Two Hundred A Day - Episode 137: This Case Is Closed

Episode Date: June 16, 2024

Nathan and Eppy finish the main tour through the first season with the 90-minute S1E6 This Case Is Closed. Jim's client sends him to Newark to check up on a soon-to-be son-in-law, and Jim starts getting heat from the mob, the cops and the feds - and he doesn't know why! With an unconventional narrative structure, plenty of good car chases and lots of Cannell-written memorable dialogue, this Roy Huggins script delivers a solid early-series Rockford experience. Note: This episode was split into two for syndication, and the sydicated versions are what's currently available on streaming services. We watched and talked about the original 90-minute version of the episode. We have another podcast: Plus Expenses. Covering our non-Rockford media, games and life chatter, Plus Expenses is available via our Patreon (https://www.patreon.com/twohundredaday) at ALL levels of support. Want more Rockford Files trivia, notes and ephemera? Check out the Two Hundred a Day Rockford Files Files (http://tinyurl.com/200files)! We appreciate all of our listeners, but offer a special thanks to our patrons (https://www.patreon.com/twohundredaday). In particular, this episode is supported by the following Gumshoe and Detective-level patrons: * Richard Hatem * Bill Anderson * Brian Perrera * Eric Antener * Jordan Bockelman * Michael Zalisco * Joe Greathead * Mitch Hampton's Journey of an Aesthete Podcast (https://www.jouneyofanaesthetepodcast.com) * Dael Norwood wrote a book! Trading Freedom: How Trade with China Defined Early America (https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/T/bo123378154.html) * Chuck Suffel's comic Sherlock Holmes & the Wonderland Conundrum (http://whatchareadingpress.com) * Paul Townend recommends the Fruit Loops podcast (https://fruitloopspod.com) * Shane Liebling's Roll For Your Party dieroller app (https://rollforyour.party/) * Jay Adan's Miniature Painting (http://jayadan.com) * Brian Bernsen's Facebook page of Rockford Files filming locations (https://www.facebook.com/brianrockfordfiles/) * Brian Cummins, Robert Lindsey, Nathan Black, Jay Thompson, David Nixon, Colleen Kelly, Tom Clancy, Andre Appignani, Pumpkin Jabba Peach Pug, Dave P, Dave Otterson, Kip Holley and Dale Church! Thanks to: * Fireside.fm (https://fireside.fm) for hosting us * Audio Hijack (https://rogueamoeba.com/audiohijack/) for helping us record and capture clips from the show

You really want Shum with the 7th? Come on, that nag couldn't go a mile in the back of a pickup truck. Call me. Welcome to 200 Today, the podcast where we talk about the 70s television detective show The Rockford Files. I'm Nathan Poletta. And I'm Epidaeus Rapshaw. And we are coming to you at long last, I say, because we had a longer than expected break in our already erratic recording schedule So we need to remember how to how to do a podcast but we are coming to you with a 90 minute episode

season 1 episode 6 we go by how I am DB says so season 1 episode 6 This case is closed says, so season one episode six, this case is closed. The hesitancy there is because it was split into two episodes for syndication, but I guess that would not be how you do, but it is one episode for the purposes of the original airing. And IMDB is telling us that this is an hour and 39 minute episode, but both of us watched an hour and 16 of those minutes. Yeah, I'm not quite sure where that number comes from, because it is neither the actual runtime of the episode that we want. So so we both have the deal.

Well, you have the DVD set, the Blu Ray set. And on both of our sets, this is a single episode. It is not to it is not the synchated version and on both of ours It was an hour 16 running time something like that our for something like you yeah Let's average it out our 15 Yeah, which makes sense for a 90 minute airing window because that's minus commercials But then if it's a two hour airing window I don't know if the one hour 30 and 39 minute has additional material in it to pad it out to a two

hour window this is a mystery that I was unable to solve with some basic research so I don't know it's it just needs like what 24 25 minutes right previously on it seems like a lot Yeah it does it seems a little excessive. But that's clearly over the 90 minute mark so I don't know I don't know where that number comes from I don't think it really matters. I mean I guess maybe combining the runtime of the two syndicated episodes right because if there are 50 odd minutes. Yeah I guess that's probably where it comes in too. 108 yeah which is pretty close. Yeah why not let's's probably where it turns into. 108, yeah, which is pretty close. Yeah, why not? Let's just say that's something.

So maybe that's where that number comes from. Double the credits, double the fun. Yeah. So we will be unable to talk about the padding done for syndication, which is called out in some of the IMDB reviews. And also actually in the 200 a day Rothford files files on our spreadsheet where one of our patrons put in a note that part of the stretching it to two episodes for syndication was using stock footage in the car chases of which there are a number of car chases yes so the 74 firebird turns into a 77 firebird in in the syndicated version because of the stock footage they use to pad it. That's great.

So that's pretty good. Also other little trivia note, once it was syndicated for a while, it ended up slotted into season four, I think, on like, I don't know how syndication works, but on whatever the schedule is for. Oh, that's interesting. And that was just like an error, but it existed like that for a number of years until it was corrected At some point but uh, yeah, so it definitely feels season one. It definitely feels I mean I experienced a little bit of

cognitive whiplash because of I just misread What episode and what see I flipped them I flipped the episode and the season in my head. Oh. And so when I went to look for the DVD, I spent a lot of time just staring at the season six DVD looking for this case is closed. And then I had mentally prepared myself for a season six. Not that you have to mentally prepare or whatever,

but like that's what I was expecting. And then when I sat down to watch it, I was like, wow, this is thoroughly season one. So yeah, I's what I was expecting and then when I sat down to watch I was like wow this is thoroughly season one so yeah I guess what I'm saying is that the seasons have vibes the seasons do have vibes yeah when I click on the IMDB link to the streaming where it's streaming on the Roku channel that is the syndicated version so if you are watching this streaming maybe it's you'll get the syndicated ones and not the tight, tight hour 14 that we're. Yes. Going to talk about.

This one is written by Roy Huggins, credited as always as John Thomas James with the teleplay by Cannell. And there is some delightful canelisms in this one. I was taking some note. You know, I'm taking notes. I kind of know where I think I'm going to cut in dialogue, right? I might have to scale back the drops for this episode because there are a lot where I'm like, I'll just cut this in. I'll just cut this in.

So see how many make it into the edit. But there are some good dialogue choices in this episode. Not to give too much away, but my notes for the preview montage, just sum up to good lines. Yeah, they're all good lines. Preview montage, just a bunch of good lines. All of the things in the preview montage are the punch lines or the, you know, the Joke in the cut. Joke in the cut or whatever.

The highlight of a slightly longer I want to drop all of this dialogue in yeah, yes. Yes. So again, we'll see how many make it This one is directed by Bernard L. Kowalski. I recognize the name Unfortunately, not from other Rockford files because this is his only Rockford files episode but he Files because this is his only Rockford Files episode but he directed four episodes of Columbo and I recognize the name from the Columbo credits. He has credits from the late 50s onward. He also executive produced the show Beretta which was a canal project. I guess it started the year after this. I'd have to look again.

But it's a contemporaneous canal project, which I think we've been recommended to watch as kind of a counterpoint show a little bit, because it's about like an undercover cop in New York. But I've never actually like watched it. Yeah, I've never. Kowalski was apparently the co-owner of Mission Impossible, whatever that means. Oh. As another claim to fame. watched it. Yeah, I know. Kowalski was apparently the co-owner of Mission Impossible, whatever

that means. Oh. As another claim to fame. Yeah. And this is a fun semi cinematic episode. Lots of fun camera movement. So, you know, I don't know. He's a pro doing a good job. Yeah. It's early, early Rockford that's experimental in the way, well not experimental, I might be preparing people for too wild of an episode if I call it experimental, but Rockford doesn't have all of its footing yet. So the way they're telling the story in this one does things that you don't see that often in other Rockford Files episodes because they're still trying to find it. So it feels like, you know, especially considering its length. And, you know, you were just mentioning Columbo. I bet you they did definitely think of it as a, you know, here's a

made-for-TV movie Rockford episode kind of thing. I imagine we could guess where they split it for syndication, but it certainly doesn't have like a hard split, like beat in the middle or anything like that. It definitely feels like the cohesive one one story. Yeah. Yeah. No gear jammers. It's no gear jammers. But is anything. Yeah, really? But yeah, so this is our last main season. Roy Huggins script, obviously, when we do the pilot, we'll talk about him again.

But kind of since we've watched a couple of Huggins scripts in a row, there is an element that I find a little interesting where Rockford in this very original conception has lots of tradecraft. Right. Right. But I think the Huggins scripts are actually much less interested in those details, so we get a lot of he's gonna do a thing and then he's done the thing and we're just like yeah it doesn't matter how he did it obviously he's gonna do it because he

right you can do all these things. So we actually other than one little small kind of fast talk con that he does, we don't really see the trade craft in this episode. And I feel like that is similar to the last couple episodes where it's like, we see him more being a tough guy, thinking on his feet, getting in fights, like all those aspects and a little less of thinking three steps ahead detective. Yeah. I think some of the other writers push a little more another

Bit about being season one is that it definitely it feels more Noir yeah The plot feels more like there's rock tradition this in here that is delicious Absolutely delicious rock tradition is so I don't want to like You know undercut that or anything like that, or say that it's a bad thing that these early ones feel more noir. But again, it's, you know,

I feel like it's them trying to find out what the character is, it's Rockford growing into Rockford, I guess. Rockford the show growing into Rockford the show. Yeah, cause I think as we've discussed, the character of Jim Rockford has been pretty, was pretty locked in from the show. Yeah, because I think as we've discussed the character of Jim Rockford has been pretty was pretty locked in from the from the beginning. We get more of the rocky disapproving beats which are good those are fun and yeah some good lines. There's a great one where he's like I'm gonna

put that away I'm afraid of guns. Yeah. I guess one of the things that just stands out is that there's like there's a lot more action in this one then yeah this one does have a lot of action which is good for us because it means that even though it has longer running time yeah my notes on it are actually not that much longer than a standard episode because there's a lot of watching cars so as we go into this one maybe maybe I can figure out what happened. Okay. Okay, there's several factions in this one. Yeah, yeah.

And at some point, I was convinced that one faction were a different kind of fed. And then in the end, I'm like, Whoa, maybe they're not. So we'll see as we go through. We'll get to it when we get into it. Yeah, I guess maybe my final, the Huggins- I guess maybe my final the Huggins ishness. Yes, the Huggins ishness. Is also reflected, I think, with a lot of comfort with a sprawling cast of characters and not necessarily resolving all the narrative threads. Yeah.

