he still managed to live a full and exciting life until his mysterious death at the age of 40. So, I’m sure boxing’s Kevin Hart will be fine and maybe, some day, he’ll change his mind about hosting the Oscars.

The way to make watching this episode entertaining is to pretend that Mr. T was playing Clubber Lang and not T.S Turner. Apparently, in an early draft of his script for Rocky Balboa, Sylvester Stallone wrote a scene in which it would be revealed the Lang changed his ways and became a preacher after losing his rematch with Rocky. So, this episode of T and T — and really, the entire series — works best as Clubber Lang fan fiction. As Rocky said at the end of Rocky IV, “Everybody can change!”

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Highway to Heaven 1.18 “A Child of God”

Posted on January 25, 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 Thursdays, I will be reviewing Highway to Heaven, which aired on NBC from 1984 to 1989. The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi and several other services!

For this week’s rather sad episode, Jonathan confronts a reverend who has lost his way.

Episode 1.18 “A Child of God”

(Dir by Michael Landon, originally aired on February 6th, 1985)

After spending years away, Marsha Stearns (Coleen Maloney) has returned home. She wants her parents, Sarah Stearns (Patricia Smith) and Rev. David Stearns (William Window), to take care of her young daughter, Amy (Natalie Gregory). The Reverend Stearns wants nothing to do with Marsha or his granddaughter because Amy was born out of wedlock. He considers Marsha to be an embarrassment to his church and a sinner who cannot be forgiven.

(Yikes! It looks like Rev. Stearns kind of missed all of the important stuff dealing with forgiveness. “Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven.” That’s Luke 6:37.)

What neither the Reverend nor his wife knows is that Marsha is terminally ill and only has a few weeks to live. However, Marsha’s new neighbor — Jonathan Smith — does know and he confronts the Reverend and rather forcefully denounces him until Reverend Stearns forgives her daughter and visits her in the hospital right before she dies.

This was a pretty sad episode and it did bring some tears to my eyes, largely because it made me think about my mom. That said, the most interesting thing about this episode was how angry Jonathan got at Reverend Stearns and his unforgiving attitude. For the past 17 episodes, Jonathan has been a mellow and peaceful angel who has always recognized that everyone has some good in them. But in this episode, when he confronts the Reverend, there is no way not to notice that Jonathan is truly pissed off. For once, Jonathan doesn’t even hide the fact that he’s an angel. He wants Rev. Stearns to know that he’s in trouble with Jonathan’s boss. And really, it makes sense. Why wouldn’t Jonathan be especially angry at a reverend who is failing in his duties? He and Jonathan both work for the same company and Jonathan obviously sees the Reverend’s attitude as being a personal insult. Jonathan is working hard and Rev. Stearns is screwing everything up.

Rev. Stearns does learn his lesson and embraces humility, though that doesn’t make up for all of the years that he refused to even acknowledge his granddaughter’s existence. The episode ends with him giving a rather lengthy sermon, in which he suggests that maybe he got to hung up on the whole idea of condemning sin when he should have been focusing on loving everyone. It’s a bit of a dull ending. William Windom has the right look for the role but, whenever he has to pretend to preach, he comes across as being a bit dry and stiff. Fortunately, Coleen Maloney is much more convincing and poignant as his estranged daughter.

Next week …. Scotty returns!

Retro Television Reviews: Acting Sheriff 1.1 “Pilot”

Posted on January 25, 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 Thursdays, I will be reviewing Acting Sheriff, which aired on CBS in 1991. The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

Who is Brent McCord?

Why, he’s the acting sheriff!

Episode 1.1 “Pilot”

(Dir by Michael Lembeck, originally aired on August 17th, 1991)

At a small country jail in North Carolina, the staff is waiting the arrival of the new sheriff.

Dispatcher Helen Munson (Ruth Kobart) is grumpy and sarcastic, as all older characters were required to be in 1990s sitcoms.

Deputy Judith Mahoney (Diane Delano) is a blonde badass who can’t wait to enforce the law and lock up every criminal that she sees, despite the fact that there aren’t many criminals to be found in this small, rural county.

