Tag Archives: Retro Television Reviews

Late Night Retro Television Review: Baywatch Nights 2.14 “Ascension”

Posted on 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, a detective show that ran in Syndication from 1995 to 1997.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

This week …. it’s Templar time!

Episode 2.14 “Ascension”

(Dir by Jon Cassar, originally aired on February 23rd, 1997)

Mitch and Ryan have been kidnapped!  They find themselves trapped in an underground prison, where their guards all wear suits and a disembodied voice demands answers without first supplying a question.  A beautiful and nameless woman (Alexandra Bokyun Chun) gives a bound Mitch a shot of sodium pentanol, the better to make him tell the truth.  But instead of answering questions, Mitch hallucinates snakes and bears.

What’s going on?  Well, not surprisingly, it’s all Teague’s fault.  In this episode, it is revealed that Teague is a part of an organization that is in conflict with the corrupted, modern version of the Knights Templar.  (*sigh*  Haven’t the Knights Templar suffered enough without being a part of every dumbass conspiracy theory out there?)  Mitch and Ryan have been kidnapped in an effort to bring Teague into the open …. or something.  To be honest, it’s never quite clear what the whole point of the kidnapping is.

The woman with the drugs apparently has a change of heart and helps Mitch and Ryan escape from their cells.  Of course, it turns out that this is all a part of the scheme to reveal Teague’s location.  (Why do conspiracies always have to be so complicated?)  Mitch figures out what’s going on and he and Ryan escape from the woman and try to break out of the prison.  If you’ve ever wanted to spend twenty minutes watching David Hasselhoff and Angie Harmon crawl around inside a heating duct, I guess this is the episode for you.

This episode feels rather pointless.  It’s never quite clear what the Templars want and Teague hasn’t really been developed enough as a character for his great friendship with Mitch and Ryan to feel authentic.  One gets the feeling that this episode was written at the last minute and a lot of the action comes across as being filler that was included to disguise the fact that this episode really didn’t have a plot.  Obviously, the show was hoping to turn the Templars into a regular set of villains, much as how The X-Files had those aliens and all the black goo.  But, if the Templars can’t even track down Teague without having to kidnap Mitch and Ryan, how intimidating can they really be?

Watching this episode, I found myself wondering how Mitch can get kidnapped and drugged by a secret organization and then go to work as a lifeguard the next day.  I mean, after everything that Mitch has seen this season, he should be one of those raving lunatics who you see on street corners holding “The End Is Near” signs.  He should be crazier than someone who has looked straight at Cthulhu.  Instead, he’s still the same mellow beach bum that he’s always been.

More power to him, I guess.  That’s the Hoff for you.

Retro Television Review: Fantasy Island 5.13 “King Arthur in Mr. Roarke’s Court/Shadow Games”

Posted on 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 1984.  Unfortunately, the show has been removed from most streaming sites.  Fortunately, I’ve got nearly every episode on my DVR.

This week, King Arthur comes to Fantasy Island!

Episode 5.13 “King Arthur in Mr. Roarke’s Court/Shadow Games”

(Dir by Philip Leacock, originally aired on January 23rd, 1982)

Yay!  Tattoo is present in this episode!

Listen, there’s nothing wrong with Wendy Schaal and it’s not her fault that the character of Julie was seriously underdeveloped by the show’s writers.  But I have to admit that I always cheer a little whenever an episode opens with Julie being sent to take care of something elsewhere on the Island.  In this case, Julie is sent to find a home for five adorable kittens while Tattoo and Mr. Roarke deal with this episode’s guests.

Sara Jean Rawlins (Linda Blair) is a country music singer who comes to Fantasy Island with her manager, Sam (the always sinister Peter Mark Richman).  Sara Jean wants to record her song Shadow Games and she wants her former collaborator and boyfriend, Billy, to play guitar on the track.  The only problem is that Billy is believed to have died in a fiery car crash.  Mr. Roarke says that Sara Jean’s fantasy can come true but only if she has total and complete faith.  Plus, she needs to let guitarist Todd Porter (Don Most) play with her.  “It is very important to the success of your fantasy,” Roarke tells her.  Hmmm….I wonder why.

