It's becoming difficult to review some of these episodes. I've tackled the ones that were the very worst that I had strong opinions about, and I've written praises for the episodes that I have loved. Now I'm down to episodes I mostly don't have a feeling for one way or another.
Here in Season 1, there are quite a few episodes like this one, where there is just nothing very special about it, although it's a solid story and Starsky and Hutch get the job done. In this story, they track down a gambler who inadvertently stole counterfeit money and is running from the criminal he stole it from. Starsky and Hutch use their sources and informants to try to find the man before the criminals can kill him.
I guess there is one small scene that stands out for me. When Starsky and Hutch are talking to the female addict and Hutch expresses a bit of sympathy for her, she challenges him with the statement "what would you know about it?" Both Starsky and Hutch react to that, not with words but just facial expressions, remembering Hutch's heroin withdrawal from "The Fix" episode. I mean, they don't say that, but PMG and DS are so good at conveying thoughts without words, you know what Starsky and Hutch are thinking. They make it look easy so you don't even think about how hard it must be to get that right feeling for their characters. These are the scenes that impress me when I watch PMG and DS and what I feel are overlooked the most when people assess the show.
On the downside, I sometimes can't believe how obvious the stunt doubles are. It seems like we often get full-face views of the doubles and, I'm sorry, but they do not look anything like our actors. I am constantly seeing PMG's double; he's very obvious in this episode and it's quite distracting. I certainly don't notice this in today's TV very much.
So this is fine, but nothing memorable to the story. We are starting to see the side gag of Starsky as the born loser type, where everything just keeps going wrong for him. I guess that is OK, and works better if you aren't binge-watching. But that kind of recurring joke is one of the things that date the show.
Here in Season 1, there are quite a few episodes like this one, where there is just nothing very special about it, although it's a solid story and Starsky and Hutch get the job done. In this story, they track down a gambler who inadvertently stole counterfeit money and is running from the criminal he stole it from. Starsky and Hutch use their sources and informants to try to find the man before the criminals can kill him.
I guess there is one small scene that stands out for me. When Starsky and Hutch are talking to the female addict and Hutch expresses a bit of sympathy for her, she challenges him with the statement "what would you know about it?" Both Starsky and Hutch react to that, not with words but just facial expressions, remembering Hutch's heroin withdrawal from "The Fix" episode. I mean, they don't say that, but PMG and DS are so good at conveying thoughts without words, you know what Starsky and Hutch are thinking. They make it look easy so you don't even think about how hard it must be to get that right feeling for their characters. These are the scenes that impress me when I watch PMG and DS and what I feel are overlooked the most when people assess the show.
On the downside, I sometimes can't believe how obvious the stunt doubles are. It seems like we often get full-face views of the doubles and, I'm sorry, but they do not look anything like our actors. I am constantly seeing PMG's double; he's very obvious in this episode and it's quite distracting. I certainly don't notice this in today's TV very much.
So this is fine, but nothing memorable to the story. We are starting to see the side gag of Starsky as the born loser type, where everything just keeps going wrong for him. I guess that is OK, and works better if you aren't binge-watching. But that kind of recurring joke is one of the things that date the show.
