Rabid

DVD, Smallville S9 (Rabid)

'Smallville' was never one to avoid the zeitgeist, so I have to imagine that 2008 was when zombies were rising in popularity in the mainstream, hence a zombie episode (I'm not going to get into the accuracy of whether someone's a zombie if they just act like one and it was caused by a virus - not interested). It seems like a standalone story, but in the last scenes we find out that it was a Kryptonian ploy to smoke out what they think is Jor-El, although it was unauthorised by Zod and it all goes a bit 'Highlander' at the end when he executes his errant man by beheading. Shame the story wasn't as compelling as the concepts in that series. When you strip away the mindless violence (which doesn't affect anyone, anyway - apparently everyone, especially the virus-inflicted, are made of rubber, and happily bounce, especially if they're Lois, who gets thrown three metres against a wall at Metropolis General by the infected Tess, and a few seconds later shows no ill effects. Maybe her mass of hair cushioned the impact?), you're left with a standard story of Clark and the Scooby gang (these days it's Chloe and Dr. Hamilton), trying to find a cure. It doesn't take long, and the main story is fairly quickly resolved (just use a handy Kryptonite-tipped needle that LuthorCorp happen to have, and which they, what, stole? Were willing to give? How does Hamilton even know about it?), by using Clark's blood to develop an antidote, then seed it across the clouds over the city using the Queen jet.

The point is to have some action horror, and it's fine, even if, as I said, no violence has any consequences. Did Lois kill any of the infected that were after her? It can't have done their brains any good to be clonked with a fire extinguisher! I was really hoping everyone wouldn't wake up looking fully normal, especially Lois, who sags in Clark's arms and looks like she's lost her fire, but retained the bad teeth and black face gunge, but then, miraculously, seconds later she's back to full make-up face! What a virus. That's the trouble with the series: there's rarely any sign of damage for all the physical trauma ordinary mortals go through, or even scars. Unless you count mental ones, as modelled by Oliver Queen, who rips up the city on his bike, in bad boy persona, bitter about Clark saving everyone, and equating him in religious connotations that do no favour to his sense of humanity - even mockingly calling him a god is distasteful, not the least for Clark, who doesn't aspire to such heights, but Oliver also leads an officer of the law into conduct highly unbecoming, and fails in the simple charge of keeping Lois awake in the lift Clark leaves them in for safety. Couldn't he have given her one of his pills? He even burns the green costume at the end, rather than what I thought he'd do, and don it once again.

I didn't really understand the deal with the Justice League, and the mention of how Chloe's keeping them safe by spying on them and keeping them away from each other. Was that the gist? I'm starting to wonder if Hamilton is safe, as he's too good to be true and I'm expecting a double-cross somewhere along the line. It just sounded so odd, but it seems clear Oliver still isn't in the mood to lead the merry band. It's difficult having a group of superheroes in a series dedicated to one, as they can only steal the limelight, or they look weak in comparison, which may be reasons why the League are so rarely seen or mentioned, and are usually busy off in the world, thataway. Another group that's busy is Zod's Kryptonian fan club, who are integrating into society in secret (maybe blasting massive symbols representing each house wasn't such a good idea after all…), Tess worried her men will lose track of them if they don't locate them soon. Her concern doesn't stretch to her henchmen's wellbeing, whom she's quite happy to abandon to protect herself when the zombies attack at the mansion (and Lex' glass table, or another one like it, gets smashed again, Tess chucked through it). How did the virus get that far out into the country? As usual, it was pretty daft, but the action wasn't bad, Tess using a samurai sword to finish off her attackers, although the best was Clark trying not to do anything too super when he's protecting Lois, but not looking like he's protecting Lois during the rampage in the Planet.

That was one of the successes of the episode: Clark's abilities being used to good effect. The best example we don't even see, but that's the point, as Lois is telling him about this fire that's started, he offers to get some coffee, and then when he zips back in seconds his hand is slightly singed and he knows exactly how long The Blur took to put out the fire… That's impressive, but it was also nice when he uses his breath to lower the temperature of Lois' coffee so she'll go and get more, leaving him free for his next task. It was also a good use when he plays taxi service ("Do you get motion sickness?"), to carry Dr. Hamilton across town in seconds so he can find out about the virus at the hospital (why hasn't he done this more often?), and he carefully chucks some people up the stairs in the escape when Lois isn't looking. She's really liking him more and more, as expected, offloading stuff about The Blur and wanting to say something as she enjoys his nursemaiding of her injury, but changing the subject. He just seems more of a hero in her eyes, something you could never imagine her calling him a couple of seasons ago. She'll have to know his secret eventually, though, and it's a toss-up whether she'll ever forgive him for all the lies, half-truths and deceptions… I'm sure she will.

Clark symbolically puts Lana's photo away in an album, and then Lois visits him to say thanks, so we know where it's all going. What isn't so clear is where the Kryptonians' story is going, since it's still a mystery why they don't have the abilities that their people should have under the yellow sun. Maybe they need to spend more time outside rather than hanging around in dingy warehouses… Just a suggestion. It wasn't a particularly good episode, but by the low standards of the season, it was certainly the best so far, and I hope this trend continues, as by the end of the season we might actually get some properly entertaining stories, more character moments and meaningful events. One can hope… Although I wouldn't recommend it in this case if Lois' nightmarish vision (which she had in broad waking daylight this time, standing in the sunshine outside the Kent Farm), is a sign of things to come, with what appears to be Chloe's death foreseen. Knowing she didn't stay for Season 10, that seems a strong likelihood.

**

The Plague Part II

DVD, Starsky & Hutch S3 (The Plague Part II)

"Part Two: The Plague," announces the voiceover after recapping the events of the first part, followed by the title on screen: 'The Plague Part II.' But that's not the oddest inconsistency of that recap - it does a fine job of bringing us up to speed on what came before, but if you know what actually came before it throws you off by chucking in a couple of scenes from the episode you're about to watch and you start to question your memory: I don't recall Hutch being so ill and Starsky standing over him in a surgeon's mask, or him visiting Roper with the suggestion of playing bait to draw Callendar out… That's because it hadn't happened yet, so why did they include it in the recap? Strange decisions aside, I was right in my memory that this was the better part of the story, as Starsky continues in the 'all business' mode that he adopted at the end of the first part, taking no nonsense, no time for games or fripperies, seen at its most pure when he takes it upon himself to walk into the lion's den of Charles Roper's estate. Surrounded by Roper's edgy men, his gun removed from his person, he doesn't present any less than a full and serious challenge to the man. In other words he's far from cowed and Roper doesn't understand the intensity he brings into the room. If Starsky's mission wasn't so personal, and on a knife-edge, you sense at the drop of a pin he'd erupt and wildly maul as many of Roper's goons as got in his way - he even grabs Roper by his lapel, only the man's coolness and willingness for the meeting to play out stops things from getting messy.

