Retro Television Reviews: The Master 1.13 “A Place To Call Home”

Posted on August 4, 2023 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 The Master, which ran on NBC from January to August of 1984. The show can be found on Tubi!

This week, The Master comes to an end.

Episode 1.13 “A Place To Call Home”

(Dir by Gordon Hessler, originally aired on August 31st, 1984)

The Master ends in much the same way that it began, with Max and John Peter McAllister in a small town that is controlled by an evil businessman. In this case, land developer Mark Richards (Jock Mahoney) wants to run the local orphanage out of town so that he can steal the land and expand his uranium mine. Max and McAllister not only help Kim Anderson (Susan Woollen) save her orphanage but they also provide some much-needed mentoring to two of the orphans, Mike (Doug Toby) and Bobby (played by Kane Kosugi). Bobby, it turns out, has some martial arts skills of his own! It’s amazing how McAllister and Max were always traveling to small towns that just happened to be home to other people who knew karate.

Though his son plays Bobby, Sho Kosugi does not appear in this episode, which is a shame considering that it would be turn out to be the show’s finale. For that matter, the show ends with McAllister having yet to find his daughter. In fact, Terri McAllister is only mentioned briefly at the end of the episode, when McAllister says that he and Max have to get back on the road because “I’m looking for my daughter.” Considering that the whole premise of the show was that McAllister was searching for Terri while Okassa was searching for McAllister, it seems like neither was really in a hurry to accomplish their goals.

A Place To Call Home feels like a greatest hits package, duplicating the plot of the pilot while tossing in a bit of the union episode‘s political subtext. Even the scene where McAllister attempts to hop onto a helicopter feels a bit reminiscent of the ghost town episode. The Master ended with an episode that resolved nothing and didn’t really bring anything new to show’s format.

Why did The Master end after thirteen episodes? When taken as a whole, the show wasn’t as bad as its reputation. While the stunt doubles did most of the work, Lee Van Cleef and Tim Van Patten still managed to develop a likable chemistry over the course of 13 episodes. At first, the show’s writer stried too hard to play up the idea of Max Keller being a rebel with a chip on his shoulder but, after the first few episodes, it appears that they realized that Van Patten’s greatest strength as an actor was that he had a sort of amiable goofiness to him. The stories were predictable but the fight scenes were usually (if not always) well-choreographed and entertaining. The stunt people earned their paycheck.

In the end, though, I think The Master never quite figured what it wanted to be. Did it want to be a straight action show? Did it want to be a goofy buddy comedy? In some episodes, McAllister was apparently a famous and well-known figure. In others, he was a total unknown. In some episodes, finding Terri was the most important thing in his life. In others, he really didn’t seem to care. The best episodes were the ones that winked at the audience and acknowledged just how ludicrous the whole thing was. But, far too often, The Master became a generic crime show that just happened to feature martial arts.

The Master is finished and, to my surprise, I’m going to kind of miss it. It had potential. But, it’s time to move on to a new series. Get ready because next week, it’s time for T & T!

Retro Television Reviews: The Master 1.12 “Rogues”

Posted on July 28, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Max and McAllister continue their trip through California!

Episode 1.12 “Rogues”

(Dir by Gordon Hessler, originally aired on August 10th, 1984)

This week’s episode finds Max and McAllister on Los Angeles’s famed Rodeo Drive. We know that this episode takes place on Rodeo Drive because every single establishing shot opens with a close-up of the street sign. It’s as if someone in production said, “Do not let them forget that this episode is not only set on Rodeo Drive but we filmed it there as well!”

Wow, a television program filmed in Los Angeles! The Master was all about spoiling their audience.

Here’s my thing with Rodeo Drive — the word is pronounced Ro-Dee-O. Get out of here with all that Roe-Day-O nonsense, you yankees.

Anyway, this episode continues last week’s theme of McAllister and Max dropping in on people from Max’s past. Apparently, the hunt for John Peter McAllister’s long lost daughter has been abandoned so that Max can drop in on his old high school buddies. Seeing as how it hasn’t even been ten years since Max graduated from high school whereas McAllister has never even met his daughter and it’s totally possible that McAllister’s ninja rivals may be trying to kill her, it seems a bit odd that this is what Max and McAllister are concentrating on but whatever. We’re nearly done with this show anyway.

Max visits his ex-girlfriend, Talia (Cindy Harrell), at the health club where she works. Talia is an aerobics instructor, which means that there’s a lot of spandex in this episode. While McAllister deals with a trainer who takes one look at him and declares him to be in terrible shape (and she has a point because, unlike his stunt double, Lee Van Cleef was noticeably overweight and often seemed to be winded on The Master), Max talks to Talia and discovers that Talia’s brother, Jerry (Paul Tulley), became a cop and is now missing! Max promises to help her find Jerry.

