"Hello pigeon. Let's see if you can fly." - A murderous thug confronting Starsky & Hutch's informant
Starsky & Hutch: The Complete Fourth Season DVD Review
By Jonathan Boudreaux
Undercover cops Ken "Hutch" Hutchinson (David Soul) and Dave Starsky (Paul Michael Glaser) gas up Starsky's red and white Gran Torino for the fourth and final season of '70s action fave Starsky & Hutch. Things are a little different this time around. Hutch has packed on a few pounds, both on his waistline and - thanks to a bushy new 'stache - his upper lip. Starsky uses even goofier accents than usual. Jive-talking hustler Huggy Bear (Antonio Fargas) is a business owner again, this time as proprietor of The Pits, a dive bar. Starsky and Hutch's boss, Captain Dobey (Bernie Hamilton), is grumpier than ever. One thing hasn't changed, though - the series still mixes camp humor with hard-hitting, muscular action. Sort of like sirloin with Velveeta dressing.
The season starts off with "Discomania," a hard-hitting look at the late 1970s zeitgeist that sends the crime fighting duo undercover to a discotheque called Fever. The club is a killer singles scene. Literally. One of the patrons has been slipping barbiturates into ladies' drinks, kidnapping them, and forcing them to dance in his basement disco before dispatching them to the giant nightclub in the sky. Why? Apparently the loser is so elderly - he's forty-two - that the hot-pantsed honeys refuse to hit the floor with him, sending the poor lug over the edge and into...discomania! Fans of the series can thrill to the sight of Starsky and Hutch dancing like spasmodic chickens having epileptic seizures to knockoffs of popular disco tunes. This episode also features T.J. Hooker's Adrian Zmed as a dancing pickpocket, and includes a female undercover cop who "promised my husband I'd be home by twelve." Whew! A late night at the disco!
The season's second episode, "The Game," isn't quite as fun but is still a camp-filled hoot. After all, what other TV show would feature an episode in which two grown men play a game of hide-and-seek that nearly turns deadly when one develops botulism? Believe it or not, things get even more ridiculous as the season progresses. In "Dandruff," a lame riff on Shampoo, Hutch and Starsky go undercover as Mr. Marlene and Tyrone, a pair of lisping hairdressers, in order to foil a jewelry heist. This episode only proves that the show is much less funny when it is trying to be funny, as evidenced by Starsky's Inspector Clouseau impersonation. The series channels The Dukes of Hazzard in "Moonshine," a cornpone liquor-fueled episode that seems to suggest that Southern California is filled with honkytonks itching to serve moonshine.
Not that all of the episodes are campy. "The Avenger" is a Brian DePalma-influenced thriller about a woman whose one-night-stands are being murdered by a jealous admirer. In "Birds of a Feather," Hutch's old partner takes drastic steps to pay off his wife's gambling debts.
Season four also features "Targets without a Badge," an epic three-part episode that follows the duo as they fight government corruption. In part one, the Starsky and Hutch quit the force after a secret witness in a drug case against a judge is exposed and killed. In part two, Starsky comes to the aid of a childhood pal, but complications arise when high-level government officials seek revenge for his prosecution of the judge. Still off of the force, the duo seemingly solves the case in part three. The story continues two episodes later in "Sweet Revenge," however, when the operation's real mastermind decides to eliminate the partners once and for all. Transforming the series from stand-alone episodes that wrap up neatly at the end of each hour to a semi-serialized drama is an interesting idea. Unfortunately, Starsky & Hutch is no Hill Street Blues. The storyline, especially in "Targets without a Badge," seems padded and flabby. What could have been two strong episodes instead is diluted into three slightly weaker ones. "Sweet Revenge" is much more intense and exciting, but as the series' final episode, its promise is never really fulfilled.
Familiar faces in season four include Roger E. Mosely (Magnum, P.I.), Jack Ging (Riptide), Liz Torres (All in the Family), Kim Cattrall (Sex and the City), Joan Pringle (That's My Mama), Fran Ryan (Green Acres), Billy Green Bush (Elvis), James Noble (Benson), Pat Corley (Murphy Brown), Carl Anderson (Jesus Christ Superstar), Kenneth McMillan (Rhoda), Mary Crosby (Dallas), Joanna Cassidy (Six Feet Under), Tim Thomerson (Down and Out in Beverly Hills), G.W. Bailey (The Closer), Rene Auberjonois (Boston Legal), Audrey Meadows (The Honeymooners), Vonetta McGee (Hell Town), Mykelti Williamson (Kidnapped), Caren Kaye (It's Your Move), John Ashton (Dallas), Robert Loggia (Queens Supreme), Maud Adams (Emerald Point N.A.S.), Jeffrey Tambor (Arrested Development), Ray Walston (My Favorite Martian), Jenny O'Hara (The Facts of Life), John Karlen (Cagney & Lacey), Martin Kove (Cagney & Lacey), Mare Winningham (The Brotherhood of Poland, N.H.), Ken Kercheval (Dallas), Ted Neely (Jesus Christ Superstar), LaWanda Page (Sanford and Son), Gino Conforti (That Girl), Richard Herd (T.J. Hooker), and Yvonne Craig (Batman).
The twenty-two episodes that make up season four are divided onto five discs. The discs are housed in a digipak featuring the Gran Tornio's racing stripes and stills from the series. An episode guide housed in a folder panel contains episode numbers, titles, and brief episode synopses. The discs themselves feature the Gran Torino's stripes. The digipak slides into a cardboard sleeve.
Season four's simple yet effective menus feature static images of the cast. Viewers can choose to play all episodes or view individual episodes. Although there are no scene selection menus, the episodes are divided into chapters.
