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Retro Television Review: Homicide: Life On The Street 4.20 “The Wedding”

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 …. someone’s getting married!

Episode 4.20 “The Wedding”

(Dir by Alan Taylor, originally aired on May 10th, 1996)

Kevin Lungo, a Baltimore radio host, is found dead.  The previous day, he announced on his program that he was not only in favor of abortion but he was in favor of requiring any pregnant woman with an IQ of less than 100 to have one.  Did that comment lead to him being gunned down in a parking lot?

(When this episode aired, 100 was considered to be an “average” IQ.  Now, the average IQ is considered to be 90.  That’s not a good thing.)

We never really find out.  The case is handled by Giardello and Kay and, while Kay has never heard of Lungo, it turns out that Giardello used to enjoy listening to him.  (Hopefully, Giardello disagreed with Lungo’s pro-eugenics stance.)  When the radio station offers a $5,000 reward for any tips, someone calls in and give the name of the “killer.”  When Giardello and Kay follow-up on the tip, the suspect pulls a gun and is shot dead by Giardello.

Giardello feels guilty about the shooting.  He tells that Kay that, when he was younger, he was able to shoot well-enough that he could simply wound a suspect, instead of killing him.  Making it even worse is that the dead man has an alibi.  The call was just a practical joke between friends.  “Why did you have to kill him!?” the dead man’s friend wails.

Back at the squad room, Lewis shocks everyone by announcing that he’s getting married to a woman that they’ve never heard of.  While he doesn’t invite any of his co-workers to the wedding, he does ask them to attend a reception at the Belvedere Hotel.  He tells Pembleton to order and pay for the flowers.  He asks Russert to arrange for the band and an open bar and asks if she would be willing to cover the cost.  (“Until my next paycheck,” Lewis assures her.)  Munch assumes that Lewis is lying.  Most of the squad room suspects that Lewis is lying.  But they give him the benefit of the doubt and show up for the reception.

Also going to the reception is Carrie, the very glamorous sister of Kay Howard.  Carrie is visiting from Florence and soon, both Kellerman and Bayliss are shamelessly flirting with her.  An actress named “Margaret May” is credited as playing Carrie.  Of course, Margaret May is actually Melissa Leo.

With the exception of Giardello and Kay (who are still working the Lungo murder), all of Lewis’s colleagues show up at the ballroom.  Even the crusty forensics examiner, Scheiner (Ralph Tabakin), shows up.  “Do you want to dance?” he asks Russert’s daughter.  “NO!” she replies.

But where’s Lewis?  Lewis is missing.  Was Munch right?  Pembleton, who is there with his very pregnant wife, is not amused.  As Brodie films him, Pembleton announces that he is going to kill Lewis and he will never get caught because of his experience as a homicide detective….

Fortunately, Lewis shows up before Pembleton gets his gun.  And accompanying Lewis is his new wife, Barbara Shivers (Karen Williams)!  The reception is a huge success.  The band plays.  Kellerman and Bayliss both try to hold onto Carrie’s attention.  Scheiner watches as Russert’s daughter proceeds to dance with everyone but him.  Finally, Giardello and Kay show up.  Kay warns Bayliss that Carrie is dangerous.  Bayliss asks why.  Kay says that Carrie likes to play game and she just does whatever feels good.  Bayliss looks intrigued….

Mary Pembleton’s water breaks on the dance floor as she goes into labor!  (In a nice twist, Mary Pembleton was played by Andre Braugher’s real-life wife, Ami Brabson.)  As the episode ends, even Giardello smiles.  For all the ugliness in the world, there is still hope.

I loved this episode!  Homicide’s greatest strength was its ensemble and here, everyone gets a chance to show off.  Yaphet Kotto reminds us of what an imposing actor he truly was, though my favorite Giardello moments continue to be the times when he allows himself to get amused by the absurdity of it all.  What really made this episode was for me was that, even with the wedding reception and Mary going into labor, the episode never allowed itself to be sentimental.  For most of the episode, everyone is skeptical about Lewis getting married and, having watched Meldrick Lewis for four season, I was skeptical too!  In the end, the episode earned its right to emotionally satisfying through smart storytelling and good acting.