Hey, do you think that maybe Billy isn’t dead and instead, he’s disguised himself as Todd Porter?  That would certainly explain why Todd’s guitar playing sounds just like Billy’s.  And do you think it’s possible that Sam, who is played by an actor who was always cast as a villain no matter what, might turn out to be the story’s true villain?

This fantasy was predictable and Linda Blair overacted the whole “country” aspect of her character but I did like the Shadow Games song.  And Mr. Roarke played the piano at one point!  It’s always fun when Mr. Roarke shows off a new skill.  (Apparently, Montalban himself was a very talented pianist.)

As for the other fantasy, Ralph Rodgers (Tom Smothers) wants to go to the past so he can meet King Arthur.  He specifically says his fantasy is to “meet King Arthur.”  Ralph is briefly sent back to Camelot but, just as abruptly, he returns to the present and he brings Arthur (played by Robert Mandan) with him!  Roarke admits that something must have gone wrong with the time traveling spell but he also points out that Ralph wanted to “meet King Arthur” and now he’s met him.

Now, what do you picture when you think of King Arthur?  Young?  Handsome?  Battle-weary?  Romantic?  British?

Here’s what Fantasy Island gives us.

Now, if you’ve ever seen any old sitcoms from the 70s and the 80s, you’ll probably recognize Robert Mandan.  He was one of those actors who always seemed to play stuffy authority figures.  He was always the overprotective father or the greedy businessman or the principal who wasn’t going to stand for any foolishness in his school.  Robert Mandan was not a bad actor but he was also definitely not British.  But you know what?  Robert Mandan is so miscast as King Arthur that it actually becomes kind of charming.

King Arthur and Ralph wander around the Island while Roarke works on finding a way to send Arthur back to Camelot.  Arthur gets harassed by a group of roughnecks who don’t seem like they really belong on the Island.  (Maybe they work at that fishing village that showed up in one episode and was then never mentioned again.)  Arthur also reveals that his wife, Gwynevere, had vanished.  Ralph eventually goes off on his own and runs into a British woman who says her name is Gwen (Carol Lynley).  She explains she came to the Island because her politician husband was too consumed with work.  Hmmmmm….

The important thing is that

  1. Arthur and Gwen are reunited
  2. Arthur knights Ralph before he and Gwen return to Camelot and,
  3. There’s a masquerade ball and Tattoo dressed up like a knight!

This was a silly but cute episode.  Between Robert Mandan as King Arthur and Linda Blair singing country music, this episode was so weird that it was impossible not to enjoy it.  I just hope Julie found a home for all those kittens.

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 2.16 “Pressure Point”

Posted on 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’s episode is a change-of-pace as Ponch and Baker get off their motorcycles and go undercover!

Episode 2.16 “Pressure Point”

(Dir by Phil Bondelli, originally aired on January 20th, 1979)

The limousine of wealthy industrialist Arthur Forbinger (Rudy Vallee) is ambushed by three cars and a motorcycle.  The motorcyclist shatters both the back and the front driver’s side window and tosses an envelope into the backseat.  Forbinger orders his driver to chase the motorcycle.

Ponch and Baker, enjoying a leisurely patrol through Beverly Hills, spot the limo speeding down the street and they decide to pursue it.  When Forbinger finally tells his driver to pull over, Ponch and Baker demands to know why Forbinger was putting lives at risk.  Forbinger lies and says that he was late to a meeting.  In reality, Forbinger has just opened the envelope and discovered pictures of his granddaughter, Chris (Mary Crosby).  The implication is that whoever broke his window can also get to Chris.

