50th Anniversary Viewing (Part 1)
Adam-12
"Camp: Part 2"
Originally aired October 1, 1974
MeTV said:
Officers Malloy and Woods take a group of children to a youth camp, but Malloy becomes preoccupied with the 14-year-old boy he reluctantly brought along, who continues to compensate for his small stature by getting into trouble. Meanwhile, Reed goes on patrol alone, and deals with a woman who uses a unique weapon to fend off an attacker.
The recap consists of a replay of the final scene of last week's episode, of Jim bringing Greg Whitney to the camp bus, to Pete's consternation. As the bus pulls away, a tearful Mrs. Whitney tells Jim that Greg is all she's got.
At the youth camp, the director, Sgt. Willard (Buck Young), introduces the kids to their celebrity volunteer coach, Olympic pole-vaulter Bob Seagren (himself). Later Pete finds Greg, who has a chip on his shoulder about being smaller than the other kids his age, involved in an altercation with a couple of them. When Pete tries to talk with Greg about his issues, Greg accuses Malloy of sounding like his mother. One of the kids involved in the altercation, Rod (Randy Whipple), overhears in the cafeteria as Seagren asks Pete about Greg's record. Afterward, Pete comes upon Greg, who'd been serving ice cream, sharing a smuggled-out carton with some of the guys. Greg ends up sentenced to kitchen duty, with Pete trying to tell him that he can't buy friends.
Back in L.A....
Reed is flagged down by a woman (Shannon Christie) who reports how a man tried to attack her in an alley. After Officer Wells's unit joins them, the woman credits Lucy with having subdued her attacker by making him faint. She opens her coat to reveal a boa inside--the kind with scales, not feathers--the woman apparently being an exotic dancer.
Back at camp, Rod and another boy named Tim (Sean Kelly) go to Malloy with an accusation of Greg having stolen Tim's watch. Pete directs a search of the dorm, but the watch isn't found. After Pete tries unsuccessfully to talk Greg into joining a ball game instead of moping alone, Bob reports to Pete that he found the watch in the shower. When Pete goes to share the news with Greg, he finds the boy gone. Pete and Jerry Woods search the premises for him. Jerry updates Pete that Greg fell into a ravine, and Pete arrives to find Woods, Seagren, and another guy pulling Greg out with a rope. Pete has another talk with Greg, updating him about the watch and advising him that being 14 doesn't last forever.
On the last day, Greg joins a cross-country endurance race, boasting to Tim and Rod that he's outrun Malloy before. Rod drops out early, but Tim keeps pace just behind Greg as he's ultimately beaten by an exhausted Malloy. Nevertheless, the guys are impressed with how Greg hanged in for the long run.
Jim brings Mrs. Whitney to pick up Greg when the bus returns. She tells Reed of how she followed his advice in seeing a counselor, who advised her to be more firm with her son. When Greg wants to go somewhere with his new friends, she takes a first step by insisting that he get himself squared away at home first. When Jim asks Pete and Jerry how Greg did at camp, they give Reed an exaggerated list of pranks that Greg presumably didn't pull.
M*A*S*H
"Iron Guts Kelly"
Originally aired October 1, 1974
IMDb said:
Lieutenant General "Iron Guts" Kelly (James Gregory) dies whilst in bed with Hot Lips, but Kelly's aide (Keene Curtis) invents a more militarily meaningful way to mark Kelly's passing.
When the general and his aide, Colonel Wortman, inspect the OR, Hawk and Trap are characteristically not impressed...though to be fair, they do have their hands full. Frank and Margaret try to kiss up to the VIP in the Officers' Club, but the general finds an excuse to have Burns escort Wortman elsewhere so he can have some alone time with Houlihan. Cut to Margaret frantically waking the guys in the Swamp to take them to her tent, where the general is dead from a heart attack.
Trapper (to Hot Lips): Did you try to resuscitate him?
Hawkeye: How do you think he died?
When Frank drops by unexpectedly, the guys hide Bernie in the closet and pretend to be playing cards with Margaret because none of them can sleep. They take the body to Wortman (who's shaving his head) and decline to divulge how the general died, but the colonel doesn't care--he starts to bake up a story of heroic death in combat. The guys refuse to sign a death certificate to that effect, but they do agree to load the body on an ambulance, which the colonel plans to drive to the front.
