Two Birds of a Feather (3.20)

Rate, review & discuss the episodes from the third season

Moderator: Styles Bitchley

How Would You Rate This Episode?

10 (Perfect!)
2
2%
9.5 (One of the Best)
4
4%
9.0 (Excellent)
3
3%
8.5 (Very Good)
11
10%
8.0 (Pretty Good)
10
9%
7.5 (Decent)
12
11%
7.0 (Average at Best)
14
13%
6.5 (Not So Good)
21
19%
6.0 (Pretty Bad)
15
14%
5.0 (Just Awful)
17
16%
 
Total votes: 109

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Styles Bitchley
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#41 Post by Styles Bitchley »

grundle wrote:Hilo is about 2,300 miles west of Monterey, where the pilot's flight began.

According to the aviation site Airliners.net, Cessna 310 aircraft have a range between 760 to 1955 miles, depending on various factors including cruising altitude, weight, amount of reserve fuel and the specific model.
Uhhh, you think someone would have done the math a few times before leaving!

Thanks grundle. I love it when real life stories echo Magnum episodes.
"How fiendishly deceptive of you Magnum. I could have sworn I was hearing the emasculation of a large rodent."

- J.Q.H.

Seaver41
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#42 Post by Seaver41 »

yeah, I remember this one vividly. Only redeeming thing is seeing Magnum figure him out in the end......one of those hair on the neck moments this series was good at.

Man...another less than stellar episode as season winds down..........the last third of this season is not strong....but is still overshadowed by the tremendous first 2/3

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J.J. Walters
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#43 Post by J.J. Walters »

Seaver41 wrote:Only redeeming thing is seeing Magnum figure him out in the end......one of those hair on the neck moments this series was good at.
Let's not forget about the cool airplanes (Boeing/Hughes Super Stearman, Cessna 172 Skyhawk, P-51 Mustang)! And Joanna Kerns and William Lucking are good guest stars. But those are about the only decent things that can be said about this episode, unfortunately. Heh.
Higgins: It's not a scratch! It's a bloody gouge!

Seaver41
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#44 Post by Seaver41 »

J.J. Walters wrote:
Seaver41 wrote:Only redeeming thing is seeing Magnum figure him out in the end......one of those hair on the neck moments this series was good at.
Let's not forget about the cool airplanes (Boeing/Hughes Super Stearman, Cessna 172 Skyhawk, P-51 Mustang)! And Joanna Kerns and William Lucking are good guest stars. But those are about the only decent things that can be said about this episode, unfortunately. Heh.
and somebody should've been fired for casting that kid as their son.......I mean, come on. 2 blondes spawned Howdy Doody's brother.

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Soon-Tek Oh

#45 Post by Faceman »

Yeah, this was a weird episode in that TM and the gang are hardly in it, which i only realised as they ranch scene in texas was going on for so long. In saying that, it started good with the flashback and i thought it was a nice enough story in itself, just poor by magnum standards.

What i love about watching this old stuff is the guest stars, and it wrecks my head as when i seen sato (Soon-Tek Oh ), i was thinking, 'where have i seen him before?'. Thanks to the episode guide i then found out this was the 2nd of 4 characters in plays in magnum, i'm only just finished season 3. He was also in season 5 of the A-team which i only seen this year, so that explains it. Like a lot of the guest stars he did the rounds in my other favourites McGyver and airwolf (well, only a small airwolf fan really), but he didn't make it to knight rider!

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J.J. Walters
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#46 Post by J.J. Walters »

Soon-Tek Oh guest starred in seemingly in every single American television show from the 1970's and 1980's. A very prolific Korean-American actor! He's instantly recognizable.
Higgins: It's not a scratch! It's a bloody gouge!

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snp389
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#47 Post by snp389 »

I actually don't mind this ep. Yeah, it slows down a bit with the romantic stuff with Hunter and Jen in Waco, Texas, but I reckon it's not a bad plot, with TSM and his 'little voice' are trying to figure out why he thinks he owes Hunter.
I just watched it again, and was trying to work out where I had seen Nick (John Calvin) before. John Calvin was in Season 2 'Wave Goodbye' as another bad-guy, but with longer hair and a beard. I have since found out he was in 3 MPI ep's:
– A Girl Named Sue (1988) … Arthur Wainwright

– Two Birds of a Feather (1983) … Nick

– Wave Goodbye (1981) … Gary the Drug Dealer

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J.J. Walters
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#48 Post by J.J. Walters »

Yeah, John Calvin is a Bellisario regular. He was in the main cast of Tales of the Gold Monkey and guest starred in a bunch of other Bellisario shows.
Higgins: It's not a scratch! It's a bloody gouge!

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Re: Two Birds of a Feather (3.20)

#49 Post by Kalai-pahoa »

I think it is a very good episode indeed. I like Sam Hunter and his feelings for his family. The dialogue between Higgins, Magnum and Sam after the plane crash is priceless:

- You can't land your aeroplane there.

- Didn't have much choice. You see, this fella was running on the beach.

- I knew it!

- What? I was running on my own beach?

- It's not yours, it's Robin Masters' beach.