Despite Forbinger’s attempts at deflection, Ponch, Baker, and Cahill soon figure out what actually happened.  Thinking that Forbinger is perhaps being targeted by a private security firm that scares rich people into hiring its guards, Getraer tells Ponch and Baker to get off their motorcycles because they’re going undercover.  Ponch will pretend to be a diplomat from Argentina and Baker will be his driver.

Ponch is overjoyed to at the chance to pretend to be rich.  He’s even happier when he meets Chris.  Oh, that Ponch!

This episode was weird.  It just doesn’t feel right for Ponch and Baker to not be on their motorcycles and the episode spent so much time with Forbinger and Chris that I found myself wondering if it was meant to be some sort of backdoor pilot for a primetime soap opera about the Forbinger family.  Despite featuring quite a few chase scenes and a few dramatic crashes, this didn’t feel like an episode of CHiPs at all.  Is there really a point to the show without the motorcycles?

The other problem with this episode was that the performance of Rudy Vallee …. well, it wasn’t good.  I know that Rudy was a show business veteran when he did this episode and that he had been around for a while but he still gives a rather flat and lifeless performance.  He delivers his lines as if reading them off of a cue card.  (For all I know, he was reading them off of a cue card.)  As for the rest of the guest cast, Mary Crosby is stuck with a nothing role while Guy Stockwell and Tom Troupe are a bit too obviously sinister as the duplicitous security men.

This episode went for a change of pace but it just didn’t work.  Sorry, Highway Patrol.

Retro Television Review: Miami Vice 3.3 “Killshot”

Posted on 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 can be purchased on Prime!

This week, another friend of Crockett’s is in trouble!

Episode 3.3 “Killshot”

(Dir by Leon Ichaso, originally aired on October 10th, 1986)

Crockett and Tubbs are working undercover as Burnett and Cooper to take down drug lord Morales (Roger Pretto).  Morales is one of the most powerful drug lords in Miami but he’s still not connected enough to know that Burnett and Cooper are undercover cops.  I know that I bring this up nearly every time I write about this show but it just baffles me that Crockett and Tubbs are somehow still able to maintain their covers despite the fact that those covers have gotten blown in numerous episodes and Crockett makes no effort to act any differently when he’s pretending to be Burnett.  At least Tubbs uses his fake Jamaican accent whenever he’s pretending to be Cooper.  Crockett doesn’t even bother to change his suit before pretending to be Burnett.

That said, they’ve somehow managed to keep Morales from discovering that they’re cops.  So, Morales instead focuses on manipulating a customs agent, Frank Ariolla (Carlos Cestero).  Frank’s brother, Tico (Fernando Allende) is an up-and-coming jai alai player.  (That’s the sport, prominently featured in Miami Vice‘s opening credits, in which the players use a wicker to both catch and launch a ball.)  However, Tico also has a raging cocaine problem.  In fact, the drug often leaves him impotent.  When a prostitute suggests that Tico might not be attracted tp women, Tico goes crazy and blacks out.  When he wakes up, the prostitute appears to be dead and madam Isabel Batista (Maria Duval) says she’ll protect Tico for a price.  Frank has to work as a double agent or Isabel and Morales will send a tape of Tico attacking the prostitute to the police.

(For the record, the prostitute was only pretending to be dead as a part of a plot to frame Tico.  But then Isabel had her killed for real.)

Trying to protect his brother, Frank agrees to work for Morales.  But when a guilt-stricken Tico makes a mistake during a match that leads to him getting killed when he’s stuck in the head by the ja alai ball, will Crockett and Tubbs be able to stop Frank from taking his own violent vengeance on both Morales and Isabel?  As you probably already guessed, this is yet another Miami Vice episode the ends with a freeze frame and an off-screen gunshot as Crockett yells, “No!”