Like kind of being comfortable with like, yeah, that's not the important part of the story is like Resolving all the we talk about motivation a lot, right? Yeah Our characters motivated to do things and how the show does a really good job of showing us motivations that aren't just like well They're the villain so they're doing bad things This one we get a lot of motivation for the stuff That's important and very little for the stuff that is clearly like, this is part of the story, but like, we don't really find with

just letting people be a little confused. Like that's, that's okay for this kind of show. Well, we already kind of mentioned it, but, uh, Epi, what are your, uh, what are your favorite takeaway lines from the preview montage? Okay, so basically yeah, what I gave up at some point just wrote lots of good lines the big turtleneck vultures is a good good insult for Private detectives PIs are a cop disease. Yes there's a joke in the preview cut that doesn't exist in the show which I like which is the There's a joke in the preview cut that doesn't exist in the show, which I like, which is the ethics. Yeah, your your ethics are lousy. And then what kind of ethics does a private detective have? Those are two unrelated things from two. They're separated by a considerable amount of time in the show, which is fun. It's fun that they like somebody went through and like and was like, let's put these two together. They're pretty fun. And then in a very Rockfordishness moment, Jim's been doing stupid things all day.

Yes. That's such a good... I mean, Jim is saying I have been doing stupid things all day. It's good. Yeah. 200 a Day is a 100% listener-supported show, thanks to our patrons. In addition to our gratitude and editing access to the 200 Files Files spreadsheet, patrons receive exclusive episode previews every month, and Plus Expenses, our bonus podcast where we talk about media, work, and our lives.

In addition, every episode, we say thank you to our gumshoe patrons. Brian Bernsen has a Facebook page where he drives his Rockford tribute car to shooting locations from the show. Facebook.com slash Brian Rockford Files. Chuck Suphel's one-shot comic Sherlock Holmes and the Wonderland Conundrum is available at WhatchaReadingPress.com. Find Dale Norwood's book, Trading Freedom, How Trade with China Defined Early America, wherever good books are sold. It's about fast ships, cheap drugs, and American political economy, published by the University of Chicago Press. Join Mitch Hampton to examine all matters aesthetic and what it means to be human at the Journey of

an Asteep Podcast, wherever you get your podcasts. Paul Townand also recommends the podcast Fruit Loops, Serial Killers of Color, at Fruit Loops Pod dot com. Shane Liebling has all of your online dice rolling needs covered at his website, Roll4Your.party. And check out Jay Adan's amazing miniature painting skills over at JayAdan.com. Thank you to Andrea Apignani, Tom Clancy, Pumpkin Jappa Peach Pug, Dave P, Dave Otterson, Kip Holley, Dale Church, Colleen Kelly, David Nixon, Nathan Black, Robert Lindsay, Jay Thompson, and Brian Cummins. And finally, special appreciation for our detective little patrons. Joe Greathead, Michael Zalisco, Eric Antenor, Brian Pereira, Jordan Bockelman, not Brockleman, Bill Anderson,

and of course, Richard Haddam. If you're interested in keeping us going for as little as $1 an episode, check out patreon.com slash 200 a day to see if becoming a patron is right for you. We start off this episode strong with our core season one theme, style theme, episode strong with our core season one theme style theme over watching the Plainland. We have some strong names in the credits coming up. This is our second and final appearance of Sharon Gless. Right. She's the third Cacody. Yeah. We talked about her in her season three episode, The Fourth Man. So we talked about her more in that one. And then this is her first appearance on the show here.

And then also Joseph Cotton, who plays a very significant role, definitely has a vibe that is not really a standard Rockford vibe, but still works really well, I think, and is a, I guess, classic Hollywood actor. I mean, he was in Citizen Kane. He was in The Magnificent Ampersons. He's got a face. He's got a face.

Oh, he's in Shadow of a Doubt. That's a good movie. There's obviously, you know, late, late career over here. There was one one note in the Ed Robertson book that I thought was fun. This episode features noted screen actor Joseph Cotton, who reportedly agreed to do the guest shot on the basis of his longtime friendship with executive producer Meadow Rosenberg. Ah, it's wonderful. Yeah, and I think he's great. He's a memorable rock bird foil.

Anyway, so we are watching Jim arrive, getting off a plane, going to a payphone, and calling a Mr. Jameson. He's back. Something happened back there. It was weird. And Jim will fill him in after getting home and freshening up. So we're getting a good drop right in the middle of the story intro here. I noted, I was like, air travel means we're going elsewhere in the Rockford verse.

But then, before he even got on the phone, the announcements were just great cues as to letting you know where you are. Because they're just telling you like all the flights, you're like, those are all flights out of LA. And then they were like, those who just came from Newark, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, oh, okay. All right. Well, now I know where he's from. Where he just came from Newark. Yeah, blah blah blah, and I was like, oh, okay. All right Well now I know where he's from

From and what yeah, no, I thought that was fun good stuff And I think the episode description primes you for Newark Yeah, you know as modern viewers coming to it, you know Jim travels to Newark So like I'm waiting for that to happen anyway Anyhow Jim heads out to the Firebird. We see someone watching him from another car. I'm going to note this just because I noted it and then it actually is kind of, it's kind of relevant to a later event where Jim gets in his car and we see that there is a seatbelt but he doesn't put it on. Yes. You know, every so often I remember to be on seatbelt watch because that was a thing where

eventually they kind of started getting dinged by the network for like for not showing people in seat belts so I just noticed it like ah he didn't put a seat belt on this might come in later did you notice the goons tie not specifically oh it's it's good it's a fun one it's got like it's geometrically busy I think I would describe it as such at first I thought he had like a bunch of giant six-sided dice on it or something like that those are like dots and lines and things. Thank you for keeping us on track, however, with the important details. I've got another important detail here.

Uh-huh. Yo, he's in the parking garage, right? On the beams... Oh yeah, I love that. It's written, slow down your speeding, which is great. Yeah, painted on in... Painted on. Yeah.

It is telling everyone, no matter what their speed is, that they're speeding. That's lovely. Just the accusation just straight up like no attempt like pretending there's a radar or something that's detecting it. Maybe a local can let us know if that is still the case. I've never driven out of the parking garage. I think I've only even been through LAX like twice, so I'm sure it's different now. But maybe, maybe those have been preserved. So we have some more credits as we're watching Jim drive.

We're seeing that he's being tailed. He sees that he's being tailed and then he hits the gas and starts speeding down a straightaway. Yeah. And we get into the high speed chase portion. I mean it goes without saying there's good harmonica underneath all of it. Oh yeah. I don't think we need to spend too much time on the car chases and follows

unless there's something in particular you want to bring up. Most of them are like on the streets and are very visceral, like low to the ground shots of the heavy cars and we're hearing in the tires. Sparks flying. Sparks are flying. Yeah.

Like all that good stuff. Yeah. But narrative wise, they're mostly some chasing and then something to end the chase. The end of this one is good. Jim turns into a pay parking lot. Yeah. In his first appearance in this episode, we have Louis Delgado, aka Billings. Unfortunately no Billings in this episode, but maybe this is Billings on, maybe he's

on his own time in this scene. Right, yeah. So he's in a car going into this pay lot where you drop a coin and the arm raises and you drive in. He's still in the entrance when Jim turns and then bumps his back bumper to push him into the lot so that Jim can make it before the arm comes down. I definitely spent time. I mean, a split second, but I was like, wait, is Jim's plan to manufacture a crash so that the cops would arrive and he wouldn't, you know, like, or you know what? But no, he's just he's just shoving this guy through so you get in under the arm, which is great

So the pursuing car sees this has to pay get through the arm And then we have a slow trek through the parking lot to try and find the firebird Which this guy's unable to do and I'm kind of expecting the like here's where he's hiding and he shoots out at something. Again, back to the like, he just knows what he's doing. We don't need to see the details. We stick with the person who's following Jim, as he can't find the car, leaves the parking lot, looks disappointed. We see him thinking, and then he does the classic hit the steering wheel in frustration. And sigh. It's fun. I agree with you. Like all the traces have like a good detail, but like otherwise they're

they're nice. Last squeals, lots of sparks. But yeah. And some of the business, like some of the staying on characters while they do things is because they have the time in the 90 minute episode. Like staying with this guy as we see him, like, slowly, look around and look around and everything. Yeah, definitely not.

Like we could have just cut to him hitting the steering wheel in frustration and we would have known what happened. But we spent a couple of seconds with him and it makes for the nice a nice pace where we get to see a couple like extended little sequences. Yeah. But we do cut from that to Jim pulling up to the trailer. Clearly, he made it There was just this note I had just because of the the shot as he's pulling up His trailer has the awning over the door at this stage and I was like, oh the awning's looking good at some point

I'm sure it gets trashed. It disappears eventually sometimes it's there sometimes it's not but I was like, oh, looking good We talked about his trailer in the last one because it's still early season one. It's in the location that we're not used to. It seems to be kind of on the street or whatever. Friend of the show, Jordan Bockelman, not Brockleman, left a note on our, on Patreon saying that up until season one, episode 10, the Dexter Crisis, the location for the trailer was near the Malibu Pier and then starting in Caledonia. It's worth a fortune is where it moved to the Paradise Cove location that we know and love, which is about seven miles away.

So there is some specific notes about the trailer changing location. Thank you, Jordan. They lay the groundwork for that in this episode There's a specific threat that comes out at some point about where the trailer is Okay, so this is the beginning that I love the trailer in this episode I love all of the gags around the trailer in this episode Yeah, he gets inside and it's it is ransacked totally trashed I noticed both the picture of Rocky is knocked over

and he doesn't pick it up at some point and brush it off, which is always good. And I think I saw that the cookie jar was broken. I feel like I saw he was in the kitchen that there was maybe it was a different jar. But yeah, Jim clearly is displeased. He goes to his literal Rolodex, which I also appreciate, flips through, and he calls the DMV to talk to registration. So this is the only real, like, con-ish thing that happens here, which is fairly straightforward, but also very fun to see.

So I was taking my notes and I'm like, oh, I think I see how this worked. He wants to track down the registration of the car that was following him. Right. Cause he got to look at the license plate at some point during that chase. So he needs to talk it out of this person registration. And I think does he put on his accent to match her accent? That might be the case. I noticed that she had like a knot.

She has kind of like a Wlly you know Oklahoma ish kind of accent the way this Khan works is a flirt mm-hmm and normally he's not doing that over the phone normally he's using his assets in person to do this but this is over the phone so yeah I would definitely believe that he put the accent on. mag wheels, just the whole thing, just the way I want it. But anyway, this guy had a for sale sign in the back window and it had a telephone number on it. And I tried to catch up with him, but I missed the light, I almost got a ticket.

But his buddy got the license plate number. And so I love how tenuous this conversation is. Yeah, yeah. If she spends any time thinking about it, it falls apart. But what he presents is, this is a win-win situation. Somebody's trying to sell their car. I want to buy it at any cost. Nobody's going to be upset about it.

