Maybe it’s me, but I don’t get how Rocky can stand there and talk over Jim’s answering machine and then not answer the door for him while he’s on the phone. They both seem kind of rude, honestly, but there it is. I get that answering machines were new technology, but surely Rocky knows that it’s an important part of Jim’s business and that he’ll need to hear, for example, new clients’ messages. Also, Jim’s busy, and it wouldn’t have killed Rocky to have opened the door and asked whoever-it-was to wait just a minute until Jim was off the phone. It’s unusual behaviour on his part from a generally pretty decent guy.
Jim has gotten a phone call from Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie (Frank Maxwell), his old CO from his Korea days. We see the colonel hauled away by a cop and a military man, but Jim doesn’t know that. Then, Dennis and a guy from the Army come to get Jim, because the colonel is dead. His daughter, Shana (Jesse Wells), comes to see Jim with her belief that her father is murdered. She persuades Jim to come with her and solve the case. Despite Jim’s feelings toward the military, open cases, and her father, he agrees.
After even just about a season and a half, it’s clear that Jim knows that it just makes sense to be careful who to trust. You can’t tell everyone what your business is every time. Unfortunately, he’s in a situation where you can’t trust anyone off the bat. Obviously someone knows the truth, and obviously Jim doesn’t have enough information to figure out who that is when he’s first in the situation. He hated the military when he was in Korea, and my goodness who can blame him—he’s asked why the military bothers drafting people like him and charitably doesn’t just fall over laughing—but that also means he’s seriously out of the loop.
I have a lot of sympathy for Shana’s feelings about her father. She was deeply hurt by him, and she never felt loved by him. She felt as though she just had to do the right thing, one last right thing, and everything would be okay. She’d have a real family. Especially after her mother died. I am one of many, many people I know with complicated relationships with a parent, and I like my mom better than a lot of my friends like their parents. Better, I think, than Shana liked her father.
Southern California for Tourists: Honestly, I don’t know what Army bases there are around LA and certainly not which ones there were in the ’70s. My dad was career Air Force—though he was also old enough to have retired shortly before I was born—and I know where an Air Force base and a Naval station are/were, but honestly I wouldn’t be surprised to discover that the base Jim’s at is actually based on Camp Pendleton, the big Marine Corps camp down near San Diego. Wherever it is, it’s far enough away so that Jim stays in a hotel while he’s there.
Take Care of Rockford Files: Held at gunpoint. Slapped around. Brief fight. Shot at. Helicopter chase. Another gunfight.