However, it turns out that Jerry is just hiding outside the health club. When he sees Max’s van, he tosses a note inside of it, asking Max and McAllister to meet him. (How exactly did Jerry know that Max and McAllister would be able to help him?) It turns out that, while investigating a series of Rodeo Drive robberies, Jerry discovered that the culprits were rogue cops who had been hired by a local gallery owner. Now, the crooked policemen are after Jerry! Needless to say, it’s time for McAllister to put on his black ninja outfit so that Lee Van Cleef’s stunt double can beat up some corrupt law enforcers!

This was not a particularly memorable episode. The corrupt cops were generic villains and even the fight scenes, which were usually The Master‘s saving grace, felt sloppy and rushed. While it was always obvious that this show was dependent on stunt doubles, it was especially obvious in this episode as the stand-ins for both Van Cleef and Van Patten didn’t even resemble their respective actors. There was a brief moment of hope when the action moved to one of those police academy shooting ranges, full of fake buildings and cardboard targets but the show never really took advantage of the location’s potential. This was one of those episodes where it felt like the basic plot could have been used for a dozen other shows without having to make anything more than a few cosmetic changes. It could have just as easily been an episode of Half Nelson.

(L.A. — you belong to me! No, no, we’ve moved on….)

Next week …. The Master ends! Will McAllister even mention his missing daughter during the show’s final episode? We’ll find out!

Retro Television Reviews: The Master 1.11 “Failure to Communicate”

Posted on July 21, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, we meet Max Keller’s father!

Episode 1.11 “Failure to Communicate”

(Dir by Sidney Hayers, originally aired on May 4th, 1984)

This week’s episode of The Master opens with McAllister (Lee Van Cleef) teaching Max (Tim Van Patten) how to fight even while blindfolded. McAllister explains that, when one’s sight is taken away, the other senses become even stronger. Hmmm…. I wonder if this will prove to be relevant to their next adventure?

Having apparently given up on trying to find McAllister’s daughter (not that they ever seemed to be trying that hard to begin with), Max and McAllister head to Los Angeles so that Max can visit his father. Max’s father, Patrick (Doug McClure), has been estranged from Max ever since the death of Max’s mother and older brother. However, under McAllister’s guidance, Max has learned the importance of forgiveness.

However, before Max can drop in on his father, he and McAllister have to rescue Kathy Hunter (Ashley Ferrare), who is being chased by three men in a cemetery. McAllister is impressed when Kathy uses some martial arts skills of her own to fight off the men. (Kathy explains that she has been in training for six years.) McAllister takes Kathy home to her father, a wealthy bunker named Jason Hunter (J.D. Cannon). Max, meanwhile, goes to his father’s law office.

However, Patrick is not at his office. Instead, Max meets Patrick’s administrative assistant, Laura Crane (Rebecca Holden). Laura is blind but, as we saw at the start of the program, that just means that all of her other senses are now superhuman. As soon as she meets Max, she knows that he recently stopped off at a gas station and that he drives a van. All it takes is for her to touch his face for her to realize that she is Patrick’s son.

Patrick, unfortunately, is not doing too well. He is now an alcoholic and he’s more likely to be found in the local cocktail lounge than in court. He’s in danger of losing his license and he’s also struggling financially. In fact, at the cocktail bar, Patrick is meeting with Straker (Marc Alaimo), one of the men who previously tried to abduct Kathy in the cemetery. Straker is blackmailing Patrick into helping with Staker’s next attempt to kidnap Kathy. Of course, when Max arrives at the bar looking for his father, all Hell breaks loose when Max sees the men from the cemetery. Patrick can only watch as Max and a late-arriving McAllister chase the men out of the bar.

After the bar fight, Max and Patrick have a tense meeting at Patrick’s office. Max accuses his father of being a bitter drunk. Patrick says that Max is irresponsible. Patrick tells Max to get out of his life. Meanwhile, McAllister escorts Laura back to her apartment. Okassa (Sho Kosugi) shows up and we get yet another fight, this time between Sho Kosugi and Lee Van Cleef’s very busy stunt double.

The next day, Patrick, Laura, McAllister, and Max all end up at a reception for Kathy. Patrick spots the three kidnappers at the reception and, having had a change of heart, attempts to lead Kathy outside to safety. However, this just leads to both Patrick and Kathy being kidnapped. Straker calls Kathy’s father and demands a $3,000,000 ransom but, fortunately, Laura smelled cemetery dirt on the men who grabbed Kathy so Max and McAllister head back to the cemetery, break into a church, and manage to rescue both Kathy and Patrick!

Yay! I guess the episode’s over, right?

Nope, not even close.

While Max and McAllister are rescuing Patrick and Kathy, Straker is busy kidnapping Laura. Straker then calls Kathy’s father and announces that he still expects to get his 3 million or “your lawyer’s secretary gets it!” Kathy’s father is like, “Why would I pay 3 million dollars for someone who I don’t even know?,” which is kind of a fair question even if it’s not a popular one. McAllister, however, tells Kathy’s father that it’s important to take care of everyone, even the strangers.