Brad’s Thoughts on Season 1 of LANDMAN, Starring Billy Bob Thornton!

Posted on by Bradley Crain

Taylor Sheridan has become a fairly big part of my life over the last decade. It started when I saw HELL OR HIGH WATER in the movie theater back in 2016. It was one of my favorite movies of the year, and it was written by a guy named Taylor Sheridan. Well, the next year brought us WIND RIVER, which was both written and directed by Taylor Sheridan, and it was one of my favorite movies of 2017. Then came the series YELLOWSTONE, which was created by Taylor Sheridan and began airing in 2018. I didn’t watch the first couple of seasons, but I thought it looked good and even bought the first season on DVD when I saw it for sale at Wal Mart. When my wife Sierra came home from performing her nursely duties at the hospital and told me that everyone was saying that we needed to watch YELLOWSTONE, I informed her that I just so happened to own Season 1 on DVD. So, we popped it in the DVD player, and we were soon obsessed with the world of the Duttons. My wife took special joy in the characters of Beth (Kelly Reilly) and Rip (Cole Hauser), while John Dutton (Kevin Costner) and Rip kept my attention. I’ll admit that it scared me a little bit that Sierra enjoyed Beth so much, and I’m glad to report that, up to this point, she has not started trying to emulate her actions in real life!

When YELLOWSTONE ended its run at the end of 2024, the Paramount network was putting a major marketing push into their latest “Taylor Sheridan” series, that being LANDMAN, which had started its first season around the same time YELLOWSTONE was wrapping up its final season. I’m a huge fan of actor Billy Bob Thornton, so the fact that he was headlining a series set in Texas oil country automatically piqued my curiosity. Not ready to commit to 10 hours’ worth of LANDMAN episodes quite yet, we put the show on the backburner for a bit, knowing that we could jump in and watch it whenever we wanted to. Well, this past weekend, we got snowed in here in Central Arkansas, so I asked Sierra if she’d like to watch a few episodes of LANDMAN. Needless to say, over the course of the day we watched every episode of Season 1. I really enjoyed the first season and decided to share some of my thoughts with you.

First off, if I’m going to commit to watching 10 hours’ worth of anything, I need to really like at least some of the characters. I don’t just like Billy Bob Thornton’s portrayal of the “Landman” of the title, his Tommy Norris is now one of my favorite characters that he’s ever played. He’s the ultimate realist, because no matter what situation he finds himself in, whether he’s dealing with the head of a drug cartel, the head of his oil company, or his ex-wife, he tackles every situation by uniquely framing the specific issues in a matter of moments and then providing solutions that appeal to his audience’s most base instincts. Alternatively hilarious, serious, heartbreaking and genius, Thornton gives a masterful performance that I don’t think anyone else could have pulled off any more effectively. His ex-wife Angela (Ali Larter) is probably the toughest of all for him to deal with as his own sense of self-preservation seems to go out the window whenever she’s around. Ali Larter’s performance as Angela is loud, brash, attention-seeking, hypersexual, and every so often, just vulnerable enough that you can kind of like her. I think she’s great, and quite sexy, in the role. Michelle Randolph and Jacob Lofland get a lot of screen time in the first season as their children, Ainsley Norris and Cooper Norris. Michelle is cute and spunky, definitely her mother’s daughter, but she also loves her dad so much. I like her. Lofland, who, like Thornton, is from my state of Arkansas, has a meatier role, having to deal with tragedy from the very beginning and then serious family drama as the season plays out. It’s not a showy role, but he does a solid job. The other performance that I really enjoy throughout season 1 comes from Jon Hamm as the head of the oil company, Monty Miller. I kept referring to him as J.R. Ewing as I watched because he’s the big boss. He’s the person that Tommy Norris calls when he can’t solve their problems. Unlike J.R. Ewing, although Miller is a tough businessman, he’s also a committed family man who tries to be there for his wife Cami (Demi Moore) and their daughters when they need him. He is as hard-nosed as it gets in his business dealings, though, and it’s easy to see why he had emerged as the main guy over Tommy. I did want to shout out the actors Colm Feore, James Jordan and Mustafa Speaks as various employees of the oil company who provide different elements of humor and toughness to the proceedings over the course of the season. Finally, as far as the primary cast, while prominently credited throughout the first season, Demi Moore has relatively little to do until the very end of season 1. If you’re a big fan of hers, just know that going in. Her character seems primed to be a big part of season 2, though, so it will be interesting to see where that goes.

