After watching the pilot for this popular 80s series, TJ Hooker, I understand why Shatner found the role so appealing. He has quite an interesting character, multi-faceted and strong, tough-minded and dedicated, TJ Hooker is a veteran sergeant full of regrets, anguish, and pride. The pilot opens with Sergeant TJ Hooker training a new group of recruits, preparing through a Police Academy on the fundamentals for how to perform as a cop on the dangerous streets of Los Angeles. The LCPD force are on the streets trying to deteriorate the swelling crime rate, and Hooker is one of those father-hens attempting to mold young men and women, first on the obstacle courses, and then patrolling the streets to get a realistic view of what it takes to "work the beat". The pilot has two criminal lowlifes who start out robbing joints, taking a fancy to shooting people, becoming a menace to society since many victims are blown away for no reason other than the shooters did it for kicks. The pilot introduces us to recruits such as Richard Lawson (who I wish would've been a recurring character during the series), Adrian Zmed (the handsome Latin Catholic stud who proudly recognizes his looks), Brian Patrick Clarke, John Gladstein, Steve Hanks, and Kelly Harmon, all of who are hoping to make it through the rigorous training exercises and patrols in order to become new police officers. The show does establish these actors in roles, giving their characters plenty of room to grow during the episode. Clarke's Officer Canfield was a former football pro who blew out his knee and has struggled to hold onto a job, an Alaskan pipeline employment causing his beautiful wife, Lacy (Deborah Shelton; "Body Double"), to become involved with the city's DA, Saxon (David Hedison; "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea-the series"). Gladstein's Granger comes from a family of cops, but Hooker feels he is not police material (later justified by an experiment where Granger fails to shoot a fake criminal when Hooker's life was supposedly in peril). Harmon is constantly hit on by Zmed's Vince Romano, at first denying his advances eventually agreeing to dinner. Meanwhile, we see Hooker's life away from the uniform, how he's "on probation" for an incident when his partner was shot and he used deadly force on the criminal, the estrangement with his ex-wife who divorced him because of the job, and the psychological crises which eat away at him (such as his Nam experiences having to see young men crack under the pressure and the thought of police officers under his guidance falling victim to the same problems on the street jungles of LA). Lawson seems to have quite a level-headed and mentally mature young officer in David McNeil, who could've given the series a quality character to watch grow as cop; it's interesting that the show chooses Zmed instead of him as Hooker's partner. The show certainly is pro-cop allowing Hooker to subtly condemn the courts for allowing criminals to often get away for their sins instead of pay the price for the crimes they either commit or potentially commit. The LA of this show seems to be a possible Beirut, with the public having to often take law into their own hands (a store owner shoots a gang member who pointed a gun in her face during a robbery, wondering if the streets would ever be safe again, opining to one of the young recruits that her husband was a victim of a shooting) at points, questioning if the police will be able to stop the burgeoning growth of violence and thievery plaguing the streets. Hooker is deeply committed to the badge and is bitter about how criminals often get away; you can sense the anger and hostility stewing, particularly when he talks about the dangers that await needed police officers, the idea that many of them will die because his training failed them.
Review of The Protectors