If there’s one thing that has stayed consistent over the first three seasons of Miami Vice, it’s that it does not pay to be a friend of Sonny’s.  From Jimmy Smits getting blown up in the pilot to Ira Stone dying last week to Frank throwing his life away to avenge his brother in this week’s episode, anyone who has ever been close to Crockett seems to end up having terrible luck.  I’m stunned that Tubbs has managed to survive for as long as he has.

As for this episode, Crockett and Tubbs both seemed to be sidelined in favor of the story of Frank and Tico.  It’s always weird when Crockett and Tubbs become supporting characters on their own show.  Carlos Cestero and Maria Duval both gave good performances, which is good because it helps to distract from the fact that Morales is a fairly dull villain and Tico is not a particularly compelling character.  For the most part, this episode works best as a commercial for ja alai, which looks a hundred times more exciting than most sports.  Certainly, its fast action and the constant danger of sudden death makes it the ideal sport for Miami.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Degrassi Junior High 3.12 “Taking Off: Part Two”

Posted on 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 Sunday, I will be reviewing the Canadian series, Degrassi Junior High, which aired on CBC and PBS from 1987 to 1989!  The series can be streamed on YouTube!

This week, Degrassi goes there again!

Episode 3.12 “Taking Off: Part Two”

(Dir by Kit Hood, originally aired on February 20th, 1989)

When last we checked in with the students at Degrassi Junior High, Shane was missing and Wheels, having been sexually assaulted by a man who picked him up while he was hitchhiking, was walking towards Port Hope in search of his biological father.

Shane is discovered underneath a bridge.  As the police tell his friend Luke, it appears that Shane either jumped or he fell.  Shane is alive, but he’s in a coma and there’s no guarantee that he’s going to survive.  When asked whether or not Shane had done any drugs at the Gourmet Scum concert, Luke finally admits that Shane did drop acid right before the show began.

As for Wheels, he manages to make it to Port Hope and he even finds the cheap hotel where his father, Mike (Dave James), is playing with his band.  Wheels imagines knocking on the hotel room door and his father happily greeting him and inviting him to join the band.  Instead, when Wheels knocks on the door, Mike is shocked and not particularly happy to see him.  Though Mike forces Wheels to call his grandmother and let her know that he’s okay, Mike does agree to let Wheels spend the day at the hotel.  Mike then promptly abandons Wheels.

When Mike eventually returns, a few things become obvious.

First off, Mike didn’t even know that Wheels’s adoptive parents had died.

Secondly, Mike doesn’t want anything to do with his biological son.

Third, Mike’s new girlfriend is pregnant and, as she explains it, they can’t afford to have Wheels around.

I mean, goddamn!  Poor Wheels!  First, he gets sexually assaulted while hitchhiking.  Then, his father rejects him.  Wheels, after yelling at his father for abandoning him, is prepared to run away again but suddenly, his grandmother shows up.  She was finally able to convince Joey to tell her where Wheels had run of to and she shows up to take him home.  Wheels is adamant that he’s going to run away again but when his grandmother starts to cry and calls him out for being a “selfish, selfish boy,” Wheels reconsiders.

At the end of the episode, Shane is still in his coma and it’s still up in the air whether he accidentally fell or if he was trying to commit suicide when he plunged from that bridge.  Wheels, however, returns to school and is greeted by Joey and Snake.  Joey apologizes for telling Wheels’s grandmother about Port Hope but Wheels says it’s okay.  He’s ready to give school another try.  Everyone smiles as the end credits roll on a well-acted and classic episode of Degrassi Junior High.

YAY!  It’s a happy ending, as long as you haven’t seen Degrassi: The Next Generation.  If you have seen The Next Generation, you know that Wheels has alcoholism and prison in his future.  And, for that matter, Shane is going to end up spending the rest of his life in an institution.  So, it’s not really that happy of an ending.

But it’s very much a Degrassi ending.

Retro Television Review: Homicide: Life on the Street 1.2 “Ghost of a Chance”

Posted on 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 Sundays, I will be reviewing Homicide: Life On The Street, which aired from 1993 to 1999, on NBC!  It  can be viewed on Peacock.

