Ed Asner plays police Lt. Vincent Busti in two episodes, "A Hole In the City", (2/1/61) and "New York to LA" (4/19/61) and in both episodes Lt. Busti gets shot. He survives in the second episode but appears to have been killed in the first one. I wonder if they were not shown in the order filmed and the earlier episode was supposed to be Busti's demise. If so, it's a sad thing because the latter episode stresses that he's got a wife and a young son at home and it's important that he recover and get home to them.
There's no confusion of character names: I just watched both episodes and Asner's character is called Lt. Vincent Busti in both. In the earlier episode he meets Flint, Arcaro and Parker and they don't know each other. In the latter episode, they do but there is no mention of the earlier incident. When Asner is shot in that episode, Olga Bellin cradles his head and shouts at Robert DuVal, "Wherever you go, Lewis, whatever you touch, you make death!" Lt. Busti is not seen again in that episode, so it's an easy assumption that he's a goner.
Herb Leonard and Sterling Silliphant were early boosters of Ed Asner's career. He appeared no less than 5 times on their other show, "Route 66". In his last two appearances there, "Shoulder the Sky, My Lad " (3/2/62) and "Welcome to the Wedding" (11/8/62), he is also killed, first by a knife in a mugging and then by a fugitive who escapes his custody, the same scenario as here. When Asner's character is shot or stabbed, he makes a point of emphasizing how awful it is to experience that, letting out screams of pain and gasping or even gurgling for his last breath. I detect a conscious effort by this socially conscious actor to tell the audience that these events are dreadful things: these characters are being physically invaded. They aren't just having heart attacks.
There's no confusion of character names: I just watched both episodes and Asner's character is called Lt. Vincent Busti in both. In the earlier episode he meets Flint, Arcaro and Parker and they don't know each other. In the latter episode, they do but there is no mention of the earlier incident. When Asner is shot in that episode, Olga Bellin cradles his head and shouts at Robert DuVal, "Wherever you go, Lewis, whatever you touch, you make death!" Lt. Busti is not seen again in that episode, so it's an easy assumption that he's a goner.
Herb Leonard and Sterling Silliphant were early boosters of Ed Asner's career. He appeared no less than 5 times on their other show, "Route 66". In his last two appearances there, "Shoulder the Sky, My Lad " (3/2/62) and "Welcome to the Wedding" (11/8/62), he is also killed, first by a knife in a mugging and then by a fugitive who escapes his custody, the same scenario as here. When Asner's character is shot or stabbed, he makes a point of emphasizing how awful it is to experience that, letting out screams of pain and gasping or even gurgling for his last breath. I detect a conscious effort by this socially conscious actor to tell the audience that these events are dreadful things: these characters are being physically invaded. They aren't just having heart attacks.
