Family Ties (1987) – Love Me Do, The Visit, and Matchmaker

While Steven (Michael Gross) is planning a surprise birthday party for Elyse (Meredith Baxter) in Love Me Do, Skippy (Marc Price) falls for one of Mallory’s (Justine Bateman) classmates, Amy (Sonia Curtis). Written by Marc Lawrence this episode was first broadcast on 30 April, 1987. It’s fun to see Skippy happy and that the relationship…

Magnum P.I. (2018) – Sudden Death, and Death is Only Temporary

Magnum (Jay Hernandez) helps T.C. (Stephen Hill) and one of his football little leaguers in Sudden Death. It first aired on 22 October, 2018, and was written by David Fury, and features Cyndi Lauper as a local lawyer, Vanessa Nero. Young Makoa (Zio Junk) looks for help from T.C. and Magnum when his father, Honi…

Star Trek: The Next Generation – Strike Zone (1989) – Peter David

Peter David delivered his first Star Trek novel with Stroke Zone. Originally planned to be a novel in The Original Series catalogue, it was changed and updated to take place near the beginning of season two of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Beverly Crusher is at Starfleet Medical, Dr. Pulaski has taken over as the…

The Equalizer (1986) – Unpunished Crimes, and Pretenders

John Cullum is the baddie in the penultimate episode of season one of The Equalizer. Unpunished Crimes was written by John Burke and Grenville Case, first airing on 1 April, 1986. Cullum is Stuart Cane, a brutal CEO with ties to a terrorist organization, and is set on ruining Frank Donahue (Dan Hedaya) and his…

M*A*S*H (1981) – Oh, How We Danced, Bottoms Up, and The Red/White Blues

Oh, How We Danced written by John Rappaport, and with an original airdate of 23 February, 1981, has a fantastic A-story, that really touches the heart (even as it messes with series continuity), and a completely forgettable B-story. The B-story first then. Charles (David Ogden Stiers) delivers a substandard sanitation rating to a nearby American…

Star Trek: Enterprise (2003) – The Breach, and Cogenitor

Captain’s log: date unknown Chris Black and John Shiban pen the teleplay for this episode from a story by Daniel McCarthy. It’s a Phlox (John Billingsley) episode that first aired on 23 April, 2003, and was directed by Voyager’s Robert Duncan McNeill. Phlox finds himself in an ethical dilemma when the Enterprise is summoned to…