Second, like with any popular dramatic TV series, LANDMAN Season 1 contains some storylines that I really enjoy, while there are some that I don’t really care for. Where LANDMAN really works for me is when it features Billy Bob Thornton’s Tommy Norris as a fixer of some sort. It was in these storylines that we get to see his ability to use his intelligence, communication skills, and understanding of human nature to come up with solutions that are best for everyone. It might not always be easy, and he might have to take a beating every now and then, but Tommy knows how to get things done, and the show is at its best when it’s focused on him. We see this throughout season 1 as Norris deals with a variety of cartel henchmen, hotshot attorneys, and unhappy leaseholders in order to advance his company, M-Tex’s interests. There are also a few badass moments when it becomes clear that talking won’t get the job done, and even more direct methods will have to be used to get his point across. This usually happens when Tommy’s feeling the need to protect his children. If there is a weakness to the show, for me, it’s the fact that when Tommy Norris isn’t part of the proceedings, I don’t like it nearly as much. For example, while scenes involving Jacob Lofland’s character, Cooper, and the recently widowed young mother Ariana (Paulina Chavez), whose husband was an employee of the company, ramp up the melodrama, they also take up a lot of time, and I don’t find them very appealing. The same can be said when Ali Larter’s character, Angela, and her daughter Ainsley, decide they’re going to volunteer at a nursing home, and then proceed to hook the residents up with alcohol and even take them to a strip club. While I smiled at some of the proceedings, they weren’t realistic and didn’t really add anything to the story. I even found myself worrying about some of the residents, I mean, I’m sure some of their medication was NOT compatible with tequila! I’m guessing that these quibbles really just come down to a matter of personal preference, as I’m sure there are some who enjoy these moments more than I do. I will admit that these scenes are well-acted and performed even if they’re not advancing my favorite parts of the story.  

Overall, I really enjoyed season 1 of LANDMAN, and I’m looking forward to jumping into season 2 soon, which is now streaming. The last couple of episodes of season 1 introduced or elevated some very interesting characters who will have more prominent roles moving forward (played by Andy Garcia and Demi Moore), and peaking ahead, season 2 also appears to have some interesting additions to the cast (I’m looking at you Sam Elliott). I’m looking forward to the next 10 hours of fun!

Miniseries Review: The Corner (dir by Charles S. Dutton)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Actor T.K. Carter died on January 9th.  He was 69 years old and his passing really didn’t get the notice that he deserved.

T.K. Carter may not have been a household name but I imagine that most people would recognize him if they saw him.  He appeared on a lot of television shows.  He did his share of movies.  He was usually cast in comedic roles, often playing the best friend who would inevitably provide some sort of gentle commentary on the problems of his friends or coworkers.  I just recently finished reviewing Good Morning, Miss Bliss, which featured Carter as Milo.  I’m not really sure what Milo did at John F. Kennedy Junior High but he was certainly more likable than Miss Bliss.