Patrick finally breaks down and admits that he was a part of the plot to kidnap Kathy. He tells Max and McAllister that the man behind the plot is actually Paul Stillwell (Mark Goddard), who is Jason Hunter’s head of security. (This seems familiar….) Patrick also explains that Stillwell is holding Laura prisoner on the Princess Louise, a decommissioned cruise ship that has been turned into a floating restaurant.

Accompanied by Patrick, Max and McAllister go to the ship. Unfortunately, Okassa pops up out of nowhere and gets into another fight with Lee Van Cleef’s stunt double so it falls to Patrick and Max to rescue Laura. (Patrick suddenly turns out to have some martial arts skills as well, which is a bit odd considering that Patrick is a middle-aged, overweight, out-of-shape, alcoholic attorney.) The bad guys try to outsmart Max by turning out all the lights on the boat but Laura is able to use her supersenses to help Max beat up Straker’s men in the dark. Laura is rescued and the bad guys are sent to prison!

As for Patrick, the Hunter family decides not to press charges because they understand that Patrick was being blackmailed. Swearing that he’s going to live his life the right way from now on, Patrick pours out his last remaining liquor bottle. Hooray!

This was one of those episodes that was a bit too busy for its own good. Rather than have Max and McAllister fight against worthy opponents, this episode just had Max and McAllister continually defeat the same three idiots over and over again and you have to wonder why it never seemed to occur to the bad guys to change their strategy when it came to whole kidnapping thing as opposed to repeating the same thing over and over again. With all of those kidnappings and rescues, there really wasn’t much time left for the emotional heart of the story, which should have been Max mending his relationship with his father. Considering how much of this series has focused on Max and McAllister’s family issues, it was a bit anti-climatic that Max’s real father just turned out to be some drunk who was being blackmailed. At least some of the fight scenes were well-choreographed and Rebecca Holden did a good job as Laura Crane, even if the character herself was occasionally too flawless and perfect to be believed.

Next week, maybe McAllister will finally remember that he’s supposed to be looking for his daughter. We’ll see!

Retro Television Reviews: The Master 1.10 “The Java Tiger”

Posted on July 14, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, the action moves off the mainland!

Episode 1.10 “The Java Tiger”

(Dir by Bruce Kessler, originally aired on April 13th, 1984)

Max and McAllister go to Hawaii!

I have to admit that I was really excited about this episode, precisely because it did feature Max and McAllister heading to Hawaii. I love Hawaii. Some of my favorite memories come from the summer that me, my sisters and our mom spent in Hawaii. It doesn’t matter how bad a show or a movie may sound, I’ll give it a chance if it features the promise of Hawaii.

Unfortunately, this episode of The Master never really takes advantage of the beauty of the islands. In fact, other than for a few generic shots of Honolulu, it appears that this episode was filmed in California. About the only thing that says Hawaii about this episode are the shirts worn by the bad guys and the lei hanging around Max’s neck when he and McAllister check into their hotel.

Max and McAllister are in Hawaii because McAllister has received a letter from an old friend of his, a private investigator/treasure hunter named Leo Fairchild (Dick O’Neill). Just as with last week, one has to wonder how McAllister got the letter when he doesn’t have a fixed address and he’s supposedly been laying low in America to avoid getting track down by the ninjas who want him dead. As well, how does McAllister have all of these old friends in the United States and how do they all know that he’s a ninja? When the series started, the whole idea was that McAllister had been Japan since the end of World War II and that he had spent the majority of that time either being trained or training others. And yet, as of last week’s episode, McAllister is now suddenly a minor celebrity.

When Max and McAllister arrive in Japan, they meet Leo’s daughter, Shelly (Cynthia Cypert). Shelly tells Max and McAllister that her father was killed while searching for the location of a priceless statue, the fabled Java Tiger. Leo, she explains, was the only person in Hawaii to have a map leading to the tiger’s location. However, whoever killed Leo, stole half of the map. Now, if she’s going to fulfill her father’s dream, she needs to get that half of the map back. She’s pretty sure that Kruger (Kabir Bedi), a notorious and greedy practitioner of the martial arts, has the missing half. So, once again, it’s time for McAllister to put on his black uniform and break into a compound with Max! When things don’t go as well as Max and McAllister might have hoped, they’re saved by an old friend of McAllister’s….

As you may have guessed, Leo isn’t actually dead. He faked his own death so that McAllister would agree to help him find the Java Tiger. As Leo explains it, he needs McAllister to enter the cave where the Tiger is hidden because the cave is full of booby traps and McAllister, being a ninja, is the only man alive who can dodge falling rocks and darts. And, of course, time is of the essence because the cave is on an island that is also home to a volcano that is about to erupt.

This is what the volcano looks like:

To be honest, there’s something oddly charming about how fake the volcano looks. I was pretty annoyed that the episode didn’t have any pretty shot of Hawaii but, as soon as I saw that miniature, plaster volcano spewing smoke, I couldn’t help but smile.