You just help out a bunch of people. And yeah, we see on her end that she's kind of like smiling and amused. And yeah, we get that flirtatious nature. So the power of Jim to flirt through the phone line is unmatched. She finally says, okay, I guess I can I can sneak a peek, I believe is what she says. She looks it up in the computer, we get some good 70s computer action. Like reel to reel tape drive. Oh, good stuff. And it pops out a name Martin Fishback. Jim looks up this Martin Fishback in the phone book.

Wouldn't you know it? Sending this. Oh, here we go. Turns out that he's another PI. With an ad in the paper and everything. Oh, there it is. Yeah, there we go. All the PIs.

Mm-hmm. Oh, wow. He has an actual phone number. Not a 555. Interesting. Full surveillance, electronic debugging. Time to call them all and see which ones are still in service. So many PIs! Detectives International, Duber, CNN Associates, Guardsmark, Wow someone really went ham on the on the on the page here National Detective Bureau yeah, this could have been you know peas and carrots throughout, but no this is good

It's like it was made for someone to take a screenshot of it 50 years later Wow wild me saying the phrase a screenshot of it 50 years later just really, really hit me. Yeah. That would be like Jim Rockford doing a podcast of something that took place in the mid 20s. Right. Oh, wait, it is like almost the mid 20s. Right. Because 50 plus 50.

Yeah. Oh, God. Oh, boy. All right. So before Jim can do, you know, has any reaction to that in particular, there's a knock on the door. Jim goes to open the door and he is immediately jumped by. Yes. One of the most physically resembling a gorilla. Gorillas, I think we've yes we've had. I'm not sure who is a cast of thousands this episode yeah i wasn't quite sure which uh which character this was most a lot of the

players in this one do not have headshots yeah but he has a face so i'm sure someone perhaps our friend sam probably knows who this is just based on the face. But anyway, real gorilla. There is one person tagged bug Jean LaBelle. Oh, yeah. LaBelle, the godfather of grappling. Yeah, I saw that. And then I forgot to follow up on it. I think he's just one of the heavies like that doesn't talk. Yeah, I think you might be right.

But yeah, I saw that. And then I did not look it up in more things. Anyway, yes, G-ma Bell a Classic wrestler of note and fighter I suppose the label lock is a is a legitimate Submission move that has been part of various wrestlers repertoires. Anyway, Jim gets punched in the face Yes, well Jim has a good initial reaction he gives a good gut punch but yeah the other goon has a gun the first gorilla punches him right in the face and then they put these like blinder glasses on him like sunglasses that are completely blacked out and toss

him into a big I wrote down Lincoln Continental I don't know if it's literally a Lincoln Continental but it it looks like Lincoln Continental. My notes, not about the car here, but my notes here when Jim gets hit at the door, I was like, what did you expect, Trappford? And then I wrote, oh no, it's season one, we haven't established. But no, this episode establishes that.

This episode does- It never opened your door. Yeah. Jim is in the car. The first of many sequences where Jim is in the back of a car surrounded by goons. Yes. Running his mouth to try and figure out what is going on and how you can get out of it. He says, Tell me what you want. I'll probably give it to you.

And the goon says, I want you to shut up, Rockford. Then we just kind of follow the car as it goes through this big, fancy automatic gate into this big property Was there theremin in the music at this point something there was there was like the eerie tone But I mean it works but it is a little yeah sound out and the other thing that stands out is the saxophone that kicks in is the saxophone that kicks in. And I think is kind of the theme for this. We're going to meet a mob guy for this mob guy. Yeah, I think the saxophone kicks in

when there's some mob appearances. But for whatever reason, it sounds like a very 80s saxophone to me. So it's almost like a 90s episode, like weird sound soundscape with the theremin and the saxophone. This is not a criticism but it definitely I definitely noticed. He's marched into the house they sit him down. He ends up facing off with Torrance Beck as we learn who is a mob guy who walks with a cane. That is his defining character trait. He's played by Joseph, I assume, de la Sorte, who was in fact in The Godfather Part 2. This is his final episode appearance for The Rockerfiles.

We have seen him in Season 3, Episode 4, Feeding Frenzy, where he plays Lucy Carbone. So I think that was one of the main mob guys in that. And then season four, the Attractive Nuisance, which I do not remember what role that would have been. Anyway, this is our last appearance for Mr. Delasorte. A wrap on Delasorte. He was in two episodes of Airwolf. So, you know. Yeah, that's good. Among many. He's a, you know, he's a yeah, a TV guy.

But here he has the little pencil mustache and the cane. Yeah, he's a character. You already got trouble. The only question is whether you're going to wake up tomorrow breathing air or dirt. Yes. His goon slapped Jim a couple of times and Jim totally no sells it. Just like doesn't even move his head which is a great effect. The look after the second slap that Jim gives is so I would put it in Rockfordishness. There's something about it.

There's something like you know it's not like an over the top menacing I'll get you for that. It's hard to explain but it's definitely this like Jim Rockford way of saying you didn't need to do that and and that's gonna come back at you. There's something about the way Jim plays these scenes that there's a certain amount of stuff he's willing to take, right? It's like, oh, you're mob, I don't wanna die,

so sure, you can mess me up a little bit or whatever as long as we end this amicably, you know, like as long as we can walk away. And then there's just these moments where it feels like he takes that away from it. It's just like, nope, that was too far. Like, and that was, that was, that's what that felt like. Just this, just angry glare. Yeah.

I just, I just have a quick addendum to talking about Gene LaBelle. He was also a stuntman. Yeah. So he's in lots of TV and movies in addition to his grappling credits. But I didn't want to I did not want to sell him short. So just throwing that out there as I have his credits open and now I'll close them. Yeah. Jim does lots of tough guy stuff in this. It's a good blend of the tough guy stuff and the trying to get out of trouble.

Yeah. Yeah. Aspects in this one. So, yeah, Torrance wants to know who he's working for. And we have the first mention of professional ethics and he offers a deal. How about let me call my client from a pay phone and I'll ask him, see if I can get his permission to tell you who he is. And there's this kind of fake out where he picks up the phone. They're in like a kind of an office, like a big room that has like a desk. Like a den, a study kind of thing.

And so, uh, Taurus picks up the phone and then I think hands it to one of his goons and says, sorry, Rockford, you lose. Is it really that important to you? Jim is saying that I don't even know who you guys are. I don't know what this is all about, but Torrance is gonna go make arrangements. Jim has about five minutes. Then he's dead. So Torrance and his two goons leave, leave Jim alone in this room. Yes.

They take the phone with them, which I think is a nice touch. And then we have Jim trying all the doors. Of course, everything is locked. And then we get the fuzzed out transition that's going to take us backwards in time over the repeating phrase, is it worth it, Mr. Rockford? Is it really that important to you? As we are going to go back to the beginning of our story and see what has been going on up to this point.

So this is a atyford files narrative structure where we're going to get the story. We're going to get that we have the framing story around the background, basically. Yeah, I was like, okay, is this flashback going to be the story? And it actually isn't. It's only like brings us up to this point again. There's plenty of story to happen after he's in this room. But yeah, it is it feels a little odd for the rock profiles and Jim into danger right away because right Jim isn't really in danger through the first part of this Yeah so instead of the rising action of like he finds out a thing and then He doesn't find out a thing and then someone threatens him and then you know We kind of follow him through that process. We're starting out from the point of oh, this is all leading up to something Right. Yeah, so I think it gives a little edge to all the previous events, I guess.

There is one fun thing that this is going to do. I think it's fun. Right now, Jim is very confused. He doesn't know who these people are. He doesn't know why they've grabbed him, ransacked his apartment or anything like that. So this is, to some extent, this is Jim thinking back and trying to piece it together, right? Which is the part that doesn't feel like

the Rockford files, right? Like we don't get that angle that often. Now we have the current information that Jim currently has and we're going to look at his history with this information and when we get back to present day, we're gonna be as confused as Jim. Which I love, it's like, hmm, let me think back And when we get back to present day, we're gonna be as confused as Jim. Right, right. Which I love.

It's like, hmm, let me think back about what's going on before and see if I can figure out what makes this. Nope. Nope. I can't. Yeah, absolutely not. This is a hard Jim's point of view episode. I don't think, other than a couple shots where we start in a room that he's about to walk

into, I don't think we spend any time with anyone else. I don't think so either. And I think that's all very intentional. This episode is about Jim being really confused. Yes. In a way that is possibly a little tiring just because of the length. Maybe we'll talk about that. Yeah. And and we certainly have had these kinds of episodes before. Probably the the best version of this or at least my favorite is Irving the explainer, which is in season four. It's our episode 93 back in October of 2021. The twist of that episode is that Jim is putting together an explanation for a series of events and

he's just wrong. Yeah, yeah. So that's kind of like my favorite version of this kind of story. But yeah, this one is very much the we're sticking with Jim and Jim is not finding things out. He's not detecting. Yes. So our transition to the past starts us with a door plate at some kind of like club called Mark's,

as in the name Mark possessive, not Karl Mark's, it would be a different kind of club. Jim is escorting in a lady, she's kind of pointing people out. We're dropping right in the middle of Jim on an investigation. My note here is there's lots of hats. Like there's just lots of people wearing lots of different styles of hats in this particular situation. It's kind of an indoor outdoor thing.

There's a bar, it's very casual. Jim is there to scope out Mark, who is the good looking one in the blazer. Meet some people. We have a couple of laugh lines about he claims he's in like the insurance adjustment. Oh, yes. But the point here is that he's keeping his eye on this guy, Mark. A woman comes up to him and asks if he's really a private detective.

And this is, in fact, Sharon Gless. She is playing Susan Jameson. We will remember that Jim was on the. She's playing Susan Jameson. We'll remember that Jim was on the phone earlier to Mr. Jameson. Yes. I thought this would be important later. She's like, that guy said you're a PI and it's like a guy in the loudest shirt you've ever seen and sunglasses kind of waving.

And that's it. He's not important. I don't think that guy comes back. Isn't this the guy that she's dating? No, that's Mark. It's just a random guy. Yeah, it's just like a guy who's like, I guess, recognizes Jim. There's a lot in this episode that's like, sure, I could fill in why that works. Right. But the point here that that'll be important later is that Susan has met Jim and knows he's a PI.