This week, the search for Adeena Watson’s murderer begins.

Episode 1.2 “Ghost of a Chance”

(Dir by Martin Campbell, originally aired on February 3rd, 1993)

There’s been a murder in Baltimore.  That, in itself, is not news.  The pilot firmly established that murder is a fact of life in Baltimore.  But, the victim of this crime is an 11 year-old girl named Adeena Watson, who left her home to go to the library and who never returned.  The press is covering every detail.  The police brass want an arrest and they want an arrest quickly.  And the primary detective on the case is rookie Tim Bayliss, who has never even worked a murder case on his own before.  Giardello refuses to replace Bayliss but he also makes it clear that he needs Bayliss to bring him something.

As for Bayliss, he spends most of this episode struggling.  Not only does he not have the respect of his fellow detective but he also, as a rookie, doesn’t even have a desk until Giardello, in a fit of anger, knocks everything off an unoccupied desk and awards it to Bayliss.  (So, was that desk just sitting there the whole time?  I thought they didn’t have any available desks.)  Because this crime is what is known as a “red ball,” (i.e., a murder that has attracted the attention of the media and the public), every detective is looking for Adeena’s murderer.  While Bayliss obsesses on who Adeena was before she was killed, the rest of the squad does the practical things, like talking to neighbors and bringing in all of the city’s sex offenders for interrogation.

My heart broke for Bayliss while watching this episode.  Kyle Secor did a good job of capturing both Bayliss’s outrage over the crime and his fear of failing to solve his first case as a primary.  While Bayliss stared at Adeena’s body in the alley, Munch, Lewis, and Crosetti debated sports.  And while their attitude may have seemed callous, this episode established that disconnecting is the only way to handle working Homicide.  Bayliss, having not learned how to disconnect, grows more and more obsessed with Adeena.  I cheered a little when Bayliss finally stood up for himself and even won the grudging respect of Frank Pembleton.  That said, the change in Bayliss happened almost too quickly to be credible.  Apparently, all it took was for Giardello to give him a desk for Bayliss to go from being meek and overwhelmed to being a confident and take-charge detective.

While Bayliss searched for Adeena’s killer, Much and Bolander dealt with a murder that happened in a wealthy neighborhood.  The killer (Gwen Verdon) was a wife who snapped after 60 years of marriage.  As she explained to Bolander and Munch, she and her husband had earlier promised each other that they wouldn’t get a divorce until the children died.  Bolander has a crush on the coroner, Dr. Blythe (Wendy Hughes), but he’s worried about getting back in the dating game after his own divorce.  When Munch asks Bolander how old he is, Bolander replies, “48.”  Ned Beatty was a great actor and I’ve never seen a bad Ned Beatty performance.  That said, it’s also hard for me to think of any film where he looked a day under 50.

Meanwhile, Kay tries to get a confession from a guy who is about to go on trial for murder.  Felton laughs when Kay says that she was visited by the ghost of the guy’s victim.  However, Felton makes up for being a jerk by helping Kay find the murder weapon.  This whole subplot was odd to me, largely because Kay really doesn’t come across as the type to believe in ghosts.  But whatever works, I guess!  Melissa Leo and Daniel Baldwin did a good job in this episode, selling a storyline that had the potential to be a little bit too cute for its own good.

As the episode ended, the killer of Adeena Watson had yet to be captured.  While the other detective drank at a wharf bar, Bayliss went to Adeena’s memorial service and stared at her coffin, haunted.  It was a powerful moment but one that left the viewer worried about Bayliss’s sanity.  Earlier in this episode, Pembleton said that a murder that goes 72 hours without being solved will never be solved.  Bayliss is running out of time.

