Wonder Woman 2.20: The Man Who Wouldn’t Tell

Airdate: 3/31/78

An unassuming but evidently popular-with-the-ladies young janitor, Alan Ackyroyd, inadvertently causes an explosion when his cleaning solutions catalyze a secret formula being developed by a weapons industry – now they’re on his tail, along with a rival industry headed by Rudolph Furst, to tell him exactly what he did. The IADC sends to Diana to help him, so now al three parties are after the terrified fugitive, who thinks it’s either cops or the insurance agency who want him to fess up. Furst manages to kidnap Alan’s girlfriend, furious after being cheated on so many times, to help jog the man’s memory, but a clever stall tactic enables WW enough time to save the day – and use her lasso to make Alan forget about everything involving the formula, rendering him worthless to any interested parties.

Taut, suspenseful chase-based actioner makes solid use of guest star GaryBurghoff as the nebbish Alan, then-currently pretty hot thanks to a little show called M*A*S*H, not to mention a young Philip Michael Thomas as the villain who would go on to star in Miami Vice. The actress who plays the girlfriend, Meg, is named Jane Actman, and she has an offbeat sweetness about her, especially toward the end when she is willing to give her cavorting beau a second chance. By and large, an improvement over recent episodes – worth the price of admission alone to see WW turn both a car and elevator into incarceration devices!