Yeah. But we cut from this whole situation to the private property of Warner Jameson, uh, played by Joseph Cotton, whose defining character trait is there's always a bird around him. I mean, I guess here he's, I guess, skeet shooting or target shooting. But in the other places, like when he's in his mansion or whatever there's like a bird standing on a pedestal behind him yeah like a Falcon I noticed it a couple times I'm like okay apparently this guy keeps birds like heaps like hunting birds they have some you know some good banter this is a a solid confrontational client where Jim has been hired to do a thing,

but the client doesn't like how he's doing it. Jim doesn't really like the client. Jim says he saw Mark. What do you think? He spends a lot of time under the heat lamp. I could have told you that without paying you $200 a day. We have some business about his target rifle. It's pulling to the right a little bit. Jim offers him some advice about fixing it. Gonna regret that one, Jim. I thought that would come up later. Yeah, yeah, I totally did too, yeah.

But, like, you know, just still pulling to the right or something, but missed opportunity there. The point here is that Papa Jameson has hired Jim to look into this guy Mark because his daughter Susan is engaged to marry Mark, but Warner thinks that he's a phony. He says that a couple of times. He says that everything about the guy is phony. I've played handball with him. And when you get him down, his accent pops out real gutter jersey. Jim says he's checked the guy out. He's squeaky clean.

Nothing on him. He got a decoration from the Korean War where he like saved two guys from a fire. Jim wants to get off the case. He doesn't like this kind of thing. Helping grumpy old men break up their daughter's romances. Yes. Makes him feel like he's just taking whatever comes along. Jim has no time for this guy and it's great. There's a lot of the sort of status stuff that's kind of in and around.

This guy's obviously very wealthy and there's comments about like, I don't think it's in this scene. It might be a later scene where he's like, you don't want to be seen around somebody who dresses like me. There's a few other comments about Jim's clothing, which is weird because I thought in the previous scene Jim was overdressed For for what was going on? Yeah, but maybe that was like also like Jim thinking Oh, these will be rich people and then overdressing and then but whatever but yeah, it's palpable Like these two do not like each other. Yeah, and Jim just wants out just just like I want no part of this. However

Jameson is not gonna let him drop out. Mm-hmm. He's booked him a flight to Jersey Or I'll make a few calls to the local power structure to friends of mine in ten minutes You'll have civil servants dropping out of trees on you. That trailer of yours doesn't look like r1 zoning to me maybe get it moved. Have your income tax return bounced? Maybe have the cops review that investigators license of yours. I shoot a mean game of dirty pool. Jim's retort is all he has to do is call Susan, tell her what's going on, and that'll end this whole thing. And then how about we break and go to neutral corners? So they've threatened each other, but Jameson comes around to saying,

This isn't going to be easy for me. I'm not used to saying please, but I am going to say please. It's hard for Jim to to say no to a good heartfelt please. Why do you even want me to stay on this case? Well, if you won't take anything from me, you won't take anything from anybody else. So I think I can trust you. And he has more than just a suspicion. There's a specific tell about Mark being from Newark. There's like a street that is pronounced kind of a specific way,

and only locals pronounce it that way, and he pronounces it that way. This feels so camel. Like, I don't know why. Yeah. And Jim ends up taking the ticket with a little rye coach. So we go to New Jersey. Jim presents himself to the local cops like he's supposed to. And this is a great chewing the scenery appearance by an actor named Eddie

Fontaine, who we have absolutely seen in other Rockefellers. I believe this is his last appearance for us first for the show. He was in four episodes, but most notably, he's one of the main characters in Counter Gambit, where he's one of the two. There's like the partnership that is fleecing the woman out of her diamonds or whatever. And then Jim and Angel have to do the counter gambit to switch the jewels. So he's in that one, which is what I remember him from. But he's been this kind of guy in multiple episodes. He was also a, probably mention this every single time he was on,

but he played a guerrilla sergeant in Planet of the Apes, which is awesome. Just having that credit, it's good credit. Yeah, he oozes authority figure Oh, yeah, and not necessarily a trustworthy authority figure Right. I got this giant hatred for private detectives. Now. You've probably heard of it It's a cop disease you guys sweep in here like big turtleneck vultures. You stomp around in my garden and then you split Leaving me stuck with a mess So here you go sport. You want my advice?

You pick up your goodies and you hop a freight out of town. Jim asked, did you talk, did you check with the cops in LA? And he returned. Yeah. They said you were a flake. So good. Clearly Jim is not getting in good with the local, the local constabulary. We cut from here to a dancing bear midriff at some kind of bar establishment.

Right, so it's an unusual cut for the Rockford Files. Rockford Files, I mean, like, they don't shy away from, you know, acknowledging that sex occurs, but they don't usually leer like this with their cameras, you know, that kind of thing. But then also what this woman's wearing, I feel like she's at like a Starfleet, like, go-go bar or something like that. Because it's like a yellow top with like a silver star where the comb batch would be. There's just something about it that I was like,

oh, what's going on? My thought was also like her outfit, which isn't particularly like scandalous or anything. It's just like a crop top and like pants. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But that and her hairstyle, people walk around looking like that right now. Like there's something about the rhythm of how fashion comes back where yes. Yeah. In this particular case, she just like is wearing clothes that like I think people are wearing now also probably. Yeah. Inspired by the same trends that brought, you know, that made them popular

at that time. It's mostly the hair. I think the hair is very like it's not excessively like styled or anything or I know something about it where I'm like, huh, what an interesting little note how things come around. But yeah, the camera kind of pans around. This is another moment where we have some like extra time that we probably would be cut out of a regular length episode. The camera kind of pans around and we see some of these characters in this bar.

Yeah. Before we get to Jim, he's been asking around. He's been showing Mark's picture to people trying to find out if they know him. The bartender doesn't know him, but he says there's a couple of guys, I think he says in the back. They might know they know lots of people, but they're busy. So Jim does some just straight up cold reading, chatting to find out that there's in fact a high stakes poker game back there. I think he says it's a $50 buy-in. Yeah, on our off the cuff, that would be $250. Yeah.

Nowadays or something like that. So, yeah, the kind of humorous rhythm here is around like they know someone. You know, they might know someone. You can only get a seat if they know you. Yeah, they know lots of people, et cetera, et cetera. But I think we end on the you can only get a seat if they know you and just smiles. And then we cut to him at the table and someone saying, oh, yeah, we know lots of people. Yes. It's a great joke. I feel like this is a this has to be like a Maverick thing.

Right. Like it's Huggins. It's Rockford. It's gambling. It's like he stepped into the role of Maverick just for this moment. Yeah. And this is what I was talking about with the like alighting. Like, how does he get into this game where they only let you in if they know you? Like, who cares? He's there. That's what's important. And not only is it that he's there, it's the seat that he's in,

which we'll get to in a minute. So they're passing Mark's picture around. They're like, yeah, we don't know him, but he's in Larry's seat. Larry is running late. The Larry Larry knows knows lots of people. And even if he doesn't, he can run it through that computer or something. He's in Larry's seat. Larry is running late. But Larry, Larry knows, knows lots of people. And even if he doesn't, he can run it through that computer or something. Yes. And then that's when Larry comes in.

And of course, it's Larry's the first name of the lieutenant that Jim was just talking to, Eddie Fontaine. And Jim is in his seat. Great. Candle dialogue here. The deal is that Jim's line was that he's making a movie and he was scouting the bar for a location. Right. Larry says just I love the line delivery here. You're gonna make a movie, huh? How'd you like to make a documentary about our county jail? On what charge? Film-flaming friends of Detective Lieutenant Larry Pearson.

That's good for 90 days County time Rockford sentence suspended If you're on the next flight back to Tinseltown He says to walk away and Jim's like I have 200 bucks and chips here Too bad Jim and Jim gets up and leaves on a hot seat Larry. I Really thought we were going to get more. Yeah, I did, too. Top stuff, which we don't, unfortunately. But yeah, it's a good interaction. There's a line towards the end of this where Larry is talking to his friends.

And I think he says something like, you guys pay me so the guys like that don't sniff around. Right. Right. You are inviting them to the game. You know, like the reason I have a seat here is to keep guys out of the game. Yeah. And like, it's funny because he's not wrong. Yeah. But Jim is not there to swindle those guys. He could be. No, no. But yeah, it's good stuff. We go to a night scene where Jim is returning to his hotel in this

cherry white and blue hardtop. I don't know. There's something about a rental car that I was like, that's a really nice looking car. Yeah. So we get the, I call it the ominous inside shot where we switch to the inside of the door to watch Jim open the door, which is never good. And there are two guys waiting for him. Of course, Jim says to tell the lieutenant to take it easy. They say they don't know the lieutenant. They're not cops. They're from the

Chamber of Commerce. We have one talker and one goon. And so the goon just kind of sits in his threatening in his tough guyness. And then the talker, you know, talks to Jim. Jim's reaction to the we're in the Chamber of Commerce is so great because he's just like, Hey, that's funny. I like jokes. Yeah. They want to know why he's just like, Hey, that's funny. I like jokes. Yeah. They want to know why he's been spreading Mark's picture around. And I feel like Jim is like basically straight with them.

He's like, I'm looking for information. And there's a, but he says there's a $5,000 reward for useful information on this guy. So if you have any, I'm buying. So he's just laying out like a, I'm willing to pay money for information. So you want some money, but they want to know why they're selling. We're cautious about this sort of thing. You tell me what you know and I give you the five thousand dollar that's a trade. Who are you working for? Myself.

I don't think so. You couldn't come up with the five thousand. You buy your underwear at a discount house. They lift James' underwear because they rifled through his stuff. And the look on his face where he's like, oh come on! Was that necessary? Yes. We get to the lines about being stupid. So good. I'm not telling.

You can't be that stupid. Oh sure I can. I've been doing stupid things all day. Tells them to head back to the Chamber of Commerce. Mm-hmm. In a rare de-escalation. Yeah. Again, maybe just because they have the time. The talker's like, all right, it doesn't really matter to us either way, but you tell your client that what he's doing is stupid and to stop looking into Mark Trommler's.

Jim says that sounds like a threat. It's not a threat. It's sound advice. And they leave. Jim peeks out the door, gets the license number from the car that picks them up, goes to get in his car. It goes to the keys and there's a note taped to the dashboard that says, your rotor is in the ashtray.

Really thinking ahead. So the two guys get picked up in a car that pulls up. So while Jim was in there talking to them, someone went into Jim's. Yeah. Yeah. Took out the rotor and left a note and then left and then came back to pick them up, I guess. It's just the coordination is amuses me. This is where mild spoilers.

I don't know. I don't know why we give spoilers for this show. If you listen to us, you've seen the episode. But are these guys feds or are they mob? Well, just to finish out the the the button on the. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, sorry. Yeah, yeah. It's a moment of rare frustration for Jim where he sees the license plate. But I think he's expecting to follow them. So then when he can't drive the car, he starts repeating it to himself

and he goes back to the room to write it down. But he can't drive the car, he starts repeating it to himself and he goes back to the room to write it down. But he can't quite remember the arrangement of numbers and we get the frustrated slam of the pencil. Yeah, that has happened in a couple other episodes too, which I kind of love. I love that like, it's just like, no, I just can't remember this stuff.

