The Fugitive (TV Series) The Judgment: Part I (1967) User Reviews

The beginning of the end.

[planktonrules · 9/10 · 20 April 2018]

ABC and Quinn Martin Productions were smart when it came to "The Fugitive". First, they let the show go on for four seasons and didn't overplay the basic idea. Second, they wanted to make the finale a memorable one...so they stretched it out to two episodes....and it became, up until then, the most-watched show in television history. Folks all over America tuned in to see if Kimble could perhaps FINALLY confront the one-armed man and bring him to justice.

This review is for part one of the two-parter. The one-armed man has been arrested by Gerard and his police force. They are not 100% convinced that Kimble is a murderer and try to break Johnson...without success. But they also think that perhaps they can use his being in custody as a way to draw Kimble into the open...and arrest him. But, as usual, folks feel sorry for Kimble and help him. In this case, it's a lady who knew him long ago (Diane Baker) and she's determined to help him regain his good name.

Oddly, this plan is knocked off course when a bail bondsman (Michael Constantine) shows up to bail out the one-armed man. Why? Who would be interested in getting the one-armed man out of the way?? This bothers the bail bondsman....and he wants the one-armed man to work with him to determine WHY someone was THIS interested that they'd bail a stranger out of jail.

As you would expect, this was well made and exciting....and ends having the viewer THINK that the truth will never come out nor that Kimble will be able to stop running. Well made, exciting and worth seeing.

Plot summary

[ynot-16 · 10/10 · 28 October 2006]

This is part 1 of the 2 part final episode, and does not disappoint. Fred Johnson, the one-armed man, is arrested in Los Angeles for busting up a bar, and the publicity brings Kimble and Gerard to town. Kimble has a hidden ally, Jean Carlisle from Stafford, a court stenographer who often works at police headquarters. He barely escapes a difficult trap with her help.

Gerard questions Johnson and starts to think maybe Kimble is telling the truth. A surprising circumstance leads to Johnson's release, requiring Jean to save Kimble again. But ultimately, Gerard captures his man.

How is the doc going to get out of this one?

[jsinger-58969 · 10/10 · 12 April 2022]

Defeat is mockingly close, and just as the search is about to destroy him, Kimble happens to see old one-arm's picture in a newspaper that was left in a truck he was about to drive. Seems Freddie busted up a bar in LA. The fuzz publicized the arrest in an attempt to lure Kimble in to end things once and for all. Complicating matters is the fact that former Stafford resident and Kimble family friend Jean Carlisle just happens to see Phil Gerard at police headquarters and makes a collect call to the doc's sister Donna. Several phone calls later, Jean heads to the farmer's market to pick up Dick before the cops do. Jean quickly finds herself falling in love with Dr K. No surprise there. Dick decides to turn himself in and beat a confession out of Fred, but someone bails the OAM out at the last minute. A thoroughly corrupt bail bondsman, a scenery chewing Michael Constantine, gets the bright idea of shaking down the guy who put up the bond. But Freddie is even more evil than he is, and kills him when he gives up the name. Kimble and Jean sneak into his office, find the body and discover that the bond was put up by Leonard Taft, who happens to be Kimble's brother in law. Could this really be? Well, the brother in law in question is now played by Richard Anderson, who is the third Leonard Taft on the show. This is confusing. Especially since Richard Anderson played many different characters on The Rifleman, sometimes being Luke's best friend and other times a real bad guy. Which is he now? Anyways, Gerard gets wise to what is going on with Dick and Jean, and for once doesn't fall for the old misdirection play at the end. So, the OAM hops a freight to Stafford to say hello to Lenny, and Kimble and Gerard are on another train to Indy to stop at the death house. It can't end like this, can it?

8/22-29/67 "The Judgment" Part 1 (of my review)

[schappe1 · 1 April 2016]

And here it is: the most watched show in the first 30 years of American television, the conclusion of "The Fugitive". Per the books of Ed Peterson and Mel Proctor, the idea of a cathartic endgame episode originated with the creator of the series, Roy Huggins, in his initial proposal: "The Fugitive will be a series which will be brought to a planned conclusion, that conclusion being, of course, Richard Kimble's release from his predicament and the ultimate salvation of justice." But producer Quinn Martin wasn't so sure that was a good idea and came to regret that they did the wrap-up show. He felt that resolving Dr. Kimble's problem would ruin the show for syndication since people "would already know how it comes out". Martin didn't live to see the show's eventual success on the A & E network, which, in turn led to the successful movie with Harrison Ford. I suspect that any problems syndicating the show in the interim had more to do with the fact that it was in black and white for the first three years, (even A&E showed the final season first because it was in color) and the fact that most syndication success stories have been with half hour shows, which fit better into local TV schedules during the times of day that syndicated shows are usually shown.

The ratings were still strong enough for a fifth season, but David Janssen was not. He's been in almost every scene of every episode and was exhausted. Peterson: "Post production head Arthur Fellows said "We'll never do another show with one person again, because you put too much on one person." This didn't prevent Martin from producing "The Invaders", "Cannon" and "Barnaby Jones". Anyway it was David Janssen himself who wanted Richard Kimble's problems to end. The final decision to have a wrap-up episode was made before "The Shattered Silence" was broadcast but I haven't been able to find out if it was before that episode was filmed. It may have been filmed thinking it would be the last episode, (assuming they were shown in order, which is often not the case.) Peterson tells us that the script for "The Judgement" was written in late January or early February, 1967 and that they felt rushed in preparing it, as scripts are normally written a longer time before broadcast than that.

