Wikipedia says it lasted only 9 episodes (two unaired). The premise seems intriguing...
It's not impossible. He often said that he ever wanted to do good sci-fi tv. The problem is that most of his ideas didn't translate well on the screen...
The Classic/Retro Pop Culture Thread
- Thread starter The Old Mixer
- Start date
Max Headroom was one of the few really good '80s SF shows, yes. Twilight Zone was fairly good, but I didn't enjoy it as much as the original. Oh, and the original V miniseries was excellent, and even more relevant now than it was at the time, although the rest of V was mediocre to terrible.
Another good one was Starman, the sequel to the Jeff Bridges/Karen Allen movie, with Robert Hays playing the new form of Starman, who'd returned to find his now-teenaged son (Christopher Daniel Barnes). It was basically a Fugitive/Incredible Hulk-style man-on-the-run series, but very smart and heartfelt and well-done. (Although it was a slightly retconned sequel, bumping the events of the movie back from the '80s to the '70s so that Starman could have a teenage son in the present.)
And of course SFTV took a major upturn in quality in 1989. In addition to TNG's breakout third season, we had two really good new shows that year, Alien Nation and Quantum Leap. Alien Nation was a particular favorite of mine, the best SF-as-social-commentary show since Star Trek (though Max Headroom had some pretty biting social satire).
Yes, exactly. People wonder why fans tolerated the "awful" first two seasons of TNG, but they were really good compared to what generally passed for SFTV at the time. They probably helped to usher in the era of smarter, more sophisticated SFTV that followed.
I remember both of those. Probe wasn't bad, an attempt at a smart, science-based show. In retrospect, it was a bit reminiscent of season-1 Elementary, with a supersmart, antisocial lead character (Parker Stevenson) with a female partner (Ashley Crow) who drew him out of his shell and helped him engage with the world. It actually has a TNG connection -- not long after Probe was cancelled, its co-creator Michael Wagner briefly took over as TNG's showrunner at the start of season 3 before handing the job off to Michael Piller, who had worked with him on Probe.
Something Is Out There was a pretty cheesy NBC show that started as a miniseries before briefly becoming a weekly series. It was your basic "human cop partners with alien to hunt escaped aliens and/or fight Earthly crime" premise, and memorable mainly for starring Maryam d'Abo as the sexy alien (who, of course, came from a planet with no nudity taboo, as sexy female aliens generally do).
Some episodes are truly little jems. Considering that I watched only few episodes of the original series, perhaps this is reason that I fondly remember the 80's show.
I'm on the fence if suggesting this to someone that never saw it. It has the same problem of many classics: it can pale in comparison with its successors (like Colony. There are real good episodes in this season).
Saw some episodes, never got my attention. I don't know why.
Ah, Earth and its backward ways...
Didn't watch much TV at all in the mid-to-late-80s, but yeah, TNG was pretty much the only game in town for space-based sci-fi during its first couple of seasons.
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Tarzan
"The Day of the Golden Lion"
Originally aired December 2, 1966
Jai doesn't get a credit on IMDb, but he's in the episode, contributing a couple of essential plot beats. At one point, our attractive female guest, Suzy Parker, addresses him as "boy" as if it were his name....
The story involves a tribal olympics with the tribe from "the east" being distinctly Middle Eastern-looking. While everybody's attention is on the games, a couple of armed men traveling with Suzy scheme to steal the poorly guarded titular prize. When the champion of the African tribe is injured by one of bad guys, Tarzan takes his place in the competition. His opponent in the games is played by Rockne Tarkington, formerly the early recurring character Rao.
TOS guests: None. TNG guests: A bearded and bespectacled George Murdock (Admiral Hanson, "The Best of Both Worlds") as one of the would-be thieves. We don't see him again after Tarzan prevents him from sniping Rockne's character by throwing a small boulder on him...and they make a point of showing his partner being dragged off to the authorities at the end...so I'm assuming he didn't survive.
Of course, the whole episode is one big, family-friendly lesson in fair play, sportsmanship, and cooperation. In the end, Tarzan throws the game just enough that it turns out to be a draw, giving the tribe he's representing a chance to win the prize for themselves the following year.
