MacGyver Mondays: "To Be a Man" (Season 1, Episode 17)

Title: To Be a Man

Airdate: 3/5/1986

My Age at Airdate: 2 years, 7 months, 17 days

Episode Type: Didactic, Espionage

I'm watching this episode with my wife so the pressure is definitely on to not pause/rewind. We'll see how this goes......


OPENING CREDITS

A fighter jet is flying through the night sky. MacGyver is apparently flying it over Pakistani airspace. He's on his way to Afghanistan to get a capsule from the inside of a satellite that they don't want the Russians to get a hold of. This is basically the same plot as "The Golden Triangle" only with different countries.

There's an Afghani military base that is going pretty nuts. They've asked him to identify himself. He hasn't responded.

Now we're on the ground with a maybe 13 year old boy who is standing outside while his mother (or someone) is inside getting attacked/raped/something.

The Afghanis are shooting missiles at MacGyver.

The plane blows up and the boy (it MAY be Kal Penn, or someone who looks just like him) watches it explode.

But it's ok because MacGyver has ejected, and the plan is that the Afghanis are supposed to believe that he's been blown up.

The boy's mother and a turbanned jerk come out of the house. TJ tells Boy to get his horse and Boy says "You're not my father!" But his mom says to do it anyways and TJ tells her that the Soviets will pay for parts of the plane and they'll pay even more for a pilot and he rides off.

(Ok, Boy is not Kal Penn. BUT he is the Indian guy from Office Space. An actor named Ajay Naidu. He is apparently uncredited in this episode.)

Boy goes an hugs his mom and points out that she is bleeding from the lip.

Mac stashes his parachute. A bunch of guys on horses and in cars are racing towards him. 

Dawn is almost here but he's also getting closer to the satellite.

The Afghanis are at the wreckage and they have now seen MacGyver running along a mesa. Do they call that land structure a "mesa" in Afghanistan? They do on this show.

Mac has gotten to the satellite on top of the mesa. 

The capsule is in a booby-trapped portion of the satellite. There's a loud and shrill beeping that he needs to disarm as fast as possible. And he does.

Easy peasy.

He doesn't know there's a bunch of guys after him. Until now. He sees them slowly ascending the mesa. He rolls away and starts assembling something from the satellite.

And now the Afghanis are shooting mortar at him.

But it appears that he's constructing a glider from it.

The Afghanis have Stormtrooper Aim with the mortar and Mac makes a PERFECT HANG GLIDER.

The Afghanis are shooting at him (Stormtrooper Aim) oh WAIT. They hit his hang glider and Mac's arm! He's in trouble.

Oh but Boy is tracking the hang glider.

So there's the army, the turbanned fellows and Boy all trying to get to him. Mac crashes into like a shallow river or something. I feel like maybe he hurt his leg, but maybe it's just his arm.

A dude is shooting at him and getting closer. Mac constructs a sling (David v Goliath style) from a piece of cloth and throws a stone at the guy, hitting him squarely and knocking him off his horse. He stumbles off as Boy runs up and tells him to get up and run but Mac says he can't

Now the Turbanned Fellows are getting closer and Boy is running for the Sling-Victim's horse. He runs over to Mac and tells him to get on. Mac does, but weakly. Boy leads the horse off.

Now the Turbanned Fellows are in the river, but Boy and MacGyver have left the river bed.

Boy has a vendetta against some guy who killed his father. I don't know if it's TJ or another guy. Sling-Victim is talking to some guy. Maybe TJ. Let's say it is TJ. Sling-Victim says that they got away and TJ shoots him.

FYI, my wife could write MacGyver Mondays. She's funny.

Ok, so I guess TJ is coming him to Boy's house because he has "unfinished business"

Boy and MacGyver have made it to Boy's House. Boy leads him inside and Boy's Mom freaks out. She says that it's too dangerous to have him there. Boy says that they have to help him and maybe he can help them.

MacGyver apologizes in his down-home vaguely Southern way and Boy pleads with her. She says he can stay for the night.

She begins to tend to Mac's wounds, sending Boy outside to keep a watch for TJ. He is to warn her when TJ is coming.

TJ rides up to the house and Boy walks up to him. TJ asks where Boy's Mom is. Boy begins to yell at him. Boy's Mom says that she'll go talk to TJ, but Mac asks if a cylinder is filled with butane and she says it is. He says to let TJ come to them. I bet he has a plan a-brewin'!

TJ walks up to the house and draws his gun. He bursts in an Mac hits the nozzle off the cylinder, turning it into a projectile that hits TJ in the chest knocking him down.

Boy tells Mac to shoot TJ, but Mac says that TJ shot himself and that he's dead. Mighty convenient. Welp, that's one bad guy dead. Who do we have next?

An army guy is talking to his superior. AG thinks that Mac is there to contact the resistance. I think we're going to have to defeat both AG and his superior.

Boy has buried TJ. He has taken TJ's whip and wants Mac to beat him with the whip because he lied to him about being alone with his mom. He used Mac to defeat TJ.

Boy is a little chauvinist. He talks about "man's work" and all that stuff. I think that Mac is going to have to teach him how....TO BE A MAN.

Boy's Mom sends him off to get rid of TJ's horse and Mac tells him not to forget the whip. She's being very tender with him. I'm predicting some kissin'. There's a bunch of sensual stuff.

Boy's Mom: It has been infected. It must be cauterized.
Mac: Ouch.

Boy sends the horse off, but not before expressing the desire to keep it.

Boy's Mom has a hot iron poker that is red from the fire. She has Mac bite on some wood and presses the poker to the wound. He passes out. And he's SUPER sweaty. She wipes him once with the towel and then once, tenderly with her hand.

OH boy has has kept TJ's horse's silver bridle (my wife assures me that this was the thing he was coveting on the horse.) And he stashes it under the bed. I wonder if that will cause trouble later......

Boy's Mom tells Boy that she doesn't think Mac will stay, but Boy is convinced that he will.

I don't know if it's a couple of days later or just like A day later, but Mac is up and hungry. Boy's Mom has dressed him in her husband's clothing.

TJ's men have found his horse and have noticed the bridle is missing.

Boy comes in with a bucket of water complaining that his back hurts. Mac is going to fix it, you guys. Boy is impatient and frustrated that things are always breaking. Mac says that he needs to have patience in his life. They wrap the pump piston in something to create a vacuum and VOILA. Water flows clean and voluminously. Boy is stoked and says that Mac can teach him how to fix everything and that he can stay. And Mac says yeah of course.

AG is debriefing the Turbanned Fellows that found TJ's horse and basically says find the American or else. So I guess they're going to be showing up at the house soon.

Mac tells Boy's Mom that he's leaving tomorrow. She says that Boy was happy that he was there. And then she's crying and he's wiping her tears and he's holding her hand....