It looked as if Roper was intrigued by 'Mr. Cop' visiting his doorstep, but if all he had to do was sit around playing chess with a drink in his hand, waiting for news of Callendar, it's no surprise he welcomed a diversion - he was already far gone enough that he talked about himself in third person! Starsky's more than that, though, he wants Roper as a decoy to draw Callendar out into the open. It was only a slim chance he'd go for it, we later hear in conversation between him and Dobey that they didn't expect him to, but he's willing to do whatever it takes. One scene that showed how Hutch's friends were pulling together was when Huggy was shown to be helping Starsky, although ineffectually as his ears on the street are too scared at both Thomas Callendar, a hitman, and Roper, a syndicate boss, to want to give any information on where he might be. I really wanted 'Starsky & Hug' to be the theme of the episode, as if this was a potential spinoff (like 'Huggy Bear and The Turkey'), with Huggy taking Hutch's place. It would have been fascinating to see a cop and a streetwise hustler out in the city working together to track down their man - only recently I was speculating what would have happened if one of the main stars had wanted to leave, and I couldn't really imagine the remaining one with anyone else, but now that I think about it, having Huggy as an unofficial partner could have made for a great continuation.

It's really Starsky's episode, though, I don't think Huggy (or Dobey), got an episode focused on their character this season, more's the pity. Hutch isn't forgotten, of course, his friendship with Dr. Judith Kaufman, which was a mere nothing in Part I, is developed a little with their short conversation through the isolation ward's telephone, though it's the long look they share when Hutch calls her back to the window that says more than their words. You could point to a patient forming an attachment to their doctor, except that Hutch was immediately fond of her even before he became a patient. It could be said to be the usual drawing together of people under duress, banding together in their time of need, especially as she doesn't hang around after the crisis is averted, off to her next assignment - Hutch suggests she's afraid to take a chance, but she has to go or she'd have surely died, getting that close to him! They either die or move away, the latter option a little better for her than the former, though indeed, I thought she was going to go down with the virus, as there was a slight suggestion of tiredness in Part I that could have become something more, and which we see again in this one, but neither she nor Dr. Meredith come down with the disease. Overall, it was just a minor subplot to fill out the two-parter, because it's really Starsky's care for his partner that matters to us.

The episode gave us some nice, heartfelt moments, such as when Starsky uses Judith's lipstick to draw 'Starsk' on Hutch's isolation window, so when he wakes he's encouraged. Why no curtains, though - are patients not allowed a little privacy? Dobey says it with flowers, showing his loyalty by taking the time to visit his man. It shows that they care, beyond the task of finding a killer. The killer himself gets his best scenes, whether it's the frank conversation between himself and Helen Yeager, the owner of the guest house, or the continued bond with Richie who attends him during his relapse after his recent exertions. Helen asks him to leave and he does, tramping the streets in his long overcoat and looking as much the tramp as his disguise of Part I. Helen also has a tearful appeal to him when Starsky finally sways the authorities (Dobey and Meredith), by pointing out it's either "Jail for Callendar or Hutch's life, what's it going to be?" A bit simplistic, as we know he's sure to be responsible for other deaths in future. Meredith's opposed to making the information public yet as it could cause panic and it was really Helen's emotional push that shifted the balance to allow the TV appeal to get Callendar to bring himself in. With Roper out to kill him they're desperate to get his blood while he's still alive, to formulate the cure. It's the thought of little Richie that gets to Callendar - perhaps he had a child once, or wanted one, who knows? If you think about it enough you could come up with all kinds of a backstory: maybe he empathised with Richie because his own Father left him, he certainly doesn't balk at Helen's wishes when she says she doesn't want her son hurt again.

You'd have thought Callendar would have done a better job of getting to the hospital than just showing up in a yellow cab and walking out of it normally, as he must have expected Roper to be watching the place. Maybe he still intended to finish his job, and was hoping the man would be there? In a way everyone gets what they wanted: Roper and his men shoot down Callendar, Callendar shoots down Roper, Starsky gets Callendar's blood, Helen gets her boy back, which is what Callendar also wanted. And the state doesn't have to let a hitman go, his punishment, death, or so I assume. He finds a sort of redemption by doing the selfless thing, 'all debts paid,' as he says. It's not entirely selfless, as he was promised immunity, but it becomes that when it appears he's fatally injured, although I wasn't certain about that. It looked like he got shot in the arm, spinning backwards in the firefight outside the hospital, but inside we see he's bleeding from a wound to the stomach, so either there was a bit of a continuity glitch there, or he was shot in more than one place simultaneously. I liked that rather than run for the hospital, he lives up to his reputation and takes the attackers on, and that Starsky and he end up working together for that brief moment, Starsky valiantly dashing over to his prone form to protect it, though not for Callendar's sake, of course, for the vital blood inside him.

Although it wasn't clear if Callendar or Roper actually died from their injuries it would make sense for poetic justice and that's how I like to see it, but it could have done with clarification. We don't even see Richie up and about again, the episode suffering from closing out syndrome: having only a short time in which to finish up. It wasn't the best written two-parter, though Part II makes up for a lot in Part I. In this one, Dobey says Starsky's stretching it a bit when he acts on a lead from the area where Callendar went missing: Helen Yeager, who usually pays with small change, paid for her groceries with a new $100 bill, but I'd say the writers were stretching it themselves at that point! It was a tense moment when Starsky drives up to the guest house, taking no risks as he makes contact with Helen, though there was no actual danger as it turned out, since Callendar was long gone. The actress that played Yeager added a lot of colour to the performance, a really believable response to events, such as a man suddenly pushing her inside her own house with his hand over her mouth, even if he was claiming to be a cop - she has an outrage about her, but still remains a polite, law-abiding civilian, but when her boy is threatened by the virus she won't keep away from him, and as I mentioned, it was her forcefulness that got the TV spot in the end, and her appeal that got to Callendar ,so she was probably the best character in it. An ordinary, decent sort, but strong enough to take what happened.

As often happens in second parts, we get down to business and don't play around much, though there are references to Florence Nightingale (Hutch doesn't want to look like her in his paper isolation garb), Starsky says "Alakazam, Captain Marvel," when he's trying to cheer his partner up, and there's a callback to the running joke of Part I: in the tag scene at the end Hutch is full of energy and life, mentioning the village where people live to a hundred and forty-eight plus, and says he's got over a hundred years to go, in his optimism and joy at being back to normal. But I thought they were going to return to the other joke about Starsky's car being towed away as he parks in the same place as last time and once again we hear the announcement that it's a no parking zone, and since they're on their way to the exit as they chat it seemed a given, but they didn't even get to the car before the episode ended! I noticed at the front of the hospital it said 'Memorial Hospital' in big letters, but unless this is a different one in the previous episode it was called City Hospital, and then Callendar orders the taxi driver he's held up at gunpoint to go to Lincoln Hospital, so which is it? Or are they all the same place with different buildings? Or is this a major slip up? Roper made me think that it would have been good for the series to have an ongoing syndicate boss as a villain, like Stryker, or others that have come and gone, because if we'd built up a recurring baddie who'd died in the firefight like it seemed Roper may have, it would have had more satisfaction to it. But they didn't go in much for continuing stories, beyond two-parters.

