Tom McFadden – Through the Shattered Lens

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing SLEDGE HAMMER!, a cop comedy which ran on ABC from 1986 to 1988. The entire series can be found on Prime!

Trust him. He knows what he’s doing.

Episode 1.7 “All Shook Up”

(Dir by Jackie Cooper, originally aired on November 7th, 1986)

15 Elvis impersonators have been murdered in the city. Doreau wonders how anyone can be so evil. Sledge Hammer wonders about the person who draws the chalk outlines at crime scenes. “What type of life is that?”

Captain Trunk, who spends this episode dealing with a migraine, is upset that there aren’t more clues as to the identity of the murderer. Hammer suggests that it will be easier to solve the case once more Elvises have been murdered. To Trunk’s disappointment, Hammer turns out to be right. A woman witnesses the 16th murder and reports that the killer was not only dressed like Elvis but he was also carrying a golden microphone!

It’s time for Sledge Hammer to go undercover! Doreau enrolls him in a school for Elvis impersonators and then accompanies him to the National Elvis Impersonator Semi-Finals. The highlight of the episode is Sledge Hammer imitating Elvis. He can’t do the voice and he can’t do the dance moves but he’s totally convincing when he draws a gun and shoots it. Later, he shows off his karate moves and wins a trophy.

As for the murderer, he turns out to be the janitor (Raymond Ma) at the Elvis school. He feels that he’s the best Elvis in the world. Unfortunately, for him, he’s electrocuted when he accidentally holds his golden microphone too close to a live wire. With the city safe for Elvis impersonators, Sledge announces that he’s going to Graceland.

This week’s episode was just ludicrous enough to work. Between the Elvis puns and all of the bad singing and dancing, it kept me laughing (or, at the very least, smiling). As usual, David Rasche’s enthusiastic performance more than made up for any jokes that didn’t quite land. This was also a good episode for Anne-Marie Martin, who played Doreau’s relationship with Hammer with just the right combination of frustration and affection.

Sledge Hammer has left the building but he’ll be back next week.

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing St. Elsewhere, a medical show which ran on NBC from 1982 to 1988. The show can be found on Hulu and, for purchase, on Prime!

This week, the first season comes to a close.

Episode 1.22 “Addiction”

(Dir by Mark Tinker, originally aired on May 3rd, 1983)

“To life,” Dr. Auschlander toasts towards the end of the finale of St. Elsewhere’s first season and the sentiment could not be more called for.

While Auschlander has spent the episode hanging out with a friend of his and getting into fights with disrespectful street punks, Dr. Morrison’s wife has been giving birth to their son. While someone breaks into the supply room and takes off with a huge supply of drugs, Dr. White is sobbing and telling his estranged wife that he knows he has to get help for his addictions. While one drug addict (Ralph Seymour) commits suicide by injecting an air bubble into his veins, Dr. Craig’s cocky son, Stephen (Scott Paulin), visits from medical school and turns out to be quite a weed-smoking, pill-popping drug user himself. Ehrlich, assigned to show Stephen around the hospital and teach him what it’s like being a resident, considers telling Dr. Craig that his son has a drug problem but apparently decides not to. Dr. Craig is very proud that his son is going to follow the family tradition of becoming a surgeon. Meanwhile, Dr. Fiscus cheats on Shirley Daniels with Kathy Martin. Fiscus, you idiot.

Life goes on at St. Eligius. That’s was the theme of the finale and it’s also been the theme of the first season. For all the bad things that happen, there are also good things. Some patients die. Some doctors are incompetent. But babies are born and doctors like Morrison and Ehrlich and Chandler haven’t given up and are still trying to make the world a better place. Dr. Auschlander may be terminally ill with cancer but he embraces life and we should all do the same.

It’s a good ending for an overall good first season. There were a few weak episodes. Dr. Samuels was a pretty annoying character and I’m a bit relieved to see that David Birney left the show after this season. Ed Flanders can be a bit overly somber as Dr. Westphall and Howie Mandel is still one of the least convincing doctors that I’ve ever seen. That said, Morrison, Ehrlich, Chandler, Nurse Daniels, and even Dr. White are interesting characters and I look forward to seeing what happens with them during season 2. The season’s stand-out was definitely William Daniels as the pompous yet still likable Dr. Craig. Other than the terrible storyline where he cheated on his wife (and I still claim that was a dream episode, like almost all of the stuff with Dr. Samuels), Dr. Craig was this season’s standout character.

Next week, we start season 2!