Wortman wakes Radar and his teddy bear in an unexpectedly difficult attempt to find somewhere that's seeing action. Frank sees the guys putting the body in the ambulance and goes to tell a drinking and jumpy Margaret about it. When he sits on one of the general's stars, she makes up a story about why he was inspecting her quarters. By the time the colonel's found his location, a couple of GIs who were throwing a party (Jeff Maxwell as recurring Pvt. Igor Straminsky and Dennis Troy) use the ambulance to sneak out six prostitutes. Blake subsequently gets a call that the ambulance was involved in an accident, and the general's body was found, apparently killed in the crash. But Wortman doesn't give up on his plan, ordering that the ambulance be driven to a specific location and then calling for an air strike and naval bombardment. In the coda, the guys find that Wortman's fiction made it into
Stars and Stripes.
Hawaii Five-O
"Steal Now--Pay Later"
Originally aired October 1, 1974
Edited Wiki said:
McGarrett matches wits with a fence who sells stolen goods to legitimate industries solely by telephone.
A truck driver (Jerry Donald Boyd) is flagged down by a man (Robert Howard Harker) with a story about a sick woman in his van, only to find himself being hijacked at gunpoint. When the driver pulls a gun of his own strapped to his lower leg, he goes down in an exchange of fire with the hijackers. The lead hijacker calls Ron Colby (Ray Danton) at his plush surfside digs to inform him of the shipment that will be arriving, and to warn him to have a particular unit set aside. When Colby goes to inspect the unit, he finds the driver's body inside a refrigerator, and orders his henchman, Puni (Nephi Hanneman), to deep six it.
The fridge is nevertheless fished out of the drink, and McGarrett's intrigue about a body being sunk in a brand-new fridge is intensified when the victim is identified as federal agent Lloyd Donaldson, who was investigating a hijacking operation. Reasoning that a large shipment of fridges couldn't be fenced via normal illicit channels, McGarrett theorizes that the hijackers must be selling their goods to legit retailers who wouldn't knowingly deal in stolen merchandise.
At a restaurant, Colby meets up with the client to whom he sold the fridges, Larry Swift (Casey Kasem), who introduces Colby to his uncle, Charles Portman (Jacques Aubuchon), who's interested in buying women's swimwear. Portman's a little suspicious of how Colby can offer such good prices given how he says he obtains the goods, as well as Colby's insistence on not providing a number and making all phone calls himself. Colby later contacts a collaborating shipping clerk named Slater (Joseph Geremia) who provides him with details of a swimwear shipment that will be arriving on the islands; and Colby informs Puni of the warehouse.
McGarrett has department store owner Mr. Rogers (Howard F. Gottschalk) and his buyer, Swift, brought to his office about the hot fridges they purchased. Swift can only offer Colby's name, having been willfully ignorant of Colby's business address or phone number. An investigation of warehouses that may have done business with Colby turns up that he's been using a wide array of them all over the island, and without making direct contact with any of them.
Danno and Duke stake out the restaurant where Colby did business with Swift and Portman, and take Colby in to be questioned by McGarrett. Colby plays it cool and has to be let go when his lawyer arrives. Later at a party, Swift confronts his host, Colby, about the stolen merch and the heat that's been put on him over it, and Colby asserts that Swift is an accomplice and thus it would be in his best interest to lie to the grand jury. The next day, the warehouse holding the swimwear is hit by Puni and associates, who load the goods onto their truck. A worker there turns out to be one of several undercover cops staking out warehouses all over the island, but when he pulls his gun, a hijacker he doesn't see nails him, following which Puni sprays him with a semiautomatic.
Filled in on the details of the robbery by Duke at the scene, McGarrett grimly orders a wide net cast for that particular shipment. At his department store, Portman, having read about the robbery in the paper, nervously goes to his nephew about what he's pieced together, but Swift warns him to keep his mouth shut. When Colby calls, Portman tells him to come take the merchandise back, but Colby says he doesn't do returns and threatens Portman's family if he doesn't pay up. Portman soon finds himself being visited by Steve and Danno, and tries to give them the slip, taking off in his car. Finding himself being pursued by the McGmobile and several HPD units, Portman ducks into a dock area and ends up slamming his brakes too late to avoid...
Notice how cars never meet their OTVF when they go into the drink. I mean, if they were really that easily combustible, you'd think there'd be at least little burst as they hit the water.