Carter appeared in some films as well.  Ironically, his two best-known films were not comedic at all.  He plays Nauls in John Carpenter’s The Thing, a film that pretty much ends with Kurt Russell and Keith David freezing to death while wondering whether or not one of them is actually a killer alien.  And he also played Cribbs, a pot-smoking member of the National Guard who finds himself lost in the Louisiana bayou in Walter Hill’s Southern Comfort.  I have to admit that, after having watched both of those films more than once, it was a bit strange to see Carter exchanging jokes with Hayley Mills and Dennis Haskins on Good Morning Miss Bliss.

That said, if I had to pick Carter’s best performance, I would probably go with his work in the 2000 HBO miniseries, The Corner.  Based on a nonfiction book by David Simon, The Corner follows several characters over the course of one year in Baltimore.  Almost all of the characters are involved in the drug trade in some way or another.  DeAndre McCullough (Sean Nelson) is a fifteen year-old drug dealer who, despite his obvious intelligence, seems to be destined to become yet another statistic.  DeAndre’s parents are Fran (Khandi Alexander) and Gary (T.K. Carter).  At the start of the miniseries, both Fran and Gary are drug addicts and both of them make the effort to get clean.  Both have moments where their lives appear to be improving.  They both have moments where they relapse and have to start all over again.  Tragedy follows both of them.

The Corner is often described as being a forerunner to The Wire and indeed, there are definite similarities.  Like The Wire, The Corner was shot on location in Baltimore.  Like The Wire, The Corner emphasizes that futility of trying to wage a war on drugs.  As well, several members of The Corner‘s cast also appeared on The Wire.  Clarke Peters, Lance Reddick, Reg E. Cathey, Corey Parker Robinson, Delaney Williams, and Robert F. Chew are among the many Wire actors who appear in The Corner.  Interestingly enough, many of The Wire‘s cops and politicians appear as addicts in The Corner.  Clarke Peters and Reg E. Cathey play two long-time drug addicts who serve as a bit of a chorus for the neighborhood.  Lane Reddick appears as a recovering addict who tries to take advantage of Fran.

That said, The Corner doesn’t trust its audience in the same way that The Wire did.  That’s largely because The Corner was directed by Charles S. Dutton, who has never been a particularly subtle actor or director.  Dutton does a good job capturing the grit of Baltimore but he also includes “interviews” with various characters in which he asks questions while off-camera.  It feels a bit too on-the-nose, as if each episode of The Wire opened with a dramatic monologue from McNulty or Stringer Bell.  We don’t need the characters to look straight at the camera and tell us that things are bad.  We can see that for ourselves.

The entire cast does a good job but the best performance undoubtedly comes from T.K. Carter, who plays Gary as being an intelligent man, a good man, a hopeful man, but also a man who cannot escape his addiction.  With his gentle smile, his pleading eyes, and the almost shy way that he asks people to help him when he needs a fix, Carter gives a heart-breaking performance and one that shows that Gary truly is a prisoner of his addiction.  He doesn’t want to be an addict.  He wants to get clean.  But he also lives in a world where drugs are not only everywhere but they’re also the only escape that he and so many other people have from their oppressive existence.  With the government and the police treating the drug crisis as a war as opposed to a public health emergency, Gary’s two options really are either prison or the basement of his mother’s home.  The police view Gary as being nothing more than an criminal as opposed to someone with a sickness.  The dealers, meanwhile, view Gary as being a marketing opportunity.  T.K. Carter captures both Gary’s desperation and his sadness.  It’s a great performance and one that deserves to be remembered.  As played by T.K. Carter, Gary is the battered heart of The Corner.

T.K. Carter, RIP.

 

Retro Television Review: Miami Vice 5.11 “Miami Squeeze”

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, the British are coming!

