PLOT: A publisher of popular pap novels (Jack Cassidy) indirectly murders an author who is fleeing his corral (Mickey Spillane) via a hireling killer, a Vietnam vet and bomb expert (John Davis Chandler). The slaying is set-up as a frame of the publisher, but he has an airtight alibi, which is too good to be true for Columbo.
COMMENTARY: This is a decent episode and the second of three featuring Cassidy as the antagonist, but it's the least of these. The problem is that the murder plot is a little too puzzling and the denouement is weak. No matter how you slice it, the publisher (Cassidy) didn't need to get a new key for the victim's office. But it's nice to see Mariette Hartley; she'll return for "Try and Catch me" (1977).
GRADE: B-/C+
COMMENTARY: This is a decent episode and the second of three featuring Cassidy as the antagonist, but it's the least of these. The problem is that the murder plot is a little too puzzling and the denouement is weak. No matter how you slice it, the publisher (Cassidy) didn't need to get a new key for the victim's office. But it's nice to see Mariette Hartley; she'll return for "Try and Catch me" (1977).
GRADE: B-/C+