McAllister, Max, Leo, and Shelly arrive at the island with Kruger’s men closely behind. With the volcano erupting all around them, they find the cave and eventually McAllister grabs the Java Tiger. But, when it appears that Kruger might be killed by a booby trap, McAllister drops the statue and saves the life of his enemy because McAllister is a man of honor. As a result, no one gets the tiger but McAllister stays true to his ideals.

To be honest, this episode was so silly that it was almost charming. Unfortunately, the usually reliable character actor Dick O’Neill gives an annoyingly mannered performance as Leo Fairchild, hamming it up and chewing every piece of scenery in sight. Leo is one of those characters who never stops talking and it’s hard not to get annoyed both the character and the actor playing him. In fact, so much time is devoted to Leo talking and talking that the episode almost feels like a pilot for a Leo Fairchild show. Who knows? Maybe it was. All I know is that the episode needed more Hawaii and less Leo.

This was a underwhelming week for The Master. There’s only three episodes left and Max and McAllister don’t seem to be any closer to finding Teri than when they started. Get to work, guys! You’re running out of time!

Retro Television Reviews: The Master 1.9 “Kunoichi”

Posted on July 7, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, McAllister and Max head to Washington, D.C.!

Episode 1.9 “Kunoichi”

(Dir by Gordon Hessler, originally aired on April 9th, 1984)

The 9th episode of The Master opens by showing us what Okasa (Sho Kosugi) has been doing since coming to America to track down and kill his former teacher, John Peter McAllister (Lee Van Cleef). Okasa has been training an apprentice of his own. The apprentice ninja is always seen while wearing a light gray ninja uniform, the better to keep the apprentice’s identity a secret until halfway through the episode.

Meanwhile, McAllister and Max (Tim Van Patten) are in Washington, D.C. As McAllister explains it, he was good friends with Brian Elkwood (Jack Kelly) when they both served in the Army together. During the Korean War, they were both held in the same POW camp and they escaped together. (This, of course, goes against McAllister’s previous backstory, which was that he left the Army after World War II and spent the next 40 years hidden away in Japan.) Elkwood is now an important advisor to the President. Apparently, Elkwood sent McAllister a letter informing him that a spy known as The Hawk was threatening his life so McAllister has come to Washington to protect him. (How exactly McAllister received a letter when he and Max are constantly driving around the country in search of McAllister’s daughter is not explained.)

At the Elkwood estate, Brian Elkwood tells his assistant, Allison Grant (Kelly Harmon), that he has been receiving letters from John Peter McAllister in which McAllister has threatened to kill him. Allison argues that McAllister has always been Elkwood’s friend but Elkwood says that people can change. Elkwood’s head of security, Ron Gordon (Rick Hill), is concerned not only about McAllister but also about uncovering the identity of The Hawk.

Or at least, that’s what Gordon claims. A few scenes later, we discover that Gordon actually is The Hawk and that he’s hired Okasa to assassinate Elkwood. Okasa is planning on framing McAllister for the assassination. The assassination will be carried about his apprentice, who we learn is close to Elkwood. The episode tries to build up a lot of suspense over who Okasa’s apprentice actually is but it’s actually pretty easy to figure out. Elkwood is not the apprentice because he’s the target. Gordon is the not apprentice because he’s the Hawk. There’s only one other guest star on this episode so obviously, the apprentice is Allison. Myself, I’m just confused as to when Okasa’s mission went from personally killing McAllister to framing him for murder.

Eventually, McAllister is able to convince Elkwood that he didn’t write the threatening letters but a sudden attack of Okasa’s apprentice leaves Elkwood hospitalized and McAllister arrested for attempted murder. Fortunately, Max is able to use his ninja training to help McAllister escape from jail and they manage to not only prevent the second attempt on Elkwood’s life but they also expose both Gordon and Allison as being enemies of the state. Yay!

This is one of those episodes where everyone, with the exception of Sho Kosugi, steps to the side and lets their stunt doubles do most of the work. There’s a lot of fights but they are all awkwardly choreographed and framed, probably in an attempt to keep the audience from noticing that Lee Van Cleef’s stunt person was notably thinner and more athletic than Lee was. As far as episodes of The Master are concerned, this was not a bad one but it still ultimately leaves the viewer feeling that it could have been so much better.

Retro Television Reviews: The Master 1.8 “The Good, the Bad, and the Priceless”

Posted on June 30, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, The Master goes to New York City!

Episode 1.8 “The Good, the Bad, and the Priceless”

(Dir by Michael Caffey, originally aired on March 23rd, 1984)

This week’s episode of The Master asks us to consider just how needlessly complicated an hour’s worth of entertainment can be.

John Peter McAllister (Lee Van Cleef) and Max Keller (Timothy Van Patten) are in New York City! Apparently, McAllister was flipping through a magazine when he came across an advertisement featuring a picture of his long-lost daughter, Terri. The agency responsible for the ad is headquartered in New York. McAllister is excited about the prospect of finally tracking down his daughter. Max is a little sad because he knows that McAllister won’t need him after he finds Terri. And Cat Sinclair (Tara Buckman) is just along for the ride….