In the heat of the moment, sometimes it's hard to remember, yeah. Are they feds? Okay, so there's a line later where Jim says there are two guys with something and and rubber rubber sold shoes. Right. Thought they were local heat. But now but now I think maybe they were feds. When he he was like, when did you guys start driving gray Chevy's?

Yeah, we'll get to that. Yeah. That part later. But yeah, that's a good question because I'm assuming they're mob just because of the behavior, but. I think they're feds because they're, right, to spoil it. Mark is in witness relocation. And they're just trying to find out if he's trying to find someone in witness relocation.

Looking back on it now, in the moment, I thought they were mob. Me too. That's when I was watching it. But now looking back on it, I'm like, they don't rough them up. Right. They don't ransack the place, but they do go through the place. And they're all about... They just want to know who he's working for. Yeah. And to let the person he's working for know that this is dangerous and you shouldn't. Because if he's working for a mob, then the feds want the mob to know that they aren't going to take that. If it's the mob, they want to know where Mark is. They don't want to warn off who he's working for. They want him to find Mark. And if they could put pressure on who he's working

for to find Mark, then that would be okay. Yeah. That's a good point. Cause the, let's see, I guess then the question and the rotor stuff is just, it's lovely and polite. Yeah. Yeah. Huh.

Okay. So there's a secondary question that we'll get to, I think, when we get back to our main timeline, but yeah, now thinking back through it, I think these guys are, are probably feds cause I, yeah. And Jim and Jim thought they were local heat. But now he thinks they were part of the feds. Yeah, that makes sense. Makes sense to me. Well, as we go through, we can revise. Like this is looking back at the scene now. I'm like, yeah, okay, I definitely read this the wrong way. I think you're supposed to the way they wanted us to read it. Yeah. Yeah.

Because up up through when we return to the initial timeline, we're thinking about mob the whole time. Yeah. Yeah. And so we're getting back to it now where we then go through a reprise of our initial sequence with Jim Landing going to the phone. And then we do the fade out with the gym's dial, a gym on the phone being like, it was weird, I'll talk to you about it when I see you over the hazy fade out as we return to the present moment. So we are now caught up to our initial frame. It's time for us to take our

traditional intermission as we all need a little break to head out to the lobby, take a little stretch, get a snack, a drink, reflect on what's come before, and anticipate what's to come in this episode of The Rockford Files. We also like to take this time to remind you of where else you can find us on the internet. Epi, where can our listeners find you? Well, you can find me at my website dig1000holes.com. That's 1000 the number, or you can find me as Epidya on the Macedon

instance dice.camp or on cohost. Where can our listeners find you, Nathan? All of my games, zines, podcasts, projects, and other work are at NDPdesign.com. You can also find me at NDP on co-host and over on Instagram at NDPdesign.games. And of course, you can always find this show 200 a day at 200aday.fireside.fm. And now we return to the continuing adventures of Jimmy Rocco. I will say I did expect more to happen in New Jersey just because I remembered Fontaine so specifically from watching this episode like the first time. But that's it.

It's just that trip. And that's it. That's all we get in Newark. Yeah. It's a shame. It's a shame. We're going to have to wait for just a couple of guys to get more. Yeah.

More Newark. Somebody should do like a show about the mob in New Jersey. Yeah. Yeah. So like critically acclaimed, hugely popular. Launch an entire genre of television type of show. We can put that in our idea file for when we're done with our podcast. Yeah. We have now returned to Jim waiting. I love this moment.

The goons come back. Our boss, Torrance, says to put Jim in the car. The main gorilla goes to grab Jim. Jim kind of pulls back goes, hey, pal, have a heart and then stomps on his toe. He leans forward in pain, punches him in the face and runs out the door right into another goon holding a gun.

So good. He is sorry about that, pal, just reflex action. Yes. They put his blinders back on, back in the car. They pull out of the gate and then all of a sudden a car pulls up in front of them and blocks the road and then we start hearing sirens. And we have another exciting driving sequence

where this big car starts getting blocked off from every angle by other cars. And we see, you know, black and whites. There's cops. They're all in pursuit. We have this shot where we just see the car going around in a big circle, like three times, trying to find somewhere to go, which is kind of funny. It's good. But they end up getting getting boxed in all the way. And then we get the call. Federal officers. Everyone out, put your hands up. Our gorilla pulls a gun,

crosses Rockford to like point it out the window. And Torrance goes, put that away. We have attorneys. So this whole operation has been orchestrated by FBI agent David Shor, who is played by James Operation has been orchestrated by FBI agent David Shore

Mm-hmm is played by James McEachin yeah, that's what it looks like another person who was like hey, I recognize that guy unfortunately This is only Rockford files appearance, but he's in two Columbus, and he has a distinctive Mannerism that I recognized so he's he's fun he's a fun character actor. He's been in like a thousand Perry masons as well. I think he's a character in Perry Mason. Oh yeah looks like he is. I just haven't watched Perry Mason really so. Yeah no he's good.

So Jim comes out and says I'm Jim Rockford. Yes. And agent Shore here says I know who you are. He explains that they've been taking this mob boss out. They saw Jim being taken from his trailer against his will. So the feds can charge them with kidnapping. And Jim says, I'll testify. I'll inform you of your right.

You're under arrest. If you do not have an attorney, one will be provided for you. I have one. He makes more than one month in a creep like you'll mix in a lifetime. So we now go to the federal building, one of our favorite locations. FBI agent David Shore has Jim's statement prepared. All he has to do is sign it. But Jim wants to know what's going on. Shore is super cagey. Don't worry

about it. Just sign the complaint. Jim, don't you want to know who I'm working for? And sure, that's a local matter. All I care is about getting Terrence back in jail. So Jim and a classic Rockford, you know what? This doesn't seem right. I don't need to participate in this. So-hmm. So that he's changed his mind. But there's there are two agents blocking the door. Good banter here. You don't want to mess with me, Rockford.

You get difficult and I'll jerk you up tight. Hey, I'm a taxpayer. Big deal. Jim wants to know who Mark Tralmers is. Shore says, I don't know who you're talking about. And this is where he explains that he's part of the organized crime strike force Been keeping tabs on Terrence who is in the mob His men tossing Jim's trailer was the opening to see how things went

He could just hope for the best and as it turns out they kidnapped Jim. So that gives him something to And as it turns out, they kidnapped Jim. So that gives him something to to to throw him back into jail with. That's all he was looking for. Jim's like, so you just let them trash my place? Yes. Yeah, basically. All right. I'm leaving. I tell these guys to move when you sign the complaint, Rockbird. Jim gives him a bit of a lecture.

I've been followed, been pounded on, et cetera. And I feel like I'm the only one who doesn't know what's going on. Yeah. You got all the answers and you stand there like some big leafy animal. Jim does have this great line in here where he's like, I've got a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that I'm the only guy in the game that doesn't know what Trump is. Well, Jim says he's not going to sign until he gets clued in.

I have told you all that I could tell you. Then let me out of here. I'm going to slap a lawsuit on you. I'll subpoena you for the trial. Oh, you haven't lived till you tried to serve me with a subpoena. That's one of my rare specialties, ducking process servers. There'll be more of that, dear listeners. Oh, it's so good.

So let's Jim go with some parting advice. Get an extra toothbrush and keep it in your wallet. So we are again, we are with Jim, we don't know what's going on. So the stuff with the cop in New Jersey, that's just personal, whatever that doesn't have anything to do with anything. That's just that's just for fun. He's been threatened by the guys that we at this point probably still think are mob. Yeah, he's been kidnapped.

And then he's been kidnapped by the mob. And then the feds were on the mob. I guess it's a little unclear whether they followed Terrence and his goons to Jim or if they were following Jim and that brought them to Terrence. Terrence. Yeah, uh, right. Jim are sure explains it like the first one, but I think it also could be the second one. Yeah, hold on. Let's think this through. Knowing what we know. Knowing what we know where we think those guys were feds,

trying to find out who Jim was working for. Yeah. Then it could have been there on Jim. And then it just so happens that Jim got kidnapped by the mob. These are orthogonal things that Shor is involved with. The witness protection thing, as we'll learn, and taking down the mob. And it so happens that Jim is an

intersection of these two things. Okay what I think has happened so far, Jim is hired by someone who has no idea he's getting involved in the mob. Yes I think that's pretty clear once we talk to him again. Yeah then Jim touches down in Newark and starts asking around so the mob hears because everyone in Newark and starts asking around, so the mob hears, because everyone in Newark is in the mob. Right, as we know. As we know, yes. If nobody else, somebody in that game, that illegal game that the cop was in, then the

feds find out that he's been asking around as well, so they put a little heat on him to find out why he's asking around. Those feds could have called back to our friend, Shore, and said, you know, he's heading home, make sure he doesn't, you know, find our guy a witness. And he heads home, he gets a tail. We forgot about this. He gets a tail at the... Oh yeah, from the private the private eye wait has the show forgotten about this why is that private eye that's a good question see this is the cast of thousands probably right all right there's a private eye there's fish fishbacker fish back fish back fish back I have the screenshot Martin fish back so fishback is a PI that somebody hired to

follow Jim from the from the airport which is after he went to New Jersey he could have been hired by the feds or by the mob right but then the mob knows where he or he could have been hired by our original guy to just keep tabs on Jim I guess that doesn't seem quite right though. All right. All right. But the main thing is, Shor could have gotten information from these guys that were in his hotel room, or Shor could be telling the truth about watching Terrence. Terrence. Either way, but Shor knows a lot about lot about Jim and sure knows about Mark. He's telling Jim he doesn't, but he does, but he definitely does.

Yeah. So this also gets to the question that I was going to ask earlier. Why does the mob kidnap Jim? Okay. So these guys, Terrence, Terrence picks up Jim because they want to find out who Jim is working for because they want to follow that back to find Mark. I think so, yeah. I think they think Jim is going to get on to Mark. But that doesn't make sense that they would kill him. Right. Unless that's all a big threat. Yeah.

Yeah, because it never, we never get to that. Because they let him stew with that knowledge. So maybe they're gonna like have some other gambit and it gets blocked by the FBI because this is all Presupposing that Mark. Hmm, but then them but then if the mob knows who mark is It's not like he's in hiding. It's just an alias, right? Yeah, so Why do they need Jim? Other than just finding out, I guess, who is asking around? Like just to find out his client. Yeah. Just so they know, I guess. Well, nobody has mentioned Mark by name except for Jim. That's true. Maybe it's the picture. Maybe it's the- Yeah. Because he's showing around the picture and someone recognized the picture.

