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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Snarky Oracle!" data-source="post: 82368" data-attributes="member: 57984">I've always found the title to "Angela" interesting -- a story where the innocent woman becomes the ultimate victim of the powermongering amongst the men. (And right on the heels of Crowley's odd "it's all down hill from here, honey" speech in "Pawns of Power").In "Angela," Pepper and the team become concerned when they find out the young cop they're working with (Scott Hylands) is dating the daughter (that's "Angela") of a mobster the department is trying to put away for heroin smuggling and distribution -- and the cop rightly comes under suspicion when the evidence, several kilos of smack, disappear from his car on the way to court.An episode that didn't originally work all that well for me, it's interesting seeing this again. My view then was that the demoralized producers, chastised about the sensational tone of Season 1 and a too-sexy Angie, were now just churning out installments by mid-Season 2, apathetically and lazily. In review, however, and removed from my lasting sense of disappointment regarding the series' dissipation of energy, I can now see that, as was the case with "Above and Beyond" and other episodes from the same period in the show, the bosses are actually trying to compensate for the new restrictions on POLICE WOMAN by making "Angela" deliberately low-key and thoughtful -- even if the effort doesn't entirely work because the reining in of Angie's charisma, previously the psychic glue of the series, has gone too far.That said, Angie has one of her finer moments during a scene in which she goes to the hospital to convince the mobster's daughter, a nurse, that her father is indeed a mobster -- and one who has just framed her boyfriend for heroin possession by having his goons plant the junk on the young cop's car in order to destroy him... The effectiveness of the scene is from understatement, and Angie is convincing as she gently prods the girl into reluctantly realizing that her dad's a heel, elaborating on the kingpin's sordid criminal history. And the writing mostly supports her... This is the focused, intelligent, seasoned Pepper which, if need be, should have replaced the endlessly coquettish one from the previous year. And if they had done this consistently (instead of edge her out of frame, or make her almost dizzy) then the de-glamorized Pepper Anderson might have seemed like a natural evolution in the character and the show.<img src="http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b78/Marky888/angela_1.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="width: 744px" />And the scene's integrity receives an exclamation point when, after Pepper tries to rub the traumatized girl's head to soothe her (as so often happened on TV back in the day) the girl instead slings Pepper's presumptuous hand away and snaps, "Don't touch me!" before exiting. As would any normal person in an identical situation.The somewhat surprising tragic ending to the episode is also intentionally underplayed -- which, in this case, is a plus; Angela the ultimate victim of the wrangling between cop and crook, Daddy and boyfriend when Daddy bombs her boyfriend's apartment and she's obliterated instead.Although I always want to cast one of Angie's rat pack pals in the role of the mobster in "Angela." But never mind that.Actual airdate: Dec. 16, 1975, despite listings which insist it aired in late Jan. '76.---------"Incident Near a Black and White" is about the shooting of a patrol cop during a barrio rumble, is a good idea for an episode. But the script is weak and the guest actors are worse (does a latino accent really disguise a lack of acting ability to the caucasian male executives??)To be fair, the dead cop's pasty white girlfriend seems to talk -- and moan -- like a small child throughout the entire thing, her dialogue seemingly dubbed all the way... Angie has a potentially good moment when she quotes a Bible passage back to a stuffy police commander, but, with the new restrictions on the way she speaks, Angie can no longer sell it without it sounding like she read it in the script that morning, and still hasn't quite memorized it.It's not Angie's fault; she's been punked by the brass: the almost idealized, worldly woman she was in the first year has been reduced to a nice, dithery, nervous-in-every-scene lady who occasionally gets to say something if she behaves and promises to say it apologetically.The best moment of "Incident" comes when Crowley and Pepper in uniform respond to a domestic dispute in the ghetto -- it's so '70s, and it's as comforting as it is kind of funny.<img src="http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b78/Marky888/pepper_crowley_uniform.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="width: 768px" />They've figured out the sniper is a white, middle aged, ex-youth counselor with some major identity issues, so as soon as Pepper sees someone who fits that description, she shoots him to some boring tune the asleep-at-the-wheel music editor picked out.Angie says something about wanting to get out of her jeans, and Crowley agrees.<img src="http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b78/Marky888/pepper_crowley_uniform_2.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="width: 773px" />--------Oh, and then there's "The Melting Point of Ice." (Another episode with the word "Ice" in at as a euphemism for diamonds?) Not the best script for Shimon Wincelberg (a good writer ordinarily) but it has some nice possibilities which seem sabotaged by the listless direction from .... Robert Vaughn??Anyway, Pepper and Crowley go undercover as construction site sandwich makers in search of the stolen diamonds -- so Pepper gets to flirt for a minute.But it's by rote, as most of Season 2 has become by this point.And despite Angie's earlier refusal to drive an 18-wheeler, she admirably accepts the duty of guiding a food van.It all ends back at headquarters when Pepper and Crowley say something provocative about how cheese is made.Yawn.<img src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c3/Angie_Dickinson_Police_Woman_1975.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></blockquote>

Verification: Who played JR Ewing?