Flipper is no stranger to alligators and has tangled with them before and won. In this episode Flipper intervenes to prevent a movie director and stuntman from a potentially dangerous situation with an alligator that they have captured illegally to make their film. They try to persuade Bud to allow Flipper to be in their movie and he declines and tells his Dad. Porter is upset because of the use of illegal alligators and filming in the Park without permission and he wants to put a stop to it. The movie maker decides that Flipper is too good an act to miss out on and sneaks into the cove, lures Flipper into their boat and keeps him in their pen pending pitting him in a dolphin v alligator underwater fight scene that he wants to film. When the Ricks discover Flipper is missing the family decide to split the searching: Porter takes the float plane, Sandy the launch and Bud the skiff. It's a measure of how much more mature the boys are now that Sandy can be given sole charge of the expensive large Park Ranger's launch.
Bud finds the film site and is trying to leave to alert the others and is discovered and held against his will by the movie director. Porter lands the plane near the launch and gets Sandy to join him in the plane. Bud uses a shiny film case to flash Porter in the sky - Porter lands up the coast and he and Sandy use a small inflatable dingy to row up to arrest the film maker. Sensing real danger for Flipper, Bud wrestles free and dives into the pen to release Flipper, Flipper must protect Bud and the film maker again from the alligator and Porter and Sandy row up in time to tackle the movie director and put an end to the whole illegal film shoot.
Two implausibilities: Flipper senses danger and bad people and would never have allowed a surreptitious attempt to manhandle him into a boat without either swimming away or loudly alerting the Ricks' and Bud is not restrained when he is apprehended and he's big enough now that it would need likely two men to fully restrain him. He could've escaped at any time but chooses only to do so right as the filming is about to commence. Cool shot of the show: Sandy dives from the launch and swims to the float plane - what a life for a teenage boy to go from one cool machine to another!
Bud finds the film site and is trying to leave to alert the others and is discovered and held against his will by the movie director. Porter lands the plane near the launch and gets Sandy to join him in the plane. Bud uses a shiny film case to flash Porter in the sky - Porter lands up the coast and he and Sandy use a small inflatable dingy to row up to arrest the film maker. Sensing real danger for Flipper, Bud wrestles free and dives into the pen to release Flipper, Flipper must protect Bud and the film maker again from the alligator and Porter and Sandy row up in time to tackle the movie director and put an end to the whole illegal film shoot.
Two implausibilities: Flipper senses danger and bad people and would never have allowed a surreptitious attempt to manhandle him into a boat without either swimming away or loudly alerting the Ricks' and Bud is not restrained when he is apprehended and he's big enough now that it would need likely two men to fully restrain him. He could've escaped at any time but chooses only to do so right as the filming is about to commence. Cool shot of the show: Sandy dives from the launch and swims to the float plane - what a life for a teenage boy to go from one cool machine to another!