That could be. As we learned, Mark is not his real name. he was in the mob so that's why he's in witness protection. Okay, interesting. Yeah, so it's a little muddled, which makes sense now because we are supposed to be muddled because Jim is muddled. Yes. I am starting to feel like there is a style over substance issue with the story as we go further into it. But the style is quite nice. It's true. I've been along for the ride just watching it, you know, the whole time. Speaking of style, we are back at the trailer.

Jim's cleaning up. There's a knock at the door. Jim has decided that he needs to be cautious. And so he debuts again. I would have to do the legwork on this but he may be debuting the yeah I think so hold a heavy object over the door. Oh, that's such a good pose though Okay So the screenshot I get is Jim beside the door

Holding his his heavy ashtray up above the door and making a fit like he's holding it with his left hand Making a fist with his right as if he's going to like He's gonna drop it and punch at the same time. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, maybe it's like depending on who how tall the person is It's one or the other. Yeah He drops the ashram the first one and punches the second guy. That's what happens So he's all set up for for the goons says come in and of course, it's rocky Yes, so good. There is the good Jim Rocky banter here.

This is the solid season one Jim you gotta get out of this business stuff. And Rocky's not wrong. No. Jim almost brained him. Jim says I don't know why I'm getting slapped around and Rocky says yeah it doesn't make any sense and then Jim says you know I'm thinking of quitting the case and Roxas. Well, that makes sense. Yes, you should quit the whole racket. Mm-hmm We do But Rocky does have some information for Jim

He got a call from this guy Jamison because Jim stood him up when they were supposed to have a meeting and I guess he found me in the phonebook. Say, did you know that there's only three Rockberts in the phonebook? There's you, there's me, and there's that guy from Detroit that got beat up because they thought he was you. That little guy with the broken glasses? Uh-huh. Hahaha. Oh, that's really funny. I love that.

Oh, so good. There's good business where Rocky's like, he left me a number, but you're not going to need this since you're retiring. He like crumples it up, throws it in the wastebasket and Jim pulls it back out. When will you learn? All these guys want is for you to take a thumping for them. Look at this place. It looks like the back room at Montgomery Wards. But Jim does call. It is indeed Warner. He's heading back east

in an hour for business. He expects to meet Jim before he leaves, come over to the house. Jim doesn't care what he wants. You know, I'm doing what I want. And he says there's a steakhouse by the airport that Jim will meet him at. I think this is where we get the line about like, like, I don't want to be seen with you or something like that. Jim's like, too bad. I don't care what you want. So they make a date for the steakhouse in 20 minutes and then Apparently very importantly he asked Rocky to clean if he can clean the place up while Jeff and Rocky agrees with what I note as suspiciously easily Doesn't even want to get paid for it, right?

Which I mean it's a little like why would rocky want to get paid for it. Right. Which I mean, it's a little like, why would Rocky want to get paid? Like I would if I offered to clean up your place after I got ransacked, I wouldn't be like looking for money or anything like that. But it definitely sets up some really good. Yeah. Really good comedic beats later on. I mean, there's a little bit of like, you know, doing favors. Rocky does a favor for Jim and Jim's gonna buy him gas or whatever, right? whatever right right yeah there's some of that stuff that happens for sure there's a note in the imdb trivia that sounds like or in one of the imdb reviews. Where it sounds like this is a characterization of rocky that is more from the pilot when there is a different actor. So that might be a little bit of holdover from that like right original conception or something Yeah, it sets up good stuff. Mm-hmm. We go to their meeting Warner indeed meets Jim at the steakhouse. He wants to know what Jim found out in Jersey

And then he wants to terminate the arrangement. I just like you're gonna can me. Well, what if I don't want any canned Every time he looks in his rearview. There's a new gray Chevy. Yeah. You can take me off the case but who's gonna take these guys off of me? Another core Rockfordishness issue. Yeah. I haven't a faintest idea what you're talking about. I just don't think you've been leveling with me that's all. Now I know Chalmers is at the center of it and the federal government is interested but they're not talking and then there's Torrance Beck this underworld character he was on the track for a while but he broke down there's you and the two guys who visited me my hotel in Newark they were wearing sweat socks and uh and rubber sole shoes so i figured they were probably Newark Heat but now i think they might have been feds

what is it you want from me i just want to know what the hell's going on. That's all. At this point, I'm like, this guy, Jameson is too high status and too like they'd made too much of a snobbery for him not to be taken down a peg at some point in this episode. So now I'm like, okay, all right. When's this guy gonna get it? Jim thinks that he is too edgy about his daughter Susan finding out about the whole thing so maybe Jim will just ask her. And Warner continues to insist that his only interest isn't breaking up this engagement. He says, I don't know who he you know who Mark is or what he's into or was into. Sounds like it's messy but that doesn't matter because Mark visited Warner earlier because Mark found out that he was the source of it. So maybe the PI was from Mark.

See, that's another possibility. That's possible. Warner says that Mark found out that he was the source of the investigation. Yeah. And since Jim hasn't told anyone who he's working for, I guess we can connect that in a headcan anyway with why with the private detective. Yeah, I'm gonna go with it Well, okay So yeah that kind of makes sense because we're getting these we got the timeline out of order But Susan meets Jim someone tells Susan he's a PI Susan is engaged to mark Susan

Presumably tells mark. Hey, you know, there's a PI at your party. Mark being in witness protection is like, why was there a PI at my party? Maybe hires this other PI. And then in the background, somehow finds out that Susan's dad is one who hired him. Yeah. We'll find out later that Susan remembers Rockford's name, which is probably how he gets on to following Rockford, right? Right. Okay, that's all he needs. All right, this is coming together. Okay. All right, Roy, I'll spot you that one. Puzzle pieces are falling together.

Um, anyway, Mark promised to break the engagement in exchange for calling off the investigation. to break the engagement in exchange for calling off the investigation. Mm hmm. And said, and Warner says we shook hands on it. So obviously it's going to happen. But he wanted to know what Jim found out just as insurance, because it never hurts to have insurance. But at this point, Warner has got everything he wanted out of the out of the deal. So he's out. He's firing Jim. He should consider himself terminated.

Send me a bill. I got a plane to catch. This is closed does he say this case is close no he doesn't he doesn't this is just the I was thinking that I was like it's kind of a not a particularly evocative title but I guess right yeah all right we then leave the steakhouse and sure enough Jim is picked up by a tail immediately. We have another night following sequence. Good rockin chase music. This is the one where we see him put on the seatbelt. Yes. So this is so he pulls into a gas station and like wipes his windshields so that he can get a look at the car following him because they just pull up to the curb. Sees that he's indeed being followed. Maybe scopes out the car. He's like, okay. And yeah,

so he gets in his car and we have the very specific, he buckles his seatbelt, he reaches up, he adjusts his rear view, and then he just burns rubber out of the parking lot. Honestly, I'm really happy with what they did with this. I was all prepared for him to put the seatbelt on, slam it into reverse, and just mangle that other car. Certainly possible, yeah. The other route where he's

like okay we're gonna do some speeding I'm gonna be safe this time yeah we have the score dropout for the high-speed street chase with lots of squealing and sparks yeah etc another reprise of that we have a sharp turn into an alley we have the bigger car barely keeping up. Jim roars past the police station and then we see there's two motorcycle cops out front who jump on their bikes. Now it's a full chase with the motorcycle cops. Probably. I mean, we don't know for certain, but probably Punch and John from chips. And then this is a real missed opportunity here because we almost get a J turn.

Almost. Yeah, almost. And it's not quite. And I wonder if it's just a driving. So like like they just didn't get it in the shot. Yeah. Well, we're only taking that shot. You know, we're not redoing it or what. But he he almost hits the J turn, but he basically cuts across the street. And then only because he ends up going he doesn't turn all the way around to face back the way he was coming

He kind of yeah ends up at 90 degrees to his original travel and then and then has to pull up into the curve Yeah, yeah, so yeah. Yeah, it's a it's a technical a technical foul Unfortunately on the j-turn, but he ends up parked facing the other way as the pursuing car turns onto the street that he had just taken the turn on. Doesn't realize that he's turned and the two motorcycle cops are still following. And then we stick with them to see them

pull over the following car. And I made a note of that because like you had said earlier, this is a very Rockford point of view episode. And I was like, this is interesting that we're still following the tail after Rockford dropped him but we do get that earlier with the guy hitting the steering wheel like I think it's just to show us that like Jim is out of it like he succeeded at his maneuver and the music okay so we get this rockin music for what is more less of the chase and more

of a tailing in the beginning. And like you said, it drops out so we can hear the squeals and everything like that. And then it returns in a very triumphant way for when the cops pull over. And it's good. It's really good. Back to the trailer the next morning. There's a knock on the door as Jim is like wiggling his teeth in the middle. Oh yeah. Earlier when he was talking to Shore he's like, I have two loose teeth that are bothering

me. We see that his trailer is all put together, it's looking nice. But Jim is no fool, gets the ashtray again. And he says to come in and through the door Rocky goes, don't you hit me with no ashtray. Oh, that's so good. It's Rocky. He thanks him for cleaning up the place. Rocky says, it was a pleasure. No charge. Must feel nice being out of the gum shoot business.

And he has a page of classified ads for Jim of jobs where he says, you'd be surprised how many of these jobs that mean you won't get your skull crushed in. He should get a nice office job, at least until the internal bleeding stops. Jim doesn't want to because he's allergic to fluorescent lights, etc. Jim is now looking in his fridge. I had a piece of steak in here. What happened to it? I had it last night. I was hungry.

I also had eggs in here, three eggs. What happened to them? Well, I had steak and eggs. Well, we're at it. How about that bottle of scotch? Well, you never said I couldn't snack. No charge, huh? I could have hired professional house cleaners for a lot less.

Do you know how much T-bone steak costs? Hmm. You bet I do. I ain't no dummy. You sure ain't. Of course I ate your steak. It was free. Yeah. Oh, so funny. Oh, I love it. But then there's another knock at the door and Rocky hands Jim the ashtray.

Yes, it's some of the best business in the game, honestly. Yeah, I love it. The goat, Rocky. So good. But this time it is, in fact, Susan. Yeah, the elusive Susan Jameson, who we met way back at the beginning. Completely forgotten about. There's some banter about the trailer and whether Jim is retiring. Rocky's like, he's retiring. Jim says Jim tells him to buzz

off but Jim's the only PI she knows and she looked him up in the phone book and wants to talk to him. So he invites her to breakfast to talk. To the taco stand. Louis Delgado is the taco man. This character's name is Louis, apparently. So maybe he's Louis Delgado is the Taco Man. This character's name is Louis, apparently. So maybe he's Louis Delgado. May have been doing that wrong. I I apologize to the Delgados if I've been. Billings. It's Billings. Billings in a undershirt slinging tacos.