***

The Plague Part I

DVD, Starsky & Hutch S3 (The Plague Part I)

This one is, if you'll pardon the pun, a bit of a plague to get through. It's full of seventies drab, like the beige tiled environs of City Hospital, or the dirty streets such as those where renowned assassin, Thomas Callendar, makes an attempt on Roper's life. He's not much of a marksman for someone dubbed 'the prince of hitmen,' even taking into account the effects of the virus on his body, his big moment of success in this part of the story being to stab an associate in the back after being blackmailed for the essential firing pin he needs to do the job on Roper. Now that was a good scene: taking place high above the city at night, atop a building with the lights of other buildings and cars below, glimmering in the blackness, the sound of sirens through the distant night air… It was atmospheric, like a good film, and as I mentioned, proved to be Callendar's only triumph. The trouble with a focus on mob politics as your main draw is that there's no reason to care - why should we bat an eyelid if Roper's taken down by some other mob boss? Let them fight it out amongst themselves, it'll be less work for the police… That would be the argument anyway, though who's to say the innocent public wouldn't get caught up in these attacks, especially if it escalated. So, as if to temper the mob story, there's a more personal side to things when Callendar introduces a virus into the populace by coming into contact with a friend of S&H's, Lieutenant Jake Donner, another of their good friends that we've never met or heard of before…

A better result was achieved at making us care about the ramifications of his death, as opposed to the potential for Roper's, not so much by the camaraderie between Jake and S&H, since they share very little screen time, but with the shock announcement by the doctor that he'd died. Moments prior, we're introduced to his wife, Virginia, who we can see wholeheartedly likes and trusts S&H, and we hear a little of what it's like to be the wife of a cop, always worrying if he'll come home. The scene sells it, as does the strong reactions of the interested parties, Starsky almost angry at the doctor for not knowing what was wrong with him. But then the drabness starts in earnest as S&H are forced into quarantine, having been in contact with the deceased, playing card games until they're freed after seventy-two hours. This was a bit of a bone of contention with me, because if they were considered free of the virus after that time, how is it that Hutch later comes down with it? They say something about after that amount of time the patient is safe, but then they'd let S&H out to roam the city searching for everyone Jake came into contact with, so presumably Hutch was spreading it all around as he went. And it would have been impossible to track down all those people at the airport - don't they count as having been in contact, since Jake was in the vicinity of so many people? Even with the use of Trans World Airlines' most up to date security cameras, they'd never be able to find all those people!

As an aside, it's revealing to see the kind of technology of the time - they only turn on the cameras when instructed to do so, when there's an incident, and a picture is taken every three seconds, a bit like the system at the bank in another two-parter, Season 2's 'The Set-Up.' What developments! It is funny to hear about such 'advanced' equipment for the time, and see the gestation of the things we take for granted today, although it makes the series seem more and more ancient the further tech progresses in our own time. Amazingly, and usefully for the story, Callendar was caught on camera and the airport boss remembered exactly what happened, but then in reality they would have no hope of chasing down Callendar, and very little hope of even identifying him as the cause, so we'll let them off on those counts. But the other thing that doesn't make this much of an episode, to stick alongside the ugliness and the lack of threat, is the waiting. S&H are waiting to be let out of quarantine, then they're waiting around for Callendar to show up; Dr.'s Kaufman and Meredith are waiting for results, or for the next clue to show up; the truck driver's waiting to get back to his delivery… Waiting is close to being bored, and there's so much of it that S&H even comment: Starsky says he finished with that routine in the army (an interesting note on his backstory, which I don't believe we'd ever heard before), prompting Hutch to call back to an earlier conversation about long life, and if you had it you'd develop patience, and have time to think and improve your mind.

This is the only running gag of the episode, and it's not really a gag, more a serious conversation, but it is running, and after opening the episode with it, they neatly refer back to it at various points. It helps that it gains resonance through what happens to Hutch, too: he read in National Geographic about some tribe that lives to one hundred and forty-plus, sparking off the points of view of whether it's better to live healthy, improve the mind and live for another one hundred and twenty years, or, as Starsky prefers, have only sixty swinging years. It's very true to their natures, as Hutch has always been the healthy one in mind and body, while Starsky's less cultured, more comfortable with junk food and doesn't tend to put a lot of stock in exercise (as evidenced by the recent 'I Love You, Rosey Malone'!). This would usually only be banter, but it becomes meaningful thanks to Hutch going down with the plague, though he still plans to be around for one hundred and forty-eight years! That's another thing that hinders the episode, however, as we've seen S&H struck down before and inhabiting a hospital bed (and would again in such episodes as 'The Game' in Season 4), and we know they're going to be fine. It's just an excuse to force one half of the partnership into doing all the work and increasing the stakes for him, but it's not for us because clearly they're going to survive (the clue's in the title, 'Starsky & Hutch,' not 'Starsky, After His Partner Died'). It would have made more sense to give us a new character, make us care about them, and then threaten that person with the disease.

I was wrong about there being only the one running gag, as I've just remembered, like Yoda lying on his deathbed, "There… is… anoth…er." When S&H visit the airport to meet Jake, Starsky parks out front where you can clearly hear a continual announcement not to park there, so it should be unsurprising that when they return, the Torino's about to be towed away, and rightfully so. Starsky flips out the badge (the second time they've been a little condescending after the airport guards want to check them when they set off the metal detectors, and they go all inappropriate on them, with innuendo to the female member of staff, and the guards have to explain that they're only doing their job, as if cops get special treatment, making S&H look most unprofessional!), and the Tow Driver rightfully questions his wish to play favourites, but Hutch says he does, and we can assume it was straightened out and the car didn't get towed - why should they have that kind of treatment, they weren't even there on a call, or anything, just picking up a friend! How does this turn into a running gag? Well, the same thing happens at the hospital when Starsky again butts against authority, protesting at the doctor's orders about putting him, Hutch and Mrs Donner in quarantine, but pleasingly, the doctor is having none of it and says he's the law in this hospital! It can't be good when you want your main characters put in their place, can it?

I was in two minds over whether the episode played up the positive or negative aspects of the city, and came to the conclusion it was a balance of the two - I mentioned the dull, grimy streets, we see Callendar undercover as a drunk (failing even in his cover, as S&H spot, he has rather too fancy shoes for a tramp), there's a whole sequence set on the streets where S&H are on the hunt for anyone who had anything to do with Jake since he got back, and that includes prostitutes, a dodgy magazine stand (Big Ben, the short guy who was the only character you could really put in the wacky category - he wasn't that wacky, either, but had a very tall assistant and was obviously very short, with a sense of humour, and in Season 3 that qualifies! He's a sort of forerunner for Danny DeVito's similar role later in the season), and then there's the fact that you have lots of lower class professions: we get a Tow Driver, a Taxi Driver and a Truck Driver, all three in the credits! But on the other hand we have the airport, which certainly isn't shabby, nor is the hospital or offices of various people (the one where they met Kaufman and Meredith looked like it could be a redress of Dobey's), and to counter the class roles, there are plenty of professional characters, too, with three doctors, and airport staff, not to mention Helen Yeager, who hires out the room to Callendar.

The scenes set here helped to give Callendar (or Steele, as he's known there), a bit more fleshing out, even a glimmer of likability - he immediately develops the beginnings of a bond with Richie, Helen's young son (something which I believe was his undoing in Part II, if I remember correctly), Richie asking in that unabashed way of children whether he really did come from Canada as they'd been told, since his Father went there and never came back. He only winks at the kid, but later, when Richie is more insistent that they follow his wishes about not getting a doctor during Callendar's battle with the disease, he sees an ally, and after recovering, notices that the boy's in need of new trainers and gives him the money for them. For a trained killer it shows that there's another side to him, he hasn't extracted all his humanity in order to do his job. Then again, maybe that's why he doesn't perform as well as his renown would suggest, failing miserably in two attempts on Roper (the first, granted, his eyes went blurry as Roper came out of a pool hall frontage, which looked like a familiar location), missing him in the street when S&H interfere. He really should have done better. Even more so when you consider how good a character he was last season! Okay, so Alex Rocco was Lieutenant Fargo in 'The Committee,' a completely different character, but it was very distracting when S&H meet Jake and then 'Fargo' walks right past - this character didn't seem quite as interesting as Fargo, either. They must have liked him, though, as this time he got 'Special Guest Star' billing!