Episode 5.11 “Miami Squeeze”

(Dir by Michelle Manning, originally aired on February 17th, 1989)

There’s a new drug lord in Miami.  He’s a British dandy named Sebastian Ross (Robert Joy) and it’s impossible to take him seriously as a legitimate threat.   The show continually tells us how dangerous Sebastian is.  When the son (Daniel Villarreal) of anti-drug Congresswoman Madeleine Woods (Rita Moreno) attempts to double-cross Sebastian, Sebastian blackmails the Congresswoman and also tries to make Castillo look like a dirty cop.  Castillo ends up getting shot, all as a result of Sebastian’s schemes.

And yet, despite all of that, it’s impossible to take Sebastian seriously.  He’s just a ridiculous character, a drug dealer who dresses like an Edwardian gentleman and who carries a can and who speaks with a remarkably bad British accent.  (Robert Joy is himself Canadian.  I should mention that Joy is also a very good character actor.  He’s just miscast here.)  As a character, Sebastian threw off the entire episode.  When you include Rita Moreno acting up a storm, this episode almost felt like a self-parody.

Joey Hardin (Justin Lazard),  the undercover cop from Line of Fire, returned in this episode.  Sonny recruited him to go undercover in order to infiltrate Sebastian’s organization.  Considering that Joey was a returning character and that there was a lengthy scene of Sonny asking if Joey felt confident enough to put his life on the line, it was kind of surprising that Joey didn’t really do much in this episode.  One got the feeling that perhaps this was meant to be a backdoor pilot for a show featuring Joey as an undercover cop who could pass for a teenager.  There’s nothing wrong with that, of course.  Who wouldn’t want to keep a franchise going?  But Joey ultimately felt like a red herring and a bit of a distraction.

This episode was a misfire.

Late Night Retro Television Review: 1st & Ten 2.9 “A Family Affair”

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 Wednesdays, I will be reviewing 1st and Ten, which aired in syndication from 1984 to 1991. The entire series is streaming on Tubi.

This week, the playoffs continue.

Episode 2.9 “A Family Affair”

(Dir by Burt Brinckerhoff, originally aired on January 13th, 1987)

A playoff game against Denver is approaching.  Denver is coached by a former protegee of Denardo’s and Denardo is obsessed with winning.  He’s so obsessed that he alienates the players and Coach Grier (Stan Kamber).  Grier is tempted to take a job as Houston’s head coach.  Denardo says he doesn’t care until Diane reveals that Grier has turned down several other jobs out of loyalty to Denardo.

As for the other assistant coach, T.D. Parker (OJ Simpson) has problems of his own.  His youngest son is acting out and the only thing that’s kept him out of juvenile detention is the fact that the cops are all fans of T.D. and the Bulls.  T.D. tells his son that he’s not allowed to leave the house.  When T.D.’s wife says that she thinks T.D. is being too strict, T.D. tells her to back off.  T.D. gets really mad in this episode but none of it is convincing because OJ Simpson was too amiable an actor to really come across as being threatening.  That’s something that would prove helpful to OJ in the years to come.

Meanwhile, the players all invest in the stock market.  The stock doesn’t do well.  The player who recommended the stock is chased out onto the field before the start of the big game against Denver.  Ha ha, those players are all broke now.  Good luck dealing with life after the game.

This show, I never know what to make of it.  Is it a comedy?  Is it a drama?  Why is it so oddly edited?  How many scenes were cut for syndication?  Why do storylines start and then just disappear?  For that matter, why do characters suddenly vanish?  Dr. Death was a huge part of the show during the first half of the second season but I haven’t seen him during the second half.  Did he get traded?  Did he get injured?  Seriously, what’s going on with this show?

I have no idea.  Football’s a confusing sport.

Retro Television Review: The Love Boat 7.3 “Bricker’s Boy/Lotions of Love/The Hustlers”

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 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, Doc Bricker gets a surprise!

Episode 7.3 “Bricker’s Boy/Lotions of Love/The Hustlers”

(Dir by Jerome Courtland, originally aired on October 8th, 1983)

Doc Bricker has a son!

