. . . and this rock-bottom "Mannix" episode is only for viewers whose idea of a fun time is pulling the wings off a fly. A fatally miscast Darren McGavin plays a psychotic Korean War veteran who is systematically slaughtering the members of his unit who testified against him (Mannix included) when he was tried for homicide. That's what there is of a plot as the episode zooms in on one gratuitous murder after another. The idiotic script is full of more holes than any of McGavin's victims and, towards the end, when Mannix fears for Peggy's life and tells her to seek refuge at a remote cabin with her young son, you weren't by any chance expecting McGavin to be there waiting for them were you?
Another armchair critic called this an unofficial remake of "Cape Fear". I sincerely hope he (or she) wasn't referring to the terrifying 1962 Peck/Mitchum classic but to Scorsese's blood-soaked, laughably inept 1990 remake whose low point was the sight of Robert DeNiro in drag.
"Mannix" was hardly one of TV's more memorable private-eye shows and why MeTV insists on repeating its re-runs (while pulling the plug on the still-terrific "77 Sunset Strip" after 2 short years) is a mystery far more baffling than any of the plots of its mediocre episodes.