Often on two-parters they show the main actors' credits at the start, but this time they didn't, although they did have the episode title on screen, so there wasn't a lot of consistency. It's better having the actors' names in the end credits as then you can match them up to the characters they played, which wasn't so easy if they were just names without roles. It ends in suitably dramatic fashion, with Starsky, having learned of Hutch's deadline of forty-eight hours, setting out to nail Callendar as the only source of an antidote to the plague, but I didn't feel he sold the unrestrained determination that we've seen before when he's desperate and Hutch is in trouble. He does have a minor argument with Dobey, but the Captain reminds him he can't put the whole precinct on the case as other lives are important, too. So Starsky snaps to it, charged up and fully professional (in stark contrast to the earlier, relaxed and unprofessional behaviour), he wants the Truck Driver's story of having seen Callendar "Clean, clear, and now," and gives a speech to the assembled police, finishing with the sentiment to the Sergeant that his partner is dying with every tick of the clock, and 'To Be Continued' flashes up on screen. It's just that everything was so calm, Hutch taking his wheelchair in good grace, but rather than a feeling of him holding back his fear, it's like he really is quite cool about it, no worries. The growing friendship between Judith Kaufman and him was very much underplayed, mentioned in passing by Starsky, as if this will give us more reason to be concerned for Hutch, but it doesn't work.

The introduction of two doctors (Kaufman and Meredith), from Disease Control, was designed to emphasise the gravity of the situation, but something about the episode doesn't sell this plague as a major threat to the city, as it supposedly is. In contrast to my argument about mob war being too impersonal that they needed a personal story, I think we didn't need Hutch to go down with it, it's always better seeing S&H working together, and although their expertise isn't in detecting disease and coming up with a plan (it would be more in their line to be helping to move people, or quarantine areas of the city that had been affected), they are qualified to be tracking down the culprit to race for an antidote. What if we'd seen the whole city be affected, make it a proper, big two-parter, with cops struck down, a city-wide emergency, the army called in, people looting, people lying in the streets, collapsed… It wouldn't need to be done on a huge scale, just enough to suggest the effect of what's happening. In reality the only street work we see in earnest is when S&H go out on the rounds to track down Jake's recent associations - last episode they had a reporter along for the ride, this time it's Dr. Judith, so at least the quality of their passengers is going up!

The stunt doubles are noticeable here and there, most obviously in chasing the pickpocket at the airport - I was wondering at first why he wasn't played by Picerni (although to be fair he had a visible role in just the previous episode, so even for the imagined short-term memories of seventies viewers that was probably too soon), but then you see Picerni's clearly taking on the stunt chase after the thief as Starsky, through crowds on escalators and such, so it would be tough to double both Starsky and play another role (though I have the feeling he did just that one time, though the episode escapes me). The thief was actually played by one James Oliver, which could be the same actor who played Ted in Season 1's 'Savage Sunday' under the slightly different name of Louis James Oliver - he did seem slightly familiar… If so, he wasn't the only actor to possibly be returning since the doctor who reveals Jake's fate at the hospital was played by David Milton, who may be the same as David Scott Milton who played Officer Edwards in another Season 1 episode, 'Pariah.' One guy who definitely was in another episode was Eric Mason, who was credited as 'Waiting Man,' and whom I assume was Roper's chauffeur, getting into a scuffle with tramp Callendar. He played Rodgers in 'Snowstorm' (coincidentally also from Season 1!).

There's not a lot of examples for our lists, but as well as National Geographic, Jesse James is mentioned (the Truck Driver mentions Callendar went faster than Jesse James on a train). We see the good old leap through the open window of the Torino (which I think had already been done once this season already, in 'Murder On Voodoo Island, Part 2'), when Hutch has to get in quick to stop Starsky from having to slow down any more in the chase for Callendar, and there's also a bit of banter between them about the state of Starsky's car, when Hutch throws an empty coffee cup into the backseat, then complains about the mess back there, so Starsky blames it on him throwing his cups in there. I also noticed that Callendar takes a Beverly Hills cab to his guest house, so does that mean that the place is close to Bay City, or is this somewhere of the same name? Huggy gets a short moment of assistance, none too keen to be flagged down on the street in broad daylight, but if anyone didn't know of his connection to S&H by now then they must be pretty slow! I have the impression the second part of the story was an improvement, which isn't often the case, but I'll reserve judgement until I see it again.

**

Metallo

DVD, Smallville S9 (Metallo)

A variation on the old freak-of-the-week theme, but Metropolis-ised to suit the way the series is now, though it still all boils down to a fight in a disused building, the only witness (Lois), conveniently being knocked unconscious (with the usual absence of any sign or effect of her being slapped across a room into some metal pipes - she has a tiny dribble of blood at one corner of her mouth, and no bruising to the face, has no need to take it easy for a few days, or shows any sign of back pain!), Clark having to fight the guy, and, this time at least, coming up with an ingenious way to win. That was one of the minor details that made me slightly more amenable to this episode than to the first of this season: Clark, up against (presumably 'Metallo,' since that's the name of the episode, and presumably this is a 'famous' villain from the comics whom I know nothing of), a Brian Austin Green with a Kryptonite heart, is affected as usual, and uses a sheet of lead plating, which he then heats up and welds to the guy's chest. Only that isn't what defeats him - he defeats himself by pulling the lead off and taking the heart mechanism with it. I'd already been spoiled that something was going to happen to Green's character, John Corben, as the DVD episodes menu had a picture of him as RoboGreenHeartMan. It's a shame that a good actor like him was used in such a manner, and so quickly. I thought he was going to be a recurring face for a while that would be in opposition to The Blur, thus cementing Lois' already strong devotion by his negativity. He could have carried proper drama, but instead they turn him into the standard enhanced villain.

He was fine as an ordinary human being, he didn't need to have some weird aspect added to him, even if it was a bit of an in-joke to have him turn into "a real-life Terminator," as Lois puts, he having been a cast member on 'Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles,' and a proven actor because of it. I'm sure we'll be seeing Metallo again, since Tess and her minor minion mention that he's like a machine that has gone offline. At least there was more of a solid story instead of trying to introduce too much and race around without any thought, as happened in 'Savior,' with an actual theme appearing: Clark can never full turn away from his humanity. I was lamenting (maybe too strong a word, perhaps slightly missing), the fact that 'Smallville' isn't the same without Smallville in it any more (something vocalised by Lois, who says something similar, though she's referring to Clark, whom she always nicknamed 'Smallville'), so it was quite nice to return to the house where so many happy times (and many more unhappy ones), took place. Clark really ought to spare a few seconds for dusting, though, it can't be good for a dog to live in a place that choked with dust! Shelby's long-awaited return (not really), at least highlighted Clark's mundane attachment to ordinary life, even if he has neglected the chores - and neglect is the right word when you consider he could clean the whole house top to bottom in seconds. I always remember that episode from, I think, Season 1, where he has a massive party, cleans up, then we hear his parents clapping mockingly as they stand to one side, having seen what he's done!