AND THEN ITS THE NEXT DAY (more than kissing, you guys)

And Boy is out looking to see if people are coming for him. They have a post-coital-I-like-looking-at-you moment and then Boy comes running up and says the Soviets are coming. They race inside. Mac gets to work in the barn. He's working one-handed here with his other arm in a sling. He has looped a rope around one post in the barn and is now burying himself in hay.

Boy and his mom are pretending that there's nothing going on. A soldier comes to look at the house. This might be TJ's second-in-command because we've seen him before. He steals Boy's food. Because he's another jerk.

A Soviet guy is walking near the barn. He doesn't see Mac in the straw.

OH NO! The Turbanned Guy has found the silver bridle!!! The jig is up. They were playing it so cool.

The Army guy goes into the barn and Mac pulls it down on him and punches him out. Then Turbanned Guy (Food Thief) comes looking for the soldier and Mac hits him with a shovel.

The soldier regains consciousness and Boy wants Mac to kill him but he doesn't. It's a lesson for Boy. The soldier runs off. Mac says that the Red Army will be there soon so it's time to skedaddle. They're going to pack what they can and head for the Pakistani border.

Escaped Soldier runs up to a truck that AG is in and a bunch of other dudes and they are on the way back to the house.

Boy's Mom and Boy have packed and Mac is in the jeep (MacGyver's apparent sponsor, you'll remember) that the soldier and Turbanned Guy arrived in. And they race off.

The superior officer is yelling at Escaped Soldier and saying he needs to find the guy so as to ONLY lose six months pay and his rank. Otherwise it's a court-martial.

So the jeep is heading for the border. The soviets see it and load a bazooka. They miss, of course. They fire again. And miss again. And again and again. And then after all that, they hit the jeep! Boy's Mom immediately gives up hope, but...Mac has a plan. He grabs the water jugs and heads for the hills above where the jeep has rolled to a stop.

They pour the water into the cracks and begins to spray the cracks with a fire extinguisher, freezing the water and loosening a big chunk of the mountain. Mac waits for it.....and......breaks off a HUGE chunk which falls on the enemy vehicle. They are free to walk to the border....I guess because the Soviets ran away? Or because the rock is in the way.

Suddenly, Escaped Soldier is there with a tank. Boy thinks he's going to kill them, but instead he tells them where the border is, in exchange for Mac sparing his life. He drives off. It's kind of a sweet moment between him and Mac, actually.

Boy realizes that if Mac had killed that guy that they would have run into a soldier that didn't give a hoot about them and they would be dead. Mac has taught him another lesson.

They start walking towards the border. Mac regards Boy as a Man now, and the episode is over. I suppose we assume that they made it to the border with no problems...what a weird ending. But I guess it was never about crossing a physical border, was it? It was about crossing the border from Boy to Man. And they did that.

Welp, see you next week!

NEXT WEEK: UGLY DUCKLING (MacGyver takes on a fable about a duck that turns into a swan!?!)

MacGyver Mondays: "Every Time She Smiles" (Season 1, Episode 16)

Title: Every Time She Smiles

Airdate: 2/19/1986

My Age at Airdate: 2 years, 7 months, 3 days

Episode Type: Penny, Espionage


Before she was a desperate housewife or even Lois Lane, Teri Hatcher had a recurring role on a little TV show I like to call MacGyver. This is the first episode she 's on.  She was 21 when this aired.


OPENING CREDITS (If we don't have any more opening gambits in this season, I believe I'll stop putting this when we start Season 2)


Ok we're establishing that we're not in America. MacGyver is walking near a Merry-Go-Round and reminiscing about when he first rode on one.


He has a cast on. And he's talking about how he should never have skied in the Swiss Alps. He's walking among old men playing chess.


Ah, we're in Bulgaria. He sits down and starts speaking code with his contact. One of his opponent's knights has the microfilm on it. He takes the knight, lightly places it on the stamp section of a postcard, a microfilm comes off of it, and he places a stamp over it and leaves. Nicely done!


Now he's waiting in line at an airport. And who should come up to him but...TERI HATCHER! Her character has big hair and big xenophobia. She introduces herself as Penny Parker. She's super cute and super talkative.


Haha. She makes MacGyver look like Clint Eastwood in Gran Turino. Grumpy and not wanting to talk.


Uhoh. Some army guys and a blond guy in a suit come in and Penny puts something in Mac's pocket. Blond guy is an exboyfriend or something. But he clearly has a temper and a lot of power. He wants her to give him back some jewelry he gave her. He searches through her bag and  discovers them missing.


Meanwhile, MacGyver walks through the metal detector and it goes off. Blond Guy and his henchmen run after him. The pull out his bag and there are the jewels. Mac doesn't know what they are, but that doesn't stop him from hit the guards with his bag and running off. But he tries to go into the women's lavatory and a big hilarious Germanish lady yells at him as the guards catch up.


So now they're handcuffed together and they're locked in a room. Haha Mac gets it out of her that she withheld one ring from the jewels and that's why they're being detained. She thinks Blond Guy is just a lowly government worker, but I think it's pretty clear that he's not.


MacGyver is looking for a way out because the postcard with the microfilm was in his luggage and he needs to get it back.


He puts his ear to the wall. He hears a whirring sound. He grabs the metal coatrack and starts bashing the wall. He breaks the drywall. But there's chicken wire preventing them from getting through. On the other side is the baggage conveyer belt. 


He and Penny start bending hangers into figure 8's. They link the hangers together and wrap the link hangers around a chair. So now the hook of the hanger  is on one side and the other side is attached to a big-ass chair. So he hooks the conveyer belt and the chair flies through the wall. They get on the conveyer belt and ride out in style, to the confusion of the public. Haha it looks like they've been canoodling.


They run outside and try to get a cab. The problem is that they have handcuffs on. Oh, and Blond Guy put an order out with their pictures to all border patrols and they're to be treated as enemies or something. Not good at all.


Now Blond Guy is talking to his uncle, Bald Guy. The jewelry is his mother's. Uh oh. The jewels are worth a LOT of money. They are part of the crown jewels of Hanover. 


The microfilm that MacGyver has has Swiss Bank Account numbers that are where Bald Guy has been putting all the money he's been skimming at his government job. The jewels are a "small part" of that skimming.


So they need all those jewels back or else they're basically going to Siberia.


But Blond Guy has been monitoring the Underground that made the microfilm. Bald Guy says that he needs to find out who has the microfilm and that torture may be necessary.


Mac and Penny are walking through the same park with the people playing chess. His contact calls out to him and they go into a shed and the contact starts freaking out. Penny tells him Blond Guy's name and his face falls even further. Of course he knows who Blond Guy is. And he knows that Blond Guy is the nephew to General Bald Guy.