While there's still plenty of outdoor shooting (including some use of zebras as riding animals in this one), they definitely seem to be doing more interior work these days than in the earliest episodes...including lots of use of at least one cave set with what looks like a soundstage jungle outside of it. And we get a second use of their underwater giant clam prop, which I'd meant to bring up in the previous episode. I don't have a lot of experience with actual giant clams, but it's not that bad-looking.
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12 O'Clock High IN COLOR
"Burden of Guilt"
Originally aired December 2, 1966
Overton's executive officer character is back, and central to the plot.
The meat of the story is drama centering around our heroes not going by the book while the guest character who does (James Broderick) threatens their MO with the intent of building himself up. Eventually they come together out of mutual interest in finding the right unterseeboot base to bomb to smithereens. In the end, Broderick's colonel does the right thing and doesn't accept the promotion to general he's been bucking for, as he proved not to have very good combat chops.
I'd read about this on the show's Wiki page--Burke's Colonel Gallagher has a "mission control" P-51 Mustang...the Wiki page cites one specific example of wartime precedent, but the whole premise seems like a bit of hokey hero conceit. And the presence of the lone Mustang on bomber runs makes you wonder why they otherwise seem to be flying missions without fighter cover...as well as solo recon missions without escort! And not just any old junior officers, but our hero and guest colonels!
When Broderick's colonel runs into trouble on his recon mission, Gallagher sends out some fighters to go save him. Should have taken Mustangs over an hour to get from England to the fictitious sub base area on the southern coast of Norway...if they weren't already with him, it doesn't seem like they'd get there in time to do any good.
And the climactic bombing run involves both colonels in the cockpit of the same bomber...despite the earlier dramatic beat of Richard Anderson's general grounding Gallagher because he didn't want to risk both of his colonels on the same mission.
Despite such distractingly inauthentic elements, I'm enjoying this show. The stories are pretty structurally solid and flow nicely.
In the last scene, I heard a soft music cue that sounds strikingly like the Trek fanfare. Since somebody has the entire episode on YouTube...44:34+:
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And that catches up my sidelist viewing with H&I's Batman airings! Henceforth, the sidelist viewing should be a weekly thing in sync with Batman, going into early August if H&I doesn't change the schedule. That'll mostly be Batman and Tarzan, with 12 O'Clock High along for the ride into mid-May.
Enjoyed it as a kid...a bit afraid to revisit it....
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Tarzan
"The Day of the Golden Lion"
Originally aired December 2, 1966
Wiki said:
Jai doesn't get a credit on IMDb, but he's in the episode, contributing a couple of essential plot beats. At one point, our attractive female guest, Suzy Parker, addresses him as "boy" as if it were his name....
The story involves a tribal olympics with the tribe from "the east" being distinctly Middle Eastern-looking. While everybody's attention is on the games, a couple of armed men traveling with Suzy scheme to steal the poorly guarded titular prize. When the champion of the African tribe is injured by one of bad guys, Tarzan takes his place in the competition. His opponent in the games is played by Rockne Tarkington, formerly the early recurring character Rao.
TOS guests: None. TNG guests: A bearded and bespectacled George Murdock (Admiral Hanson, "The Best of Both Worlds") as one of the would-be thieves. We don't see him again after Tarzan prevents him from sniping Rockne's character by throwing a small boulder on him...and they make a point of showing his partner being dragged off to the authorities at the end...so I'm assuming he didn't survive.
Of course, the whole episode is one big, family-friendly lesson in fair play, sportsmanship, and cooperation. In the end, Tarzan throws the game just enough that it turns out to be a draw, giving the tribe he's representing a chance to win the prize for themselves the following year.
While there's still plenty of outdoor shooting (including some use of zebras as riding animals in this one), they definitely seem to be doing more interior work these days than in the earliest episodes...including lots of use of at least one cave set with what looks like a soundstage jungle outside of it. And we get a second use of their underwater giant clam prop, which I'd meant to bring up in the previous episode. I don't have a lot of experience with actual giant clams, but it's not that bad-looking.
_______
12 O'Clock High IN COLOR
"Burden of Guilt"
Originally aired December 2, 1966
Xfinity said:
Overton's executive officer character is back, and central to the plot.
The meat of the story is drama centering around our heroes not going by the book while the guest character who does (James Broderick) threatens their MO with the intent of building himself up. Eventually they come together out of mutual interest in finding the right unterseeboot base to bomb to smithereens. In the end, Broderick's colonel does the right thing and doesn't accept the promotion to general he's been bucking for, as he proved not to have very good combat chops.
