As usual, Jerry gets to do all the heavy lifting. Literally in one case, when Jerry has to drop off Tony, concealed in a bag of dirty laundry. Jerry also has to fight two bikers. Meanwhile, Tony spends time with Lynda Day George's character, and does parlor tricks for Eric Braeden's character Paradine. Who is as bored with Tony's tricks as I am at this point.
The basic plot is that a defecting scientist, Alex Pochek, gets abducted by a kidnap organization that plans to auction Alex off to the highest bidder. Alex has invented a cheap way of extracting oil from shale. Ah, 1974, when America was in the midst of an energy crisis. The idea of a human auction is a relatively clever one, particularly in 1974. They even have one of the bidders (an Arab, Hassid, of course) say that he's bidding to keep Alex from revealing his process to the world and bankrupting him (and OPEC, presumably).
The episode starts with a faked assassination attempt and then a phony cremation. The latter set up by Tony, who is involved for who knows why? Because he's the protagonist, I guess. But the kidnapper somehow realizes that it's a ploy, and sends a biker gang in disguised as female (???) mourners. They tranq Tony and the CIA agent instead of shooting them dead (continuing the show's obsession with having the bad guys not use guns so Tony doesn't have to), and take Alex away.
Lynda Day George plays Stacey, no-talent actress hooked up with the other main bad guy, Braeden's Nelson Paradine. Paradine is an oil executive who financed Alex's escape from the "Iron Curtain", but Alex refused to give his process to him when Alex realized that Paradine hoped to make a profit off of his oil-extraction process. Tony gets to Paradine through Lynda Day, and watching Paradine rip into Stacey is the unpleasant highlight of the episode.
As noted, Jerry goes undercover as a "jive dude", finds out the location of the biker gang that the kidnappers (presumably, there's a lot of "presuming" in this episode) hired to abduct Alex, and beats up two of their wimpier members. This somehow leads him to the linen company the kidnappers are using as a cover. And I don't think writer Edward J. Lasko knows how linen companies work: this one has a board room (??) on an upper floor.
Jerry sneaks Tony in, and Tony uses his exploding cigarettes from the pilot movie to free Alex. It turns out the CIA guy who has wandered in and out of the episode is auctioning off Alex. Tony and Alex escape via the roof and a guy line, in an escape sequence that was much better done in the 'MacGyver' episode "Prodigal Son" a decade or so later.
And that's it. Tony dabbles in international politics and saves the U.S. from the energy crisis. Because he's so gosh-darn good. He does get to do some magic in the middle of the case, but Bixby still looks insufferably smug while "entertaining" Paradine, and like Paradine I'm bored with his tricks by now. Bixby looks unenthusiastic flirting with Stacey, and when he's applauding the far superior magician, Mark Wilson, at the end of the episode, when Wilson does one of his "Magic Castle' cameos along with his son Greg. Stacey goes back to NYC to find herself, and she doesn't even get a goodbye scene with Tony. Which makes their earlier flirting look awkward since there's no resolution.
I suppose we should be thankful that Stacey isn't one of the show's treacherous female leads that the writers and producers seem so fond of. Instead she just does... nothing. Shows up, pitches her little act of defiance, and then leaves for NYC to "find herself".
But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong. What do you think?
The basic plot is that a defecting scientist, Alex Pochek, gets abducted by a kidnap organization that plans to auction Alex off to the highest bidder. Alex has invented a cheap way of extracting oil from shale. Ah, 1974, when America was in the midst of an energy crisis. The idea of a human auction is a relatively clever one, particularly in 1974. They even have one of the bidders (an Arab, Hassid, of course) say that he's bidding to keep Alex from revealing his process to the world and bankrupting him (and OPEC, presumably).
The episode starts with a faked assassination attempt and then a phony cremation. The latter set up by Tony, who is involved for who knows why? Because he's the protagonist, I guess. But the kidnapper somehow realizes that it's a ploy, and sends a biker gang in disguised as female (???) mourners. They tranq Tony and the CIA agent instead of shooting them dead (continuing the show's obsession with having the bad guys not use guns so Tony doesn't have to), and take Alex away.
Lynda Day George plays Stacey, no-talent actress hooked up with the other main bad guy, Braeden's Nelson Paradine. Paradine is an oil executive who financed Alex's escape from the "Iron Curtain", but Alex refused to give his process to him when Alex realized that Paradine hoped to make a profit off of his oil-extraction process. Tony gets to Paradine through Lynda Day, and watching Paradine rip into Stacey is the unpleasant highlight of the episode.
As noted, Jerry goes undercover as a "jive dude", finds out the location of the biker gang that the kidnappers (presumably, there's a lot of "presuming" in this episode) hired to abduct Alex, and beats up two of their wimpier members. This somehow leads him to the linen company the kidnappers are using as a cover. And I don't think writer Edward J. Lasko knows how linen companies work: this one has a board room (??) on an upper floor.
Jerry sneaks Tony in, and Tony uses his exploding cigarettes from the pilot movie to free Alex. It turns out the CIA guy who has wandered in and out of the episode is auctioning off Alex. Tony and Alex escape via the roof and a guy line, in an escape sequence that was much better done in the 'MacGyver' episode "Prodigal Son" a decade or so later.
And that's it. Tony dabbles in international politics and saves the U.S. from the energy crisis. Because he's so gosh-darn good. He does get to do some magic in the middle of the case, but Bixby still looks insufferably smug while "entertaining" Paradine, and like Paradine I'm bored with his tricks by now. Bixby looks unenthusiastic flirting with Stacey, and when he's applauding the far superior magician, Mark Wilson, at the end of the episode, when Wilson does one of his "Magic Castle' cameos along with his son Greg. Stacey goes back to NYC to find herself, and she doesn't even get a goodbye scene with Tony. Which makes their earlier flirting look awkward since there's no resolution.
I suppose we should be thankful that Stacey isn't one of the show's treacherous female leads that the writers and producers seem so fond of. Instead she just does... nothing. Shows up, pitches her little act of defiance, and then leaves for NYC to "find herself".
But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong. What do you think?