Deputy Mike Swanson (John Putch) is the smart, responsible deputy who ran for sheriff in the last election but lost, despite his years of hard work and his likability.

Who is the new sheriff? Why, he’s Brent McCord (Robert Goulet), a former Hollywood star who went from starring in films like Get Al Capone and A Fistful of Courage to appearing in books with titles like Where Are They Now? Brent once was a huge star but, after several failed television shows and a handful of divorces, he has returned home and …. run for sheriff, for some reason.

When he does show up at the jail, Brent swaggers around like John Wayne and says things like, “Is the slime infecting the streets waiting for me?” Brent McCord doesn’t know anything about being a county sheriff but he does know how to act like a character in a movie. He walks into the station, draws his gun, and accidentally fires it.

Deputy District Attorney Donna Singer (Hilary B. Smith) is not happy about the new sheriff. She tells him that, “Someone should put a tent over you and charge admission!” She’s even less happy when a banker robber (Lee Tergesen) escapes from the jail, largely due to the sheriff’s incompetence. Fortunately, Deputy Mike remembers a scene from Get Al Capone where McCord’s character recaptured a bank robber by leaving more money around for him to steal. Following the same strategy, Mike recaptures the bank robber but he allows Sheriff McCord to have all the credit. Mike’s a good guy who doesn’t hold a grudge over a silly thing like losing an election to a B-actor.

This pilot, which was produced by Disney for CBS, aired once and that was it. It didn’t lead to anymore episodes and, watching the pilot, it’s easy to see why. The pilot struggles to combine the relatively realistic portrayal of a county jail with the over-the-top performance of Robert Goulet. Occasionally, Goulet will get a laugh by delivering his pompous lines in the most self-serious manner possible. But, far too often, the character is so cartoonish that the other actors don’t seem to know how to keep up with Goulet’s hammy performance. (At times, Goulet seems to be copying William Shatner’s technique without any of Shatner’s charm.) Probably the biggest problem is that pilot fails to answer the most obvious question that one would have while watching the show. Why did Brent McCord run for sheriff? Does he want to do a good job or was he just bored? Does he care about the county or did he just want to see his name in the newspapers? Is he well-intentioned or just buffoonish? The pilot doesn’t seem to know and, as a result, audiences would never find out.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Monsters 1.17 “Taps”

Posted on January 24, 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 Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991. The entire show is streaming on Tubi.

I was pretty hard on Monsters last week. In retrospect, I think some of that was due to the fact that I was feeling anxious about getting my new laptop. I stand by what I said about the episode because it wasn’t a good one but I do regret the slight tone of outrage that I took in my review. Seriously, this is not a show to take seriously.

Take tonight’s episode for example….

Episode 1.17 “Taps”

(Dir by David Misch, originally aired on March 4th, 1989)

Suzy St. Claire (Mary Jo Keenan) is a professional dancer who is appearing, on Broadway, in a show that stars and is directed by an egomaniacal tap dancer, Gary Gregory (Neal Jones). Suzy wants freedom from both the show and her romantic relationship with Gary so that she can go to Hollywood and try to become a star. Gary tells her that there’s no way he’ll ever let her go. So, Suzy contacts a lawyer and he helps her got out of the contract, along with suing Gary for sexual harassment. Nah, just kidding. That’s what I would do but Suzy just decides to poison him. When Gary doesn’t die quickly enough and proves to be too big to fit in a suitcase, Suzy dismembers him.

A few years later, Suzy is in Hollywood with her agent, Sam (Dan Frazer). She demands to know why Meryl Streep is getting Oscar nominations but she’s not. Sam points out that starring in Graveyard Slasher III is not the path to getting Academy recognition. After Sam leaves, Suzy realizes that she’s not alone in her apartment. She looks over at the window and, behind the curtains, she sees a familiar red shoe. She opens the curtains and is confronted by….

…. A DISEMBODIED LEG!