I'd read about this on the show's Wiki page--Burke's Colonel Gallagher has a "mission control" P-51 Mustang...the Wiki page cites one specific example of wartime precedent, but the whole premise seems like a bit of hokey hero conceit. And the presence of the lone Mustang on bomber runs makes you wonder why they otherwise seem to be flying missions without fighter cover...as well as solo recon missions without escort! And not just any old junior officers, but our hero and guest colonels!
When Broderick's colonel runs into trouble on his recon mission, Gallagher sends out some fighters to go save him. Should have taken Mustangs over an hour to get from England to the fictitious sub base area on the southern coast of Norway...if they weren't already with him, it doesn't seem like they'd get there in time to do any good.
And the climactic bombing run involves both colonels in the cockpit of the same bomber...despite the earlier dramatic beat of Richard Anderson's general grounding Gallagher because he didn't want to risk both of his colonels on the same mission.
Despite such distractingly inauthentic elements, I'm enjoying this show. The stories are pretty structurally solid and flow nicely.
In the last scene, I heard a soft music cue that sounds strikingly like the Trek fanfare. Since somebody has the entire episode on YouTube...44:34+:
_______
And that catches up my sidelist viewing with H&I's Batman airings! Henceforth, the sidelist viewing should be a weekly thing in sync with Batman, going into early August if H&I doesn't change the schedule. That'll mostly be Batman and Tarzan, with 12 O'Clock High along for the ride into mid-May.
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There is the pilot on Youtube... try if you dare!Enjoyed it as a kid...a bit afraid to revisit it....
Thank you, I'll check out Max Headroom. I've been meaning to for a while.
I actually like bad TNG though! Star Trek is fun when it's lame.
Also known as Buck Rogers: Okay, How About We Just Pretend We're Star Trek, Would You Like That Better?
Shhh! You aren't supposed to say it aloud!
The miniseries was superb, lots of undercutting undercutting st cliches.
The series at least had some bold ideas - ex-cop and stranded alien investigate odd cases that aren't actually paranormal - but was poorly done and seemed like a weak Moonlighting rip-off without the wit and daring of that, or the original two-parter.
I don't remember being all that impressed by the miniseries of Something is Out There. I remember very little about the series as a whole, actually, less than other shows from the period. I think I watched it mainly because Maryam d'Abo was hot.
This Week's 50th Anniversary Viewings
50 years ago this past week.
_______
Star Trek
"The City on the Edge of Forever"
Originally aired April 6, 1967
Stardate 3134.0
See my post here.
I had a little more to say this week, but it's about as hard to find something new to say about an indisputably strong classic as it is about an indisputable turd.
_______
The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
"The Five Daughters Affair: Part II"
Originally aired April 7, 1967
Open Channel Deja Vu--The second part uses the same opening credits as the first, even though Curt Jurgens and Telly Savalas are barely in the coda this time.
Solo and Kuryakin are working together in most of the story for a change. I've gotta hand it to Kuryakin in the resolution of the cliffhanger...when they get out of their ropes on an unpiloted jet, Illya heads for the cockpit while Solo's first priority is to answer his communicator...!
I'm not usually one with an ear for TV composers, but Nelson Riddle's hand stood out for me here. The music sounds very similar to his Batman music, especially that used in the movie.
In one scene, the bad guys really slap Kim Darby around. I always wanted to do that to some of the kids in "Miri," but she wasn't one of them.
Another odd You Only Live Twice coincidence...the story takes our heroes and guest heroine to Japan, where Darby's character disguises herself as a Japanese woman (a geisha, to be specific).
Philip Ahn--Now I'm getting a hankering to start watching Kung Fu! His role was brief, but he belonged in the opening credtis of this part more than Savalas and Jurgens.
_______
The Saint
"Island of Chance"
Originally aired April 7, 1967 (UK)
Simon's introducing himself so much these days that I'm probably going to give up on bitching about it.
This one has a similar opening premise to "The Man Who Liked Lions" from earlier in the season...somebody gets murdered while trying to tell Simon something, so he investigates.
Simon doesn't engage in gunplay too much from what I've seen, so it's noteworthy that he blows somebody's head off...OK, it's a snake that somebody put in his bedroom, Dr. No style. Instead of feeling the tension as it was crawling up his bed, I was hearing Roger Moore of six years later: "You should never go in there without a mongoose."
