Late Night Retro Television Review: Pacific Blue 2.19 “Lost and Found”

Posted on September 9, 2025 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, the bike cops screw up another case.

Episode 2.19 “Lost and Found”

(Dir by Michael Levine, originally aired on March 2nd, 1997)

I’ve often felt that the most interesting thing about Pacific Blue is witnessing just how totally incompetent the bicycle cops really are.

This episode centers around a girl who has run away from home. Chris and Palermo are holding her at the station and they release her to the first guy who shows up claiming to be her father. They don’t bother to ask the man for any sort of proof that he’s her father. They don’t even ask to see his ID. Instead, they just let her go with him.

Guess what? That guy wasn’t her father!

Her actual father shows up a little while later and, needless to say, he’s pretty pissed off. Instead of apologizing or in any way accepting accountability for screwing up, Palermo and Chris snap at the guy to calm down and then say that they’ll track down his daughter. What’s funny is that we’re supposed to be on the side of the bicycle cops because the father is angry and yelling. Well, the father has every right to be angry and yelling. THE IDIOTS LET HIS RUNAWAY DAUGHTER LEAVE WITH THE FIRST GUY WHO SHOWED UP!

Now, the show later reveals that the father was abusive and that his daughter ran way because he was beating her. Yeah, he’s not a good father and he should lost custody of his daughter. That doesn’t make the bicycle cops any less incompetent, though! It just amuses that this show continually tries to convince us that we should take these people seriously as cops but every episode seems to feature them making some sort of terrible mistake. This show really seems to think that, as long as Chris is shooting people the death glare, that means she’s not responsible for any of her screwups.

This episode also featured a subplot in which Cory tried to protect her no-good brother from some hitmen. She did a better job with her storyline than Chris and Palermo did with the case of the runaway. Maybe Cory should be in charge.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Pacific Blue 2.8 “Undercover”

Posted on June 24, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Chris goes undercover.

Episode 2.8 “Undercover”

(Dir by Terrence H. Winkless, originally aired on October 13th, 1996)

A smarmy detective wants Chris to go undercover to help investigate a suspected money launderer, Tim Wakefield (Scott Plank). Palermo argues that Chris doesn’t have enough experience to work undercover but the detective asks Chris, “What do you want to do? You ready to get out of those bicycle shorts and do some real police work?”

I have to admit that line cracked me up. It really made the whole episode. Palermo got offended, as he always does whenever anyone points out that bike cops look silly with their shorts and their crisp white shirts. What was great about the line was that it was true. The detective may have been smarmy but he was right about Chris being invited to do “real police work” and he was right about bike cops not being real policemen. Everyone know it’s true! Seriously, if a bicycle cop ever tries to pull you over, just slam down on the accelerator. What are they going to do? Chase you when you’re going over 30 mph? I think not!

(Seriously, two seasons in and the show is still trying to convince us that bike cops are real cops. Sorry, Palermo, it’s not going to happen!)

That said, this episode’s main plot still ended up falling flat because Chris is not a very interesting character and her whole undercover thing wasn’t particularly credible. When she went undercover, she still came across as being just as stiff, humorless, and unlikable as when she’s riding her bike and threatening people with arrest. Tim Wakefield, of course, fell for her and Chris was supposed to be attracted to him and conflicted about her assignment and I never bought it for a second.

(As for Wakefield, he turned out to be not as bad of a guy as everyone assumed. He was arrested but his lawyer got him off and the episode ended with him sending Chris a postcard from some tropical beach. I think Chris was supposed to be wistful as she looked at the postcard but, since Darlene Vogel was apparently only capable of one facial expression, who knows for sure?)

Meanwhile, Cory dealt with being stalked by a mentally unstable ex-boyfriend, Wasn’t it just last week that Cory’s partner was being stalked by a mentally unstable woman? This show certainly does enjoy repeating itself. While Palermo worried about Chris, TC and Victor chased some roller-blading teens who were shooting random tourists with paintballs. The roller-blading scenes were kind of exciting but, unfortunately, they had to share space with all of the awkward bicycle scenes.

This episode had its moments. The roller-blading was cool. The detective making fun of Palermo was gratifying. Overall, though, the fact that the show centers around bicycles continues to be a flaw that simply cannot be overcome. There’s simply no way to make anyone riding a bicycle look impressive, I don’t care how serious they try to look.