Apparently, she forgot to destroy Gary’s leg and now, it has tracked her down. In a scene that has to be seen to be believed, she is chased around the apartment by the leg. When she tries to leave the apartment, the leg trips her. The leg hops up and down until she says, “You want to dance with me?” It’s a scene that is so ludicrous that it nearly works. The only problem is that a hopping leg, on its own, doesn’t really have the type of forward momentum necessary to be a real threat. If you can’t outrun one hopping leg, maybe you deserve whatever you get.

In Suzy’s case, that means using a meat carver to chop off her own leg and then somehow — it’s never shown how — attaching Gary’s leg to the stump. When we next see Suzy, she is back in New York and Sam is wondering why she’s abandoned her film career to return to dancing.

Good Lord, this was silly. To its credit, it was meant to be silly. None of the dialogue was meant to be taken seriously and the actors were all clearly in on the joke. But, ultimately, that disembodied leg was just too utterly ridiculous for the story to work. I applaud this episode for laughing at itself but I just wish it had been a little better executed. Add to that, for an episode about dancers, we didn’t get to see nearly enough dancing. Sorry, the hopping leg doesn’t count.

Next week …. Tori Spelling guest stars! We’ll see how that goes.

Retro Television Review: The Love Boat 3.27 “Invisible Maniac/September Song/Peekaboo”

Posted on January 24, 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 Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986! The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!

This week, The Love Boat has a very special passengers!

Episode 3.27 “Invisible Maniac/September Song/Peekaboo”

(Dir by George Tyne, originally aired on April 19th, 1980)

This week, the pop cultural stars align as a young David Hasselhoff boards the Love Boat!

Hasselhoff plays Tom Bell, a 20-something attorney who is dating a 30-something attorney named Cathy (Shelley Fabares). Cathy insists that they keep their romance a secret due to the age difference. She doesn’t want people to think that she’s a cradle robber or an older woman with a gigolo. (Cathy might also want to consider that she’s a senior partner at the firm while Tom is just a junior partner.) Tom doesn’t care about the age difference. In fact, he wants to marry Cathy!

And yes, they do eventually get married. Tom even has his grandparents waiting for them when the boat docks in Los Angeles so that they can act as witnesses. There’s not really any suspense as to whether or not Tom and Cathy will end up married because this is The Love Boat, the show that combined the swinging culture of the 70s with the morality of the 50s. The Hoff is his usual dramatic but self-aware self while Shelley Fabares is endlessly likable. They’re a cute couple and, minor age difference aside, they just look like they belong together. It was a sweet story.

As for the other passengers:

Fay Piermont (Peggy Cass) is married to Bill (Gordon Jump). Bill’s a nice guy but Fay fears that they’ve become a boring couple. She wants to be an exciting couple and she’s figured out that the way to do this is to get a makeover, buy a new wardrobe, and then toss her glasses and all of her frumpy clothes overboard. (At first, both Julie and Vicki are worried that Fay is planning on throwing herself overboard. One would think that would be cause for ship-wide alarm but Julie and Vicki just check on Fay occasionally to make sure she’s still alive.) At first, Bill is freaked out by Fay’s new attitude but, eventually, he comes to accept it and Fay comes to realize that she loves Bill, even if he is a bit reserved. This is the type of story that The Love Boat did frequently. Fay and Bill are a nice couple, even if they’re no Tom and Cathy.

Finally, Isaac is reunited with a former high school classmate, a model named Janet (BernNadette Stanis). Janet is upset that her husband (Clifton Davis) is more into sports than romance so she tries to make him jealous by lying about what a womanizer Isaac was in high school. Gopher overhears and tells Isaac that Janet referred to him as being “all hands” in high school. Now, most people would understand that Janet was just trying to make her husband jealous but Isaac somehow becomes convinced that he is a womanizer but he just can’t remember his actions because he suffers from dissociative identity disorder and he even goes to Doc Bricker for help! Why would Isaac believe that? It makes no sense that Isaac — cool, calm Isaac — would suddenly be so stupid. This is something that would happen to Gopher not Isaac.

That one silly storyline aside, this was a pleasant cruise on The Love Boat. I’m glad things worked out for Tom and Cathy. Seriously, the world is so lucky to have The Hoff.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Baywatch Nights 1.11 “Takeover”

Posted on January 23, 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 Tuesdays, I will be reviewing Baywatch Nights, an detective show that ran in Syndication from 1995 to 1997. The entire show is currently streaming on Youtube!

