A standard plot device for PI/cop/lawyer shows is for the bad guys to have some elaborate plot to gain some nefarious end and the good guys spend the episode getting to the bottom of it. This outing has the good guys with the plan and the bad guys trying to figure it out.
Danny Lavor (Gordon Hoban) robs a drugstore for the second time in a month, shoots the pharmacist, and barely eludes the police on stakeout near the front door. Looks like an open and shut case, but Joe is visited by Danny's wife (Leslie Charleson) and is nagged by Peggy into investigating it. Turns out the whole thing was a police plan to hide Danny as he spills his guts on the mob. Danny was suppose to surrender at the drugstore door but he realized one of the guys was a crooked cop so he ran. Instead of doing all this, why didn't the police just move him to a safe house? No idea but it would have been easier. Two mob hoods Vodich (Jan Merlin) and Hammel (Sandy Kenyon) are after Danny. The pharmacist "victim" is in a hospital room to complete the illusion of a crime so the two hoods go there. Why? I have no idea. Why would the victim know where Danny is? Turns out the victim is just lounging around his hospital room doing not much. The bad guys discover this and realize it is all a set up. Joe chases Hammel though the hospital before getting hit on the head (again!). The crooked cop had the wife's phone tapped and hears a conversation between Danny and the wife arranging a meet in code. Finally, it all comes to a head when the bad guys follow Joe to the meeting arranged through the wife and everyone ends up at Danny's hideout. It turns into a gunfight with Joe and Danny against the two hoods and the bad cop (Scott Brady). Guess who wins.
There is plenty of action and the story moves along but the plot holes stand out. Why did there need to be a first robbery done a month before this story starts? No reason for it. When the pharmacist is "shot" in this second robbery, we can assume the people in the store rendered first aid as the two cops let Danny escape. Since there is no bullet wound, how did that get handled? This next remark is in the weeds but the police lieutenant says that the pharmacist is a guy from the police lab. Since the two robberies were a month apart and we can assume the first robbery was not on the guy's first day, we have an untrained, unlicensed undercover guy doing a pharmacist's job and filling dozens of drug prescriptions every day for several weeks. Highly illegal but okay - it's only a show. There is one part where the wife is supposedly worked over "pretty good" by one of the hoods and when you see her again, she has a small bandage on her cheek. Not very convincing. At least give her a black eye. I've hurt myself worse shaving.
The cast is fine. Merlin and Kenyon make good hoods. Every time I see Jan Merlin, I think he should play only Gestapo agents or SS officers. Kenyon was around forever and seemed to always play slimy guys. Scott Brady plays the bad cop well but he played heavies his whole career so has it down pat. I knew he was a bad cop when I saw him on the stakeout. I used the "guest star rule". It states big time guest stars who seem to have only a small part means there is more to come. Brady was an "upper tier" guest star who had his own western show back in the day and there is no way he does a standard "cop partner" role. An earlier Mannix episode had Paul Carr playing a PI who is supposedly killed in the first five minutes after a couple of lines of dialogue. No way Paul Carr takes that gig so I knew we would see him later. The same rules applies to crime and mystery shows from the 60s and 70s. The murderer is always the biggest guest star. The series Murder She Wrote broke that mold but it was good up until then. Dewey Martin plays police Lt Lockwood for this single time. It would have been interesting to have one of Mannix's normal police lieutenant buddies in the role and see a little conflict there.
Not a horrible outing but it does lack logic. Not the first time I've written that about Mannix and I'm sure it won't be the last. If you're looking for an episode that makes absolutely no sense, A Gathering of Ghosts will get you there. Joe does get paid. He should split it with Peggy.
Danny Lavor (Gordon Hoban) robs a drugstore for the second time in a month, shoots the pharmacist, and barely eludes the police on stakeout near the front door. Looks like an open and shut case, but Joe is visited by Danny's wife (Leslie Charleson) and is nagged by Peggy into investigating it. Turns out the whole thing was a police plan to hide Danny as he spills his guts on the mob. Danny was suppose to surrender at the drugstore door but he realized one of the guys was a crooked cop so he ran. Instead of doing all this, why didn't the police just move him to a safe house? No idea but it would have been easier. Two mob hoods Vodich (Jan Merlin) and Hammel (Sandy Kenyon) are after Danny. The pharmacist "victim" is in a hospital room to complete the illusion of a crime so the two hoods go there. Why? I have no idea. Why would the victim know where Danny is? Turns out the victim is just lounging around his hospital room doing not much. The bad guys discover this and realize it is all a set up. Joe chases Hammel though the hospital before getting hit on the head (again!). The crooked cop had the wife's phone tapped and hears a conversation between Danny and the wife arranging a meet in code. Finally, it all comes to a head when the bad guys follow Joe to the meeting arranged through the wife and everyone ends up at Danny's hideout. It turns into a gunfight with Joe and Danny against the two hoods and the bad cop (Scott Brady). Guess who wins.
There is plenty of action and the story moves along but the plot holes stand out. Why did there need to be a first robbery done a month before this story starts? No reason for it. When the pharmacist is "shot" in this second robbery, we can assume the people in the store rendered first aid as the two cops let Danny escape. Since there is no bullet wound, how did that get handled? This next remark is in the weeds but the police lieutenant says that the pharmacist is a guy from the police lab. Since the two robberies were a month apart and we can assume the first robbery was not on the guy's first day, we have an untrained, unlicensed undercover guy doing a pharmacist's job and filling dozens of drug prescriptions every day for several weeks. Highly illegal but okay - it's only a show. There is one part where the wife is supposedly worked over "pretty good" by one of the hoods and when you see her again, she has a small bandage on her cheek. Not very convincing. At least give her a black eye. I've hurt myself worse shaving.
The cast is fine. Merlin and Kenyon make good hoods. Every time I see Jan Merlin, I think he should play only Gestapo agents or SS officers. Kenyon was around forever and seemed to always play slimy guys. Scott Brady plays the bad cop well but he played heavies his whole career so has it down pat. I knew he was a bad cop when I saw him on the stakeout. I used the "guest star rule". It states big time guest stars who seem to have only a small part means there is more to come. Brady was an "upper tier" guest star who had his own western show back in the day and there is no way he does a standard "cop partner" role. An earlier Mannix episode had Paul Carr playing a PI who is supposedly killed in the first five minutes after a couple of lines of dialogue. No way Paul Carr takes that gig so I knew we would see him later. The same rules applies to crime and mystery shows from the 60s and 70s. The murderer is always the biggest guest star. The series Murder She Wrote broke that mold but it was good up until then. Dewey Martin plays police Lt Lockwood for this single time. It would have been interesting to have one of Mannix's normal police lieutenant buddies in the role and see a little conflict there.
Not a horrible outing but it does lack logic. Not the first time I've written that about Mannix and I'm sure it won't be the last. If you're looking for an episode that makes absolutely no sense, A Gathering of Ghosts will get you there. Joe does get paid. He should split it with Peggy.