Airdate: 12/1/76
A Women’s Army Corps recruit named Mary Jo is shot and
killed, inexplicably, by her commanding officer, Sgt, Billings, unbeknownst to
anyone else on the base. The camp’s general enlists Charlie’s services to find
whodunit, and the girls go green when they go undercover – Sabrina as the base
nurse and Kelly and Jill as the unlucky grunts. Via Mary Jo’s best friend, Sally,
the Angels learn that the ill-fated soldier had been cozy with Billings before
her untimely offing, Sabrina becomes cozy with the base doctor, Dr. Canlon, who
also seems to have ties with Billings. Kelly’s snooping naturally arouses
suspicion – her reprisal takes the form of a gas mask minus its filter during a
drill. But the real clincher proves to be young female patient given
dangerously expired medication, and apparently aware of it. The Angels discover
that Billings and Canlon are involved in a scheme to sell bad medicine to
hard-to-track Medivac units (Mary Jo was on to them), and they TCB in a
climactic airplane/jeep chase on the base runway.
Odd caper involving the decidedly thrill-less topic of
medication profiteering is just an excuse to allow the Angels to play G.I. Jane
for an hour, but there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. Definitely a hoot
to see CHiP’s star Robert Pine play
good guy/bad guy with surprising credibility, and it offers up yet another
opportunity to see Sabrina involved in a quasi-relationship with a leading man
(she’s getting all the breaks in this regard). It it got me thinking about
another reason I like this show – it doesn’t make men look like s**t. Yes, they
can be bad guys, but they’re also multi-dimensional humans the Angels work with,
interact with and are very often nice to. It’s the reason they solve these
crimes, in the fictional universe, and why they did so well with male viewers
in the real one. The same can't necessarily be said for its umpteen
“girl-power” imitators and knock-offs. Seems to be a trend for the show, though, to start off with a murder, usually of a young female, often a whistleblower. Let’s see some greater equality there, writers.
…And give ‘em credit for attempting to stage a reasonably
dramatic climax in which the Angels, somehow, manage to chase down an airplane
with a jeep and get it to crash into a shed and explode. Even Schwarzenneger
would have trouble with that one!
Oh, and the Angels, pretty sore for having to join the army
on this mission, manage to give their boss a pretty good comeuppance at the
end.
Client: General Green
Plot difficulty level: 3
Rating: ***
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