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The A-Team (1983–1987) 7.4
Four Vietnam vets, framed for a crime they didn't commit, help the innocent while on the run from the military. |
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Title: The A-Team (1983–1987)
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Cast
| Complete series cast summary: | |||
| George Peppard | ... |
John 'Hannibal' Smith
(97 episodes, 1983-1987)
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| Dwight Schultz | ... |
'Howling Mad' Murdock
(97 episodes, 1983-1987)
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| Mr. T | ... |
B.A. Baracus
(97 episodes, 1983-1987)
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| Dirk Benedict | ... |
Templeton 'Faceman' Peck
(96 episodes, 1983-1987)
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Plot Summary
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Storyline
At the end of their stint in Viet Nam, Col. John "Hannibal" Smith and his team were framed for robbing the Bank of Hanoi (which they had done, but under orders), and sent to a US military prison. They escaped and went on the run, pursued first by Col. Lynch and later by Col. Decker. While on the lam, they became heroes for hire, working as good-guy vigilantes around the US or the world. Hannibal was their leader and an expert at disguises. Face was the team's con artist and lady's man. BA (officially "Bad Attitude") was their mechanic, but also took care of mayhem and intimidation. The final member of the Team, "Howling Mad" Murdock, was an expert pilot, and a certified lunatic--they broke him out of a mental hospital whenever they needed him for a mission. Written by Marg Baskin <marg@asd.raytheon.ca>
Taglines:
Heroes for hire.Parents Guide:
View content advisory »
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Details
Country:
USALanguage:
EnglishRelease Date:
23 January 1983 (USA) See more »Also Known As:
A Omada See more »Filming Locations:
Saddle Rock Ranch - 31727 Mullholland Highway, Malibu, California, USA See more »Company Credits
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company contact information
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Technical Specs
Runtime:
|Sound Mix:
MonoColor:
Color (Technicolor)Aspect Ratio:
4:3
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Narrator: In 1972 a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit. These men promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire the A-Team.
See more »
Did You Know?
Goofs
In order to have become a Green Beret BA Baracus would have to have undergone Airborne Training and completed a number of parachute jumps. Yet according to his mother he was afraid of flying even from an early age. However, given BA's tenacity and toughness, that doesn't discount the possibility that he did many parachute jumps simply because he wanted to face that fear and overcome it. See more »Quotes
[opening narration]Narrator: In 1972 a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit. These men promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire the A-Team.
See more »
The A-Team was one of three shows - the others being The Cosby Show and Miami Vice - that rescued NBC in the 1980s, and this mixture of action and comedy still holds up as an entertaining concoction.
The show succeeds primarily on the personalities of the cast. George Peppard's career was drying up and looked half past dead when he was cast as flamboyant Colonel John H. "Hannibal" Smith; his performances gave his career the boost it otherwise would not have gotten as in the manner of Leslie Nielsen he found his niche in comedic flamboyance after nearly two decades as a straight lead or in a character role.
Dirk Benedict brings Starbuck to Earth (best shown in the show's most overt and best in-joke, the shot of a Cylon centurion guide at Universal Studios walking past Templeton Peck with the intimidating hum of its eye scanner added to the soundtrack) and scores again as the slightly decedent but ultimately sympathetic rogue who is the team's primary scam expert. Peck is something of the dry-witted observor of the crazy happenings to the team during its adventures.
Mr. T had become a household name in Rocky III but it was The A-Team that cemented his persona with his trademark "Shut up, fool!" and general attitude with a heart of gold. Bosco Arnold Baracus was always feuding with the team's pilot, Hector M. Murdoch, committed to a VA psycho ward due to insanity concocted in the Vietnam war - insanity that is just a ruse for Murdoch to better help the team.
It may seem odd to think of Dwight Schultz as a qualified Broadway performer, but his career has been in that vein, and his role of Murdoch made him a true TV star; Schultz gave Murdoch his personality but he also tempered him with believeable torment, best shown in the show's warmest episode "Bounty," co-starring Schultz' reallife wife Wendy Fulton. Murdoch can be funny, but as Wendy helps bring out in this episode, Schultz is also a qualified dramatic performer.
Ultimately fleshing out the show was the Gerard-esque pursuer of the team, Colonel Roderick Decker. Lance LeGault portrayed Decker and made one of TV's best recurring villians. Decker gained sympathy from his determination and it showed in one of the show's weaker episodes, "Incident At Crystal Lake" where he and his executive officer Captain Crane are attacked by four criminals and brutally beaten; no pleasure is derived from seeing Decker and Crane brutalized; if anything the viewer despises this scene precisely because the two Army officers are so humiliated. This sympathy angle is best shown in the show's flashback episode "Curtain Call" where Decker has the team cornered and they offer no resistance to arrest and also in a later episode where Hannibal needs to protect the family of his client from mobsters, and the only way he can is to draw Decker into the fray.
As Crane, future director Carl Franklin displays superb chemistry with LeGault throughout the run of the show, and it was a mystery when, after two episodes of the show's 1985-6 season, Crane was curiously dropped.
This is a show where everything revolves around personality. The plots and production values are deliberately on a budget; it is the personality of the characters that drives the show and makes it work. Hannibal always loves it when a plan comes together, B.A. is always cantankerous and terrified of flying (except, curiously, in one 1986 episode where Peck is rescued and they fly out in a helicopter), Templeton Peck always has a scam running, and Murdoch is always engagingly nuts.
And it all works, each episode, of a pivotal action comedy series of the 1980s.