Sorry, Pacific Blue.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Pacific Blue 2.6 “The Enemy Within”

Posted on June 10, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Okay, let’s do this again.

Episode 2.6 “The Enemy Within”

(Dir by Stephen L. Posey, originally aired on September 28th, 1996)

A group of masked men are breaking into the homes of wealthy Vietnamese immigrants and stealing their money and jewelry. We are told that the men are specifically targeting the Vietnamese because Vietnamese people do not trust banks or the police. I have no idea if that’s true or not. I just know that the show insisted that this is true with a bizarre vehemence. To be honest, I’m Irish-Italian-Spanish in descent and I don’t trust banks or the police either. That said, I would be kind of offended if something bad happened to me and the cops responded by going, “Eh. It’s because she’s Irish-Italian-Spanish, what can you do?”

Kelly Hu, who is not Vietnamese, plays Wendy Trang, the granddaughter of a Vietnamese couple of have been robbed. Her grandfather does not want to talk to the police so Wendy instead talks to her grandfather and then meets with TC to tell him what her grandfather told her. From what Wendy tells him (which I think would be considered hearsay in a court of law), TC decides that only one of the thieves is Vietnamese and that the head of the robbery crew is probably an American who served in Vietnam and who harbors resentment towards immigrants. Seriously, he figures that out from just having one conversation.

(Actually, maybe it was Palermo who figured it out. Once they get on their bikes and put on their helmets, Palermo and TC are pretty much indistinguishable.)

TC recruits a psychic named Leslie Quint (Ken Weiler) to handle a knife that was left behind at the scene and to pick up on whatever psychic residue has been left behind. Chris smirks and calls the guy a fraud because, two seasons is, the writers still haven’t bothered to give Chris a personality beyond being bitchy. The psychic not only reveals that the leader of the gang is a big white guy but he also tells Chris that she needs to go to the dentist because she has a cavity. (Ewwww! Brush your teeth, weirdo!) He also tells Cory that her never-before mentioned brother is involved in some trouble.

The psychic’s right! Peter McNamara (William Bumiller), Cory’s brother, is a corrupt narcotics cop!

Anyway, things worked out. The bag guys were captured. Cory realized her brother wasn’t perfect. Chris learned a lesson about dismissing secret powers. TC smirked in that oddly humorless way of his. As Palermo, Rick Rossovich seemed to be begging someone to remember that he had been in both Top Gun and The Terminator before allowing himself to get sucked into the world of Pacific Blue.

Along with Kelly Hu, this episode featured Cronenberg favorite Robert A. Silverman, playing an eccentric on the beach. It’s always nice to see Silverman!

Otherwise, this was another stupid episode. At some point, these characters are going to have to develop personalities beyond riding bikes and getting annoyed, right?

Feeling the Burn: Death Spa (1989, directed by Michael Fischa)

Posted on October 12, 2018 by Jedadiah Leland

Michael (William Bumiller) owns the hottest health club in Los Angeles but that may not stay true if he can’t do something about all the guests dying. Members get baked alive in the sauna. Another is killed when a malfunctioning workout machine pulls back his arms and causes a rib to burst out of one side of his body. Shower tiles fly off the wall and panic a bunch of naked women. A woman loses her arm in a blender and a man is somehow killed by a frozen fish. Strangely, all of the deaths don’t seem to hurt business as people still keep coming to the gym. Surely, there are other, safer health clubs in Los Angeles.

Michael suspects that his brother-in-law, David (Merritt Butrick), might be to blame for all of the trouble. David is good with computers and since this movie is from 1989, that means that he can do anything. (David is described as being a “hacker,” which may be the first time that overused term was used in a film.) Michael feels that David has never forgiven him for the suicide of his sister. Two useless cops show up to investigate the murders while the spa gets ready for Mardi Gras night.

This incredibly cheesy horror movie used to be a mainstay on HBO, where young viewers like me appreciated all of the gore and slightly older viewers appreciated all of the nudity. Viewed today, Death Spa is a real nostalgia trip. From the leg warmers to the bulky computers to the choreographed workout routines, this is a movie that could only have been made in the 80s. The plot is beyond stupid but some of the gore effects were well-executed and that scene where the frozen fish comes to life continues to amaze. Sadly, this was Merritt Butrick’s last film. The actor, who was best known for playing Captain’s Kirk’s son in The Wrath of Khan and The Search for Spock, died the same year that Death Spa was released.