Well, actually, it’s more a case of David (Timothy Patrick Murphy) claiming to be Doc’s son.  It turns out that David’s mother was one of Doc’s ex-girlfriends.  By the end of the cruise, Doc has fully accepted David as his son but then David admits that he’s been lying the whole time.  Doc is not his father.  However, he wishes that Doc was his father.  So, Doc — who has got to be the most understanding guy on the planet — adopts him.  Vicki has a crush on the loser and Captain Stubing seems to be okay with that, despite the fact that David is a liar who took a cruise without even bothering to buy a ticket.  Seriously, I’m kind of worried about Vickie at this point.  She’s so bereft of friends her own age that she falls in love with every teenage boy who boards the ship.

While Vicki is busy making a bad decision, gigolo Gary Thomas (Ted McGinley) is traveling with his employer, Arlene (Vera Miles).  Gary falls for Fran (Constance Forslund), who is traveling with her sugar daddy, Roy (Chuck Connors).  Luckily, Arlene falls for Roy, which frees Gary up to date Fran.  Wow, what a sleazy story!  I mean, it’s probably as close to real life as this show ever got but still….

Finally, advertising executive Andy O’Neal (Brodie Greer) works on a perfume campaign and ends up falling in love with his client’s flighty daughter (Lydia Cornell).  Good for them!

Yeesh.  I usually love The Love Boat but this sure was a bland episode!  Not even Ted McGinley pretending to be a gigolo could liven this one up.  I will say that Bernie Kopell once again proved himself to be far better than the material that he had to work with.  But otherwise, this episode was pretty dull.

How coked up was Julie?  Obviously nowhere near enough.

 

Late Night Retro Television Review: Pacific Blue 3.10 “Only In America”

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 Pacific Blue, a cop show that aired from 1996 to 2000 on the USA Network!  It’s currently streaming everywhere, though I’m watching it on Tubi.

This week, Lt. Palermo has a lot to deal with.

Episode 3.10 “Only In America”

(Dir by Charles Siebert, originally aired on November 9th,1997)

Lt. Palermo has a lot going on in this episode.

When we first see Palermo, he’s playing basketball near the beach.  As has been established in the past, Palermo, a middle-aged white guy, is apparently the best basketball player in all of Santa Monica.  In this episode, he discovers that he’s now the second best.  Jamal Rasheed (Elimu Nelson), who has just moved to town and who spends most of his time sitting in the stands and reading, turns out to be an even better player than Tony Palermo!  Palermo is enthusiastic about Jamal until he discovers that Jamal is a former college player who was suspended when it was discovered that he was shaving points to pay for his drug habit.  Jamal claims that he’s now clean and that he’s taught himself to read.  Palermo isn’t sure that he trusts Jamal …. and if you’re asking how this is any of Palermo’s business, you’re having the same reaction that I had while I watched this episode.

Palermo is also concerned about a young, roller-blading Romanian named Dimitri Radu (Nathan Anderson), who keeps committing crimes and declaring that he has diplomatic immunity.  It turns out that Dimitri wants to exchange his diplomatic immunity for political refugee status.  Palermo discovers that Dimitri’s father is a big time arms dealer and that his former partners are looking to take out both him and his son.  He also learns that the U.S. government is going to give Dimitri’s father citizenship in exchange for him testifying against his partners.  Palermo is outraged!

And again, Palermo — you’re a bicycle cop!  You wear those stupid shorts every day.  Nobody cared about your opinion, dude!

This episode featured some truly horrendous acting on the part of the guest cast.  It also featured a shoot-out in which Cory killed one of the arms dealers.  Usually, an officer involved shooting would lead to the officer being on desk duty while the shooting is investigated.  Instead, Cory hops on her bicycle and continues to look for Dimitri.  This was a pretty dumb episode but it’s Pacific Blue so I wasn’t expecting anything different.

Oh, how happy I’ll be when I finish this series.

Retro Television Review: Fantasy Island 7.22 “Surrogate Mother/The Ideal Woman”

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.  The show is once again on Tubi!