(Meanwhile MacGyver is picking the lock to the handcuffs with one of Penny's earrings.)


Blond Guy is the head of Security and the wrong guy to mess with.

Mac's Contact examines the ring and tells them about the looting of the crown jewels.

MacGyver asks if his contact can hide Penny until he gets the microfilm back. The contact is leading them to a hiding place, but the then Blond Guy and two suited henchmen come down the hill and start chasing after them.

MacGyver and Penny run away, leaving the contact to fend for himself.

They run to the Merry-Go-Round from the beginning. Mac turns the Merry-Go Round on full speed (we're talking red zone of the lever.) Then he throws some rings on the gears that are making it turn and the thing suddenly stops and the henchmen go flying.

So now they're sitting an a dark cafe. It's very romantic. She has drawn him a map of Blond Guy's apartment. It's going to be tough to break in. MacGyver thinks that the stuff is in Blond Guy's apartment because he'd want to keep it all safe.

Aww he and Penny are having a moment. He's very paternal to her. Also, her hair is HUGE! And MacGyver gives her a kiss for good luck (kiss slut) and then she gives him a big passionate kiss for even more luck.

So now Mac's Contact is siting in a dark room, shirtless getting a bucket of water to the face. Blond Guy and Bald Guy are torturing him. Bald Guy has a picture of his family that he thought were safe. His Contact starts spilling. He says that Mac called her "Penny".

Bald Guy tells Blond Guy that the microfilm is probably with the other stuff in his apartment, so Blond Guy is going to go there and shoot MacGyver on sight.

MacGyver is now at Blond Guy's apartment. He has scaled the wall and gone in through the (conveniently) unlocked window. He's having this inner monologue considering the trouble that talking to Penny has gotten him into, but he can't be rude, you know?

Ok, he has found the postcard, but there's a buzz at the door. And someone's knocking. It's Penny. The silly girl. Haha she came in the front door because the doorman knows her. Of course that's bad.

And now Blond Guy is coming into the place. So they have to hide. But Penny doesn't hide. She sits on his couch and distracts him. She might not be so dumb after all.

Mac is in the kitchen. He has removed the gas line from the oven and puts the line over a cookie sheet. He's going to mix rat poison, soap flakes, and tile cleaner. Now he's putting a dab of lard on a plate, a piece of newspaper, and some crystals from a bottle of oven cleaner. He puts it in front of the gas line.

Mac reveals himself to Blond Guy. Blond Guy tells him to look at all the soldiers outside. The building is surrounded. Blond Guy pulls his gun out and threatens MacGyver. He wants the microfilm.

Meanwhile the stuff in the kitchen is bubbling and smoking. Blond Guy goes to investigate and Mac knocks him out. The stuff in the kitchen explodes. He and Penny grab bathrobes to mingle with the tenants. But she grabs sexy lingerie. Hilarious. They jump in Blond Guy's car. Penny has grabbed the keys from his dresser and they escape.

Blond Guy is making plans to block the borders, have guards at the gas stations and all that. But he wisely tells a subordinate that "there is always a way to get through" which is rare for a villain to realize.

MacGyver and Penny are driving through the night. She's gushing about the beautiful countryside. Mac is worried about the gas level. But Penny knows where they can get gas that's not at a gas station.

Blond Guy is on the move. He has "an idea" he wants to check out.

Mac and Penny are in a nice house that turns out to be Bald Guy's house. But the gas can she was remembering is empty.

Penny: Hey wait a minute! There's that machine that they used to plow with...
MacGyver: ........A trac-tor?
Penny: Yeah!
--Laugh out loud comedy on this week's episode. Seriously.

So they're going to go get the tractor (or maybe just the gas for the tractor) but then Blond Guy comes in with a gun

Penny: OH SWELL! You're not gonna shoot us, are you?


Mac tries to convince Blond Guy that he has a choice in the matter of whether he kills them and continues to take orders from his corrupt Uncle.


Ok, so I don't usually say what the names of one-time-only characters on this show are, but Blond Guy's name is Stephan (pronounced STEFF-on). It might be "Stepan" or "Stepon" (like STEP-on), but

MacGyver: It's a matter of conscience, Steve. You do have one of those, don't you?


Hahaha he keeps calling him Steve. Awesome.

So they're on their way out, but then Bald Guy steps out of a doorway and ALSO has a gun. So Mac hands over the postcard to Bald Guy. Bald Guy tells Steve to kill both of them. Bald Guy explains that the other men are waiting at the crossroads for 10 minutes and then they'll come to the house where Bald Guy will explain that they had to shoot the two spies because they were trying to escape.

Steve attacks Bald Guy and Mac knocks him out! Change of Heart!!!! Uh oh. Dude is going to get shot. He knows his Swiss Bank Account number so he can help them escape and pay their way. I almost guarantee that Steve is going to get shot.

Bald Guy awakens as the guards pull up. So it's a race to the border. This show has a lot of races to the border. Borders were a big thing in the 80's.

MacGyver has Penny take the wheel and drive close to a truck that's ahead of them while Mac goes out the sunroof and jumps onto the truck. He connects the exhaust from the truck (which is a water truck) to the hose into the water tank and cuts another line so that it's leaking all over the road. The diesel and water are forming an immiscible liquid and causing the cars following them to swerve and crash.

They go under a fence and are in Greece! All three of them. A Greek soldier immediately drives up (what, are they patrolling the countryside??) and demands the passports, but then Penny recognizes him and it's clear that he is in love with her too.

Steve utters the title of the episode and Mac says "Shoulda known" and it's over. They're all safe. I guess I thought the writer(s) was/were going to go for a more tragic ending, but then they didn't.

END

So, that's the first of several Penny Parker episodes that crop up throughout the show. She's lovely and funny. AND HER HAIR IS SO BIG!

See you next week :)


NEXT WEEK: TO BE A MAN

MacGyver Mondays: "Deathlock" (Season 1, Episode 12)

Title: Deathlock

Airdate: 1/22/1986

My Age at Airdate: 2 years, 6 months, 6 days

Episode Type: Escape, Espionage

OPENING GAMBIT

East Berlin.
MacGyver is in a coffin. He is trying to get out of East Berlin. "Dying to leave".

The vehicle transporting "the body" is driving along. The "mourners" are standing at the border. The soldiers are checking the documents. And they're letting the transport through. Wait. They're stopping the car. They're pulling out the coffin and telling the "mourners" to come get it. Ok. They're walking, they're walking. There's a call at the guard station! The East Germans are running after them, the "mourners" are dumping the coffin over the edge of the bridge. MacGyver hits two switches and BOOM, parts of the coffin blow off and reveal a jet ski that he races away on. And he does a couple of cocky maneuvers to really stick it to them.

End of Gambit. Hm. There wasn't much to that, was there?

