We all watched the Columbo Season 4 and 5 on DVD. We rated the episodes as follows:
Season 4
Most Excellent (A)
1 By Dawn's Early Light (Patrick McGoohan)
2 Negative Reaction (Dick Van Dyke)
3 Playback (Oscar Werner)
Average (C)
4 Troubled Waters (Robert Vaughn)
A compromise rating on Troubled Waters. I enjoyed the show but thought the murder was convoluted and badly planned. Little Miss RC disagreed.
5 Exercise in Fatality (Robert Conrad)
6 A Deadly State of Mind (George Hamilton)
Deadly State rated low due to Columbo's obvious trick and Hamilton's illogical actions. Hamilton is one of the less clever and convincing murderers on the show. Further, at the start Columbo really has no reason to suspect him.
Season 5
Most Excellent (A)
1 Now You See Him...(Jack Cassidy)
Good (B)
2 Identity Crisis(Patrick McGoohan)
I'd rate this higher except for the weak ending. Columbo never really built much of a case against McGoohan and never could have got a conviction. In addition, the CIA agents (Led by Larry Tate) were rather silly.
Average (C)
3 Forgotten Lady (Janet Leigh)
Forgotten Lady rating is a compromise. Mrs. RC loved Janet Leigh, I thought the ending a little weak.
Below Average (D)
4. A Matter of Honor (Richardo Montalban)
5.A Case of Immunity (Hector Elizondo)
6. Last Salute to the Commodore (Robert Vaughn)
We felt a definite drop in quality from Season 4 to Season 5. Other disagreements noted "Little Miss RC" thought 'Playback' and 'By Dawn's Early Light' to be average. In Season 5, the producers were probably trying to do something new and different. So they got away from the formula and gave us (i) an ensemble cast and a who dunnit (Commodore); traveling to Mexico (Honor); dealing with Arabs (immunity) or the CIA (Identity Crisis).
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2 comments:
Wow in all my comments about TV shows I have always left Columbo off the list because you know the appeal of it always escapted me. Along with McCloud, MacMillian and Wife and Murder She Wrote. I guess I don't care for these genteel cerebral mysteries. Give me fat Frank Cannon squeezing out of his Lincoln Contiental and bashing some guy in the noggin with his forty five any day of the week.
Did Cannon ever bash anyone? I thought he just sat - mostly. And talked.
BTW, it was cool seeing a young Cannon in the "The Killers" (1946) - he was kind of a tough guy then -although a little chubby.
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