Review of 5108 "Pen Pals"

"Pen Pals" C+

WEAK. A lot of pretty good elements are built on a ludicrous foundation.

The story starts with Hunter & McCall driving by the scene of a crime and stopping to check it out. A kid is rushed to hospital after getting some bad dope. The ensuing investigation leads Hunter to roughing up a scuzzball. The confrontation between them is badly re-edited and dubbed to give the bad guy a gun to pull on Hunter, and straight-away you start to worry about the quality of the episode.

Anyway, the scuzzball is killed that night.

Bernie immediately shows up at Hunter's place, and our hero is in jail quicker than you can say 'stupid plotting'.

From there the episode redeems itself somewhat, as the partners (now split up) work the case from both sides.

On the outside, McCall is partnered with Tim Thomerson, doing a great turn as a somewhat vain, pretty-boy, ladies man, and the writer has a lot of fun with the idea of McCall having a new partner and Hunter's reaction to that fact.

On the inside, Hunter goes through the usual list of prison clichés, before getting enough evidence to show which convict planned the whole thing from the start.

Yes, the whole thing was a plan to get Hunter into jail. And, if you can buy the fact that random coincidences coupled with inept (and prompt) police-work can be part of an elaborate plan, you won't have a problem with this episode. Otherwise you'll dismiss it as rubbish.

Rubbish, as I said before, with some pretty good elements:

The best scene, undoubtedly, is a brief one where McCall goes undercover as a strung-out junkie. Kramer is stunning.

Gil and McCall team-up to capture the killer with some fantastic music on the soundtrack.

And the early scene of Hunter & McCall questioning a friend of the kid shows their team-work at it's best.

Pity the actual story is rubbish.

18-12-03