 

Late Night Retro Television Review: Check It Out! 2.15 “Tots ‘R’ Us”

Posted on 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 Saturdays, I will be reviewing the Canadian sitcom, Check it Out, which ran in syndication from 1985 to 1988.  The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi!

This week, Edna has a good idea.

Episode 2.15 “Tots ‘R’ Us”

(DIr by J. Sumner, originally aired on February 1st, 1987)

I have no idea who J. Sumner was.

J. Sumner is credited as being the director of this episode.  (Up until this episode, Alan Erlich was the show’s regular director.)  I’ve never seen the name before and it struck me as being such an odd name to use that I actually looked the director up on the IMDb.  According to the IMDb, this episode of Check It Out! is the only thing that J. Sumner has ever been credited as having been involved with.  That’s quite an accomplishment, making your entertainment career debut as a director   Most people have to work up to it.

I kind of suspect that J. Sumner is a pseudonym of some sort.  Maybe the real director didn’t want to be credited for this episode, though there’s nothing about it that’s really all that different from any other episode of Check It Out.  It’s not a terrible episode but it’s also not a particularly interesting one, which is why I’m wasting so much time speculating about the identity of J. Sumner.

The episode takes place on Canadian Mother’s Day.  Edna decides to turn the back offices into a daycare so mothers can leave their children while they shop.  That actually does sound like a good idea to me.  Whenever I go grocery shopping, I always seem to get stuck in line behind people who have multiple hyperactive children.  Just last week, this little brat stepped on my foot while running around the store and his mother didn’t even apologize to me.  Seriously, I was limping for hours afterwards!  I should have called the cops and pressed charges….

Anyway, all of the moms and their kids eventually leave.  Except there’s one child (played by Benjamin Barrett) left behind.  He wears a nametag that reads “Orphan” but a call to the local orphanage reveals that no one is missing.  Edna calls the police but tells them that the store will take care of the kid and hold onto him until his parents arrive.  The police apparently say, “Okay, thanks for letting us know,” and then never bother to come out to the store.  That doesn’t sound like typical police procedure when it comes to an abandoned child but who knows?  This is a Canadian show so maybe that’s the way they do it in Manitoba.

Edna pressures Howard into using a sock puppet to talk to the kid.  The previously silent kid is happy to talk to Goober The Sock.  The kid’s name is Freddy.  He stays overnight at the store with Edna and, in a really sad scene, Edna asks Freddy if he knows anything about adoption.  Edna’s dreams of taking Feddy into her home are ruined when Freddy’s father (Walker Boone) shows up.  Howard gives Freddy and his father tickets to a baseball game.  Awww, that was nice!

This was a pretty simple episode and, to be honest, it was kind of boring.  Howard and Edna are more fun when they’re weird than when they’re nice.  As always, Gordon Clapp (as Viker, the electrician) got a few funny lines and made the most of his limited screentime.  Otherwise, this was a sweet-natured but not particularly enthralling episode.

And if J. Sumner is reading this, say hi in the comments!  We’d love to hear from you!

Retro Television Review: Welcome Back, Kotter 4.3 “Don’t Come Up And See Me Sometime”

Posted on 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 Saturdays, I will be reviewing Welcome Back Kotter, which ran on ABC  from 1975 to 1979.  The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi!

This week, Vinnie tries to move on with his life.  The Sweathogs say, “No!”

Episode 4.3 “Don’t Come Up And See Me Sometime”

(Dir by Norman Abbott, originally aired on September 25th, 1978)

Vinnie Barbarino has his own apartment!

And it’s a dump!

Seriously, if you watch enough 70s sitcoms, you know that no one is going to live in a nice apartment.  For whatever reason, characters on 70s tv shows always lived in the ugliest apartments imaginable.  But, even with that in mind, Barbarino’s apartment is terrible.  The walls are stained.  The couch is worn and has visible stuffing.  Every time the train goes by, the entire apartment shakes and Vinnie’s bed falls out of its closet.  It’s an awful apartment in an awful part of Brooklyn but then again, Barbarino is a janitor who hasn’t even graduated from high school so really, the crappy apartment is probably the most realistic part of this episode.

