Leave It to Beaver (TV Series) Captain Jack (1957) User Reviews

Pet Beave...we, I mean, Peave

[realsocialconsulting · 9/10 · 22 May 2022]

This episode, as well as all the others, works well on every level. Kids can appreciate the episodes as well as their parents. I'm a baby-boomer and I can remember life as it was in Beaver and Wallys day.

It's very realistic. The attitudes and mores are exactly as I remember. People who criticize the series without properly giving it a real chance are a pet peeve of mine.

Watch it and watch and listen to what good and clean entertainment is all about.

But be careful to keep you finger away from the sawing teeth of Captain Jack.

See you later alligator, after while crocodile Cleaver

[pensman · 8/10 · 15 June 2017]

Ward is still doing a voice over and this episode is about love: love for a baby alligator. Ward is digging through the chair and is fishing for junk while upstairs the boys are dreaming of purchasing and raising their own Florida alligator for $2.50. Yes, back then it was still legal to sell baby alligators. They were a favorite souvenir for relatives to bring back as gifts for nephews after a return from a trip to Florida. You could have gifted nieces also, but I don't recall girls from my era being fond of them.

Beaver figures they can keep the alligator in the bathtub. The money is sent and the giant beast arrives, in a shoe box. It's alive but it's about seven inches total; the boys have been "token." They don't need the tub, it fits nicely in the sink. Now they have to tell dad they have an alligator. When they ask Ward about alligators, they realize they need to speak to expert. Mayfield just happens to have one, Captain Jack who runs the Mayfield alligator farm with a population of 1,500 gators.

The boys have brought their gator to Captain Jack because they need help. They don't want theirs to die in captivity. What do you even feed an alligator? Jack tells the boys the survival of the baby gator depends on them; if they don't care then the gator won't care. First, he gives the boys advice on feeding their pet: some milk using an eyedropper (maybe add a dash of brandy) and a little raw egg. And the boys have a name for him, Beaver says it's Captain Jack.

To stop the gator's skin from cracking, they are using June's beauty cream. The boys are keeping Jack in his aquarium, the toilet tank. June is wondering about her missing eggs and beauty cream, and Ward notices his brandy is going down.

The gator is doing very well and is now over a foot long. The boys are even giving their own gator tours in their room to the neighborhood kids. Now the gator is too big for the "aquarium" so they will use the laundry tub in the basement. And Ward still is trying to figure out who is at his brandy, could it be Minerva, June's housekeeper. When Minerva comes running up from the basement screaming there's an alligator there, Ward figures Minerva has been at the brandy, and he escorts her to the bus stop. When a neighborhood girl comes to see Captain Jack, June finds they do indeed have an alligator in the basement. So does Ward when the Captain bites him. While Ward admires the boys for actually raising an alligator to that size, it's not practical to keep him. Ward has his first serious talk with the boys and they donate their alligator to the real Captain Jack who tells the boys they can visit any time, for free.

The boys go upstairs and are still sad and are promising to visit Jack every afternoon; but there is a puppy in a box with the name Captain Jack written on it. Of course, the boys are crazy for the puppy and . . ..

A good story but we know the boys don't keep a dog. The writers are going to have to learn to be more careful. Edgar Buchanan plays Captain Jack and he will return to eventually play Uncle Billy; brother to Ward's father. Also, we add to the mystery (for me at least) as to where Mayfield is located. Many clues suggest it's in Ohio and yet others suggest California. How many states have alligator farms?

A better time for t v!

[mm-39 · 7/10 · 15 April 2022]

Back in the late 70's we come home, or at my friends Tonys, and watch Leave it to Beaver. A better time for t v! Simpler more innocent t v. Wally and the Beve want a pet and dad thinks way too much responsibility for the kids. Captain jack at the California park get the brothers into gators, which the two order from a comic book. What makes this story compelling is the gator gets bigger and bigger. What will happen next? A joke with the maid Mrs O' Mally having too much to drink made my dad laugh when the maid yelled their is a gator in the basement for the conclusion which was sweet and memorable. A better time for t v. 7 stars.

Capt Jack the Alligator

[MarkJGarcia · 8/10 · 21 May 2018]

Alligator in toilet tank and hidden down in basement.

Direct ancestor to Malcom in the Middle

[bcjones-46089 · 8/10 · 1 January 2024]

In an episode that could have directly been a plot in Malcolm in the Middle, the boys get a mail order alligator and raise it. I'm sure with Malcolm sensibilities the alligator would have gotten out and some comedic action ensure, however as it is it beat contemporaneous portrayals of children as little angels. In addition, the depiction of the drawbacks of Ward's masculine decisiveness and June's refusal to roll-over both showed a bit of well-needed subversion of 1950s uniformity.

Yes, the continuity gap brought on with the pet dog is a small concern. Think of the dog as equivalent to the missing guy in the Pine Barrens, a mystery left for the viewer to resolve on their own.

Ward owes Minerva an apology!

[AlsExGal · 7/10 · 5 May 2024]

Wally and Beaver order a Florida alligator from an ad in a magazine. When they pick him up at the post office, they are disappointed to see that he is only a few inches long and feel like they were had. Because of his small size, they are able to sneak him into the house and hide him in their bathroom without their parents knowing about this. But when he won't eat the insects they catch for him, they decide to consult "Captain Jack" a caretaker at a local alligator farm.

The alligator grows to a foot in length, so the boys move him to a tub in the basement that is never used, but when the housekeeper Minerva goes down there to hang out wash to dry because it is raining, she runs back upstairs screaming that there is a monster in the basement. Ward takes the fact that she is seeing monsters and that some of his brandy is missing (the boys are using it as an alligator appetite stimulant) as proof that Minerva is drinking on the job and fires her. I certainly hope Ward gave her an apology, some severance pay, and letter of recommendation after the truth came out. Minerva is never seen or heard from on LITB again.

In these early episodes, all through the first season, there's much more playful banter between Ward and June. They always talk, but the conversation is much more serious in later seasons.

The end has something happening that the writers just forget all about the following week - the appearance of a puppy that Ward and June have gotten for the boys. Earlier in the episode, Ward said that if the boys demonstrated some responsibility, then they could have a discussion about a pet. Probably raising an alligator in captivity from a few inches to a foot long proved that responsibility. However the dog is never seen or mentioned on LITB again. Perhaps he went to live with Minerva?

Interesting factoid - This was supposed to be the first episode of the series, but it was delayed as the censors had a problem with an actual toilet being shown on TV! Thus was the state of censorship in the 1950s. Only when the producers agreed to only allow the toilet tank to be shown, which is where the boys were keeping their alligator, was the episode given the green light.

Captain Jack Meets Captain Jack

[StrictlyConfidential · 5/10 · 6 June 2020]

(*Beaver to pet alligator quote*) - "Cootchy-Cootchy-Coo!"

You know, I find that, far too often, Ward Cleaver (as the apparently "ideal" 1950s father) seems to be only good at doing two things. And that is either putting his foot down over some matter of disagreement or else putting his foot into his mouth when it comes to offering up some unsound advice to his boys.

And, here in this "Captain Jack" episode - Ward clearly puts his foot down (and not into his mouth) when his 2 young sons ask him if they can have a pet.

But, of course, Wally and Theodore secretly defy their old man (natch) and promptly send away for an alligator through a mail-order delivery service.

Anyway - With that all said - I found this particular episode ended on a real bum-note that totally overplayed itself when it came to being nothing but a pile of saccharin-loaded sentimentality.