OPENING CREDITS

We open on a shipyard. The camera pans over to a building. A snooty fellow is in a spotlight being taken to task by 3 shadowy figures. Oh. This guy was the guy that lost track of MacGyver in East Berlin. So that's why the opening gambit.

I think this guy's name is Quail. I will be referring to him as Snooty, but I wanted to point out that his name is Quail.

The triumvirate is giving Snooty another chance to stop MacGyver from delivering the information he got out of East Germany to his bosses.

A helicopter is landing on a building and a bunch of suits are standing around on the ground looking nervous. MacGyver walks down the stairs and stands awkwardly among them. All of a sudden a flashy red sports car pulls up and a bleach-blond beauty comes over to MacGyver and greets him. She says he's from Pete Thornton. They're going to get away from the nervous guys/hit men.

Mac puts on his Southern twang and kisses her (kiss slut) and they get away.

They drive up to a mansion. An electric gate closes behind them. She tells him that Pete has set up a special safehouse.

MacGyver: Been at the company long?
BBB: Why?
MacGyver: I thought I knew all the pretty girls at the office
--Macgyver: Irrepressible flirt or sexual harassment suit waiting to happen? You be the judge.

In a telling bit of foreshadowing, he comments that safehouses aren't normally mansions. And sure enough, we see Quail (ok, I can't help it. His name is QUAIL. I don't need to call him something snarky. Quail will do just fine, thank you) watching them in some sort of control room.

Pete comes down the fancy staircase and greets MacGyver. They start sharing war stories for BBB. Men. Always showing off.

Small talk, small talk.
Quail watches, Quail watches.

MacGyver meets an old Asian cryptologist. She goes to put the camera or the film or the list or whatever into the computer to decode, when all of a sudden, the computer turns on and starts going haywire!

Suddenly Quail comes on an intercom, says "Trick or Treat, it's April Fool's" (ok......) and BLOWS UP the computer.

Then he bars all the windows and flips several switches. The door to the room starts to close. Asian Cryptologist runs for it and, even though Mac shouts for her not to, grabs the doorknob and is pricked with a pin and goes stiff. Quail tells the gang that she is merely sedated.

MacGyver recounts his previous encounter with Quail. And Quail lays out "his game" on literally the clearest black and white TV I've ever seen.

Pete, not understanding the technology in use, shouts at Quail, asking if this is all about the camera or film or list or whatever and Quail says that his instructions are to destroy it and take care of them.

BBB looks worried and Quail tells her it's all in a day's work.

Pete runs to the phone to call for help, but it CRUMBLES in his hand. CRUMBLES. And then it sparks once he's dropped it. How do you rig a phone to CRUMBLE? Quail is truly a diabolical genius.

Quail signs off by challenging theme to TRY to escape. To TRY to find him.

They leave the room and head for BBB's car. But it's gone!

Quail activates the motion-sensitive Machine Guns (like you do).

Mac tests the door to the outside. It's not electrified. He slowly opens it. Nothing. But it MUST be booby-trapped. They wheel a conveniently place suit of armor over and lean it out....where it is blasted by the machine guns. Quail laughs diabolically.

They gather the armor up into a nearby sheet and head for the kitchen.

Pete: Well, here it is
BBB: Why here?
MacGyver: You can find lots of handy stuff in a kitchen. Let's look around
--MacGyver, summed-up in three lines.

They keep Quail talking. Building up his ego. Meanwhile MacGyver goes around the kitchen plugging appliances in and stationing Pete and BBB by them.

MacGyver takes a metal bowl, pokes a hole in it and attaches it to an electric juicer axle.

They turn on all the appliances and jam Quail's radio signal, so he can't see or hear them.

Pete chooses NOW to mention that he has a radio phone in the room they just came from. I guess that would have been something handy to mention WHEN WE WERE IN THAT ROOM.

Pete leaves to go get it and Quail sees him go.  Pete checks on Asian Cryptologist.

BBB starts talking to MacGyver about how she used to play International Spy as a kid. Meanwhile, MacGyver is working.

Pete goes to the closet and opens the case with his radio phone. He frantically talks into it when all of a sudden, Quail is on the screen. Quail flips a switch and the radio phone shocks Pete, knocking him out.

BBB nervously says that she guesses it's HER turn to distract Quail. MacGyver puts down what he's doing. A saxophone starts playing. He takes her by the shoulders, tells her it's going to be ok and kisses her (kiss slut).

She leaves and starts walking down the hall.

MacGyver attaches a bunch of batteries together, puts that onto a cart next to a hand mixer. He attaches the beater from the mixer to the wheel of the cart with a rubber band. Turning on the mixer now makes the wheel of the cart turn!

Quail is sitting in his control room when all of a sudden, there's a knock at the door. He grabs his gun and opens the door. IT'S BBB!!! She's working for Quail!

But she's having second thoughts. She's worried that they're going to find out what she's up to. And she's also scared of Quail.

Quail hints that she has someone close to her to worry about. I guess we'll find out what that's about soon enough. He sends her back to the kitchen to monitor MacGyver's movements.

MacGyver is attaching the top part of the armor to the cart.

BBB moves a bit of a painting outside the kitchen to reveal a peep hole. She tells Quail about the cart and replaces the bit of painting. Then she runs to a staircase, rests her chin on a newell post, and whispers "Help"

Mac has taken the hinges off the back door of the kitchen. He lets the cart go and draw the machine gun fire with the armor. Then he slowly crawls behind it below the sight  of them (and Quail's cameras). He sends the cart rolling one direction and runs in the other direction while the guns are shooting at the cart. He leaps over several hedges and is making a run for it.

Quail comes on the loudspeaker and tells MacGyver that he has Pete and that MacGyver can come back and get him in the Trophy room (the room where Pete and Asian Cryptologist are passed out). He will turn off the guns so that MacGyver can come back.

Quail and BBB are having a bit of a tussle about orders. She just wants to retrieve the film (confirmed that it's film) and Quail wants to have his revenge. He tells her to go to the Trophy room to get the film from Pete. He says Pete won't stop her because he has given Pete "the shock of his life".

She walks into the Trophy room to get the film and sees Pete lying on the ground. She screams and MacGyver runs in. She tells MacGyver that Pete's dead by electrocution. He checks Pete's pulse and tells her that Pete's not dead.

So they leave the both of them and go back to the kitchen. MacGyver lays out his plan to go down to the basement and cut the main power supply. Meanwhile, he's gathering vinegar, baking soda, a pot, and a fire extinguisher.

She asks him what he's doing. MacGyver embraces her and pulls out the radio she's been using to communicate with Quail. She asks him how he knew and he tells her 2 reasons:

1. She was too quick and cool getting him away from those hitmen. And the hitmen didn't follow.
2. She assessed electrocution from across the room? I don't THINK so.