Chloe too, recognises that Clark's not done being Clark, and is still looking backwards (the same as me as I watch the series, really), and that he isn't telling Jor-El about his attachment to Lois. That wasn't badly played this time, with Lois a willing sidekick, rushing to 'their' phone booth to report, and Clark tempted to reveal his face when she wakes at the end. I wonder whether she'll be disappointed or surprised when it eventually happens, but at least she's best buddies with Clark nowadays, over the moon at his return from 'visiting' 'his' 'cousins' (as told to her by Mrs. Kent, who gets two references this episode - Lois also mutters to herself about Clark's Mum not liking the state of her old place if she saw it, when she visits the farmhouse). Talking of which, the Kandorians, as Tess and minion refer to them, don't appear (except for the intriguing concept that when Zod arrived there were burn marks of other houses from Krypton, for each of them that came, including one of the House of El…), which may have been why this was a slightly more appealing episode, though it's suggested they were the ones that cyborg-ised Corben. They must be really good surgeons, as well as soldiers, right? And how did they know he was going to get run over, do they stand above the city watching, listening and waiting as Clark does? Doesn't sound like Zod's style. The lorry driver was heartless not to stop, and the aftermath of Corben's collision was rather gory, blood all over him, lying in a pool of it… I can't say I really felt sorry for him either, as he just walks out into the road without looking both ways, from between parked cars - very stupid, or careless.

The motivation of his sister, Rebecca, getting killed by a murderer that escaped a van Clark saved, wasn't the greatest, and very cliched, but I sort of got his point about Clark coming in and altering people's destinies. But what else can you do? You're either going to use your abilities, or not, and if you don't use them they'd be wasted, and if you do use them, not everything's going to pan out wonderful for everyone, but you can't hold him responsible for the actions of a murderer - otherwise you'd be saying he should spy on every citizen and stop them from even attempting crime of any kind, and then it becomes a Big Brother state of existence, with everyone under a watchful eye. He'd be a dictator, not a hero. So there were at least little things to make you think, which is commendable. I forgot that Dr. Hamilton was in on Clark's secret, or so completely on the inside that Clark goes to him for help, which makes the series feel rather different. He could do with someone to advise him, as Jonathan and Martha used to do, to help with the big questions (and the small).

In other news, Lois gets her job back at the Planet (did she ever really lose it?), by threatening Tess by saying she'll go to the Inquisitor and spill the beans about her alien takeover thing. Why doesn't she just go to work for that paper anyway, what's so great about the Daily Planet since Tess holds sway over it? Why would Tess even take a threat from her, she might as well just kidnap her or batter her about again? Maybe she secretly admires Lois' gall, or finds her more useful as someone to spy on, or is so desperate to find out what happened when she vanished, since she doesn't know about the trip to the future… It's all up in the air at the moment, but at least Chloe and Clark don't hate each other any more, even if she's a little lost when it comes to Lois and The Blur/Clark and Lois, while she plays piggy in the middle, unwilling to tell Lois the truth about his identity, and somewhat infuriated by Clark's attitude to heroism. She's softened on him a little, but thinks that, basically, he should stop messing about with little things like feeding the dog and get on with world-saving training. That's my take, anyway. It was nice to revisit the farmhouse, even for a short while, and even though it didn't add much to the story, because one of the series' great concepts was the weird and the strange and the dangerous, amidst the safe and the homely, something which was lost long, long ago. Even a reminder of homely, was something positive - we even see Chloe's at the Talon again, which I'd forgotten. So not as bad, but still a lot of improvement required.

**

The Heroes

DVD, Starsky & Hutch S3 (The Heroes)

If you want to know what 'Starsky & Hutch' is all about then this is a perfect episode to watch - it's got the car chase, it's got the gunfight, it's got the victims, it's got the heroes, the humour and the Huggy Bear. Okay, that last one I just added in for effect, Hug only gets the one scene, but this just adds to the feeling that this is the series back to 'normal,' if you want to call it that, away from particular issues and driving head-on into the all-round issue of policing in the 1970s, the challenges and tactics, the professional attitudes of the time, and the way things can appear to the untrained eye. You could say it's almost an apologist for the type of detectives S&H are, but it's more about putting the uninitiated in their place (or her place!), and showing that far from being the chauvinistic, bullying, lawless cops (well, apart from the chauvinist part, but Chris proved perfectly capable of handling their attentions and keeping a professional distance), they really are down and dirty heroes, beating the kinks out of the city. Maybe it's a patch job, but it's better than no job, and as Starsky cries, they have to work within this system and these laws. It's one of the best episodes because it's a combination of Season 1's hardness (lining up all the patrons at the bar for an impromptu 'lesson,' was very much the style of that season), with the goofiness and chuckle-worthy competing and teasing between S&H that made Season 2 more fun. Season 3, at least in this episode, is suddenly a lot less serious.

And yet… it is. This time the angle is of an outsider along for the ride, C.D. Phelps, whom they and their Captain all assume is a man, S&H backtracking considerably on their lack of cooperation on the idea of a reporter riding along with them for a column in the Dispatch (I wonder if this has anything to do with the London Daily Dispatch of 'Bust Amboy'?), when 'he' turns out to be a 'she,' and not just any she, but another blonde for the boys to fight over. We'd already had 'crusading girl reporter' Jane Hutton, in 'Murder Ward,' but Chris seems both more professional and more realistic as a journalist, where Jane stuck out like a sore thumb in her undercover operation at the Mental Institution. Chris, a mere twenty-six, wants to write about police work on the street, but makes it clear this isn't going to be a hatchet job. All the same, S&H are ordered to play nursemaid and concentrate only on their current case: someone's cutting Strychnine with heroin, killing users off. This would have been fine if they'd made it clear to Chris this was how it stood, but she's expecting a normal day in the life, so when they ignore minor calls (as they'd been instructed to), it makes them look lazy, and when they go about their methods of gaining information it looks like bullying. To be fair on Chris, she did see the worst of them - to the viewer, it's hilarious the way they fight over her attention, slimily holding her microphone hand when she interviews them, squabbling amongst themselves, but it must have made her a little uncomfortable.

This is one of the keys to making this episode so much fun to watch, because it really is excruciating the games they play - Starsky, for perhaps the first time ever, suggests they should share the driving, when he's never been happy about Hutch messing with his car before. It's because Hutch finds it a lot easier to chat to Christine, as she's wedged uncomfortably between the two sweaty cops in the front seat (no seatbelts, either!). The running jokes of the episode are uneven, that is to say, they phase in and out, one of them being the bet S&H make between themselves on whether Chris is Hutch's type or not. This begins as a $5 bet at first, but later rises to $20, but we never find out who won, probably because the friendly relations are curtailed when Chris' first column hits the stands. The atmosphere becomes decidedly frosty when it appears the hatchet job she mentioned hasn't been laid aside, after all. The distance between them is shown in the fact she's not invited into the front seat any more, having to sit in the back, while the stony-faced cops decide to show her what the grim side of city life is really like, and what they're up against. But she does have a conscience, she was never out to 'nail' them, she really did want to discover what the 'counter-culture cops' as she calls them, what 'the new breed' do. You can tell she feels bad about slating them, but stands by what she saw.