This week, Baywatch Nights reboots for the first time and gets a brand new opening.

Episodes 1.11 “Takeover”

(Dir by Georg Fenady, originally aired on February 3rd, 1996)

This week’s episode opens with Mitch arriving at Nights early in the morning. Ryan and Garner are waiting for him and so are all of the club’s waitresses. Some expositional dialogue establishes that Lou Raymond has sold Nights to “D.M. Marco.” The waitresses are waiting to see if they still have jobs. Ryan, Garner, and Mitch are waiting so that they can re-sign a lease for their detective agency….

Eleven episodes into the first season and Baywatch Nights has already rebooted itself! It’s usually not a good sign when a show drastically changes its format or starts writing out old characters and replacing them with new people. Usually, when this happens, it’s because the show’s rating have suddenly declined and the producers are desperately trying to inject some new life into things. It’s never a good sign when something like this happens before the first season is even halfway finished.

As Mitch waits, a blonde wearing a short but not particularly flattering blue dress steps into the club. Mitch assumes that she’s a waitress and starts hitting on her. Ha ha! Joke’s on you, Mitch! She’s Donna Marco (Donna D’Errico) and she’s your new landlord and a new regular on the show! Mitch is stunned to discover that women can be successful in business. This kind of goes against everything that the viewer has previously learned about Mitch but whatever. It’s a reboot! It’s a new world! And now Mitch is apparently one of those guys who is left with his mouth agape over the idea of a woman being the boss.

As for this week’s case, it’s also about business. Someone is targeting the executives of a company called Rancor. Two of those executives went to high school with Mitch so he’s not going to let anyone kill them. That said, a lot of executives who don’t have a previous Mitch connection do end up dying. In fact, this episode has the highest body count of Baywatch Nights so far. At first, Mitch assumes that the murders are being orchestrated by a corporate raider who wants to take over the business and who has apparently never learned how to buy stock. But instead, the murderer turns out to be a blonde executive named Nicki (Sandra Hess), who blames the company for death of her father. Despite her murderous ways, there are some sparks of romance between Nicki and Mitch but that comes to an end when Nicki blows herself up while trying to take out the final Rancor executive.

This was a weird episode, as the pacing felt off and the story was far more violent than any of the ones that came before it. At one point, Mitch gets a favor from an IRS agent by promising him a date with Donna and that just felt really icky. There’s another extended scene where both a businessman and the show’s cameraman spends several minutes leering at Ryan’s legs and again, it just felt off. Previously, the show had never been shy about showing off Angie Harmon’s legs and, speaking as someone who enjoys showing off her own legs, there’s nothing wrong with that but, in this particular episode, it crosses the line from being appreciative to being tacky. One could tell that the show’s producers brainstormed and couldn’t come up with anything better than, “Let’s make Baywatch Nights more like Baywatch!”

What’s sad is that Baywatch Nights really didn’t need a reboot. The first ten episodes were, for the most part, fun and entertaining in their vapid way. This episode, though, feels like it’s begging for attention and that’s never a good look. Don’t worry, though. Not all reboots are bad, as we’ll see in another 11 episodes. That is when we will reach season 2 of Baywatch Nights.

Retro Television Reviews: Fantasy Island 4.10 “High Off The Hog/Reprisal”

Posted on January 23, 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 Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1986. Almost the entire show is currently streaming is on Youtube, Daily Motion, and a few other sites.

The plane has arrived!

Episode 4.10 “High Off The Hog/Reprisal”

(Dir by Michael Vejar, originally aired on January 10th 1981)

This week’s episode of Fantasy Island is all about being someone that you’re not.

For instance, Hadley Boggs (Stephen Shortridge) wants to thank his family for taking out a mortgage on the family farm, just so he could go to MIT. Hadley has a great future ahead of him but he just wants his dad (Noah Beery, Jr.), mother (Dody Goodman), and sister (Misty Rowe) to have a chance to be live like rich people for the weekend.