Swift visits Colby at the restaurant to offer that what his unc did was stupid before pleading with Colby for a good deal on some cassette recorders. Swift produces some written evidence left by Portman and burns it as a show of good faith. But when he leaves, Larry reports to his cab driver, Chin, who puts him on the radio with McGarrett to make a long-distance request.
Colby actually proceeds to see to the order, securing some Tranasonic models. This is where my Stupid Criminal Radar kicks in, because as smooth an operator as this guy is, he's known that Five-O was onto him since the second act. You'd think he'd at least lay low for a while.
The shipment is loaded onto Chin's truck, which is tailed by Danno driving a tool truck--Those commercial licenses are really paying off this episode. Chin's flagged down by Puni using a method similar to the one in the opening, and Chin cooperates as the hijackers pounce him, avoiding getting shot. After Puni and another hijacker pull the truck into a warehouse, the doors close behind them and McGarrett calls for their surrender via bullhorn, informing them of the assault squad positioned outside.
The hijacker duo reunites with the other three in the back of a paddy wagon and, under McGarrett's orders, are not allowed phone calls. Colby is subsequently lured to Swift's department store by a call from Larry claiming that the shipment never arrived. Colby finds a stock of new Tranasonics in the store and confronts Swift in the storeroom. Once Colby's had a chance to make some incriminating threats, McGarrett comes out of hiding, followed by Danno, Chin, and Duke, each holding a different-colored Tranasonic recorder with a tape of what Colby just said.
McGarrett: Book him, Danno. Murder one, grand theft for openers.
As his increasingly characteristic parting zinger, McGarrett tosses his recorder to Colby as a "present for your cell".
Al Harrington does not appear in this episode. Apparently his presence became sporadic this season and he'd eventually be dropped from the main credits for episodes that he wasn't in. I'm guessing that this is one of those things that plays more sensibly in production order; e.g., this episode is the fourth aired for the season, but is actually #10 by the production code listed on Wiki.
H5O's eye candy quota is met this week by Colby having a different playmate using his pool in each of his phone business scenes.
The Odd Couple
"The Hollywood Story"
Originally aired October 3, 1974
Wiki said:
After landing a bit part in a movie, Oscar brings star-struck Felix to Hollywood.
Oscar's getting ready to leave for where the show is actually filmed to appear as himself along with some other sports writers. "Crazy Rhoda" bails on him at the last minute, following which Felix, who'd been spitefully expressing his supposed disapproval of the show biz capital, begs Oscar to take him. (Explaining one of the stickers on his suitcase, Oscar tells Murray that he never went to Rome, but his bag did.)
As soon as they arrive at LAX, obviously voiced-over location footage ensues of the duo visiting the Walk of Fame, Grauman's Chinese Theatre, and a driving tour of stars' houses, where they run into someone making an uncredited appearance as himself taking out his garbage, who obligingly signs an orange peel that he was discarding.
Bob (after they leave): I've gotta get a dog.
As the duo check into their hotel, on-set audio kicks in, as does Felix's meddlesome side, as he promotes himself to the position of Oscar's agent, fussing over how Oscar should have a more luxurious room and a larger role. The producer, J.B. (Alan Dexter), and director (Allan Arbus) are just discussing having written more lines for that sportswriter Madison to fill in a scene when Felix visits the studio to "negotiate". When he returns to Oscar, he takes credit for the two extra pages of dialogue and the $50 that comes with them.
Felix continues to fuss over the arrangements as they report to their location shoot in a stadium locker room in Pahrump, Nevada (which is just a studio set, making you wonder why they're shooting on location). Felix's less-than-professional starstruck side kicks in when he meets the actual star whom Oscar is playing against, Griff Lockwood (George Montgomery)...whose bad side Felix manages to get on by bringing up some gossip regarding an extramarital affair that he read about in Rona Barrett's column. When Felix tries to play hardball with the director by citing Oscar's legendary temper ("He slapped Fellini!"), he gets Oscar fired from the picture. As they're packing at their hotel, Felix tries to play it as a win, noting that they got an all-expenses-paid trip to Hollywood for no work...but Felix ultimately returns to the studio (Oscar tossing Felix's clothes off the balcony after he leaves). As before, J.B. is already discussing having to get Madison back--Oscar's replacement having dropped dead from learning that he got the part--when Felix walks in and is instantly given what he came for. Felix tries to advise J.B. not to be such a marshmallow.