Who is Cat Sinclair? She was introduced last episode as a love interest for Max. This episode tests Cat as a third member of the regular cast. Unfortunately, since Cat isn’t a ninja, she doesn’t really got to do much in the episode, other than stand in the background and roll her eyes whenever Max makes one of his terrible jokes. At one point, McAllister mentions that Max has a bit of a crush on Cat but we don’t really see much evidence of it. If anything, both McAllister and Max seem to go out of their way to ignore her.

Anyway, it turns out that the modeling agency is surprisingly willing to give out the home phone numbers of its models. They also have no problem telling McAllister, Max, and Cat that Terri has been booked as a model at a private fashion show being put on by Simon Garrett (George Maharis).

However, what neither McAllister nor Simon Garrett realize is that the woman who shows up at the fashion show and introduces herself as Terri McAllister is not Terri at all but is instead an FBI agent named Gina (Janine Turner), who bears a passing resemblance to Terri as long as she’s wearing a brunette wig. Simon Garrett is not only a fashion designer but he’s also an international criminal. Gina shows up (as Terri) at the fashion show and tries to search Garrett’s office. When Garrett’s security goons discover her, her life is saved by McAllister and Max, who both believe her to be Terri.

(How exactly McAllister, Max, and Cat managed to crash Garrett’s exclusive and private fashion show is not discussed.)

Gina continues to pretend to be Terri so that she can convince McAllister to help her figure out what Garrett’s current scheme is. Meanwhile, Garrett recognizes McAllister as an American ninja so he arranges for his men to kidnap Gina (who, again, everyone thinks is Terri). He threatens to kill Gina/Terri unless McAllister uses his ninja powers to break into the Brooklyn Museum of Art and steal the Crown Jewels of England. McAllister agrees to do so, which leads to an extended sequence of Lee Van Cleef’s stunt double avoiding the security lasers by doing elaborate back flips. Timothy Van Patten’s stunt double then does the exact same back flips. Who knew that stealing the Crown Jewels would be so simple?

As you can probably guess, this all leads to all the stunt doubles getting into a fight at Garrett’s office. Garrett is arrested. The crown jewels are recovered. Both McAllister and Max turn out to be surprisingly understanding about Gina having lied to them. One would think that McAllister, who is essentially being hunted a ninja assassins because he came to America to find his daughter, would be a bit more upset over having his emotions so blatantly manipulated but McAllister actually appears to be amused by the whole thing. Again, it’s hard not to suspect that finding Terri is not really as big a thing to McAllister as Max seems to believe it to be.

This is one of those episodes where everything was dependent upon everyone else being an idiot. These are typically my least favorite episodes of any show and that’s the case here. It’s kind of a shame because Lee Van Cleef and Timothy Van Patten both had some good moments in this episode. The scenes where Max talked about how much he’s going to miss McAllister after they find Terri actually did have some emotional heft but it wasn’t enough to make up for the episode’s missteps. I will admit that I smiled a bit at a subplot about an ad guy who wanted McAllister to put on a cowboy outfit and pose for a series of deodorant ads. McAllister took one look at the outfit and said, “I would never wear that.” Oh yes, you would, Van Cleef!

Next week: Okasa returns!

Retro Television Reviews: The Master 1.7 “Juggernaut”

Posted on June 23, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Lee Van Cleef gets a chance to show off what he can do!

Episode 1.7 “Juggernaut”

(Dir by Gordon Hessler, originally aired on March 16th, 1984)

This week’s episode of The Master opens with Max’s totally groovy van driving across what appears to be farmland. Judging from the mountains in the background, it appears that they are back in California. (If they did mention their specific location during this episode, I missed it.) Last week, as you may remember, Max and McAllister were looking for McAllister’s daughter in Louisiana. Now, they’re apparently just hanging out in California again. It’s odd that McAllister left behind his life in Japan so that he could come to America to find his daughter but, now that he’s actually in America, there doesn’t really seem to be any sense of urgency when it comes to actually tracking her down.

Inside the van, McAllister informs Max that he’s concerned about the way that Max is always losing his temper and starting fights. Max promises that there will be no more unprovoked fights on his part. When they stop in front of a local bar, Max says he’s going to get a beer but he also promises McAllister that he will not be getting tossed through the bar’s window.

Five minutes later:

Now, in all fairness, it isn’t totally Max’s fault that he got thrown through that window. Max went in the bar and saw Alan Kane (veteran TV and movie bad guy William Smith) harassing Cat Sinclair (Tara Buckman). When Max told Alan to back off, Alan challenged Max to a fight. Max was forced to explain that he’s not allowed to fight. Cat rolled her eyes and then Alan tossed Max through the window. Seeing that his protegee is in trouble, McAllister enters the bar, beats up Alan, and saves Max and Cat.

