The A-Team – Season Three
Picture: C+
Sound: C+ Extras: D Episodes: C
One of the most successful of reaction TV in the 1980s and
hit TV without a brain at that was The A-Team, now unthinkably being
considered for a big screen revisit, is coming out in its original episodes in
the meantime on DVD. Season Three offers the 1985-86 episodes as the silly show continued to help NBC
position itself as the number one network of the time. Of course, the idea that they are soldiers
of fortune the U.S. Government was always preposterous, for you don’t need the
latest digital technology to find Mr. T, people bought it and the show did
well.
Another one of Universal’s wacky
action series form the period, the show has aged very oddly post-9/11 and their
trusty van feels more like a relic of the 1970s. However, the show is simply a bad 1980s time capsule of goofiness
and it has actually become worse. I
never thought this show was funny and it may be one of the most plastic
productions to have a Vietnam connection ever made. The late George Peppard (who did not get along with Mr. T) pretty
much cashed out his credibility, sick and tired of not getting better
roles. Dirk Benedict finally found a
hit after Battlestar: Galactica. The rest
of the cast is mostly identified with this show, which had its share of strange
moments and character actors. In some
ways, the show foreran the bombastic films, TV and even videogames that are
making people deaf today. And this was
the good old days?
The box claims that this was the
most popular season and with NBC on the rise, that makes sense, but the show is
surprisingly repetitious and dull, though this was considered a new approach at
the time. Now it is echoed in hundreds of
bad cable, straight-to-video and other serial productions. On a more serious note, the Rollback
politics of the show are embarrassing, as if Vietnam could have been won if it
was not for that bureaucracy that made them criminals when they were not. Now, we guess this show could be considered
their crime.
The 1.33 X 1 image shows its age with grain and
substandard color, though in fairness to the show, it was not supposed to look
polished. It is no better or worse than
the broadcast prints. The Dolby Digital
2.0 Mono is on the same level, though it is a little soft for a TV show of the
time. There are no extras.
- Nicholas Sheffo