:lol:
(even though we know that there are no private beaches in Hawaii)
The director Virgil W. Vogel did an excellent job with the "Nam" set, the war bombing explosions and, most of all, the plane crash into the tidal pool. It looks real. Maybe it is or maybe they used some small rocks to make it look bigger. :D
And it looks like it is flying very very close to Tom Selleck. The star of the show!!!
Image
Vogel has also directed the episode 'Distante relative' that features the outstanding chopper chase scene. Great work.
So sad to read that Chad Lee Sheets (Kip Hunter in this episode) died at the age of 26, following a battle with cancer (http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cg ... d=15619195).
Unfortunately it reminds me the story of Dana Hill (Willie the Weapon in the 'Basket Case' episode, one of my faves), another unlucky guest star of this season.
I know what you're thinking, but this time you're wrong.

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Re: Two Birds of a Feather (3.20)

#50 Post by marlboro »

I can see why this was not picked up as a series. I think it had potential, but they highlighted the wrong aspects of the show.

I thought the family drama moments were well acted and fairly interesting, but I don't think I would care to watch it week after week. I would imagine that most of show would have been based around the pilot's "aerial archeological" adventures, right? But they really didn't play that up at all.

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Re: Two Birds of a Feather (3.20)

#51 Post by SignGuyHPW »

I liked it well enough. It was obvious that it was meant to showcase the pilot of a different show, but I enjoyed what they did for the most part. Joanna Kearns was someone I always enjoyed watching. The flashback scene in the begining was great Magnum, p.i. That helped tie everything together I thought. Higgins freaking out and blaming Magnum for the plane being in the tidal pool was classic as well.

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Re: Two Birds of a Feather (3.20)

#52 Post by ZelenskyTheValiant (Ivan) »

A very average episode but I do have to agree with others that the plane crash into the tidal pool was very well done.

I also have to agree with IslandHopper that the plane does look real. Now, I personally realized that it was a model that they crashed into the pool (albeit a rather large model - probably close enough to the real thing) but if you compare it with the tidal pool rocks it doesn't really look like a model. Heh, that's actually funny, isn't it? :lol: When it crashes into the tidal pool it does look a bit like a model but when I look at the picture that James posted (meant to show that it IS a model) it actually doesn't look all that much like a model. Not to me anyway. The rocks still look pretty small compared to the size of the plane. Also keep in mind that we are talking about a very small plane here. So the model work actually works very well in this case. Again, I'm guessing the model was almost the size of the real plane. So it's all very believable. We're not talking about a Boeing in the tidal pool. :wink:

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Re: Two Birds of a Feather (3.20)

#53 Post by Dave Anderson »

I have never liked this episode, but didn't realize how hated it was by fans. Interesting. I also didn't know it was supposed to be a pilot for another series.

I actually didn't mind the show spending some time focusing on characters other than "Magnum and the gang." However, these other characters were terrible. The Texas ranch scenes are almost embarrassing. The characters were ridiculous stereotypes, and the ranch in Waco? Seriously? I haven't been to Waco, but from what I know the area is flat, plains country. I have also never been a fan of Joanna Kerns. Growing Pains was my favorite show in the 80s (even more than Magnum!), at least for the first 3 seasons before they started adding more kids and messing it up. However, I always felt that Joanna Kerns was the weak link in the show. I never felt her acting abilities were very good. That can be seen in this episode, only worse. The plot ending was also too unbelievable.

The basic premise could have worked (as an episode, not a series), but it was poorly written on many levels. It actually gets a few bonus points for having scenes without the main characters (some variety is always good), but that doesn't save this episode overall.

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Re: Two Birds of a Feather (3.20)

#54 Post by Little Garwood »

Dave Anderson wrote:I have never liked this episode, but didn't realize how hated it was by fans. Interesting. I also didn't know it was supposed to be a pilot for another series.

The basic premise could have worked (as an episode, not a series), but it was poorly written on many levels. It actually gets a few bonus points for having scenes without the main characters (some variety is always good), but that doesn't save this episode overall.
For a "back-door pilot" that works, try The Rockford Files S3 episode Just Another Polish Wedding. It has characters we've already been introduced to: Gandy Fitch (Isaac Hayes) from The Hammer of C Block and Marcus Aurelius Hayes (Louis Gossett Jr.) from Foul on the First Play; two characters who are charismatic, engaging, and hilarious. The episode boasts a brilliantly funny and literate script--including a scene in a neo Nazi bar that is priceless. It's also a story that doesn't discard its lead for the sake of shoehorning a pilot into the show (Thomas literally "phoning in" to help Sam Houston Hunter in Two Birds of a Feather infuriates me to this day). The plot of Just Another Polish Wedding wraps up perfectly at the end and would have made a great series on its own yet we never forget that we're watching The Rockford Files.
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Re: Two Birds of a Feather (3.20)

#55 Post by marlboro »

Little Garwood wrote:The plot of Just Another Polish Wedding wraps up perfectly at the end and would have made a great series on its own yet we never forget that we're watching The Rockford Files.
That's the key, right there. Producers are just setting themselves up for failure by shoehorning in an entirely new cast into an established show. "Mr. Ed" had three or four (terrible) episodes like this; there was even one about a cartoon alien!


I've heard that "The Return of Luther Gillis" was intended as a pilot episode. I can definitely see it. Can anyone confirm that?

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