Even though Cat is not impressed with Max’s refusal to fight, she still gets in his van and allows him to give her a ride home. It turns out that Cat and her mother, Maggie (Diana Muldaur), are farmers but an evil land baron named Hellman (Stuart Whitman) is trying to intimidate them off their land. Alan works for Hellman and, because of him and his thugs, none of the farmers have been able to get their crops to market.

Both Cat and Maggie refuse to accept any help from Max and McAllister so our heroes get back in their totally happening van and try to leave town. However, when one of Hellman’s truckers runs the love van off the road, the engine is damaged and the local mechanic informs Max that it will take 48 hours to fix it. Stranded in town, Max searches for proof that Hellman’s trucker was the one who ran them off the road. Meanwhile, McAllister returns to the farm and, turning on some of that Lee Van Cleef charm, proceeds to fall in love with Maggie.

If any of this sounds familiar, it’s because, with the exception of McAllister falling in love, it’s pretty much the same thing that happened in not only the first episode but also the third episode. Max and McAllister have an uncanny talent for randomly wandering into towns that are controlled by evil businessmen. Just as the first and third episodes featured Max giving impassioned speeches about the rights of the workers, this episode features McAllister giving a speech at a meeting in a barn.

While McAllister is giving his speech, Max is getting arrested for snooping around Hellman’s property. Fortunately, McAllister puts on a fake beard and breaks him out of jail. McAllister then directs the farmers to form a convoy and to work together to get their crops to market. Though Alan attempts to set off a bunch of explosives on the way, McAllister uses a cropduster to fool Alan into setting off the explosions early. Then, Lee Van Cleef’s stunt double beats up Hellman. McAllister and Max congratulate each other on a job well done.

Having saved the farmers and beaten up the bad guys, it’s time for Max and McAllister to once again continue their journey across America. McAllister may love Maggie but he still needs to (eventually) find his daughter so he gets in the Chevy van and waves goodbye.

As I said before, this episode felt very familiar. It’s probably not a good sign that, after just seven episodes, The Master was pretty much repeating itself. That said, the episode did feature the great William Smith playing yet another rural bully and Stuart Whitman always made for a convincing villain. With Max sidelined by McAllister’s demand that he stop fighting, Lee Van Cleef got his moment to shine in this episode. He was obviously frail, making it all the more obvious that his fight scenes involved a stunt man, but Van Cleef still got a chance to show off some of his old school movie star charisma.

Next week: The Master steals the Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom! …. sure, why not?

Retro Television Reviews: The Master 1.6 “Fat Tuesday”

Posted on June 16, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

After spending last week in Las Vegas, John Peter McAllister (Lee Van Cleef) and Max Keller (Tim Van Patten) drive Max’s van across the country in search of McAllister’s daughter.

Episode 1.6 “Fat Tuesday”

(Dir by Sidney Hayes, originally aired on March 9th, 1984)

This episode opens not with a scene of Max Keller in training but instead with Okasa (Sho Kosugi) visiting a dojo in Las Vegas. The master of the dojo explains that he does know where John Peter McAllister is but that he will not tell Okasa because he is not sure that Okasa is actually a former student of McAllister’s. Okasa responds by 1) fighting every student at the dojo and 2) proving that, unlike Lee Van Cleef, Sho Kosugi didn’t need a stunt double for his scenes. Having proven that he trained under the legendary McAllister, Okasa is informed that McAllister and Max Keller are in New Orleans.

That’s right! This week, we’re in the Big Easy!

Of course, any show that takes place in New Orleans has to take place during Mardi Gras. This episode is full of stock footage of the Mardi Gras celebrations but, at the same time, we never see McAllister or Max taking part in any of them. In fact, other than a trip to a jazz club and a fight on a dock, McAllister and Max do very little that one would normally expect to see a visitor doing in New Orleans. New Orleans is one of the most distinctive city in the U.S. but, in this episode of The Master, it might as well be Houston.

McAllister and Max are in New Orleans because a reporter named Eve Michaels (Susan Kase) has been writing a series of stories about how a wealthy businessman named Beaumont (Robert Pine) has been smuggling drugs into the city and selling weapons to Middle Eastern terror groups. In her stories, Eve claims that her source is named Terri McAllister. Could Eve’s source also be John Peter McAllister’s daughter?

Eve, The Reporter

No, she’s not. However, it’s not just a case of mistaken identity. As Eve eventually confesses to Max, Terri McAllister is a name that she assigned to a source that she made up. It turns out that Eve never had a source for her stories about Beaumont but apparently, Beaumont is such a shady character that it was easy for Eve to imagine what Beaumont was probably doing. Because Eve’s made-up story was too close to the truth, Beaumont kidnapped and killed Eve’s friend. That just made Eve even more determined to make up additional lies, all of which turned out to be true. As crazy as that sounds, what’s even crazier is that neither McAllister nor Max are particularly upset to discover that they’re no closer to finding the real Terri. Indeed, McAllister seems to find the whole thing rather amusing which makes me wonder if he really cares about Terri or not.