That accounts for some of the criticisms of the finale, such as the one armed man climbing a tower to escape: every movie fan knows why he would do that- so he can fall off of it, (just like Ted de Corisa climbing the Williamsburg Bridge in the movie "Naked City") . Looking at it again, years after I first saw it, I'd have to say it's a pretty good episode. I had compared it to the end of the movie, which involves a medical conspiracy and features an army of policemen, on foot, in cars and helicopters surrounding the combatants, making it clear that nobody is going to escape justice this time. But the ending of the original works just as well. One of the two lines that strongly resonate form the finale comes when Gerard is wounded and hands his gun to Kimble, saying, with the utmost gravity, "Go get him!" You realize that, at the end of a four year, 120 episode journey, this is going to be it. The hero vs. the villain for all the marbles.

(See Part 2 for Part 2 of my review, which was too long for this one post)

Good episode but overrated.

[dmpearsall · 8/10 · 5 May 2021]

This final episode of 'The Fugitive' is a very good one but I don't think it deserves the rating of 9.0 on this site.

Yes it provides the conclusion to one of the best and most popular series of the sixties but check out the episodes 'Wife Killer' with Janice Rule,'Echo of a Nightmare' with Shirley Knight and 'In a Plain Paper Wrapper' with Lois Nettleton all from the Emmy winning 3rd series and hopefully you'll agree.

One actor deserves several stars

[ColonelPuntridge · 8/10 · 11 April 2022]

I always remind myself: two-part finales are often not as good as viewers expect. This first of the two parts would have been pretty hum-drum (IMHO) except for one show-stopping actor: the immortal Michael Constantine, who apparently had already been around doing TV character-roles forever. (I recognize him because I used to be a devotee of the cheesy late-1980s show "Friday the 13th: the Series", in which he very memorably played the corrupted father of one of the protagonists.) With his pudgy body, round face, expressive brown eyes, flutey voice (which would be a sweet tenor if it weren't so husky and whispery), and deceptive smile, by 1967 he had already been typecast for characters who are guilty but sympathetic, characters who had tried to get rich by taking one big risk rather than by working hard over time like normal people, and who had gotten into something illegal and dangerous, too big for them to handle. Characters who make you think "there, but for the grace of God, go I."

So it's nice to see him playing a pure-evil character this time: a sneaky, greedy, ruthless, low-class bail-bondsman, who manipulates his prisoner (the one-armed man), and plans to "squeeze" his own mysterious client in most unscrupulous fashion. Constantine obviously enjoys playing an unambiguous bad-guy, a character we love to hate, rubbing his hands together and chuckling with glee at his own cleverness, like a cartoon villain or like King Richard the Third. (Spoiler: he gets what's coming to him.)

Definitely don't overlook his work in this first part of the finale!

You don't owe me anything anymore

[sol1218 · 7/10 · 3 August 2011]

****SPOILERS**** Fugitive from justice Dr. Richard Kimble, David Janssen, has worn out at least two dozen pairs of shoes running from the long arm of the law since he escaped four years ago when the train that was taking him to get executed in the Indiana State death house derailed. Now undercover as a truck driver in Tucson Arizona Kimble sees a news article with photo included of this one armed man Fred Johnson, Bill Raisch, who was arrested in L.A for tearing a ginmill apart and putting a number of it's customers, including the bartender owner, into the hospital. Quiting his job and heading down to L.A Kimble plans to expose Johnson,the one armed man, as his wife's killer whom Kimble was unjustly convicted of murdering.

It's when L.A court stenographer Jean Carlisle, Diane Baker, spots Let. Philip Gerard, Barry Morse,in the L.A police station where Johnson is being held she realizes that the whole thing,Johnson's rampage and arrest, is a set-up by Let. Gerard and the LAPD to catch Kimble when he comes to the station to both give himself up and point out Johnson as his wife Helen's murderer. Tipped off by his sister Donna,Jackie Scott, back in Stafford Indiana where Jean, who called Donna about her brother being set up, also comes from Kinble still plans to take his chances and go to the police station and turn himself in just to finally confront his wife's killer and prove to the court police and himself that he's an fact an innocent man.

It's just then when Jonson is about to be interrogated by the police that shyster lawyer Art Howel, Michael Constantine, drops in with Johnson's bail money,$3,000.00, setting him free before Kimble has a chance to both expose him and at the same time prove his innocence! Now on the run or on the road again Kimble with the help of Jean, who's scandal riddled family back in Stafford the Kimble's took in and helped, try to track down Johnson and get him to talk to the police about what he knows about the circumstances behind Kimble wife's murder! That's if they can find Johnson before the police and Let. Gerard find Dr. Richard Kimble!

***SPOILERS*** Johnson in desperate need of money gets carried away when his lawyer Howel tells him he plans to shake down the person who paid his bail for an extra $50,000.00. Instead of going along and splitting the cash with Howel Johnson murders him and then plans to travel to Stafford and collect it himself from the person behind this whole scheme who's, from what Howel brought out before he was murdered by Johnson, a very dear and close friend to the both Kimble and Carlisle families! With the walls of justice and Lt. Gerard quickly closing in on him Kimble in a least desperate attempt to prove his innocence plans to get back to Stafford where he knows that the one armed man Fred Johnson is heading for in order to get the money from the person who sprung him is at! That's if Let.Gerard and the LAPD don't get Kimble first before he ever leaves town!