She's right, of course, because to someone coming in fresh to the tough street life that S&H deal with on a daily basis, it isn't easy to understand the way they feel they have to work - one of the most interesting ideas of the episode is the question of judgement and how much is excessive violence. This is particularly well resolved when they finally catch up with Paul Rizzo, the guy dealing in Strychnine, which turns into another hallmark of earlier seasons, but which we haven't seen much of here: a gunfight atop a roof. Chris has signed a waiver so they're not responsible for her if she gets hurt, but she ends up getting used as a hostage by Rizzo, and screaming for S&H to shoot him down in the midst of her fear. But the pair talk him down instead, in a powerful scene in which we see the pitiful criminal cry like a child, admitting his guilt, but also hear that his sister was killed by drugs or druggies, it doesn't really matter which, I wasn't paying enough attention to the words at that point because the spectacle of what was happening was so engulfing. Chris can't understand why they didn't just shoot him, and Starsky explains patiently, it was because they didn't need to, as the music turns both triumphant and sad, but also heroic. And all at once she realises the difference between excessive force and good judgement and the slate is wiped clean, S&H get a heroic review and all is right with the world again. It's a great ending!

At the same time, you could say that Chris had a point. She didn't know that Larry The Fall Guy was an insurance scammer, so when S&H treat him disrespectfully after he's had an 'accident,' pouring a drink over his prone form, it seems shocking. Likewise, she doesn't understand the way snitches work - how is it that they allow some people to break the law in exchange for information? That's a good question, because cops aren't above the law, but Starsky has an answer, for what it's worth. He admits that the snitches of today are the criminals they'll lock up tomorrow, but for the moment they're useful. It's not an ideal situation or an easy answer, but it's the way things work. Her point of view is rammed home when, after Hutch gives the tragic Roxy some cash for her help, in his usual softhearted manner, pitying a downtrodden victim of society, she ends up dead shortly after, having presumably taken some of Rizzo's dodgy (I should say dodgier, since drug-taking is hardly a health benefit even if it were 'pure'!), smack. That's the implication, anyway, I didn't get the impression he went in and outright murdered her, although that would have been perfectly possible if he used the promise of drugs to gain entry. I got the impression S&H can't help but feel that Chris is right on that point, and Roxy might well have been alive if they'd brought her in when they visited. She was another tragic figure, a warning to those who think drugs is the answer, but is in fact, in reality, the destroyer of body, emotion and dignity.

With people like Roxy in full evidence, you'd think this would easily fall within the purview of a 'negative' episode, and adding to that total would be the rough areas of town (one place S&H visit because Starsky wants Hutch to invest in a house, Hutch suggests they leave the neighbourhood before they get mugged, and I think he was only half joking!). O'Riley's, the bar above which Roxy lives looked familiar as a regular location (the external view, anyway), but it may just be these places all look alike. But when you measure it all up, it's really more on the positive side, as it's about dipping their toes into the street while they have Chris along, and the attitude they display has a lot of bearing on how the city comes across. This time, primarily due to their friendly rivalry for Chris' affections, everything is light and fun, they're not depressed and feeling under a heavy weight, or disgusted by what they come across, it's like a game. We even see them not fully concentrating on the job, such as when Hutch reassures the old woman, helping her back in her car, after she thought she'd run down Larry, and he's only half paying attention, keeping an eye on Starsky so he doesn't get a chance to get to Chris. It's actually pretty funny, if embarrassingly unprofessional - he even uses the tried and true tactic of distracting his partner, calling out to Starsky until he has a chance to catch up, then saying it was nothing, purely to keep him away from the waiting Chris! I also love it when Hutch speeds up in his battered old car, to be first to meet her, then Starsky screeches into the lot a few seconds later. Or another time, when he looks as if he's about to speed off once Chris has got in the Torino, assisted by Hutch who still has to go round the other side - I thought he was really going to do it, too, and so did Hutch!

So their antics really are hilarious, even when they first meet in Dobey's office, the Captain has his beaming, slightly abashed face that he reserves for women, and S&H barge each other and almost trip over the chair in their haste to get to Chris first! Once things have got serious, and Chris has put her views in print (S&H under the pseudonyms, Mutt and Jeff - I was just waiting for someone to say I'm Mutt, he's Jeff, but unsurprisingly they didn't see the funny side), it's no more Mr. nice cops, and they stop their games and oneupmanship to show Chris what the street is really like, a hard edge coming over them, although they're still very polite and not unkind to her, which I thought was a nice touch. She gets to see the rules and regulations in full force after they attend an attack on a woman in a construction yard (it's not clear whether she'd been raped, or it was an attempt, but she's credited as 'Rape Victim,' hardly the best character credit in the series, identifying her only by her victimisation). Back at the station they have to let him go, much to Chris' horror, because the woman won't press charges. This is the beginning of her eyes being opened to the rigours of the law and the system under which S&H are forced to work. Even so, I couldn't help feeling she had a point in some degree - it's not supposed to be up to the cops to decide what's lawful or not, only to enforce it, though of course life is much less clearcut and far messier when you're on the front line, which was really the message of the episode. The most important thing is that S&H are goodhearted and upright. They have their ways, which don't always seem entirely righteous and aboveboard, but they're dealing with the scum of the Earth who will use every trick in the book, and out of it, against them.

One thing I was surprised at, and shows how useful it is to keep an eye on the credits, is that Christine was played by none other than Karen Carlson! Who? Gillian from the Season 2 episode of the same name, the woman who's death affects Hutch so strongly. I can't believe I never noticed before this viewing! This is actually another of the episodes to feature a repertory of former 'S&H' faces, though none (but one), are reprising characters, they've all been in another episode: Karl Regan, the guy they chase who was believed to be the last person to speak to Roxy, was played by Madison Arnold, who'd been in Season 1 ('The Hostages'); I noticed the Medical Examiner at Roxy's place, who had a kind, innocent face, as being the same as in 'Death In A Different Place' (the only character in this one to recur - though she was called Ginny last time and is only credited by her formal title here), so I wonder if they'll use her again; Lee McLaughlin had been Frisco Fats in Season 1's 'Captain Dobey, You're Dead!' and was the barkeeper Al on this occasion; and the other Picerni, Charles, joins his brother Paul in Season 3 (who'd been in 'Murder on Voodoo Island'), as Larry, his second credited role after Nicky Cairo in Season 2's 'Murder At Sea,' though better known for his stunt doubling of Starsky - the only time I briefly noticed him was driving the Torino in the car chase. I should also mention that a young Gary Graham (best known these days as the recurring Vulcan Soval in 'Enterprise'), as one of the bar patrons, Freddy.