She tells him she didn't know Quail was psychopathic. He asks her how much she was paid and she reveals that her brother is being held hostage. And that, kids, is how you write a female character that is BOTH the double agent AND a sympathetic character. MacGyver doesn't have to do any Crying Game-esque shower crying for having kissed a double agent but we still get the reveal of her working for Quail. Genius.

MacGyver tells her that if they catch Quail, they can use him as a bargaining chip to get her brother. And if the bad guys don't go for that, MacGyver will go into Czechoslovakia and personally retrieve her brother.

So they're going ahead with the basement plan, but Quail activates machine guns in the house (this house is SUPER swanky, you guys. Armor, hidden peep holes, lots of machine guns....it must have a tremendous resale value). These guns, Quail explains, are attached to moving lights. Basically the guns shoot whatever is in the light. To me? It makes more sense to have hidden guns WITHOUT a visual indicator for where they're shooting, but I'm not a professional, so I could be wrong.

MacGyver quickly mixes the baking soda and vinegar into the pot that he has placed on a nearby pedestal. This creates a smoke screen and they get away. BBB leads MacGyver to a secret passageway that is apparently off the grid of Quail's cameras.

She tells MacGyver where Quail's control room is. He says that maybe it's time for Quail to come out and play.

They set up a bunch of metal piping to alert them when Quail starts heading to the power room after they cut the power. Then they go to the power room.

Mac has BBB stack a bunch of junk around the room. Casual clutter, he calls it. He basically wants to only give Quail one direction to walk when he comes in. Meanwhile MacGyver is attaching all the wires from the circuit breaker to what looks like a wheel like you would see on like a water main or something.

He sends BBB to go get a mirror. He sets the mirror up so that they can see Quail without him being able to see them. He has also set up a pressurized water cannon that he can control with a rope.

Then they cut the power. Quail happens to have a flashlight right there. So he starts to head for the power room.

In the power room, BBB kisses MacGyver "just in case". Man, the 80's were CRAZY for kissers, huh?

Quail knocks over the alarm barricade, so they know to hide. He shoots the door open and cautiously advances. He walks past the mirror that they have set up, so BBB adjusts it. Like an idiot. Quail sees her hand and shoots the mirror. But what's worse is that he knows where they are.

He tells them to get up. They do and BBB tells Quail that MacGyver is setting a trap. She goes to his side and Quail prepares to shoot MacGyver. But then BBB pushes Quail into the position that MacGyver told her they needed him in and MacGyver activates the water cannon, pushing Quail into the  exposed wires and disarming him. MacGyver runs up and, right before he delivers the KO punch says:

"This one's free of charge"

Which sounds like a corny cliched line, but then you realize that it's an electricity pun. A BEAUTIFUL electricity pun!

Something that happens often on MacGyver is that Mac will punch someone and then shake his hand because of it hurting. I like this. I feel it offers a realism. I've never punched someone super hard, or at all in the face, but I would imagine that it would sting the puncher. And I like that MacGyver addresses that.

They go to check on everyone else.

EPILOGUE

Pete is on the phone with his people and MacGyver and BBB are telling a freshly woken Asian Cryptographer that, basically, they don't need her help anymore. Or something. Basically patting themselves on the back for defeating Quail. Smug non-cryptologist bastards.

Welp, that's it for Deathlock! See you next week!

NEXT WEEK: FLAME'S END

ALSO: In two weeks, I'll be doing a MacGyver Monday on my all-time favorite MacGyver episode, appropriately titled "Countdown". I don't know if I'll be doing something special with it, but I have watched it more than any other episode, so I have a LOT to say about it. Don't miss it!

MacGyver Mondays: "Nightmares" (Season 1, Episode 11)

Title: Nightmares

Airdate: 1/15/1986

My Age at Airdate: 2 years, 5 months, 30 days

Episode Type: Espionage, MacGyver Impaired

So, I missed last week. I hope you'll forgive me. If everything goes to plan, I should be able to do 2 MacGyver Monday posts. I don't know if it'll be today or next week, though. Maybe I shouldn't, though. Maybe I'll just take the missed week. I know these posts are intense and I wouldn't want to burn anyone out. Ok. Decision made. 1 episode a week, no matter if I didn't post last week.

OPENING CREDITS

We open on a boat called Gemstone.

MacGyver starts talking about how sick he is of being at sea. So I guess he's been on that boat.

Hey look! It's Pete Thornton! In his first episode as Pete Thornton. You'll remember Dana Elcar was in the pilot as some other guy. This is so exciting. Remember this for trivia. Pete Thornton's first episode was "Nightmares".

Ok, so two guys with accents are watching Pete wait for MacGyver.

MacGyver stops to help a young girl who is having trouble fishing. She's trying to use seaweed. Idiot. He comes over and pops a foil gum wrapper on her line. She says she's fishing for food and that she can't pay him. He tells her to just catch something. And then she does. Awww. Heartwarming. :)

Pete greets Mac and Accent and Non-Accent (turns out the driver of the car doesn't have one) get out of their car and approach a guy eating a sandwich. They are paying him to do SOMETHING. And I guess we'll find out what that is in a second.

Pete and Mac are talking and Sandwich is walking behind them. Accent and Non-Accent approach Mac and Pete. Pete tells MacGyver to run while he takes care of them. Pete crouches behind a car and aims. Non-accent crouches behind a different car, aims, and HITS PETE IN THE ARM. See folks? We can't rely on Stormtrooper Aim to save us or our friends.

MacGyver is being chased by Sandwich. He ducks behind a car and when Sandwich runs by, hits him with his bag. Sandwich is out, but Accent is still coming.

MacGyver takes a second to open the concrete casing of a parking lot light and he put the list with "the names and plans of the terrorists" inside. I guess Accent and Co. are East German and affiliated with "the terrorists".

MacGyver runs off and immediately finds a cop writing a ticket. Thank goodness. He starts to tell the cop what's up and then the cop JUDO CHOPS him and knocks him out. Don't trust cops, kids.

Accent, Non-Accent, and Cop drag MacGyver off.

Pete is back at the office with his shot arm in a sling looking through pictures. He identifies Accent. Definitely East German. So they know who they're looking for.

Meanwhile, Accent and Co have MacGyver back at their lair (which has a bulletin board hung on what appears to be another, larger bulletin board, but might just be a brown wall) and are asking him where the list is. He refuses to tell.

They tie his arms down, rolling up one of his sleeves. They pull out a syringe. They tourniquet his arm. MacGyver tries to offer other methods of interrogation, but they aren't amused.

They inject him.

Accent tells MacGyver that the stuff was designed for him. He's going to hallucinate, then be in a lot of pain, then die. Unless he gets the antidote in 6 hours.

So here's our timeline: He's going to start seeing things immediately. Then in 3 hours, be in horrible pain. Then he has 3 more hours to get the antidote or else the effects are irreversible and he's going to die. Dastardly East Germans.

