This was Jan Hammer's final musical appearance on the show. Tim Truman would take over in season five, although Hammer's opening theme would remain. Some of Hammer's classic tracks are featured in this episode, including the music when Crockett and Tubbs meet Grocero in the smoke-filled room in Smuggler's Blues (1985) (used during Burnett's dealings with Manolo and Gutierrez, as well as when he first wakes up after the explosion) and "Rico's Blues" (used when Rico is visiting Manolo's Miami HQ). Additionally, the Hammer track featured during the scene where Crockett/Burnett drives off in his speedboat with Tubbs calling out to him is a mixture of the haunting melody first used when Tubbs remembers his brother's death in Brother's Keeper (1984) and "Crockett's Theme".
This was the show's only season-end "cliffhanger" episode. Prior to 1980, cliffhangers were unheard of in television. However, after Dallas (1978)' "Who Shot J.R.?" cliffhanger in 1980 captured the nation's imagination (and became the most-watched TV show in America until the M*A*S*H (1972) series finale), networks began using cliffhangers as a way to pique interest in a series over the summer reruns. Of course, sometimes cliffhangers were implemented and then a show was cancelled anyway, leaving fans and viewers "hung out to dry", as was the case with Michael Mann's other 1980s television series Crime Story (1986).
Manolo's gallery is the same house (pink house) used by Tony Amato in No Exit (1984). This house is located at 9325 N Bayshore Drive, Miami Shores, Florida, USA.
Antonio Fargas was the third member of the cast of Starsky and Hutch (1975) to be involved with the show. Paul Michael Glaser and David Soul both directed several early episodes of the series.