It’s time for one last trip to Fantasy Island.

Episode 7.22 “Surrogate Mother/The Ideal Woman”

(Dir by Don Weis, originally aired on May 19th, 1984)

All things must come to an end.  For the original Fantasy Island, the final episode of the seventh season was also the final episode of the series.

The show didn’t get a grand finale.  Instead, it was a typical episode with two fantasies.  In one fantasy, Charo — yes, Charo — played a woman who had been hired to be a surrogate mother for a childless couple (John Saxon and Juliet Mills).  In the other one, Ben Saunders (Shea Farrell) tried to win back his ex-fiancee (Mary Kate McGeehan) while judging a Fantasy Island beauty pageant.  (How many pageants did Fantasy Island host?)  Two men (Don Galloway and David Sheiner) demanded that Ben pick their girlfriends as the Ideal Woman.  (Both of the girlfriends materialized on the Island, one from a painting and one from a block of stone.  It was a weird fantasy.)  Ben picked his ex, declaring her to be the “ideal woman.”  Neither fantasy was great, though I will say that Charo gave a surprisingly sincere performance and it was nice that frequent Fantasy Island guests stars John Saxon and Juliet Mills appeared on the last episode.  It was an okay trip to the Island, particularly when compared to some of the other season 7 episodes.  Still, the whole thing felt a bit tired.

I have to admit that it’s hard for me to believe that I just reviewed the final episode of the original Fantasy Island.  I started reviewing Fantasy Island on September 6th, 2022.  It was one of the original shows that I picked for Retro Television Reviews.  Now that I’m finishing the show up in 2026, The Love Boat is the only one of my original picks that I still have episodes left to review.  I’ll be reviewing The Love Boat for a while.

(To be honest, I’m stunned that I’ve stuck with these reviews.  I don’t think anyone was expecting me to get all the way to end of Hang Time, let alone Fantasy Island.)

My thoughts on Fantasy Island?  I loved the first four seasons.  The fifth season, with its introduction of Julie and it’s frequent side-lining of Tattoo, was when the show started to go downhill.  The biggest mistake that the show made was, needless to say, not agreeing to pay whatever was necessary to get Herve Villechaize to come back for season 7.  Season 7, the season without Tattoo, felt odd from the start.  Christopher Hewett and Ricardo Montalban never had the right chemistry and the stories themselves were largely recycled from earlier episodes.  The perfect ending for Fantasy Island would have been the season 6 clip show.  

What’s next?  On television, Fantasy Island was revived twice.  In the 90s, Malcolm McDowell played a version of Mr. Rourke.  And then, more recently, there was an attempt to revive it on Fox but, after an enjoyable first season, that show became a self-parody.  I may review both of them in the future.  For now, though, I’m still considering several shows to start reviewing next week.  I’ll reveal my pick next Tuesday!

For now, let us say goodbye to Fantasy Island.  Thanks for the laughs, the tears, and the fantasies!

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 5.4 “The Killer Indy”

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 Prime!

This week, Baker has a new partner!

Episode 5.4 “The Killer Indy”

(Dir by Leslie H. Martinson, originally aired on October 25th, 1981)

When a group of bikers start holding illegal street races, Getraer wants it stopped before someone is seriously hurt!  Jon Baker and his partner Steve McLeish decide to end the races by any means necessary, especially since Steve’s brothers are involved….

Wait, who?

Played by a pre-transition Caitlyn Jenner, Steve McLeish serves as Baker’s partner in this episode.  We don’t really get much of an introduction as to who Steve is or why he’s even riding with Baker.  Everyone just acts as if Steve has always been there.  Ponch is not even mentioned and it’s difficult not to notice that Larry Wilcox seems a bit more cheerful than usual in this episode.  For once, he’s the one who gets to do all of the cool stuff while everyone else watches.

