Strolling down the great pantheon of television’s sleuths, we can see the powerful busts of its most notable players like Magnum, Rockford, Fletcher, Kojak, and Columbo; all true masters of mystery solving and general badassary.
However, off to the side is a smaller hall that people don’t visit; where oil paintings hang of TV detectives that aren’t as notable but just as significant. To the left we can see a piece called “The Brothers Simon” depicting Simon & Simon solving a crime in a hot air balloon.
Next to that is a piece called “Ironside” depicting the detective rolling down a dark alley in his trademark wheelchair.
… and finally, one’s eyes fall on an interesting portrait depicting two men leaning on a candy-apple red racecar. One, an older, barrel-chested man in a blue ballcap looks on with a serious look in his eyes. The other, a younger man with curly hair, smirks directly at us.
The title?
“Hardcastle and McCormick”
Hardcastle and McCormick was a series that premiered in 1983 about Judge Milton C. “Hardcase” Hardcastle (Brian Keith), a no-nonsense LA Superior Court judge and his partner, Mark “Skid” McCormick (Daniel Hugh Kelly), a street-smart car thief.
Like most programs in the 80’s, there has to be a transport. Magnum had his Ferrari, The A-Team had their van, Airwolf was a helicopter and Hardcastle and McCormick had the “Coyote X;” an experimental race car designed by McCormick’s murdered friend.
I’m going to go on a tangent for a second because I absolutely love prop cars. In Hardcastle and McCormick, the Coyote X was so spectacular it could have easily stolen the show. Based on the very famous, very recognizable lines of a McLaren, the car’s original chases was from a VW and had a Porsche engine but, later on, was switched to a mother-loving De Lorean DMC-12.
That’s right kids; under the sweet, sweet lines is a flux capacitor.
Anyway, McCormick is up for robbery and looking at some hard time. Fortunately his judge is, you guessed it, Hardcastle.
Hardcastle set it up so that instead of jail, McCormick is under supervision by the judge so they can bust 200 criminals that got off because of technicalities.
As so many times before, the running theme to most shows of that era is the “odd couple.”
As you can see with Hardcastle and McCormick, they’re simply teaming up an older “law and order” guy with a young, hotshot (non-threatening) criminal.
However, this show was brought to us by the legendary Stephen J. Cannell, who basically invented the detective genre of the time; being the creator of Rockford Files, Columbo, Baretta, Ironside, and a number of other amazing shows like The A-Team, Riptide, 21 Jump Street, and The Greatest American Hero.
Cannell is probably one of the most prolific Executive Producers in television history and recently passed away in 2010 at 69 years old.
The show featured great interactions between veteran TV actor Keith and Kelly, who would later on have his own large body of work. As so often with my reviews, you can see watch a few episodes on YouTube and see Keith and Kelly’s fantastic chemistry – check it out, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.
Overall I think Hardcastle and McCormick really fell through the cracks. If you’re a fan of any of the above mentioned shows, I strongly recommend you take a look at the series for yourself.
Hell, the sweet title sequence alone is worth a few new eyeballs.
Until next time, friends.
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