Accent throws Sandwich a watch to put on MacGyver's wrist that will count down the 6 hours. Which is very helpful. Then he shows MacGyver (and us, the audience) that the antidote is a small red pill.

Accent: It's your choice MacGyver. To live.......or to die.
--cut to commercial

Sandwich and Cop are leading MacGyver up some stairs. They push him into a room with a cot and nothing else. Man, how is he going to get out of this one.

Oh wait. There's a sink and a toilet.

And some power outlets.

MacGyver: One time when i was a kid, i built a slingshot out of a couple of broken hockey sticks and an old inner tube. And you know, no matter how hard I practiced, I just could never miss.....my neighbor's window.
--RDA displaying some actually delightful comic timing.

So he's taking a spring off the mattress of the cot, stretching it out and securing it around a pipe near the door. Basically, he's making a slingshot out of the....boxspring? The thing that holds the mattress. He has secured a spring to each corner of this thing.

And he just took a moment to have some sweat and double vision.

He's taking his belt off and using it to connect the sink to the power outlets. He turns on the sink, and the water goes along the belt to the outlets, and down the wires to the power box, which starts dripping.

Sandwich is eating a sandwich. He and Cop hear the dripping. They slowly walk over to the power box, stand there for a second...AND THEN THE POWER BOX SHOOTS OFF A BUNCH OF SPARKS AND STUFF.

They run upstairs, one of them saying that Accent had said MacGyver might try something like this. Haha, so why weren't you more diligently prepared?

MacGyver lets the Boxspring/Slingshot go and it bowls over Cop and Sandwich. MacGyver hightails it outside, but the hallucinations/double vision stuff has started, so he's kind of moving a little slower than usual.

He almost gets hit by a big truck. And he stumbles off.

He looks kind of like a zombie, actually. He's stumbling along a fence. He's having trouble and all of a sudden a couple of teenagers are walking past. One of them is Fisher-girl!

Her friends tell her not to help him because he's a drunk and she's a runaway, but she goes to help him anyway. Her friends leave. Because they're shitty friends.

She sees a cop and starts to go over to him, even though she's a runaway and "the last thing [she] needs is a cop], but he remembers Cop hitting him and tells her not to go over to the cop. And then he falls over. She helps him up and helps him walk off.

Fisher-girl helps MacGyver along while Accent narrates the plan for the serum. Fisher-girl helps MacGyver into the place where she's staying which is like an abandoned building. Not too safe looking.

Accent tells Non-accent to track down who has seen MacGyver stumbling along.

Fisher-girl's place is HUGE. It's like a warehouse or something. She leads him to I guess her main living area and fills a basin with some water. She gives him a cool washcloth for his neck. She shows him that she has hooked up an old car battery so that she can have lights on.

Then she tells him her name and he doesn't remember meeting her. She offers him some of the fish he helped her catch.

She has him debone the fish while she "starts the stove" which is essentially a candle or something.

She tells him about her abusive upbringing. Even drug-addled, he wants to help a kid in need. He is truly the Greatest American Hero.

She has some schoolbooks and plans to get her diploma and all that.

And then the excruciating pain starts in on MacGyver.

Cut to Non-Accent, Cop, and Sandwich (eating again) talking to Fisher-girl's shitty friends. They tell them they don't want to hassle her. They just want MacGyver.

MacGyver is having Nightmares (EPISODE TITLE). He's remembering some of the events leading up to the injection and then he has a hallucination of Accent coming in and trying to smother him with a pillow. He jerks upright in bed as Fisher-girl comes in. She asks him what the matter is.

He has some more memories of earlier that day and then looks down at the watch. There's only an hour and a half left. And he remembers basically everything now.

Unfortunately, Fisher-girl has come to tell MacGyver that Cop, Sandwich, and Non-Accent are snooping around outside.

MacGyver snaps into action. He puts two chairs in a row. He puts one of the car batteries on the back chair. He puts an old cathode ray tv screen on the front chair. He's setting it up so that when the bad guys come in the door, they force the chairs together and short the fuse and blow the tv screen.

Then he turns on a transistor radio to lure them into the trap. Fortunately, there's a rockin' guitar-heavy song playing, so they come right up.

Sandwich opens the door and the tv screen EXPLODES!

Meanwhile, MacGyver and Fisher-girl are upstairs. Mac sees a firehose and starts unwinding it. He goes to a room with a window and Fisher-girl starts to get a little nervous. She says she hopes MacGyver knows what he's doing and MacGyver says he hopes so too.

Non-accent sees the firehose, goes to the window and looks out. He doesn't see anybody either way. They must have escaped! He turns to leave the room with Cop and Sandwich, but Sandwich says WAIT. He goes over to a closet in the room and opens it. Nothing. Ok, so they must have escaped. The three of them run out of the room.

The camera goes to another boxspring (did this warehouse used to be a boxspring storage facility?) and MacGyver and Fisher-girl come out from under it, having successfully misdirected the bad guys.

Now they're walking down the sidewalk and MacGyver is asking Fisher-girl to call Pete and deliver him a message. She doesn't want to leave him. It's a SUPER windy day. I imagine they filmed this in like October or November 1985. It's that kind of wintery wind. Does California get that kind of wind?

So this is actually pretty good plotwork. MacGyver is looking worse and worse, but he's not hallucinating as much and his memory is getting clearer. Which, of course, means he's about to die. We should look at the watch again.

MacGyver is going to go to a warehouse. He sends her off. Sexy saxophone music plays.

1 hr, 7 minutes remaining.

Ok, so the warehouse he's going to is the one that Accent and Co took him to initially. Makes sense. That's where the little red pill is. Oh. Hey I forgot something kind of crucial in Accent's poison layout. The time? It's a general guide. He seriously said something like "if you haven't taken the antidote by then, give or take a couple of minutes...." haha so I'm thinking, the watch alarm is going to go off, the tension will be at an all-time high and THEN he'll get it. Let's watch and find out.

MacGyver is watching Sandwich lean against the car. Sandwich is not eating. He looks hungry, though. He's all antsy. There we go. Sandwich pulls the sandwich he had in his pocket out and starts to eat it. MacGyver uses this opportunity to run across the street and behind the car. He begins to let the air out of one of the car's tires. Sandwich notices immediately and, c'mon, we would have judged him even more harshly if he hadn't. He's leaning on the car while he eats.

Sandwich starts to circle the car to investigate. He sees the leaking tire, bends down to investigate...AND GETS A CAR DOOR TO THE NOGGIN.

Let's hang on a second. He noticed the tire leaking, but didn't notice the door opening and closing? Hmm. I think Sandwich deserves some pretty harsh judgement after all.

Also? LOCK YOUR CARS, BAD GUYS! Seriously, how many times does MacGyver take advantage of lazy villainy?