When the duo returns to the location, it's Oscar's turn to blow things as he ruins his scene with klutzy accidents. Desperate to secure another replacement on short notice, the director agrees when Felix offers to fill the role. Oscar gets a good laugh on the sidelines as Felix improvs a dramatic monologue, following which Felix thinks he's gotten Oscar back the part...but the director instead goes with the Mayor of Pahrump (Leonard Barr returning two episodes later), who's been manning the clapboard.
Ironside
"Trial of Terror"
Originally aired October 3, 1974
Wiki said:
When a witness in a case going on trial is murdered, Ed attempts to persuade the victim's daughter to take her father's place on the stand.
James and Caroline Ward (Jack Manning and Joan Van Ark) disembark at a marina after spending some father/daughter time on their boat; a topic of conversation being how James was unknowingly involved in a criminal operation and will be testifying against a man he was working for named Martine. When Caroline goes back to the boat for her shoes, her father's killed by a car bomb. That, or just turning the key causes cars to blow up in TV Land, which is supported by this being written up in the papers as an "accident".
Ed tries to pay a visit to Caroline to find her place ransacked, and talks with a friend named Debbie Hinden (Pamela Hensley again), who was already in the apartment.
Caroline's not at the funeral, where the Chief briefly talks with Mike Martine (Harold J. Stone) and his crooked lawyer, Rogers (Tom Troupe). When Ed finds Caroline at the boat, she acts defensive, and indicates that she's mainly concerned with staying alive, but Ed convinces her to come with him to see the Chief. A hood named Sonny Powell (Larry Watson) who's staking out the marina calls Martine, who questions Rogers's method of stopping Ward from testifying and is concerned with what his daughter might know. At the Cave, the Chief informs Caroline that the bomb may have been meant for her as well.
Powell is lured away from Cave stake-out by Mark driving Fran out in a blonde wig. While Mark checks into a hotel with Fake Caroline, the Chief assigns Ed to watch Real Caroline, though they haven't been getting along thus far; and we see her prepping a big-ass needle. Ed takes Caroline to a house at an Army base. At a construction site, an associate named Garvey (Joe E. Tata) indicates that he wants to cut out for a while to lie low, to Martine's displeasure and concern. He orders a move made on Caroline, so Powell takes advantage of a room service visit to bust into Mark's hotel room to find Not Caroline holding a gun on him, but gets away by taking the waiter hostage; though Mark wounds an armed associate dressed as a bellhop.
The team identifies Powell and knows that he saw that Fran wasn't Caroline. At the base, after Ed gets back on Caroline's bad side by questioning her about her relationship with Martine, he finds her lying in the bathroom, learns that she's a diabetic, and helps to give her a shot. She then tells Ed that she saw the evidence from Martine's books that her father was compiling, and hid it as her insurance. Ed encourages her to overcome her fear and come forward with the evidence.
In an effort to draw Caroline out, Rogers plants a story in the paper about how she's testifying that spooks her into skipping out on Ed; while Powell goes to Debbie's place to lean on her, leaving an answering service number on a painting she was working on and implicitly threatening her with sexual assault. Having taken Ed's car, Caroline hears on the police radio that there's an APB out on her...and anyone bothering to monitor would know that she was out and about unprotected. Ed realizes that Caroline left her insulin behind and will need to score her next fix. The Chief and Ed pay a call on Martine and Rogers to warn them to stay away from Caroline, perpetrating the ruse that she's still in protective custody.
Caroline, clearly suffering from her lack of meds, unwisely goes to Debbie's to rest. Debbie tips Powell off between scenes and then guiltily urges Caroline to get away in her car. The team learns of a prescription order from Caroline's doctor, but when the Chief calls the pharmacy and Caroline hears a siren approaching, she splits. The Chief and Ed go to the boat looking for her, as do Powell and another heavy who looks confusingly like Martine with guns drawn, only to find that Ed's got the drop on them. A firefight ensues in which Not Martine is wounded, and Powell tries to get away in his car only for the Chief to block him with the van.
The final scene has Caroline reporting to the courthouse, and there's a bit of business in the corridor with Martine and Roberts about tying Martine in with Powell and Garvey, but it gets cut off by the premature ending of the Frndly recording.