Fantasy Island to the rescue!

When the Boggs family arrives, they are shocked to discover that they are going to be living in a mansion. Mr. Roarke has arranged for them to host a cocktail party with ten of the richest men on the island. Unfortunately, he makes the mistake of telling Tattoo to place an invite for the party in the Fantasy Island Chronicle. (Yes, Fantasy Island has a newspaper and, in this episode, it appears to be printed in red ink.) Tattoo decides to spice things up by claiming that the Boggs family owns a uranium mine. Mr. Roarke is not happy.

“But, boss,” Tattoo says, “I am your best assistant!”

“That does not matter,” Roarke snaps before explaining that the Boggs family could be in a lot of trouble if they start buying things with money they don’t have or selling property they don’t own.

And, of course, that’s just what happens. Roger Fox (Shecky Greene) offers the father of the family a few million dollars for the mine. Thinking that it’s all part of the fantasy, Dad agrees. Roger then sells the non-existent mine to someone else because it turns out that Roger is a con artist at heart. Fortunately, with Roarke’s help, the family is able to con Roger into giving them back the non-existent mine and Hadley even falls in love with Roger’s daughter, Kathi (Kathrine Baumann). To be honest, I had a hard time following exactly how Mr. Roarke conned Roger into giving up his fake mine but I’m glad things worked out.

This fantasy was …. eh. The problem is that Hadley’s family was presented as being borderline idiots, what with their amazed reaction to existence of cars, airplanes, servants, and checking accounts. It’s one thing to make them a poor farm family. It’s another to treat them as if they’re the members of a cargo cult that has never had contact with modern human beings before. West Virginia is not the Amazon Rain Forest.

The other fantasy featured Maureen McCormick in one of her six trips to the Island. This time, she plays Trudy Brown (Maureen McCormick), an orphaned gymnast who is treated terribly by her aunt (Janis Paige) and her cousin (Holly Gagnier). Trudy wants to win the Fantasy Island Gymnastics Competition and, in the process, she wants to defeat her cousin. Mr. Roarke gives her the power of telekinesis, which Trudy promptly used to make her cousin fall off the high beam. Roarke gives Trudy a stern talking to.

It’s a struggle but eventually, Trudy realizes that she doesn’t want to win through magic powers. Nor does she want to hurt her cousin or anyone else competing. Roarke takes away her powers and Trudy, having learned a valuable lesson, wins the competition on her own.

This fantasy was actually a lot of fun, just because it gave the viewer a chance to see what Carrie would have been like if Maureen McCormick had played the title role instead of Sissy Spacek. McCormick seems to be having lot of fun loosening screws with her mind. Toss in some gymnastics with the telekinesis and you have classic Island fantasy!

This episode had one boring fantasy and one good fantasy. Luckily, the good overshadowed the boring.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: CHiPs 1.11 “Name Your Price”

Posted on January 22, 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 again fails to get rich.

Episode 1.11 “Name Your Price”

(Dir by Ric Rondell, originally aired on December 8th, 1977)

This week’s episode opens on an unusually somber note for CHiPs. It begins in a cemetery. A woman (Jaime Lynn Bauer) is dressed in chic funeral black and appears to be attending a service. But it soon turns out that she’s actually just making sure that everyone is so distracted by mourning that they won’t notice her stealing a Rolls Royce!

It turns out that a Rolls is not quite as easy to steal as she thought and soon, she finds herself being pursued by Ponch and Baker. It’s a chase that leads from the highway and into the city and, to Ponch and Baker’s shock, they lose sight of the stolen car.

“How does a Rolls Royce vanish!?” Ponch asks, in shock.

Ponch is a bit distracted himself this episode. He has been accepted as a contestant on a game show called Name Your Price! Name Your Price is obviously meant to be The Price Is Right and Ponch spends the majority of the episode memorizing the price tags on appliances. Unfortunately, Ponch does not memorize the price tag of a motorcycle and therefore, he turns out to be a bit of a bust when he appears on the show. As Baker and his date sneak out of the studio, Ponch is humiliated as the show’s host wonders how a motorcycle cop could not know how much a motorcycle costs.