Simon also uses Russian roulette as an interrogation technique...though true to form, it turns out the gun wasn't loaded.
Overall, it was a somewhat sloppy story...the deep, dark secret of the scientist who's the center of the plot turns out to be that he had a hidden gold stash, even though he was already established to have had a wealthy benefactress.
_______
Get Smart
"A Man Called Smart: Part 1"
Originally Aired April 8, 1967
I'm picking up this series as it approaches the end of its second season. The Daily Binge that I recorded was part of Remarkable Women month. One might assume that would mean these particular episodes would be among 99's stronger ones. More likely, they were chosen for other reasons, as the overall execution of that theme seemed arbitrary. This episode didn't seem to be at all 99-centric, for starters.
This is a show that I haven't seen too much of, but enough to get the gist of it. There was nothing kneeslappingly/asthma-inducingly hilarious here, but some half-decent gags:
The cliffhanger wouldn't have seemed terribly original to anyone who'd been watching Batman the previous season: Max rolling out the back of an ambulance on a stretcher.
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The Avengers
"The Superlative Seven"
Originally aired April 8, 1967 (UK)
Emma Does Her Party Piece
The "we're needed" scene is cute but doesn't agree with the scene that follows, in which Emma seems to be reading Steed's invitation for the first time. It ties in more closely with the completely absurd coda scene.
I was going to complain that our heroes are a little too quick to fall into traps by responding to invitations or requests from mysterious parties...but a twist here is that Steed smelled a trap from the beginning and had Emma tailing him. As the synopsis suggests, it's a very Steed-centric episode, with Emma off-camera for the bulk of it following the "briefing" scene, only popping up again in the last 10 minutes. I like Steed, but that's robbing the episode of two of the show's greatest strengths--Emma, and the chemistry between the two.
Of course, when it's revealed right out front that one of the people Steed's stranded with is planning to kill the rest of them, the group immediately does the stupidest thing possible--They split up! And they keep splitting up, even as their number gets whittled down at an alarming rate.
We know that we can rule Steed out, but everyone else is particularly suspicious of him, as he's the most tight-lipped about his occupation/area of expertise.
In general, the story did keep me guessing. It was neither the most nor least obvious suspect, but when the killer in their midst was revealed, it made perfect sense because there had been a substantial but easy-to-overlook clue. Somebody else might have spotted it more readily than I did.
One of the bad guys was a bald fellow with a very distinct look, such that I was sure I'd seen him somewhere before. It turns out that he holds a small but distinct role in the annals of geekdom--He's John Hollis, a.k.a. Lobot from The Empire Strikes Back (actually credited as "Lando's aide"). Among his other roles, he was also one of the Kryptonian elders in the first two Superman films.
_______
Coming up next week:
50 years ago this past week.
_______
Star Trek
"The City on the Edge of Forever"
Originally aired April 6, 1967
Stardate 3134.0
MeTV said:
See my post here.
I had a little more to say this week, but it's about as hard to find something new to say about an indisputably strong classic as it is about an indisputable turd.
_______
The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
"The Five Daughters Affair: Part II"
Originally aired April 7, 1967
Xfinity said:
Open Channel Deja Vu--The second part uses the same opening credits as the first, even though Curt Jurgens and Telly Savalas are barely in the coda this time.
Solo and Kuryakin are working together in most of the story for a change. I've gotta hand it to Kuryakin in the resolution of the cliffhanger...when they get out of their ropes on an unpiloted jet, Illya heads for the cockpit while Solo's first priority is to answer his communicator...!
I'm not usually one with an ear for TV composers, but Nelson Riddle's hand stood out for me here. The music sounds very similar to his Batman music, especially that used in the movie.
In one scene, the bad guys really slap Kim Darby around. I always wanted to do that to some of the kids in "Miri," but she wasn't one of them.
Another odd You Only Live Twice coincidence...the story takes our heroes and guest heroine to Japan, where Darby's character disguises herself as a Japanese woman (a geisha, to be specific).
Philip Ahn--Now I'm getting a hankering to start watching Kung Fu! His role was brief, but he belonged in the opening credtis of this part more than Savalas and Jurgens.
_______
The Saint
"Island of Chance"
Originally aired April 7, 1967 (UK)
IMDb said:
Simon's introducing himself so much these days that I'm probably going to give up on bitching about it.