Vinnie is happy to have his own place because he has a serious girlfriend, Sally (Linda McCullough).  Sally works as a nurse at the hospital.  Vinnie can’t wait to spend time with her, though she has to break their first date when she’s assigned to work overnight.

Julie Kotter makes her first appearance of the season when she drops by to give VInnie a house-warming present and to show off her terrible new haircut.  The present turns out to be towels.  Vinnie is happy with the gift because he was feeling bad about stealing towels from the hospital.

Then the Sweathogs show up, including a new blonde guy with a Southern accent.  Washington says that the guy’s name is Beau (Stephen Shortridge) and he’s a new student at Buchanan High and in Mr. Kotter’s class.  What’s odd is that the previous episode ended with Vinnie once again enrolled in high school and a student in Kotter’s class.  So, why hasn’t he met Beau yet?  Did Vinnie drop out after dropping back in?

After Vinnie and Beau debate which one of them is uglier, Vinnie gives everyone a tour of the apartment.  He’s especially proud of his dining table.

Things are going fine until the Sweathogs start to talk about how they’re going to be spending all of their time at Barbarino’s new apartment.  Vinnie, realizing the he just wants some privacy, asks all of the Sweathogs to leave.  The Sweathogs get offended and say that Vinnie has let his new apartment go to his head.

The next day, at school, Gabe is shocked to see the Sweathogs shunning Vinnie.  Woodman, however, tells Vinnie that he’s lucky.  “I haven’t had a friend in 20 years,” Woodman says, “and look how happy I am!”  Fortunately, Gabe is not quite so cynical and he’s able to help the Sweathogs realize that they need to give Barbarino room to live his own life.  This episode ends with Barbarino, having nearly been driven mad by loneliness, happily allowing the Sweathogs, the Kotters, and Mr. Woodman into his apartment.  But then Sally arrives and he kicks them all out.

This episode feels like a metaphor of sorts.  Just as Barbarino was escaping the Sweathogs and starting his own life, John Travolta was escaping television for the movies.  One has to imagine that, just as the Sweathogs were offended to be kicked out of the apartment, there were some Kotter people who weren’t necessarily happy about not being included in Travolta’s new Hollywood career.

This episode works surprisingly well.  That’s largely because it’s a showcase for John Travolta.  The scenes of Barbarino talking to himself come close to going on for too long but Travolta’s charisma carries the day.  At the end of the episode, even Gabe and Julie look happy for a minute or two.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Friday the 13th: The Series 2.13 “Eye of Death”

Posted on 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: The Series, a show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The show can be found on YouTube!

This week, Ryan goes into the past.

Episode 2.13 “Eye of the Death”

(Dir by Timothy Bond, originally aired on January 30th, 1989)

Atticus Rook (Tom McCamus) is an antiques dealer, one who is well-known to Jack.  No one seems to really like or trust Atticus Rook.  Everything about him seems to scream sleaze.  But Atticus has somehow managed to get artifacts from the American Civil War that no one else has ever been able to find.  His latest claim is that he will soon be selling Robert E. Lee’s sword.

How is Atticus accomplishing this?  He has a cursed magic lantern that he uses to project old pictures onto his wall.  He’s then able to step into the picture and enter the time period in which it was taken.  (Hey, that sounds like a fun cursed object to own!)  Atticus has been going into the past and telling Gen. Lee (Bernard Behrens) that he’s a spy.  However, the information that he gives Lee is just stuff that he remembers from history class.  Atticus thinks that he’s got a pretty good operation going but there are two catches.  To go to the past, he has to kill someone in the present.  To return to the present, he has to kill someone in the past.