There's very little to cross off the checklists this time, as S&H are too busy showing off for Chris, but they do mention Walter Cronkite, a US TV journalist that anchored CBS News at the time the series was airing. Another US icon is Mickey Mouse, the soft toy appearing again, this time on the desk, moving in on Pinky or Perky Pig's position! Something we've seen now and again is when a call comes in on the radio and S&H have to leave in a hurry, forcing them to dump freshly bought fast food (not fast enough, obviously!), into the nearest bin - this time it's Chris that has to throw her meal in a terribly awkward sequence for her where S&H are waiting and everything that could go wrong, does. Couldn't she have just given the meal to Huggy who was sitting nearby? Speaking of which, I wondered if his earring stud was a new thing as I've never noticed it before. As if to add insult to injury, S&H both turn up on one of the days dressed the same: in black leather jacket, red-checked shirt and jeans! It would have been very funny, except I think that was when they first realised what Chris had written about them, so they turn very serious! The other running joke, Starsky's plan to get in on a fixer-upper with the investment of Hutch, bookends the episode and features in the middle, which worked quite well - as usual Starsky's taste isn't the best. I was impressed to see David Soul do his own stunt of falling from the porch after leaning on a damaged balcony, actually hitting the ground. It reminded me of 'Murder On Stage 17' when Hutch almost went flying after leaning on a stunt balcony!

In terms of mistakes, I would point to Starsky hitting a JCB, or tractor vehicle, when he screams to a stop amidst the flying dust at the construction site, as I'm sure he was meant to stop before hitting anything! Also, when S&H want to speak to Dobey outside his office, they all walk out and the Captain asks Starsky what's the matter, but he's looking at Hutch as he says it. Could the good Captain really have mistaken two of his best men? But regardless of these little oddities, this is a really solid episode. It doesn't have as much action as some, but 'The Crying Child' showed that you don't need it to make a strong story, what you need is character, and S&H have it in spades. Their comedy doesn't go too far, it's enough to be obvious to us and Chris, so we can laugh at them, but it's not 'Dandruff' levels of ridiculousness to take us out of the story. Also, I like it when the tone changes, going from the light banter to stone-faced intent, the music changing to suit this mood, Chris reduced to an observant passenger, which in all truth, she should have been from the start. Even better, we get another sympathetic villain - Rizzo looks like the usual dead-eyed psycho, with no real reason for what he's doing other than malevolence, but his breakdown, and the fact that S&H recognise he's not the hardened killer he appears, conspire to create as powerful a resolution as 'The Crying Child,' making these two episodes a one-two punch of goodness that I wish had been the norm for this season.

***

The Crying Child

DVD, Starsky & Hutch S3 (The Crying Child)

At last, a bona fide good episode, without any caveats! You'd be forgiven for thinking this was a Season 2 episode. Well it is, in part, since they reused the teaser (technically they don't do teasers on the series as the opening credits kick off the episodes, but I think of the first scene as a teaser), from 'Nightmare,' probably my favourite episode of the whole series. I can see why they would reuse it, as, although it does sit within the constraints of that particular episode (Lisa's birthday is mentioned as the reason they're in this part of town), it's also a fine seriocomic escapade that shows S&H at their best: inventive, brash, self-sacrificing (Starsky has to sacrifice his dignity in a big way!), and… really very little to do with the main story. So it wasn't too much of a stretch of them to drop this in at the start of another episode. It's just slightly annoying, as if they either couldn't come up with something new, they ran out of budget or they ran out of time. Perhaps a mix of all three, though budget shouldn't have been a particular issue this early in the season. At least it wasn't a clips episode, we can be thankful for small mercies! I give them credit, too, that this opening also suited the theme of the episode: the abuse of children. If you know 'Nightmare,' then you'd instantly see the parallels, about a young adolescent girl with a child's mind, who suffers rape and attempted murder at the hands of a scruffy scoundrel. That was much more clear cut, a case of tracking down the culprit and soothing the girl as much as possible, whereas this one shines a light on the procedure and intricacies of accusation, abuse and authority.

S&H aren't so able to just jump in, kick around some bad guys and drive off at the end, a job well done (mind you, that hasn't really happened this season, the third episode in a row to feature sensitive subject matter). The jurisdiction, the rights and responsibilities are all a little hazy and uncertain. Take Carol Wade as a prime example: she's the considerate teacher that notices her young pupil, Guy Mayer's, injuries, but is frightened to go through official channels to report it. S&H urge her to do so, as if they don't think telling them is the best way for the procedure to start. Carol's not only concerned about the boy, but that making any kind of accusation might lead to losing her job. S&H agree to take the matter up, which gives her mind some rest, but she doesn't feel empowered to voice her concerns to the police force as you'd think would be the accepted way. S&H get another surprise when, out of the kindness of their hearts (it being not the sort of thing they usually deal with), they visit the department that deals with child abuse, only to find a jaded, pessimistic woman in charge of it. Part of her spiel is to get them onside as potential recruits, so she paints the worst picture she can, yet it's also true - far from S&H finding it as simple as filling out a form for the department to investigate, they learn that it's severely understaffed and underfunded, with ten officers assigned to cover the city out of the four or five thousand officers that serve in the city.

One of things that make this a memorable episode is the lack of clear cut motives and the positioning of the story in the positive/negative view of the city that I've talked about before. At first it seems to be the seedy, grimy aspect (if we're including the stolen teaser from 'Nightmare' which you have to, really - just put it down to strong deja vu for S&H, and they just happened to be doing the same thing for Lisa's birthday as they did last year), with jolly old Uncle Elmo's toy store turning out to now be an 'Adult' toy store, not to mention the setting of railway lines, murky laundromats: the streets. But then we visit a school and things turn positive, hopeful about the future, S&H rehearsing some play they're going to do as Laurel & Hardy (and, for a couple of cops, doing a more than passable impression of the classic comedy duo - if they ever decided to quit, they should go into TV…). Then we get into the tragedy of Guy's marked back, but then L&H, sorry, S&H, get involved, so things look up… but then things aren't as simple, because the Mother lies to them about how he got the marks, saying he was in a fight with another boy… Guy, sister Vikki, and their Mother, live in a street that is the picture of respectability, with neat, green lawns and white houses, far from the usual haunts of criminality and the abused. But here is the most damning negative message of the episode: even here, just as much here, do terrible things go on. Because the victim's a young boy it's all the more striking in the point it makes. But that comes later, when the true grime of that house is shown in the grotty back garden, old shed, and a dustbin in which Janet dumps her child.

It's just not that simple, however, as although everything appears to play out as we'd expect it to, this episode is the perfect example of evidence to the contrary of the erroneous statement that the camera never lies. By selectively showing us what we expect to see we're quick to build up a picture with the circumstantial evidence shown: Janet Mayer seems a goodly, godly woman, trying to bring up her two children alone, while on the other side, her former husband, Eddie, is an imposing figure who appears quick to anger, rising up in apparent rage when Guy, staying at his place, breaks a lamp. Except the camera cuts away then, and from all we see in that scene, Eddie's an indulgent Father, or at least not the ogre we assume from his size and the accusations of his ex-wife - he lets Guy have five more minutes when it was bedtime, and seems quite laid-back until the breakage. The same can be said about his workmate, Coop, who S&H meet at the City Trucking Corp. - he's quick to point out Eddie's temper, claiming he hit him when they went out for drinks, but can we really see Coop as a reliable witness? In the light of the later revelations, and with the testimony of Gwen Larson, Eddie's widowed girlfriend of two years, he's a decent sort, with a fairytale life - he's never lost his cool with her, has been like a Father to her daughter, and likes to make pottery to get some extra income. It's far from the typical stereotype we might have of a rough, tough truck driver, who's quick to violence, and no one will challenge.