This one has a similar opening premise to "The Man Who Liked Lions" from earlier in the season...somebody gets murdered while trying to tell Simon something, so he investigates.
Simon doesn't engage in gunplay too much from what I've seen, so it's noteworthy that he blows somebody's head off...OK, it's a snake that somebody put in his bedroom, Dr. No style. Instead of feeling the tension as it was crawling up his bed, I was hearing Roger Moore of six years later: "You should never go in there without a mongoose."
Simon also uses Russian roulette as an interrogation technique...though true to form, it turns out the gun wasn't loaded.
Overall, it was a somewhat sloppy story...the deep, dark secret of the scientist who's the center of the plot turns out to be that he had a hidden gold stash, even though he was already established to have had a wealthy benefactress.
_______
Get Smart
"A Man Called Smart: Part 1"
Originally Aired April 8, 1967
Xfinity said:
I'm picking up this series as it approaches the end of its second season. The Daily Binge that I recorded was part of Remarkable Women month. One might assume that would mean these particular episodes would be among 99's stronger ones. More likely, they were chosen for other reasons, as the overall execution of that theme seemed arbitrary. This episode didn't seem to be at all 99-centric, for starters.
This is a show that I haven't seen too much of, but enough to get the gist of it. There was nothing kneeslappingly/asthma-inducingly hilarious here, but some half-decent gags:
- A briefcase that sports an extending metal ladder.
- The Cone of Silence--I'm not sure exactly how often they used it, but know that it's a running gag. Here, the twist is that several people have to crowd into it at once.
- The Chief going through numbers of agents like a deli. When 86 comes up, Max has to check a slip in his pocket to confirm that it's his number.
- Max taking calls on multiple hotel phones at once, getting the cords tangled and the callers mixed up.
- A KAOS spokesman making their demands on TV in the style of a commercial.
The Chief said:
The cliffhanger wouldn't have seemed terribly original to anyone who'd been watching Batman the previous season: Max rolling out the back of an ambulance on a stretcher.
_______
The Avengers
"The Superlative Seven"
Originally aired April 8, 1967 (UK)
Steed Flies to NowhereWiki said:
Emma Does Her Party Piece
The "we're needed" scene is cute but doesn't agree with the scene that follows, in which Emma seems to be reading Steed's invitation for the first time. It ties in more closely with the completely absurd coda scene.
I was going to complain that our heroes are a little too quick to fall into traps by responding to invitations or requests from mysterious parties...but a twist here is that Steed smelled a trap from the beginning and had Emma tailing him. As the synopsis suggests, it's a very Steed-centric episode, with Emma off-camera for the bulk of it following the "briefing" scene, only popping up again in the last 10 minutes. I like Steed, but that's robbing the episode of two of the show's greatest strengths--Emma, and the chemistry between the two.
Of course, when it's revealed right out front that one of the people Steed's stranded with is planning to kill the rest of them, the group immediately does the stupidest thing possible--They split up! And they keep splitting up, even as their number gets whittled down at an alarming rate.
We know that we can rule Steed out, but everyone else is particularly suspicious of him, as he's the most tight-lipped about his occupation/area of expertise.
In general, the story did keep me guessing. It was neither the most nor least obvious suspect, but when the killer in their midst was revealed, it made perfect sense because there had been a substantial but easy-to-overlook clue. Somebody else might have spotted it more readily than I did.
One of the bad guys was a bald fellow with a very distinct look, such that I was sure I'd seen him somewhere before. It turns out that he holds a small but distinct role in the annals of geekdom--He's John Hollis, a.k.a. Lobot from The Empire Strikes Back (actually credited as "Lando's aide"). Among his other roles, he was also one of the Kryptonian elders in the first two Superman films.
_______
Coming up next week:
- Star Trek, "Operation: Annihilate!" (season finale)
- The Man from U.N.C.L.E., "The Cap and Gown Affair" (season finale)
- Get Smart, "A Man Called Smart: Part 2"
- The Avengers, "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Station"
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BTW, the intro for the Buck Rogers in the 25th Century pilot/movie is probably the most 70s thing ever appeared in a sci-fi series. This and the pants of Space:1999 first season
That sounds about right. Worth getting, if it ever comes out on a cheap DVD set.
