"The Linesman" is one of my favourite episodes of "Combat!" thanks to it combining two of my favourite actors: Vic Morrow and Jack Lord ("Hawaii 5-O").
This Edward Lakso story has the squad going out on a mission to lay a phone line as HQ feel sure that the Germans are monitoring Allied radio communications. Lord plays Sergeant McKlosky who was a linesman in civilian life and he carries a bitterness and lack of faith in others after an accident in a Wyoming blizzard where his colleague left him, near freezing to death with a broken leg.
Things get off to a bad start when a sniper takes out McKlosky's assistant and this is even before the start of the mission. He blames Sergeant Saunders and the squad for allowing the sniper to get anywhere near and draws a telling off from Lieutenant Hanley. Regardless, McKlosky now feels he is surrounded by an inept squad. These feelings are ramped up when squad stumblebum, Private Littlejohn drops a vital reel of telephone wire from a bridge into the fast flowing river below. McKlosky assumes the mission is nixed as they no longer have enough cable to reach their destination. Saunders thinks otherwise and offers a short cut.
They find themselves still short of wire and Saunders suggests a village where they can salvage some wire, assuming that one length of wire is just like any other, here, McKlosky show his expertise and puts Saunders straight. Saunders and the squad put McKlosky straight when they have a fire fight with a German platoon who arrive in the village and having completed the mission, they get out safely in a German truck. The episode ends with the two sergeants having a mutual respect for each other's abilities.
The lack of perpetual gunfire appears to annoy some, but the acting makes up for the lack of squibs going off. Morrow and Lord were stars in long running tv series for a very good reason: acting ability. Both could do heroes and villains and make them believable. Acting was an art, it seems to have been lost, long ago.
10/10.
This Edward Lakso story has the squad going out on a mission to lay a phone line as HQ feel sure that the Germans are monitoring Allied radio communications. Lord plays Sergeant McKlosky who was a linesman in civilian life and he carries a bitterness and lack of faith in others after an accident in a Wyoming blizzard where his colleague left him, near freezing to death with a broken leg.
Things get off to a bad start when a sniper takes out McKlosky's assistant and this is even before the start of the mission. He blames Sergeant Saunders and the squad for allowing the sniper to get anywhere near and draws a telling off from Lieutenant Hanley. Regardless, McKlosky now feels he is surrounded by an inept squad. These feelings are ramped up when squad stumblebum, Private Littlejohn drops a vital reel of telephone wire from a bridge into the fast flowing river below. McKlosky assumes the mission is nixed as they no longer have enough cable to reach their destination. Saunders thinks otherwise and offers a short cut.
They find themselves still short of wire and Saunders suggests a village where they can salvage some wire, assuming that one length of wire is just like any other, here, McKlosky show his expertise and puts Saunders straight. Saunders and the squad put McKlosky straight when they have a fire fight with a German platoon who arrive in the village and having completed the mission, they get out safely in a German truck. The episode ends with the two sergeants having a mutual respect for each other's abilities.
The lack of perpetual gunfire appears to annoy some, but the acting makes up for the lack of squibs going off. Morrow and Lord were stars in long running tv series for a very good reason: acting ability. Both could do heroes and villains and make them believable. Acting was an art, it seems to have been lost, long ago.
10/10.