Tacos and coffee is a great combo. Jim, the tacos are good. Susan, no, I can't get into tacos for breakfast. All right, so we have this conversation while there's some business where they're at the stand and they're waiting for the tacos and the coffee and they go to a seat and whatever. Lots of hot sauce. Lots of hot sauce. And I think I have a screenshot of this that I've used for other things. Yeah, I think this is the one. I think this is actually the what we use on our Patreon.

But this is a fresh artisanal hand selected screenshot here where Jim where Jim takes a big bite of taco while Susan's talking. And I love that it's a breakfast taco. Oh, it's so good. It's great because he specifically says, taco with lots of hot sauce. And then when he sits down, he adds hot sauce,

which is wonderful. And then the other thing is where he says, put it on my tab. Yeah. I want a taco tab. Susan's upset she's having trouble keeping it together which is unlike her but this is unprecedented Mark came over you know they went out to dinner or whatever but it was all for him to tell her that he was breaking it off that he couldn't marry her and and that he

couldn't see her again and she says he wasn't dumping me. It wasn't like that I've been dumped before this was different. He had tears in his eyes He was just as upset as I was it felt like he was doing this for some night There was something making him do this and but he wouldn't tell me what it's not another woman I would that thought how it felt is like something else So she wants Jim to find out why mark broke it off Jim obviously knows the situation But he pretends that he doesn't so that he asks her some clarifying questions.

What do you want me to do about it, et cetera? He's like, I want to find out why he broke it off. He asks if she has any relatives in the area, just her dad, gets her dad's name. She says, my dad hated Mark, but he hated everyone that I've ever dated. I guess that's a father's prerogative. Jim has to clear up some professional ethics before getting involved.

Yeah, here we go. This is from the preview montage. What professional ethics does a PI have? My own kind. Yeah. It is such a delicious quandary for him to be in, right? Because he knows the answer to all these questions Her even hiring them for one day. It doesn't take any time for him to invest right? He already knows it and also

that violates the confidentiality of his previous but then he can't tell her that because You can add one in one together pretty easily like it's that one. Yeah, no, it's good stuff. I think he says like, basically, I have to clear the decks of a previous client or something like that. Yeah. Right, he's pretty cagey about what the ethical issue is. She asks him what he charges and we have our only-

200 a day plus expenses. It's a lot. Think so? I was thinking about increasing it. But he will give her a call once he clears up his ethic, his ethical non. Right. And I think he's pretty since he's like, he's not saying like, I'm not interested or whatever. He's like, I need to figure this out. I will call you. Mm hmm.

He sees Sue off, goes to open his door back into the trailer, and he again walks right into a gun. Rocky is tied up on the couch. There's a couple goons, and Rocky's gagged as well. Yeah. You know, he's like, you okay, Rock? And kind of nods. So he like confirms Rocky's like, okay, before going with him. He's like, I'll going with him. I'll go with you. Yeah thrown into yet another car Wonderful Jim running his mouth. I don't know, you know, which goon this is. Yeah, he's fantastic The the line where he's like, it's a long drive don't pluck it up is so good

Yeah, so Jim keeps on like he you know, he has all these like gambits, like, what do you want to know? Maybe I'll tell you, you know, you got the wrong guy, like just like thrown out everything. And so the goons like you're in trouble. We're going to go see like the big, I think he says like the big, like the boss man or the main man or something. If you try this song and dance with him, you're going to end up buried up to your ears in cement. Mob-coded, to the nines. We have a long drive montage. The saxophone is mixed in again, so I think that is

the tell for it being a mob situation. And this car meets with like a stretch limo, and that's just in a field, like out, you know, by a highway somewhere. One of the goons gets out of the car to go talk to someone in the limo. While that's happening Jim starts spinning up some of his patter again. Uh, who's in there? Shut up. Be sure and tell him I'm not on a case at the moment and I'm thinking about leaving town. Shut up.

Who's doing your material? It's really monotonous. I was doing yours. I am. It shows. And Jim gets this look like, oh man. The delivery really does it. Like so many things, it is impossible to replicate. So we have this business with like going to the car, talking to someone through the window, coming back, talking to this guy through the window.

It's all whispering in his ear. It rolls a window back up. The limo leaves. They tell Jim to get out of their car. And the goon says, we won't need you today and tells them to start walking and threatens him not to look back, et cetera. But as soon as Jim walks away, that car leaves. So they just abandoned him in this field.

And we see Jim thinking, he will get himself out of this pretty soon. But yeah, so what's going on now? Yeah. So okay, my theory now, again, didn't have this while watching the show. My theory now is that Mark has now passed away. Oh right, yeah. So the the mob people are like, okay our problem is over, we don't need to create a new body, we don't need to do anything with this guy. So like Jim's in the free and

clear, there's no mob people. Yeah he's not a person of interest if you will. But Jim doesn't know it. This is the weirdest thing. Like they just took him out into a field, a horrifyingly desolate, desolate field. Yeah. Um, so yeah, so my, that's what I think happened here is that the news came down. It's over and that's it. Thinking this at the time was like, if this is a Scorsese movie, like that you would have like gone to the other limo and then come back and like just like shot Jim through the window and they would have just to abandon the car and all of them just walked away or something. Right.

Like, yeah, yeah. Or when they said we wouldn't need you and he got out, they would have just shot him. Right. Right. So it's not that. But it is that tone of like, this could be it for Jim. And then they're like, no, never mind. tone of like, this could be it for Jim. And then they're like, Oh, no, nevermind. But yeah, I think you're right. As we learn the timing is such that between when they picked Jim up and when because they said it's a long drive. So between when they picked Jim up and when they presumably they've been on the road to pick him up and everything. Yeah, when they make the meeting with the big man, at least they haven't gotten the news yet. So, yeah, that makes sense. And will we crossfade to Jim waiting at a phone booth? He gets a cab, the cab takes him to the federal building, which has been a ten dollar forty five cent fare. Yeah. The music in this is a is the is a variation

as it often is on the Rockford theme. But it definitely feels, again, hopeful or triumphant. There's something about this that makes you think like Jim's gotten gotten away with something. Jim's about to solve it right like this is something that feels very not just the time and how long you've been watching these episodes but like it's just something beat about everything that's happening here. Which is good because otherwise it's a little grim. It's been a little grim for the last scene or two. Jim gives the cab driver a 20, and he's like,

what do I gotta do for this extra 10 bucks? You sending him to the trailer to untie Rocky. You're gonna find this old man tied up just to untie him, and he'll pay you for the fare. Yeah. And he's like, you know, you're not serious. Yes, I'm serious. Add another five and you got a deal. You and my father are going to get along real good. All right. Jim has been to see Shore.

He's like, I got picked up by the mob again. There's another kidnapping for you to prosecute. And Shore's like, what do you want me to do about it? I had you under surveillance until the cops picked up two of my men. Jim was like, oh, those were feds? When did you switch to Chryslers? That's right. And their response when the mob switched to Grey Chevys. So yeah, so Jim was under the impression that he's being followed by the mob. He was being not I don't think it would have changed what he did.

No, no. When did that? I'm trying to remember his Chevys. Okay, so he comes out and seatbelts in. Where is he leaving at that point? He's leaving... It doesn't matter, I guess. Well, he pulled into the get... Oh, he was leaving the steakhouse. Yes. His meeting. Right, right. Yes, he had the meeting with his client.

Yeah, so the feds were following him from... Those were feds. Jim just wants to know what's going on. Sign the complaint and I'll fill you in. Fill me in and I'll sign the complaint. Maybe. And Shore says, well, it's going to be in the papers anyway. Mark Chalmers is dead.

He was killed that morning. Turns out that he ran numbers in New Jersey. He got busted as part of a big operation and he traded 10 years in the pokey for testimony that put five heads of mob families in jail So in exchange for that they gave him a new identity Brought him out to the West Coast, etc. Offered him protection. Shore says he shouldn't have opened the club. That was stupid. Too high-profile He should have done something safe for like beach coming Jim says what if it wasn't the mob?

Sure isn't having it. And then there's some more banter. So when Jim came in, he made a comment like, like, don't get your hopes up. I'm not going to be here long enough or something like that. Yeah. So here he says, all right, sure. This isn't going to work.

I know it takes 15 minutes for the process server to get here from the courthouse and I've only been here 10, so I'm leaving. Does he mention the processor? I think he's just like, it's going to take him 15 minutes. It takes him to get here from the courthouse. So I guess I filled in the process server. He never says who he's talking about. And I do spend some time going, who is he talking about?

But we'll get the next beat in a moment. This is where I'm like seeing how much runtime is left. I'm like, feels like we need to wrap it up pretty soon. On his way out, Shore is like, come on, you can testify against some guy and organized crime. Come on. They kill people. We'll protect you. What, what'd you say Chalmers real name was Fred Willow? Nice fellow. Yeah, it was just a very clear implication. Yeah, Jim is heading down an elevator. He sees a guy coming into the federal building with like an envelope in his jacket, you know, like in his pocket gets a look on his face goes over intercepts him says you have the subpoena for Jim Rockford

You better get up there sure has him locked in a room And the guys like oh, thanks, and he runs up the escalator and there's great triumphant banjo is Jim smiles And leaves oh, it's so good Jim takes another cab home. He slowly comes in as we see Rocky holding the ashtray. The cab driver made it. Rocky says something like, like, will you believe it? He came all the way over here. I tipped him and like he tipped him.

I tipped him. Good stuff. Really, the real winner of this whole episode is this cab driver. Yes, yes. He's up with like 25 bucks. Jim calls Warner, says, you know, heard about Mark. He's dead, but I'm sure it wasn't a gang thing. Yeah. Like, as you said, Jim was picked up after the murder happened and they still wanted to know who Jim was working for.

Uh, right. Yeah. Which I think Jim, you know, extrapolates, um, or says says for for Warner's benefit. So Rockford says, I think that Susan killed Mark and Warner says, perhaps we'd better get together and discuss this. I'll meet you at the country house in an hour. This is where I have a note of, I think Warner did it.

Yeah, I do too. And I'm 90% certain that Jim does too. Yeah. So, yeah. We have an ominous drive out to the country property. Jim gets out of the Firebird. He's looking around. He's all alone. He starts climbing this hill.

