McHale's Navy (TV Series) Secret Chimp 007 (1966) User Reviews

Same plot from Season 3 episode 28.

[kfo9494 · 2/10 · 24 November 2014]

This is basically a repeat of a script that was done in season three. In that season three episode, 'The Great Necklace Caper', a chimp on Taratupa island steals a necklace off the desk of Binghamton, then Binghamton accuses McHale and his crew of the theft. This episode has the exact same plot except this time it is letters off Binghamton's desk instead of a necklace. Not the best to win fans when all they really did was rehash an old script.

What has happened is that a chimp has taken a top secret letter off of Binghamton's desk then made his way to McHale's camp also taking letters. Ensign Parker is going to follow some footsteps in tracking the letter thief back to his camp. In the meantime, Binghamton has set-up the thief by places some more letter on his desk. Sure enough the chimp returns and when Binghamton follows the chimp and finds him in company of Parker. Poor old Parker was just tracking footprints. Now Binghamton thinks the entire crew of the 73 are spies for the Germans.

How the producer can let this slip by before production is unknown. Perhaps they just wanted a episode in the can at any cost. All this was is the same script that has been modified to fit in Italy rather than the islands of the Pacific. Other than the actors, no one put much thought into this show. It was like saying' the viewers be darned' they will never know that they are seeing the same script. But thanks to IMDb the viewers are now informed. Giving this a two for the actor's sake, no other reason to give anything for a redone script.

Episode written for kids, definitely skip it if older than 10

[FlushingCaps · 2/10 · 5 December 2020]

Spies are rumored to be in the area. Binghamton is visited by a courier with "top secret" papers in an envelope labeled "Do not open until 6 p.m." The courier is Adam-12 star Kent McCord, who for the previous few years was a semi-regular on Ozzie & Harriet. The captain sets the papers on his desk as he and Carpenter talk while facing away. They don't see the chimp (presumably the same one as we saw before a couple of times) who comes in the open window and silently picks up the envelope and exits through the window.

The one good thing I did like was that for once in WWII, when something goes wrong, Captain Binghamton does not immediately blame McHale. He sets out a trap, staged with Elroy pretending to deliver "top, top, secret" papers to the captain, with both of them loudly announcing their actions to whoever might be within earshot outside. They go and hide as the chimp returns and picks up the new envelope with the fake orders.

Now in the meantime, that chimp carried the original secret orders to McHale's base where nobody was around. He picked up several other papers lying around, and carried them away to a gypsy, who was camping in the woods. We see that the gypsy owns the chimp and learn that he trained him to steal jewels and valuables, and is troubled that he keeps stealing only papers. He leaves the papers and takes the chimp away.

Binghamton and Carpenter try to follow the chimp to see who controls him. Of course, the chimp leads him to where Parker is, just after he's found the papers the chimp took. So Parker is arrested for being a spy. Back at the office, after McHale comes in to help Parker, who is being given the famous 3rd-degree with the bright lights in his eyes-same as the chimp-Binghamton has again left the secret orders sitting on his desk and the chimp again snatches them and leaves.

Everyone goes off to chase the chimp. McHale and men, with Parker find him first, with the gypsy, and they find the secret orders the gypsy flipped into the bushes. Before they can go far in taking the orders to Binghamton, he and MPs show up to arrest them all, now believing all three men are spies.

He sends for General Bronson. While holding the four (counting the chimp), it becomes time to open the orders, which direct the captain to order all PT boats to a certain point for a rendezvous later that night. McHale knows this area is deep in enemy territory and urges the captain to check out the orders. Instead, blunderbutt Binghamton quickly makes a conference call to all the other boats ordering the rendezvous.

While they argue, in comes General Bronson, who confirms McHale's worst fears-that he never sent any top secret orders and is further upset that the ones Binghamton shows him have a signature that doesn't even resemble his own. They are able to stop the rendezvous and the crew is seen at the café wondering how seriously Bronson is going to punish the captain. Here comes the chimp again, with the general's watch.

Throughout the show, Binghamton and Parker talk to the chimp as though he's a human. Leaving top secret papers on his desk in his first floor office with an open window is not something any competent officer would do-especially not when he has a wall safe in the same room. He was going to put them away, but there was no reason he couldn't have done so immediately.

Just Binghamton believing that Parker could have a trained chimp that the captain (as far as this show's plot is concerned) never saw before, or that McHale and Parker, who very recently rescued (as far as the captain knows) him from a German U-boat and saved his life, could be spies for Germany is beyond belief.

Frankly, I thought this script was written for 7-year-olds. If you think back, you can surely remember shows, or just jokes you shared at young ages that made you laugh then, but later you think are totally stupid. I don't see how more than a tiny percentage of adults watching could find it humorous. A dreadful episode that gets a 2 from me.