So Sandwich is out and MacGyver sneaks into the warehouse. He sees silhouettes in the office talking. Accent, Non-accent, and Cop. He looks at his watch: 22 minutes. There's a transition from his watch to the clock Accent set for himself so that they could both know how much time Mac has.

Non-accent is giving Accent grief about losing MacGyver. Accent makes the point that, if MacGyver is the only one who knows where the list is, and he dies, the list is as good as gone. Then he pays Non-Accent.

MacGyver is out in the warehouse, scoping out some rope, a smoke alarm, and some sheets of plywood. He has a plan (of COURSE he has a plan. do you think a little "fast approaching death" would stop him from coming up with a plan?).

We cut to Fisher-girl on the phone, getting hassled by the Feds because they think she's prank calling them. But she gets the message to the receptionist or whoever.

Mac has tied one thing of rope around the smoke detector and then used another thing of rope to bind two of those big jugs of water that you use for water coolers together. He throws the other end of that rope around the rafters and starts hoisting the water jugs into the air.

Meanwhile, Pete is FINALLY getting the message that Fisher-girl sent him. He snaps into action.

Ok, at some point, MacGyver lit the rope around the smoke alarm on fire. So that he had time to set up the jugs and get hidden. The smoke finally reaches the alarm and it starts to go off.

Accent sends Cop and Non-Accent to check it out. They walk closely together and MacGyver calls out to them. He's sitting on the steps up to the room he escaped from. They draw their guns. He tells them that he's giving himself up. We see that he has the rope to the jugs under his foot. THey tell him to come down and he does, releasing the rope, which drops the jugs onto the plywood and that knocks a bunch of barrels onto the bad guys.

Oh. I guess he put the plywood sheets up against the barrels. Probably around the same time he lit the rope.


So that's a neat way to take out your opponents without breaking their necks or skulls, which is what would have happened if Mac had dropped the jugs directly onto their heads, like I thought he was going to.

They're not quite down yet, so Mac jumps down and does one of those "hit you with a fist formed by me clasping my hands together" things on both of them.

He then gets out of sight. Accent comes out of his office, gun drawn. He sees Non-Accent out cold and goes to the front door to look out. MacGyver runs and TACKLES him. They go sailing over the trunk of the car.

Fisher-girl is running.

Mac and Accent are fighting, but Mac is kind of losing. Fisher-girl runs up just as Accent knocks MacGyver to the ground. Accent doesn't know Fisher-girl is there. The sound of sirens appears in the distance. Accent pulls the canister containing the antidote out of his pocket. He tosses it down a sewer grate where Mac can't get it. MacGyver tries to get it, then slowly and weakly approaches Accent. Accent says that MacGyver doesn't have the strength left to hit him. And for a moment, it looks like he's right, and then MacGyver SOCKS HIM IN THE FACE. Accent goes flying. Fisher-girl runs by Accent and asks MacGyver what he meant by "Antidote". MacGyver explains that he's been poisoned and needs to get that vial and fast.

MacGyver runs over and grabs a metal rod and starts slamming it against a fire hydrant. Fisher-girl plays the obligatory incredulous witness and MacGyver explains that the impact of metal on metal makes a temporary molecular realignment. Mac has made himself a temporary magnet. He runs back to the sewer grate.

He puts the rod through the grate and starts pulling up the antidote. But it falls back down.

You know what I would have done if I was Accent? Not have the antidote pill in that vial. That way, MacGyver uses his last minutes desperately trying to get the vial and then when he realizes it's empty it's too late.

MacGyver tries again. He's almost got it. Almost there....and he's got it! Accent didn't do what I would have done and the pill is there and MacGyver takes it and looks at his watch. He has nearly 2.5 minutes left. So, really he had a lot more time than the music would have had us believe, huh?

Fisher-girl holds him while he recovers.

You know, they could have called back to the beginning and had her use her fishing pole for something. Or her fishing skills. Maybe she could have used what MacGyver taught her that morning in some way.

Also, it's a good thing the vial that held the antidote was magnetic. It almost seems like plastic would have been a better choice. But who am I to judge?

EPILOGUE

MacGyver retrieves the list and goes to talk to Fisher-girl. He shows it to her, throws it around a bit, talks loudly about it. It's a good thing Fisher-girl isn't a secret East German spy. He tells her that it's a bargaining chip that she can use. He's going to talk to Pete about arranging a Government Scholarship! Aww. So heartwarming. :)

That's it for "Nightmares"! See you next week!

NEXT WEEK: DEATHLOCK

MacGyver Mondays: "Thief of Budapest" (Season 1, Episode 3)

Title: Thief of Budapest
Airdate: October 13, 1985
My age at Airdate: 2 Years, 2 Months, 27 Days
Episode Type: Espionage

OPENING GAMBIT

A man with a very awesome mustache sits in a tent in the desert. He is in the tent with a horse. Mustache has stolen the horse from a king and it's considered to be one of the most valuable horses alive.

MacGyver takes out the guard and steals his turban. Yep. There's MacGyver in a turban. A perfect disguise.

Mustache is practicing sword-based Martial Arts while Mac saddles the horse and rides it out of the tent. For some reason, a shepherd is among those who try to stop him. So MacGyver steals his crook (shepherd lingo. it's something i do.)

MacGyver leads the chase with his deft, one-handed horseriding. They're on a beach. Hopefully Mac has a plan.....

He's surrounded by Mustache and his men. So what's left to do but joust. Sword vs. Crook. The first pass, Mustache cuts the end off Mac's crook, the next pass, Mac clotheslines Mustache with the hooky part of the crook.

And then the chase continues.

Suddenly, there's a helicopter with a tow line. MacGyver grabs it, hooks the hook to the saddle and the horse lifts into the air. Turns out it was a harness and not just a saddle that MacGyver put on the horse.


Horse (neigh-over): Whinny!!
MacGyver (voiceover): I'm with you, pal. I hate heights


OPENING CREDITS

MacGyver is in, of course, Budapest. He gets an ice cream cone and very cooly eats it without dripping on his snazzy white shirt. He looks good, you guys.

He eats the ice cream and throws the cone away. If there's one thing MacGyver hates....it's probably guns. But if there's TWO things MacGyver hates.....well, probably guns and heights. But if there's THREE things MacGyver hates, you've gotta give the bronze to ice cream cones. Apparently.

He checks out some sort of fancy yellow car and moves on. But the camera lingers as an adorable Street Urchin Girl in a Jaunty Cap and a Fancy Necklace runs up behind him. She runs into him and CLEARLY picks his pocket. Mac catches her and criticizes her technique. She asks him if he's a gypsy. Haha aw, she's cute. I think her name is Yanna. I dont want to call her Urchin the whole episode because she's cute.