I think he stops short of where he's supposed to be, right? And it's like, he's going to kind of sneak in. However, Warner's waiting in the trees with his sport rifle and starts taking pot shots at Jim And Jim helped him aim Jim Jim makes it back to the firebird But Warner manages to shoot out one of his tires before he can escape the property. He runs into a barn. There's lots of horse sound effects and Foley as

There's lots of horse sound effects and Foley as they play cat and mouse. Foley expected him to come out on a horse. Yeah, riding a horse. Escape that way. Yeah. But nope. But nope. We settle into Warner's walking around with his rifle, trying to find where Jim has gone to ground. And then Jim just explodes through a fence. Like, yeah, like some latticework it's like a lattice like those latticework panels that you know holes in them but are you

know solid it's like the back of a shed or something Jim just shatters it comes flying through a diving tackle onto this old man knocks the gun away Warner says my daughter didn't kill him Jim says says, I know, I lied to you. Warner learned that Mark and Susan were going to run away together, and he just couldn't let that happen. We go to our final scene. Susan is joining Jim, leaving some building. She says she got her dad a good attorney. There's some dialogue about how it's been a couple of weeks.

Yeah, everything is starting to settle down. She just can't hate him. He's her father. Fair. Um, they get into the firebird. Jim asks where she wants to go. Oh, somewhere where they don't sell tacos. I want a taco so bad.

I know. Sue doesn't want to talk about all this stuff anymore. She feels like she's stuck in a soap opera. There is some some dialogue about how she's always the one who keeps it together. Like, yeah, we get a little compressed, like Susan family family history and like her personality right now, right before the episode. I feel almost like it's out of order. But, you know, it doesn't hurt to have it. I think it's giving us a little bit of like, why Jim is still hanging around, I guess. Yeah, yeah.

They have some kind of attraction and connection. Yeah. And Jim, Jim gets her out of her head about this stuff. Like, right, he doesn't need to talk to her about the case. Like they can talk about other things. Of course, this is where Jim sees that they're being tailed. And I think this is the one where we see it in the rear view mirror. Yeah. And the cameras like on the rear view. So we have these interesting shots where like it swings and we're just seeing like the street. And then the car comes back into the frame. Yeah, it's pretty cool. You can almost hear the Jaws soundtrack. Jim has had just about all this.

He can stand. Yeah, pulls over. He gets out to confront the car that has followed him. And it's the marshal's office. They finally got him that subpoena. And then Jim looks behind them and there's another car that just has like guys in dark suits and sunglasses staring at him. Yes. And he waves his arms, come on guys give me a break will ya? Freeze frame, end of episode. I assume that's the mob right? Right because the Marshal's office is serving a subpoena, no reason for the feds. Right, the mob now has a reason to find him because he's being subpoenaed to testify against the mob.

Yeah, yeah. So that's what that is. At least a reason to keep an eye on him, I guess. Yeah. So there we are. We've resolved who all the Grey Chevys are. I guess. Oh, gosh. And then the case was closed. And then the case was closed. This was a fun one. Like I said at the top, it feels season one. I never mean that in that it's rough or anything like that.

Season one just has a different vibe. It definitely has a little more of a noir. The same plot could be applied to any detective. No, wait a minute. What am I saying here? I don't know if I'm saying anything. He's getting tossed around by the greater forces at work. It's a thing that does happen in the Rockford Files a lot, but it's something that the Rockford Files inherits from a lot of noirs where they just are bobbing about in this ocean of crime and feds and things until something surfaces and he manages to grab onto the truth. I like those types of stories, so I have no problem with it. But

it's not that it doesn't feel exactly like a Rockford story, is that it feels like that kind of story in the Rockford files. Yeah, yeah. It definitely has that nature of like, I think this might be kind of a Hugginsy thing where it's like, I had an idea for a story. Right. Because I'm doing the Rockford files. That's what it's gonna be. But like the story came for it. Sometimes the stories are derived from the Rockford universe. Right. His character and stuff or from a specific plot hook or something like that. This story could be told in lots of different ways and they don't necessarily have to have Rockford in them. I will say this one, the other tidbit from the Ed Robertson entry on this is that this was one of the two episodes novelized in The Deadliest Game, which was the Rockford Files novel published in 1976.

The other source was the was the Kirchhoff case. But I guess that is now that we've watched it, that is not too surprising because it does have a quality that lends itself to having more like I haven't read the novelization. But like, there's a quality to the story that you could have a lot more material without changing the story. So it kind of lends itself to like writing as a book, because you need more like stuff to make a book work. So yeah, just that that trivia piece kind of falls into place for me now that we're

talking about it. I didn't realize that there were novelizations and now I'm, uh, I'm going to seek some of them out. I think Jordan Bachman has sent us a couple. I think he's read some of them back in the Twitter era. Maybe send us some screenshots. Oh, right. Yes. The novels or something. I think that's Jordan or someone one of our patrons

was certainly reading them at some point in the last three years. So apologies if I'm misremembering somebody that we know of in the last decade, read something related to the Rockford Biles. So definitely fun to watch. I do feel like watching it in two syndicated episodes, the padding would be palpable. It would. And you would, I don't know how you would piece together what happened. Like we watched it in one sitting. The last time on would really have to carry a lot of weight.

Yeah, it would. Yeah, no, I'm I am curious about how they cut it up. I mean, I guess we could find out by watching the streaming version, but maybe I'll leave that as an exercise for the for the listener. Yes. Yeah, I guess I keep saying it was fun to watch going back through it. It gave us some some juicy questions to try and resolve. And I think we were able to resolve them.

However, I think getting back to what I was kind of commenting on at the beginning with the Rockford doesn't know what's going on story, the nature of this particular story is such that Rockford's confusion never has catharsis, right? Yeah. There's not the point where, you know, he finally figures it all out or right him having an insight into one of the players leads it because sometimes it's like, I don't know what's going on. But I do know that if I threaten this guy, he's going to try to kill me

and that's going to that's going to push the reveal that's going to get everyone into play and I can finally see what the deal is like, so we don't even have that. I, you know, the big cathartic moment is, I guess, chasing down Warner, which is really just, like, just proving to Jim for his own purposes that what he thought happened happened. Dave And Warner is such a jerk that you just kind of have to let him reveal himself. You're right. Yeah, he reveals himself because he he's such a miserable person.

Yes. Like, he could just shut up and not say anything and not react and everything would be fine. The cops would never look for him. Jim has no proof, but he has to try and take action because Jim knows. And that's what, you know, gets him in the end. So like, because Jim knows and that's what you know gets him in the end. So like you know and that's fine. In contrast to Irving the explainer where I was saying the whole thing is a setup for Jim to misunderstand what's happening and be wrong about everything.

But the climax of that episode is a resolution being made of the people who do know what's going on. And Jim is left stranded going like, but wait, what about all this stuff? And they're like, no, that's not what was happening at all. While in this one, it's there's no real, there's no real narrative climax, I guess. It's a little bit of like a string of events. And then Jim gets to have a little moment of victory over the true villain of the story at the end and we all move on. I don't know what I'm trying to say here.

There's something where there's a little... It's like a missing beat. Yeah, even though we were able to fill in our questions as we went, and like that's a tribute to the storytelling and the giving us those little details so we could fill it in if we were looking for them. Yeah, there's just something where it feels a little like, eh. I guess that's what I was trying to say with the style over substance, I guess. Like, the style is great, but it's a little bit of a nothing there, there, as we got into the details.

I think a lot of these types of stories run a risk of that because, like I was going to say, partly because we're very used to a specific style of detective story, but there are many, many styles of detective stories. I'm already like, even like, I was like, like the Sherlock Holmes style style But the Sherlock Holmes style actually isn't the way most people think if you've read the original Sherlock Holmes a lot of them Do you resolve like noir's like he just puts himself in a spot where somebody comes after him and he's like, oh, okay So you're the the person or you know like that kind of thing? But yeah I guess it's Agatha Christie who'd always has like the very or Columbo, you know, but yeah No, I agree. There's it's resolved but it doesn't it's it's not quite the result

The resolution doesn't really mean anything because Jim has never been involved with the stuff that gets resolved We never like we see mark like he's in the shot where Jim like sees him So we know who the picture is when he's showing it around but Jim never interacts with him We don't know how much money Jim has made. I know how much he's lost. He's lost $200 The from the poker game he lost $15 As a tip to that cabbie and he's out a t-bone steak three eggs and some scotch and he's out a T-bone steak, three eggs, and some scotch. Plus a taco and two cups of coffee on his tab. Yeah, no, I see what you get in that, I think.

But a fun one, worth watching. But the style is good, so like... Yeah, yeah, it is, it is. All Rockford files are good, like, you know, the baseline is still high. Yeah, I guess I was a little surprised to come out the other side and kind of be like, huh. Yeah. So that's what was happening. Yes. All the drama is in the backstory, I guess.

Yeah. Once once Rockford figures it out, there's no big plot to solve it. No, it's just a kind of it's kind of a shootout with a tackle. Yeah. Right. Like, and that's it. It's just being bringing bringing a murderer to justice just kind of a shootout with a tackle. Yeah. Right. Like, and that's it. It's just being bringing bringing a murderer to justice just kind of for the sake of it. Like, which is fine. Like, I'm not saying murderers should not be brought to justice, but all the dramatic stuff is like in like Shore's story about why Mark is important. Yeah. And that all happens off screen.

Yeah. But one of the most cannelly, sick dialogue written episode, I don't know how to say that. One. Oh, the dialogue is so good. Yeah. One of Cannell's season one high points, I think, in just the density of good dialogue delivered well by actors who care about what they're doing.

Like, yes, if that's all good stuff. I have one more screenshot to share with you, which we kind of skipped over while we're talking. Uh, I think you will really appreciate the jobs, the classified ads. Yeah. The jobs the the classified ads. Yeah, right rocky with a huge grin on his face Showing him all the classifieds that he circled Jim's look is so good. We can see the Rolodex in the front in the foreground Yeah, TV set in a spot that we're not used to mm-hmm mm-hmm season one all right season one

That's a season one and that is other than the first episode. Oh, yeah. Yeah. If you're coming to us since the last time we talked about this, we are going to watch the pilot, the first episode and the last episode as our last three episodes. So we do still have episode one of season one to do. But past that, we're done with season one. Wow. Yeah. Draw drawn too close. Yeah, getting down, getting down to our last couple. There's, let's see.

Status report. If you stuck with us through this whole episode, thank you. Here's a status report for the real 200 a day heads to keep in mind as we're going forward. We have four more regular episodes and then the last 90s movie before we get into our final three episodes. Right. Plus, you know, we'll probably have one or two other, like we'll definitely have like a summary, you know, just talking episode at some point, etc. But yeah, that's 12345. But but we do plan to end it so that the narrative wraps around and people can start from the beginning of our podcast. And just go from there.

But yeah, that means that is that eight individual things that are still on our list. Can you believe that? Oh my god. It doesn't sound like very much does it? No, it does not. Terrifying. It's like the opposite of 50 years later, we took a screenshot of this. It was an equal but opposite impact when I think about them in those terms. But that does mean well, I guess do you have anything else for this case is closed this this episode is closed

This episode is closed, but we will be back next time or another episode that is still open of the Rockford Files Well, you never said I couldn't snack