Beaumont, the bad guy

Of course, Max and McAllister are also busy proving the Beaumont is a criminal. They crash Beaumont’s Mardi Gras party. McAllister wears his ninja costume. Max dresses up like a …. well, I guess he’s supposed to be a pirate.

Okasa also shows up at the party, also dressed as a ninja. In fact, this episode’s saving grace is that it features more of Okasa (and Sho Kosugi’s determined performance in the role) than any episode so far. Not only do McAllister and Okasa fight at the party but they have a later confrontation at a park. What’s interesting about this scene is that McAllister isn’t in his ninja uniform so Lee Van Cleef’s stunt double was required to put on a really phony looking bald cap for the fight scenes. Needless to say, the fight scenes are filmed in long shot and McAllister never faces the camera.

Along with fighting Okasa, McAllister also faces off against two of Beaumont’s men. In this fight scene, Van Cleef is actually shown throwing a punch and kick but he does so in slow motion and we don’t really see him making contact with anyone.

Oh, Lee!

This was a fairly generic episode. The most disappointing thing about it is that it didn’t really have any New Orleans flair to it. As well, the plot depended on a huge amount of coincidence and character stupidity. (Just imagine if Beaumont had just threatened to sue Eve for libel, as opposed to sending his hired goons to kidnap her.) Lee Van Cleef came across as being a bit tired and cranky in this episode. To his credit, Tim Van Patten tried to inject some energy and some humor with his pirate disguise. It didn’t work but at least he tried.

Next week: Max and McAllister take on an evil trucking company!

Retro Television Reviews: The Master 1.5 “High Rollers”

Posted on June 9, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Viva Las Vegas!

Episode 1.5 “High Rollers”

(Dir by Peter Crane, originally aired on March 2nd, 1984)

“Hi, I’m Max Keller….”

This week’s episode The Master opens with Max (Timothy Van Patten) and McAllister (Lee Van Cleef) standing on top of a mountain in the Nevada desert. McAllister explains to Max that a ninja will sometimes be required to quickly descend from a roof or a cliff to the ground below. (Uhmmm …. okay.) McAllister has Max rappel down the side of the mountain. Though hesitant at first, Max does so and reaches the ground fairly quickly. However, before Max can brag too much on himself, he discovers that McAllister is already down there, waiting for him.

“Expect the unexpected,” McAllister explains.

I already mentioned this last week but I can’t help but feel that Max’s “ninja training” is mostly just McAllister amusing himself by seeing how far he can push his student.

Weekly ninja training completed, it’s time for Max and McAllister to drive to …. VEGAS, BABY!

That’s right! In this episode, Max and McAllister visit the ultimate American playground, Las Vegas. Of course, there’s a long history of movies and television shows being filmed in Vegas. In many ways, Las Vegas is the epitome of American ingenuity, a glitzy playground that has been built in an otherwise inhospitable desert. Many great directors — from Martin Scorsese to Francis Ford Coppola to David Lynch to Paul Schrader — have found their inspiration in Las Vegas’s unique aesthetic.

Unfortunately, the Las Vegas that we see in The Master seems to be incredibly tacky. There’s very little of the glitz and glamour that we typically associate with Las Vegas. Instead, the action takes place in one rather dingy hotel and casino, the place where it looks like a month’s worth of chewing gum has been hidden under the tables and smashed into the carpet. A group of thieves, led by the mysterious Blake (Art Hindle), are planning on forcing a showgirl named Tracy (Terri Treas) into helping them rob the hotel. Tracy happens to be Max’s former girlfriend and, in fact, she’s the whole reason that he’s visiting Las Vegas in the first place.

Blake’s plan to rob the casino is ludicrously complicated. Basically, his plan rests on convincing Tracy to flirt with the owner of the hotel and to convince him to invite her up to his room for a drink. In the owner’s room, Tracy is to drug his drink and then, when he’s passed out, she’s supposed to steal his keys. In order to make sure that she does this, Blake kidnaps her annoying 12 year-old daughter, Suzie (Angela Lee Sloan).

While Tracy is drugging the owner of the hotel, a bomb is set to explode at the nearby power station. With all of Vegas plunged into darkness, it will be all the easier for Blake’s men to shoot tear gas into the casino. While everyone’s disorientated, Blake will open the casino’s safe and then he and his associates will head to an abandoned western movie set in the middle of the desert. From there, they will wait for the arrival of a helicopter that will take them to safety.

I mean, seriously, what happened to the concept of keeping things simple? Blake’s plan is dependent on so many things happens at the exact right moment that there’s no way any halfway intelligent criminal would have agreed to have been a part of it. Along with all of the obvious things that could go wrong, Blake also has failed to take into account that he might be followed to the old west town by a ninja and his idiot sidekick.

Which is pretty much what happens. McAllister and Max show up at about the same time as the helicopter.