Film Review: Do or Die (dir by Andy Sidaris)

Posted on March 10, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

So, imagine this.

You and your BFF are at a luau in Hawaii. Fires are being spun. People are dancing. Drums are being beaten. It’s almost time to eat the pig and suddenly, you discover that a mysterious old man wants to speak to you. The man is surrounded by armed guards but you’re used to that. Both you and your BFF work for the government. You blow things up and save the world for a living!

Anyway, the old man informs you that he is a master criminal named Kane. He’s one of those “I’m going to take over the world” types but apparently, you keep thwarting his plans. He’s a little bit upset about that and why not? It’s hard enough trying to conquer the world without having somebody continually blowing up all of your friends. He says that he’s going to have you killed.

Uh-oh!

But fear not! Kane isn’t going to kill you right there and then. It turns out that Kane has a code of honor that he lives by. He may be evil but he believes in fair play. So, Kane says that he’s going to kill you later. Apparently, he’s hired six different teams of assassins. Over the next couple of days, they’re going to try to kill you. Fortunately, the team’s aren’t going to work together or anything intelligent like that. That wouldn’t be fair. Instead, they’re going to come at you one at a time. Once one teams fails to kill you, they’re out of the hunt.

How would you react? What would be the first thing that you and your BFF would do?

Would you make sure your guns were loaded, lock the doors, and then wait for the first team to make their move?

Would you try to make the first move, maybe trying to take out Kane right then and there?

Or maybe you would leave the country and try to start a whole new life under a new identity?

I’d probably go with the third option but that’s not what Donna (Dona Speir) and Nicole (Roberta Vasquez) do when Kane (Pat Morita) tells them that they’ve been targeted. Instead, they get topless and relax in the hut tub while discussing how much it sucks that someone wants to kill them.

Honestly, this shouldn’t come as a surprise. The 1991 film, Do or Die, was directed by Andy Sidaris. In a Sidaris film, a topless hot tub party plays much the same role as the family get togethers that often end the Fast and the Furious movies. Still, it’s hard not to be a little bit disappointed by their sudden passivity. After all, Donna is the same agent who previously used a rocket launcher to blow up Erik Estrada at the end of Guns.

Speaking of Erik Estrada, he’s back. However, he’s playing a different character than he played in Guns. Now, he’s a heroic agent named Rico. When Donna and Nicole finally get around to letting their boss, Lucas (William Bumiller), know what’s going on, Lucas recruits Rico to help protect them. Bruce Christian (Bruce Penhall) and Shane Abilene (Michael Shane) are also brought in as well. Shane still has terrible aim. I know that’s a running joke in all of the Sidaris films but you really do have to wonder why the government continues to employ someone who sucks at a huge part of his job.

Anyway, Donna and Nicole eventually head for the mainland but that doesn’t do much good because Kane put a tracking device on her watch and Donna apparently lost several IQ points between the end of Guns and the start of this movie. At first, they go to Vegas but eventually, they end up in Louisiana. This leads to the usual remote-controlled boats and helicopters, the same ones that appear in nearly every Sidaris film. Needless to say, a lot of stuff gets blown up.

And it’s all pretty boring, to be honest. It sounds like it should be fun, what with all the different assassins showing up and Kane getting more and more frustrated as Donna and Nicole continue to survive. But, unfortunately, none of the assassins are that interesting. Most of the film takes place in Caddo Parish. My family lived in Shreveport for a year and a half. I like Caddo Parish. But it really can’t compare to Hawaii as far as photogenic locations are concerned.

Do or Die had potential but it got lost in the hot tub.

Film Review: Guns (dir by Andy Sidaris)

Posted on March 9, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

As you can probably tell by looking at the poster at the top of this review, the 1990 film Guns was Andy Sidaris’s attempt to make a Bond film. Not only does the poster feature a man in a tuxedo and two gun-wielding women but the tag line even reads, “James Never Had This Kind of Help!”

(Of course, that’s not really true, as anyone who has seen Dr. No, Goldfinger, The Spy Who Loved Me, or For Your Eyes Only can tell you.)

Much like a Bond film, Guns features a secret agent fighting to defeat an international conspiracy. The agent’s efforts lead her and her allies to several different cities in several different … well, really only one country. Being a Sidaris film, it’s doubtful the Guns really had the budget to film anyplace other than the United States but still, the action does move from Lake Huvasa, Arizona to Hawaii to Las Vegas. That’s about as close as a Sidaris film ever gets to featuring exotic locations.