Well, the Wiki page does confirm his involvement, but doesn't go into detail.
I wonder if it's the same giant clam that tried to eat Robin. There weren't a lot of giant clams working in Hollywood in those days.
This is one I've seen recently. Definitely short on Emma, but there have been other Emma-centric stories, so I guess it balances out.
And people complain about "Faith of the Heart."
Good question...maybe...the Tarzan episodes that featured it are already out of my deletion bin, so I can't double-check (though maybe it will be coming up again). If it was the same prop, it was dressed differently and looked more naturalistic shot underwater in Tarzan.
That begs the question: Did you catch the clue to the real killer?
I tried to google a little a bit, but there isn't a lot of material about this series.
From the Isaac Asimov FAQ:
From an interview to Parker Stevenson
He says "overseen by Isaac Asimov", so it doesn't seem that they just used his name as a publicity stunt.
ETA: Asimov talked about Probe in an editorial of the Isaac Asimov Science Fiction Magazine (January '89). Does anyone have it..?
ETA 2: Found it! This is the part relevant to Probe.
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^^ And that's why we love Asimov. I must have read that, because I was a subscriber to the print edition at the time (there was only a print edition at the time), but I don't remember-- and, since he didn't actually write it, I was not inspired to watch it.
I must have read that, because I was a subscriber to the print edition at the time (there was only a print edition at the time), but I don't remember-- and, since he didn't actually write it, I was not inspired to watch it.
Yep!
Columbo: "Death Hits the Jackpot": I suppose a story about Columbo vs. a lottery winner had to be about an already upper-class man who murdered his poor nephew to steal his lottery winnings, since Columbo has always been about the working-class lieutenant outwitting arrogant, rich, and privileged killers. Although Rip Torn comes off as a bit more rough-hewn than the usual killer, partly because of the Southern accent. He's also not very convincing as a rival in a battle of wits with Columbo, given how bluntly his reactions telegraph "Oh no, I've been caught in a lie" or "How I hate and fear this detective closing in on me." Jamie Rose is reasonably good as his accomplice, the nearly-ex-wife of the victim, but she's written inconsistently. Late in the story, when she asks Leon for the half of the money that she's legally entitled to and he puts her off with vague promises, you could see her recognizing that he'd done the same thing with the nephew in whose name he claimed the winnings -- which should've tipped her off that she might be the next to die and sent her to Columbo to give him up. Instead, she just kept up the deception until the end, and Columbo manipulated Leon into giving her up, which wasn't as satisfying an ending as if she'd been the one to give the unpleasant Leon his comeuppance.
The episode also tried to hard to be broad and funny, with all of the victim's neighbors being either stereotyped starving artists/hippies (in 1991) or broad ethnic stereotypes, and with a pet baby chimp playing a pivotal role in the episode. The chimp's fingerprint being the damning clue was kind of clever, if predictable as hell, but the whole thing seemed a little too twee, and it was unappealing from an animal-rights standpoint both in-story and in real life. (That cute baby chimp would've grown up to be a superstrong, untameable adult and would've been unable to be kept in captivity or survive in the wild. There's a reason there are laws against keeping wild animals as housepets.)
It occurs to me that this is the second movie in a row where the male murderer had a female accomplice, and the third of the past four where there have been two people implicated in the murder. There's another conspiracy three movies later, in one we've already seen, "It's All in the Game" with Faye Dunaway and Claudia Christian as the conspirators. And there are at least two more to follow before the end of the series.
The episode also tried to hard to be broad and funny, with all of the victim's neighbors being either stereotyped starving artists/hippies (in 1991) or broad ethnic stereotypes, and with a pet baby chimp playing a pivotal role in the episode. The chimp's fingerprint being the damning clue was kind of clever, if predictable as hell, but the whole thing seemed a little too twee, and it was unappealing from an animal-rights standpoint both in-story and in real life. (That cute baby chimp would've grown up to be a superstrong, untameable adult and would've been unable to be kept in captivity or survive in the wild. There's a reason there are laws against keeping wild animals as housepets.)
It occurs to me that this is the second movie in a row where the male murderer had a female accomplice, and the third of the past four where there have been two people implicated in the murder. There's another conspiracy three movies later, in one we've already seen, "It's All in the Game" with Faye Dunaway and Claudia Christian as the conspirators. And there are at least two more to follow before the end of the series.