This leads to an elaborate fight in the old west town. On the one hand, it’s a nice homage to Lee Van Cleef’s days as a spaghetti western star. At once point, McAllister even tells Max that he feels oddly at home in the old west town. “I always wanted to be a cowboy,” McAllister says. On the other hand, it’s also pretty obvious that all of the action sequences and fight scenes feature not Lee Van Cleef but Lee Van Cleef’s much less stocky stunt double. That takes away from the excitement of seeing Van Cleef return to his roots.

That said, there is a cool moment where Van Cleef’s stunt double jumps over the helicopter.

One of the good things about this episode is that we did learn a few new details about Max and McAllister’s relationship. For instance, when Max wants to beat up Blake’s men, McAllister warns Max that he’s allowing his temper to control him. Later, Max has an epiphany in which he realizes that, unlike Blake’s men, he could never bring himself to kill someone. It’s actually a nicely human moment and it took me by surprise. It’s a moment that suggests that The Master perhaps had higher ambitions than just being a typical action show.

We also learned a little more about Max’s backstory. As he tells Tracy, his mother and his brother were both killed in a plane crash and he and his father had a falling out shortly afterwards. Max says that he doesn’t know where his father is. When Max says that, his relationship with McAllister suddenly makes a lot more sense. Max puts up with McAllister because he’s looking for a new father figure. That said, I’m still pretty sure that most of McAllister’s training exercises are just McAllister’s way of amusing himself at Max’s expense.

While I appreciated all of that, this episode was a bit too messy to really work. The casino stuff was difficult to follow and, as I mentioned before, Blake’s big scheme was a bit too big for its own good. I did like the fight scenes in the old west town but, unfortunately, the episode was nearly finished by the time that McAllister and Max arrived. This episode had a lot of potential but it still felt like it was never as good as it could have been.

Next week: Max and McAllister hit up New Orleans! Mardi Gras, baby!

Retro Television Reviews: The Master 1.4 “Hostages”

Posted on June 2, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, The Master teams up with an old enemy.

Episode 1.4 “Hostages”

(Dir by Ray Austin, originally aired on February 10th, 1984)

“Hi, I’m Max Keller….”

This episode of The Master opens with Max (Timothy Van Patten) flying high above California in a motorized hang glider. Apparently, this is the latest part of Max’s ninja training, though I have to wonder where the hang glider came from and whether or not being able to use a hang glider is a specific ninja skill. The more I think about it, the more it seems that McAllister (Lee Van Cleef) is just leading Max on for his own amusement.

Max spots a woman (Jennifer Runyon, who later took over the role of Marcia Brady in A Very Brady Christmas) who is sitting behind the wheel of an out-of-control car. Apparently, the brakes have failed and the car will soon careen over the side of a cliff! Max swoops down and rescues the woman, minute before her car crashes and explodes.

The woman is Alice Clayton, the extremely talkative daughter of U.S. Senator Sam Clayton (Robert Dowdell). Don’t worry, no one was trying to kill her. The brakes just failed on their own. A grateful Alice invites Max and McAllister to come to a party that the senator is throwing at his hillside mansion.

Soon, Max and McAllister are wearing tuxedos and hanging out at the party. A CIA agent named Malory (one-time Bond star, George Lazenby) recognizes McAllister and accuses him of running a “subversive ninja school.” Meanwhile, by an amazing coincidence, Okasa (Sho Kosugi) — McAllister’s former student who has taken a vow to kill him — also happens to be at the party. He even takes the time to throw a ninja star at McAllister.

But that’s not all! The party is also crashed by a group of terrorists, lead by Serena (Randi Brooks) and Castile (David McCallum). The terrorists kidnaps Alice, her father, and the wives of several European diplomats. The head of the CIA (Monte Markham) orders McAllister and Malory to set aside their differences and to rescue the hostages. Max also decides to help which means that the hang glider makes another appearance as Max soars above the terrorist compound.

Lee Van Cleef’s stunt double gets quite a workout in this episode of The Master. Not only do Okasa and McAllister have a brief fight but McAllister also gets to take on an entire compound full of terrorists. Of course, McAllister wears his full of ninja uniform while doing all of this, all the better to hopefully keep us from noticing that Lee Van Cleef isn’t the one doing all of the kicking and hitting. And I will say that, in this episode, the fights were fairly well-done. The plot was predictable but the fights were probably about as exciting as you could hope from a network television show that aired in the 80s.

Other than the fights, the best thing about this episode was the chance to see George Lazenby playing a character who was Bond in everything but the name. Lazenby himself has said that one of the reasons he struggled with the role of James Bond was because he was too young when he starred in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. In this episode of The Master, Lazenby is older and a bit more weathered and he’s totally believable as a spy who is tough but who still enjoys the better things in life. As well, David McCallum does a good job as the cynical terrorist, though his character isn’t really given much to do.

I actually kind of enjoyed this episode of The Master. As opposed to the previous three episodes, it focused on the action and it didn’t really have any slow spots. It was a fun episode.