The plot description given here ("Marty Lacayo and Glenn Talbot are street narcs, meaning they are given the task of busting nickel-and-dime users and hustlers; Shep, one of their users, gives them a tasty lead on a big distributor, but they are forbidden by Lt. Hagedorn from pursuing him . . . ") doesn't begin to do this episode justice.
It leaves out the fact that Talbot (Robert Goulet) is a kind of wild-man instigator "optimistic" to the point of risking professional suicide, paired with a worrier's worrier and born pessimist of a partner whom he dragoons into this adventure kicking and screaming (actually, more like moaning and groaning), while their lieutenant boss is an absolutely no-nonsense by-the-book curmudgeonly stickler for rules and procedures with absolutely no sense of humor at all. If that were not enough, the whole time they are working this case that they have been expressly ordered not to work at all, no less than Cheryl Ladd and a girlfriend are left waiting in suspenseful anticipation of spending a weekend fling with them at a resort in Palm Springs. In other words, though I can't say for sure from the credits just exactly who really wrote this installment of one of the very best cop TV series ever made, it has famed police realism novelist (not to mention, cynical humorist) Joseph Wambaugh's characteristic style in story, characters, and wicked ironic humor written all over it, like a Wambaugh novel in micro. And although I have never been a fan of the hammy acting of Robert Goulet, here his over-the-top tendencies made him perfect for this part, and his performance of the shamelessly extroverted Talbot is beyond criticism. Thus, if you ever get a chance to see this (I caught it at about 2 am recently on the "H&I" or "Heroes and Icons" network) don't pass it up. (Hell, you even get to see Cheryl Ladd a year before she showed up to replace Farah Fawcett on *Charlie's Angels*).
It leaves out the fact that Talbot (Robert Goulet) is a kind of wild-man instigator "optimistic" to the point of risking professional suicide, paired with a worrier's worrier and born pessimist of a partner whom he dragoons into this adventure kicking and screaming (actually, more like moaning and groaning), while their lieutenant boss is an absolutely no-nonsense by-the-book curmudgeonly stickler for rules and procedures with absolutely no sense of humor at all. If that were not enough, the whole time they are working this case that they have been expressly ordered not to work at all, no less than Cheryl Ladd and a girlfriend are left waiting in suspenseful anticipation of spending a weekend fling with them at a resort in Palm Springs. In other words, though I can't say for sure from the credits just exactly who really wrote this installment of one of the very best cop TV series ever made, it has famed police realism novelist (not to mention, cynical humorist) Joseph Wambaugh's characteristic style in story, characters, and wicked ironic humor written all over it, like a Wambaugh novel in micro. And although I have never been a fan of the hammy acting of Robert Goulet, here his over-the-top tendencies made him perfect for this part, and his performance of the shamelessly extroverted Talbot is beyond criticism. Thus, if you ever get a chance to see this (I caught it at about 2 am recently on the "H&I" or "Heroes and Icons" network) don't pass it up. (Hell, you even get to see Cheryl Ladd a year before she showed up to replace Farah Fawcett on *Charlie's Angels*).