So, Yanna closes the scene by successfully picking Mac's pocket.

There are two KGB agents monitoring MacGyver's double agent friend Nicky. He's Russian. It's the 80's.

So, Nicky doesn't want to give MacGyver the names of the KGB agents he has out in public. He says to meet him at Cafe Mozart. (is that how you spell Mozart? It looks wrong...) so, he walks away.

Yonna trips him with some marbles and steals what is almost certainly the list, but she doesn't know any better. Unless......maybe she's a covert KGB agent! It's brilliant! Employ the cute gypsy youth. It'll be the  KGB-CGY project!

The KGB agents (there are like 4 of them now. They must double like tribbles...) yell out Nicky's name and he runs into oncoming traffic and is hit by a truck. Whoa. He's way dead.

The KGB leader searches him but...gasp...no list! They figure that MacGyver must have the list. But then they watch the surveillance tape and see Yonna (have I changed the spelling of her name? Maybe Urchin would have been easier) pick his pocket. So they're after both of them.

KGB Leader is talking to the guy who plays the Dad in My Big Fat Greek Wedding and he's like the head cop of Budapest or something. Clearly a dirty cop.

MacGyver tries to catch Yanna/Yonna to get his knife back but she's a clever gypsy.....but not clever enough! He knows that she took the watch, too. Man, she's a horrible thief. She said that she gave the watch to her brother, Bruno.

They're going to go talk to him, but the police get to Bruno first! Fuckin' Hungarian Pigs. Whoa it looks like they arrested her whole damn family.

Greek Wedding Inspector also has an AWESOME mustache, too.

KGB Leader tells Greek Wedding Inspector to be a hardass with this family, despite his qualms. GWI is basically a good guy, I think.

So, first things first. Mac and Y?nna have to break her family out of the work camp/prison.

Haha, there's an Asshole Prison Guard in every work camp/prison, you know? This one just picked on Bruno (? I'm not sure if that's Bruno or, like, someone else in her family)

Mac puts a lightbulb (where the hell did he get an intact lightbulb in the Hungarian countryside?!) between two boards ("Think of it as a lightbulb sandwich....and hope they swallow it." Mac always needs a skeptical observer to explain what he's doing in charming, down-home ways) and Y?nna pulls it across the road as the Supply Truck arrives.

WHOA. There's like 7 lightbulbs in that sandwich! Was there just a whole bunch of lightbulbs laying around out there?!?!

Also, why didn't the driver of the Supply Truck notice the wooden board that was crossing in front of the path of his Truch apparently of its own volition?!?1

Naturally, he DOES swallow it, thinking he's popped a flat. He stops and goes around to inspect all the tires, giving MacGyver time to get into the truck. Locks, people. Put locks on your Supply Trucks.

MacGyver puts on a Black Prison Uniform and exits the truck. He fills a bucket with Battery Acid?

Haha he tells a quick anecdote about his mom's chili while he's making a bomb from salt, sugar, weed killer, and the battery acid (or something. it looked mostly like white powder and cloudy water to me).

He makes contact witht he family and tells them to "hang tough".

Under the prison uniform, he has a guard uniform. The gypsies cause a diversion while he takes out the guard of a forklift or something. Oh. Bulldozer. With barbed wire attached to it.

The barbed wire separates guards from prisoners and the bulldozer knocks over the guard tower a la F Troop.

Everyone (by which I mean Bruno and Y?nna's grandpa) loads onto the Supply Truck and escapes!



MacGyver: Now where's my watch?
Bruno: I sold it.
MacGyver: You sold it?!

--comedy genius

So MacGyver has to go talk to a Gypsy Fence named Reena. Bet she's gorgeous. Who wants to bet me?

An obligatory barfight later (wasn't much of a barfight actually. Two guys vs MacGyver. Mac dives behind bar and lights something explosive back there and it flashes like Phosphorous. What could it be? Red powder behind a bar? Anyone?) MacGyver finally meets Reena.

MacGyver: You know, I really don't drink too much.
Reena: Virtuous or suspicious?
MacGyver: Habit.
--Possibly one of the reasons I don't drink is because I saw MacGyver not drinking. True story.

The watch is hanging from a necklace around Reena's neck. MacGyver levels with Reena. And she kisses him. Haha she says that that's how she knows he's not lying. Nice lie detector. Someone's always kissing MacGyver. Have you noticed that?

MacGyver shows her where the list is hidden on the watch. Why is he trusting her so much? That's weird. After all that, she asks what he's offering to pay. The KGB have come into her bar. She says he can't afford to buy it, so it's a gift. He slides down the roof and calls for a taxi.

Welp, that looks like the end of it...hm much more quickly than usual....

Wait. That guy driving the taxi is Y?nna's brother Bruno. So the other guy was her...Dad? Yeah, that makes sense.

Y?nna tells MacGyver that her family wants to defect.

The whole family is now dressed in mechanic's uniforms. They're going to steal racecars from a rally in Budapest to drive across the border.

MacGyver is jamming slices of a credit card into the timer on the traffic light.

Uhoh. KGB Leader and GWI got news that the Taxi had been found, so they're on the way.

Huh. The racecar's are red, white, and blue minis. I mean, they're not mini-Coopers and I never saw the original, but is this, like, an homage to The Italian Job? I think it is!

The traffic light trick slows KGBL and GWI down, but the motorcycle cops are still on their tails.

There's all sorts of racecar shenanigans going on. MacGyver has Y?nna tape her transistor to the police radio(....which they took at some point...I just rewound the episode to see if I was typing when they stole it, but I didn't see anything of the sort...) to jam the radio with non-descript "rock and roll" if they can get it high enough. Fortunately, there's a balloon salesman right there and they stop and buy all his balloons.

The radio/transistor combo is attached to the balloons and the police radios are jammed!

Greek Wedding Inspector: "They're heading for the border!"
--No duh.

The speedy American colored cars make it across like a fjord? or something, but one of the cop cars is swept away.

They're in a sewer pipe now (I think we have car chase BINGO, here.) and some of Y?nna's cousins have raised the grate for them. But they put it down so the last cop car runs into it and off the road.

With so many helpful cousins, why have they not defected before?

They roll into Austria. They're safe.

KGB Leader yells "MACGYVER!" and Mac salutes him sarcastically.

EPILOGUE

MacGyver comes out of the guard booth and tells Y?nna's family that they have successfully escaped. He goes to walk away, but Y?nna has some last words. She's upset that he's leaving. So he gives her his Swiss Army Knife and SHE GIVES HIM A CURSE WHERE HE KEEPS GETTING THINNER AND THINNER....no, I'm kidding. She gives him her gypsy charm necklace. They hug and we go to credits.

Man, that episode had EVERYTHING!

Thanks for watching/reading!

NEXT WEEK: THE GAUNTLET