This was the first of several episodes that Erik Estrada missed during the fifth season, the result of being injured during a stunt gone wrong.  Jenner, who was then best-known as an Olympian, was brought in to play Steve McLeish.  Judging from this episode, Jenner was a remarkably bad actor.  Compared to everyone else in the episode, Jenner comes across as being awkward and stiff.  Like many nonprofessional actors, it’s obvious that Jenner was not sure what do when not delivering dialogue.  Jenner stands there, hands awkwardly positioned and occasionally trying to react to the other actors.  It’s really almost painful to watch.

It’s obvious that this episode was written with Ponch in mind.  Like Ponch, Steve has two brothers and used to be a motorcycle-racing delinquent when he was younger.  His older brother (who is played by the legendary character actor Robert F. Lyons) is named Toro, which might make sense if he was Ponch’s brother but, as it is, you really do have to wonder about the parents who would name one son Toro and the other sons Steve and Ted.  Ted, incidentally, is played by Kevyn Major Howard.  Howard, Lyons and Jenner have next to no features in common, leading one to wonder how they could possibly all be members of the same family?

There was some good motorcycle chase action in this episode.  There was also so much dialogue about the importance of wearing a helmet that, as soon as the gang’s leader announced he didn’t need a helmet, the most viewers had to know that he was doomed to ultimately be thrown from his motorcycle and crash headfirst into the pavement.  “He hit his head,” Getraer says and that’s the last we hear about the guy.

As for this episodes comedic subplot, Grossman begged his fellow patrol people to join him and his nieces at the waterpark.  While Baker, Steve, and everyone else took care of his nieces, Grossman hung out with his two bikini-clad neighbors.  Grossman winked at the camera as the CHiPs theme music started to play.

And so, it’s another day in L.A….

Retro Television Review: Miami Vice 5.10 “To Have And To Hold”

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!

The 100th episode of Miami Vice finds Crockett and Tubbs pursuing separate stories.

Episode 5.10 “To Have And To Hold”

(Dir by Eugene Corr, originally aired on February 10th, 1989)

When Sonny learns that his now-teenage son (Clayton Barclay Jones) is acting out at school, he hops on a plane and flies to wherever it is that his ex-wife (Belinda Montgomery) and her new husband (Parris Buckner) are supposed to be living now.  Sonny discovers that his ex-wife is pregnant and that his son is having a hard time adjusting to the idea of being an older brother.  He also doesn’t get along with his stepfather.  Sonny and his son watch the original, Boris Karloff-starring Frankenstein in a movie theater and have a discussion about family.

(Sonny’s son says that he relates to the Monster because the Monster doesn’t mean to kill people but he does.  Today, that would probably lead to the kid getting suspended from school and sent to a boot camp.  In 1989, though, that just meant the kid was feeling misunderstood.)

With Crockett gone, it falls to Tubbs — using his “Cooper” persona and his fake Jamaican accent — to investigate who is responsible for killing a just-married drug kingpin.  Tubbs meets the kingpin’s ruthless son (Miguel Ferrer, looking intense) and he also falls in love with the kingpin’s widow (Elpidia Carrillo).  Tubbs is in love and thinking of leaving Vice?  Needless to say, the widow is dead by the end of the episode.

This episode concludes with Tubbs and Crockett fishing on Crockett’s boat.  They’re both feeling disillusioned.  Crockett is still in love with his ex-wife.  Tubbs is realizing that he’ll probably never find happiness as long as he’s working undercover in Miami.  It’s a bit of a bittersweet ending.  Neither Crockett nor Tubbs seems to be particularly happy.  Miami Vice was always at its best when it ended on a down note.

This episode managed to give Crockett and Tubbs an equal amount of screentime and both Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas gave good performances.  Unfortunately, the divided format of the episode meant that both stories ended up feeling a bit rushed and incomplete.  The ending was effective and Miguel Ferrer gave a typically strong performance but otherwise, this was a pretty uneven episode.