I wonder if Coop had a score to settle, which is why he painted a black picture of Eddie - I'm not saying the man didn't give him a black eye, just that he may well have had good reason for it. Though he may not be a violent man, he's not backward in standing up for himself, and the stress of his broken family on his pride doesn't help him be civil to cops when they come asking for him. Again, this serves to back up what we think we know of him, a big, hulking man, who drives big, hulking trucks can be just as sensitive about his family as anyone. And just as we assume Janet is the wronged party at first, she's proved to be a liar, and a violent one at that. Even she has reasons for how she is, having been brought up in a single-parent family and abused by her own Father, so she has a deep hatred of all men that she's carried since childhood. It's a tragic backstory that brings you to feel pity for her, not to condone her behaviour at all, but I like when a 'villain' gets some sympathy, and isn't just a two-dimensional being to be beaten. Maybe not the best choice of word there, but you get the idea. Janet's shown to be religious, praying and fondling her rosary, calling Eddie a sinner (something else that touched a nerve when Guy says repeats it, and you're wondering what it's going to be that sets off Eddie's anticipated rage, since he seems so peaceful reading his paper, which was good use of tension), but she's forgotten her own beliefs: that we're all sinners. Lying, bullying and wordlessly cajoling, almost pleading with the children to lie to the police for her, just so the status quo remains.

The interpersonal dynamics are another of the things that make this a standout episode, because there's reality and complexity that we don't often get in the series' characters. Janet wants to keep her children, she's alone in the world otherwise, yet she also hates her son for being 'garbage, like his Father,' and is driven by her own problems to take them out on him. S&H discuss the idea that Guy doesn't know any better, accepting the abuse as 'normal,' and though you can see Vikki is very conflicted (I love that shot of her sitting alone on the floor of her Mother's room, staring brokenly towards the camera), she wants to protect her Mother, perhaps from herself. It's a minefield of loyalties and misunderstanding, Eddie himself tortured by his inability to keep his family together and safe, and you really feel for him. In this regard it's a stunningly well written episode that touches all the bases, the lowest point being when Starsky sees the new injuries to Guy's back - rather than show gory detail the full impact is given to us by his strong reaction of horror and disgust, so much that he has to leave the room. When Hutch finds him he says you 'get used to all the killings, and the murders, the rapes and the junkies,' but that this is worse, the strongest impression of the negative in the episode, on a par with their poetic description in the pilot of the city being a toilet bowl. He basically sums up the seventies, saying "we've got a lot to learn." If only modern TV would realise that showing is gratuitous, and hinting is far more powerful in ramming home a point.

Importantly, and ultimately why the episode is broadly optimistic about the future, is the way things end on a hopeful note. It's true, as Sergeant Sheila Peterson says, that S&H come riding in like knights in shining armour, to sort out the problem, but that's not the end of the story because Guy will live with the mental scars for the rest of his life, and Janet will get treatment, but it will be from a similarly overworked and underpaid psychiatrist who won't be able to give her the care she needs… but S&H counter with the fact that with people like her working on the problems the future is bright. I did feel the ending was a little heavy-handed in the way it underlined the point that there aren't enough resources for those fighting child abuse, perhaps it wasn't being dealt with as seriously in those days, and almost in a counter to many of the episode endings, the idea of it not being 'case closed' is really laid on strong. But you know that with Peterson, and of course, S&H looking out for them, things will get better. In fact, you could almost say it's gone too far in the other direction now, with parents on the back foot, uncertain how much they can discipline their children, children encouraged to speak out at the slightest thing, which could be misused, and the impression that children can pretty much do what they want, because they know they'll get away with it from their parents and society. As Starsky said, "We've got a lot to learn," and not just those in the seventies.

The episode is also interesting from the point of view of police procedure in the seventies. We've often seen things are a lot more lax in many ways, but there are options to follow. One was that if the Mother refused to testify against Eddie, the court could choose to use a polygram test, which I assume is the same as a polygraph: a lie detector. It was apparently admissible only in cases of child abuse, but even then it sounded like they couldn't use this to prosecute, it would just mean that he'd have to go through the courts to see his children. Something else that would be questioned today, was a responsible adult appointed on the fly to look after the children, when S&H ask Carol to take care of them while they sort out the mess. Again, she's reluctant, and quickly gives them up when their Mother comes looking for them, a scene we didn't see, but you can tell Carol isn't comfortable, perhaps because of her position. In reality she'd be the ideal person, being Guy's teacher and known to them, but we wouldn't have a police detective just arbitrarily make that call, there would have to be rigorous tests and probably care homes. They pull the same trick on Carol as Sheila did to them, to get her to agree, perhaps you could even call it emotional blackmail, despite the good cause! But it's interesting that none of them feel they have proper authority, it's strongly the parents responsibility and they're entering sensitive ground. That expectations and stereotypes get turned on their head make for a superior story.

There are few of the expected novelties of the series, apart from the obvious reference to Laurel & Hardy, a much more subtle one, and a good example of the kind of writing on show, is when, in response to Sheila's questioning of society, Starsky reassures her with "Peterson… In our time," a play on the 'peace in our time' quote of Neville Chamberlain on returning from his meeting with Hitler before World War II. There is the ghost of a running theme with S&H looking out for jobs for Franklin. I was struggling to think who he might be until it clicked that it must be the guy they arrested at the beginning of the episode in the second teaser (I wonder if the episode had simply run short, which was why they added the 'Nightmare' sequence), a man shoplifting because he's desperate and his children are starving - another link in the chain of hardships suffered by children. As if to cement the episode in the positive, S&H mention how they bought the children lots of food (including something Starsky meant for himself!). I'm not sure if they took Franklin in, or whether they allowed him freedom, but they can be pretty softhearted sometimes! With no wacky characters, the episode firmly grounded for the sake of emotional attachment, there weren't really any other notes, except when I first saw it, I thought Eddie was played by Donald Sutherland (same build and voice, but it was actually a Michael Lane). And to confirm my suspicion that they often used the first take of a scene, when S&H leave to find Mayer at work, Starsky tries to open the Torino's door, forgets it's locked, and has to unlock it, then try again - they wouldn't have done that multiple times! Also, there's a voiceover at the start saying it was a good job they had their costumes in the trunk or they'd have been late for rehearsal, then Hutch says in the car that they'll be late for rehearsal.

In the limited possibilities of the series (it is a cop show, after all), this episode shows what's possible in crafting a strong story with realistic characters, without reliance on the usual action or romance (preferring to use tension rather than outright violence - an example is when S&H go to talk to Eddie and we're already built up for a difficult encounter, and he does fight, but it's not the animal aggression and crazy temper we expected). It displays the delicacy of such situations when it's one word against another, and that the truth can be uncovered if thought and care is used in a timely manner. It shows S&H at their best, their human nature shocked, but not affecting their judgement, except in making them even keener to do their job to the best of their ability. The mental processes and feelings of real people are fully integrated into a complex interpersonal study, which gives insight into people and the way they think and act that is quite mature for the series, and most importantly, on the entertainment side, it leaves on a note of optimism - S&H might be moving on to the 'next planet' in the 'Star Trek' manner (though in reality they don't have that luxury, but there tends not to be much continuity), but like superheroes that have come in and done a job, they leave inspiration in their wake, and the strength for those stuck there to carry on and keep making a difference to people's lives. I like it a little more every time I see it.

***