Oh, Ponch — will you ever win!?

It’s not all bad for Ponch. He and Baker pull over a car and Ponch is excited to discover that it’s occupied by the two stars of his favorite soap opera. (Does Ponch do anything other than watch television?) And Ponch also gets to help out when a chicken truck is involved in a minor accident and dozens of chickens end up running around the highway. As usual, the main emphasis of this episode is on the idea of the members of the highway patrol working together and keeping the streets safe for chickens and humans. Yes, this episode says, the CHiPs do chase car thieves and arrest criminals. But usually, they’re just taking care of mundane tasks and getting little thanks and little pay.

This episode was entertaining. I enjoyed looking at the cars that were stolen. If you’re going to commit a crime, you might as well commit it for a Rolls Royce. And the ending with the game show was a lot more effective than the typical CHiPs ending. Ponch has spent the first 11 episodes of this show destroying motorcycles so it’s a nice bit of humor that a motorcycle would destroy his chance to get rich. That’s karma!

Next week, Baker and Ponch continue to keep L.A. safe!

Retro Television Reviews: Miami Vice 1.19 “The Home Invaders”

Posted on January 22, 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, Crockett and Castillo take down some home invaders. Yes, Crockett and Castillo. Not Crockett and Tubbs. Read on to find out why.

Episode 1.19 “The Home Invaders”

(Dir by Abel Ferrara, originally produced by March 15th, 1985)

Always do your research.

Philip Michael Thomas does not appear in this episode of Miami Vice. At the start of the episode, it’s mentioned that he’s in New York, visiting Valerie Gordon. It’s a line that sounds like it was written at the spur of the moment and, when I heard it, I assumed that there had been some sort of behind-the-scenes drama between Thomas and the producers. Fortunately, before I went with that and said something snarky, I actually looked up the reason for Thomas’s absence and I discovered that he was injured performing a stunt in the previous episode. Thomas missed this episode because he was recovering. As well, this was the only episode that he missed during the entire run of Miami Vice.

Thomas may be absent but that doesn’t mean that crime is going to take a break in Miami. A series of violent home invasions lead to Crockett and Castillo getting temporarily assigned to the robbery division. Crockett is excited to be working under his former boss and mentor, Lt. John Malone (Jack Kehoe). Castillo quickly realizes that Malone has gotten rusty and that his investigation into the robberies has been sloppy.

This is a moody episode, with the emphasis as much on Crockett’s disillusionment with his old boss as with the efforts to catch the home invaders. That said, the home invaders are a scary bunch. Led by Esai Morales and David Patrick Kelly, they are totally ruthless and willing to kill anyone who fails to move quickly enough. The scenes in which they break into various mansions and threaten the inhabitants are difficult to watch and it definitely captures the trauma of having your personal space invaded and your sense of safety destroyed.

(When I was 17, our house was broken into and, for months, I couldn’t sleep through the night. Almost every night, I was woken up by what I thought was the sound of someone breaking into my house and I would end up walking through the house in my nightclothes, carrying a golf club for protection. One night, I nearly hit my sister when she came out of the kitchen with a midnight snack. It may sound funny now but, at the time, it was terrifying.)

It ends with a shootout that’s violent even by the standards of Miami Vice. Castillo and Crockett gun down the bad guys and it’s hard not to notice that, while Crockett seems to be clearly upset by the fact that he had to kill a few men, Castillo barely shows any emotion at all. Castillo is effective because he holds back his feelings about everything. That’s also why Castillo, and not Crockett, is capable of seeing that Lt. Malone is past his prime. With the home invaders neutralized, Malone tells Crockett that he’s quitting the force. His days of being an effective detective are over. The job and all of the terrible stuff that he deals with on a daily basis has left him burned out and it’s hard not to notice that he and Crockett are the same age. Fighting crime in Miami takes a toll.

This episode was directed by Abel Ferrara, who keeps the action moving quickly and who fills the screen with ennui-drenched images of people who are not sure whether they’re making any difference at all. This is an effective episode, even without the presence of Ricardo Tubbs.