User Reviews

Warning: For this review I need to reveal something from the ending. This isn't a murder mystery so it shouldn't ruin any fun you can get in viewing this episode later. Read my review later if you disagree.

Steve is packing for a trip to San Francisco he will leave for tomorrow. Katie is helping Charley wind yarn on the couch with the others in the room. Suddenly Katie cannot talk and she drops the yarn and jumps up onto the couch in obvious great fear.

She has seen a spider on Uncle Charley's shoulder. Ernie takes care of it, Charley protests that he whacked him too hard and later, Katie somehow claims she was "brave" on this issue.

I know the classic female reaction in old shows to a mouse in the house is to shriek and stand on a chair. The mouse is on the floor, so they get their feet off of the floor. But when the spider is on someone on the couch beside you...the only reaction that makes any sense is to get OFF the couch, not climb up onto it. She could have easily dropped the yarn-as she did-and jump up running away from the couch.

It gets worse.

We move to the next evening when Steve is gone. Robbie, Chip, Ernie, and Uncle Charley are all going to some basketball game leaving poor defenseless Katie alone to study for the evening. Robbie treats her like a kid being left alone actually saying "You won't forget to lock the doors and windows. And you won't let any strangers in." I'm surprised he didn't arrange for some neighbor to check in on her every half hour.

We see several minutes of Katie alone with Tramp while a thunderstorm rages. A few times, Tramp is seen on camera with his usual doggie smile while we hear the whimpering of a dog, supposed to be Tramp but he clearly is not making any sound.

We get scenes in the upstairs hallway, where the window at the end is wide open with curtains blowing in. Now most folks would make sure to close any window during a thunderstorm on the side of the house where the wind is blowing the rain in. Not Katie, not even after hubby ordered her to "lock all the doors and windows." When she hears Tramp reacting to the thunder, she tells him the most curious thing: "You're going to have to get use to that Tramp if you're going to be a California dog." Huh? I cannot think of how anyone would think a dog raised in the old Douglas home somewhere in the Midwest would not be used to thunderstorms. Sure, lots of dogs hate thunderstorms, but how could Katie think they will get more in California than where he used to live?

The storm continues as we move to seeing Katie awakened by a loud clap of thunder. She sees the time is almost 1:30 in the morning, well past the 11 p.m. Robbie promised her they'd be home by. She calls the Sports Arena and talks to the night watchman who assures her everyone left over two hours earlier.

Along with the thunder, Katie hears this odd sound that resembles a beating heart. This sound is not constant, but off and on. I thought it might have been a tree branch scraping the roof or the side of the house in the wind. She can't identify it, doesn't at any time move through the house to see if it's louder in some place-you know, discover the source. Instead she calls Steve in his hotel. He tries to reassure her without offering any real help but just talking with him helps calm her down.

The amazing thing here is that there is no concern whatsoever about the four men being so late, knowing the game ended hours ago and it wasn't in some arena hours from home. You'd think she would be frantically phoning the police to see if there's an accident report on them.

Instead, the noise she described to Steve as a "lumpy heartbeat" starts sounding again and she races downstairs toward the front door-for reasons we cannot fathom-and just as she opens the door, her four men return home.

Now there's another review of this episode that incorrectly states there is never a reason given for their late return. Perhaps the airing he saw skipped this scene. I saw Robbie telling Katie how they were stuck on a flooded road and couldn't go anywhere. Otherside, that review was well written and I fully agree with him.

Robbie, then Uncle Charley, then Chip and Ernie all file in to the room carrying a glass of hot milk for Katie. Charley asks the ones who came in after him who they thought he was heating the milk up for.

Ernie says, "I wasn't sure but I thought I was too young to be asking questions this late at night." One second later, he asks, "Hey, how come Katie's crying?" What kid, Ernie's now 11, would ever say it's too late at night to ask a question? Then he contradicts that thought immediately after. Great example of a poorly written script.

Why did both Chip and Ernie think it necessary to bring separate glasses of milk to Katie, even if they didn't know Robbie and Charley had already done so?

During the remainder of the night, everyone except Katie has trouble sleeping because they keep hearing that same sound that troubled her. Nobody acts on this. The next day Chip and Ernie set up a "ghost catcher" maze of netting and things, just in case.

Conveniently, the next night there's another thunderstorm. Chip gets out of bed with a flashlight to explore. That hall window is still blowing heavily into the house, but he doesn't close it either. That hallway floor must be soaked near the window by now.

He goes downstairs only to, literally, bump into Ernie, causing both to scream in panic. Charley and Robbie race into the room to find out about the noise. Now they all hear the "heartbeat" noise and decide to investigate. They track it to the basement but as they go down the stairs, find there's a few inches of water all over the floor.

Now Robbie takes off his slippers to walk into the water toward a box that they think looks like a coffin.

I interrupt to ponder: Why did Robbie, hearing a loud noise, stop to put on slippers before rushing to the living room? Second question: In going farther down the stairs, why does he need to hold the slippers along with his flashlight? I would have just put them down on a step.

Robbie's attempt to open the "coffin" is interrupted by the loud noise of the "ghost-catcher" that the returning Steve has been caught in. They all dash upstairs and in talking to their dad, they learn what made the sound.

Apparently, these four males can move into a new house and for months, nobody ever explores the basement to notice or learn about this big box that covers up something. I cannot conceive of any of them never noticing it or somehow-ask Dad-finding out what this box is.

Perhaps THE most unrealistic thing is that Steve casually explains it's a water pump, a sump pump that pumps out water when it comes into the basement. He seems to be saying that whenever it rains, he expects water to flow all around the basement floor until the pump pumps the water out.

I've had a sump pump in my house for decades. But the water is not supposed to go all over the floor of the basement. That would make the whole basement practically useless, unless you like having your possessions covered with mold. The pump gets rid of excess water coming in from outside into a hole in the floor in a little room under the porch-before it floods the basement.

If you dislike totally unrealistic shows where the characters say and do things that make no sense, you'll skip this episode because it's one of the least watchable ones in this series. The illogical dialogue makes me give it the lowest rating-a one.