(If Lake Havusa sounds familiar, that’s because Jimmy Kimmel gave away at trip to Lake Havusa during the Oscars.)

And like any good Bond film, Guns has a flamboyant and almost comically evil villain. Juan “Jack of Diamonds” Degas (telenovela star and future reality tv mainstay Erik Estrada) is an international gun dealer and an all-around sociopath. He’s the type who shoots someone and then smirks about it. He’s so evil that he’s even got Danny Tejo working as his main henchman! That’s really evil! Estrada gives a surprisingly good performance in the role. Especially when compared to the forgettable villains who appeared in Sidaris’s previous films, Juan Degas feels like a worthy opponent. It’s not just that he’s evil. It’s that he’s so damn smug about it. You can’t wait to see him get taken down.

Degas is planning on smuggling a bunch of Chinese weapons into America through a base on Hawaii. The only problem is that Donna (Dona Speir) and her new partner, Nicole Justin (Roberta Vasquez), are based in Hawaii! Degas knows that he has to get rid of them if he’s going to have any hope of succeeding. (For whatever reason, it never occurs to Degas to smuggle the weapons through Guam or American Samoa. I mean, there are other islands out there.) When Degas sends two cross-dressing assassins to kill Nicole, they end up not only shooting the wrong woman but also killing a friend of Dona’s as well.

Now, it’s personal!

Except, it was already personal. In a typical example of Sidaris’s make-it-up-as-you-go-along style of plotting, it turns out that Degas previously killed Donna’s father. And now, it appears that it might get even more personal because Degas has kidnapped the Attorney General of Nevada, who happens to be Donna’s mother!

Obviously, this means that it’s time to gather together another group of misfit agents and take down the bad guys. That means that Savage Beach‘s Shane Abilene (Michael J. Shane) and Bruce Christian (Bruce Penhall) both show up again. It also means that a lovable magician named Abe (Chuck McCann) gets to help out as well. Unfortunately, one member of the team is eventually blown up by a remote control boat.

That’s right! A remote control boat! For some reason, remote control vehicles were a Sidaris obsession and it’s not a Sidaris film without someone getting blown by either a remote control boat or helicopter.

Anyway, there’s a lot of explosions to be found in Guns but the good thing is that it’s women blowing stuff up and it’s women who are in charge of the entire operation. That’s the thing with a Sidaris film like this one. For all of the nudity and the double entendre-filled dialogue, Guns was an action film where women got to shoot the guns, beat up the bad guys, and ultimately save the world from a smirking misogynist. When Donna picked up that rocket launcher, it was both ludicrous and empowering at the same time.

Guns is one of Sidaris’s better films. For once, despite all of the usual Sidaris red herrings, the plot can actually be followed and Estrada is an appropriately hissable villain. While the film may not be able to compete with the best of the Bond films, it’s still more fun that SPECTRE.

A Movie A Day #52: Overexposed (1990, directed by Larry Brand)

Posted on February 21, 2017 by Jedadiah Leland

Someone is stalking soap opera star, Kristin (Catherine Oxenberg). She is receiving frightening notes and her coworkers are dying. Who is after her and what does it have to do with a tragic fire at a birthday party? Is it one of her jealous co-stars? Is it her duplicitous boyfriend (David Naughton)? Is it the stranger (William Bumiller) that she’s having an affair with? Or is it the obsessed fan (Karen Black)? Detective Morrison (Larry Brand) is on the case!

The return of Detective Morrison (played, again, by the film’s director) makes Overexposed a sequel to The Drifter. (Both films were directed by Brand and executive produced by Roger Corman). Morrison has much more to do in Overexposed than he did in The Drifter so maybe the plan was to launch a low-budget franchise of Detective Morrison movies. It didn’t happen, because Overexposed is much less interesting than The Drifter. The spoiled and rich Kristin is never a likable character and the movie’s real star was Oxenberg’s busy body double, Shelley Michelle.

Overexposed does have a few good scenes, including death-by-acidic-facial-cream. The best thing about movie is Karen Black, who brilliantly delivered a monologue about why she loves television. It doesn’t have much to do with the rest of the movie but Karen Black knocked it out of the park. The monologue ends with Karen Black paying homage to The Mod Squad by shouting out, “Solid!”

Overexposed was forgettable but Karen Black?

Karen Black was solid.