Naturally, Ryan ends up in the past while trying to retrieve the magic lantern.  Ryan meets General Lee and tries to present himself as also being a spy but it turns out that Ryan paid even less attention in history class than Atticus did.  Ryan being Ryan, he also falls in love with a widow named Abigail (Brooke Johnson).  As we all know, having Ryan fall in love with you is pretty much a death sentence on Friday the 13th.  Abigail’s death does allow Ryan, Jack, and Micki to return to the present.  Moving the lantern allows Atticus to get trapped in his own wall, where he suffocates while trying to return to the present.

This was a surprisingly good episode.  I say “surprisingly” because you wouldn’t necessarily think that a low-budget Canadian show would do a great job of recreating the American Civil War but this episode pulls it off.  The costumes, the sets, the words used by the people encountered by Ryan and Atticus, all of them work to make the episode’s Civil War setting feel very realistic.  Tom McCamus is a great villain and Bernard Behrens is well-cast as Robert E. Lee.  Even the obviously doomed romance between Ryan and Abigail works remarkably well.

I have to admit that I’ve always assumed this show took place in Canada, largely because of all of the Canadian accents and the Canadian scenery.  This episode reveals that Friday the 13th is supposed to be taking place in the United States, despite the way that people pronounce the word “sorry.”  When Ryan ends up in the Civil War, he says that he’s from Chicago.  (It’s not necessarily a good idea to go back to the Civil War era and immediatly tell everyone that you’re a Yankee.)

Well, this show can pretend that the antique store is in Chicago if it wants to, but it’ll always be Toronto to me.

Retro Television Review: T and T 3.18 “Suspect”

Posted on 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, we have yet another surprisingly serious episode of T and T.

Episode 3.18 “Suspect”

(Dir by Ken Girotti, originally aired on May 5th, 1990)

On trial for having physically abused his girlfriend, Giles (Tom Melissis) can only smirk when his girlfriend, Ally (Isabelle Mejias), takes the stand and says that she doesn’t remember who beat her.  Far less amused is Ally’s lawyer, Terri (Kristina Nicoll).

After telling Ally that she needs to recant her testimony and testify against Giles, Terri starts to receive threatening letters.  While Turner immediately suspects that Giles is the one behind the threats, it turns out that it’s actually Ally!  Ally explains that she’s actually an ex-convict named Deborah, a former client of Terri’s who got sent to prison.  This, of course, leads to a huge question — why didn’t Terri recognize Ally when she agreed to serve as her attorney?  And how did Ally manage to fool everyone into thinking she was Ally when she’s actually Deborah?  Ally doesn’t say anything about getting plastic surgery or anything like that.  She also implies that her last encounter with Terri was only a year or two ago.  (Seeing as how Terri wasn’t even on the show until the start of this season, it couldn’t have been that long ago.)  Terri immediately recognizes the name Deborah but she didn’t recognize Deborah when she was standing right in front of her.  Wow, Terry …. and I thought I was self-centered!

No worries, though!  Despite all of the threats, Terri agrees to not turn Ally into the police as long as Ally testifies against Giles.  I don’t know if I could so easily overlook a harassment campaign but whatever.  The important thing is that Giles goes to jail and Ally is free to continue leading a double life.

This episode featured good performances from Isabelle Mejias and Tom Melissis and I appreciate any show or film that ends with an abuser getting sent to either prison or the graveyard.  But the story itself felt really rushed.  This is one of those episodes that would have benefitted from a longer running time because there was a lot to unpack in just 30 minutes.  As well, it’s hard not to feel that Ally’s backstory would have had more impact if Amy was still on the show.  Season 3 (and the show itself) are nearly over and I still don’t feel like I really know how Terri Taler is supposed to be.  Amy was established, over the course of two seasons, as a whip-smart attorney who had a long history as a crusader.  Terri, on the other hand, still feels like someone who just showed up nowhere.

Like last week, this was a surprisingly serious episode of T and T.  The episode didn’t quite work but the show still deserves credit for trying.