Airdate: 11/06/1985

Directed By: Michael Landon

This is going to be a peculiar episode—and it’s even written by Dan Gordon, so not any highwayman or something. It’s also the first one in the series to directly deal with environmentalism and pollution, which, in a way, ties back to the ongoing “bin” problem, and it introduces pollution as a recurring issue in the show.

Complete show available here.

Assignment: Jonathan and Mark are “assigned” to expose the corruption of a local factory which secretly contaminates the environment, putting the community’s health at risk.

This time, the assignment is peculiar for multiple reason: the first one is that it doesn’t come from a direct order by Jonathan’s superior as it has always been up to now. Rather, it is Jonathan’s own initiative to save the community from contamination.

That’s the first time in the series in which Jonathan takes the initiative to solve an assignment, defying what their “official” assignment is, because apparently, they have one.

That’s extremely peculiar in the series.

Anyway, Jonathan’s “assignment” is to investigate the mysterious death of some seagulls that he’s convinced stems from a Plant nearby polluting the water. And his investigation apparently involves organizing demonstration where he drops some punchlines dressed up in a weird bird costume.

No kidding, that’s Landon.

That’s a very relevant topic even for a modern audience.

But that costumes sort of undermines it, isn’t it.

Someone should have told Landon the Halloween Special aired one week ago.

Anyway, it’s officially the first assignment about pollution, which is included in the Bums, Bins, Drugs (the three Landon’s obsession) as a kind of extension to the “bins” part. It’s not going to be the last episode about it. And maybe that explains why Landon is so committed here, although it’s unclear why they didn’t just make it an official assignment.

• Background

The background this time it’s unclear: the episode begins with Jonathan and Mark driving away.

This part will serve as a recycle in a future episode. What’s to point out for this show is that it’s unclear where they were headed in the first place. However, considering that later on in the season they’ll be moving East (particularly New York) for a couple of assignments, it is plausible they are now headed there.

Instead, as for this “assignment”, it’s unclear: Jonathan mentions they are around “Rose Beach”, yet it’s a fictional place. But they even made a fictional newspaper for that.

Curiously, it’s the first time in the series they created a fictional newspaper just for a show, and it won’t be the last time.

Anyway, even the timespan is unclear: likely, by resorting to the general idea, it’s a couple of weeks, yet there are no indications about it.

• Characters

Jonathan’s actions in the episode are very odd: first, the whole idea of having an assignment by his own initiative is unusual, and he justifies it as a personally important matter.

Now, why on Earth is Jonathan so upset by the death of an animal. Not that it’s unimportant, but rather that they have never shown before in the series he cares that much about it. The only similar occurrence was in the first season episode of One Winged Angels, when he dropped a punchline saying that he didn’t want to help Mark fishing because he didn’t want to take part to killing other creatures (see the “punchline” section on that episode). So, maybe Jonathan has always cared about animals, yet they never got the chance to show that side of him.

However, the problem is that it comes across as oddly personal—as if it somehow ties to his own backstory or something. And, just to be clear, it doesn’t. Or at least, they never put it that way: so far, it is only known that Jonathan died of a lung relate illness due to his smoking, as he revealed on that baffling moment early in Hotel Of Dreams, but that had nothing to do with contamination. Or maybe it’s because he regrets polluting the environment with cigarettes or something that now he’s become an advocate for animal rights.

Instead, about Mark, there are so many unusual reactions too: first, upon learning the assignment is not an official one, he seems so reluctant about it.

Now, it’s supposedly the first time they work on an assignment without their superior’s permission — so maybe he is at least confused like the audience right now — yet it still involves helping other people. At least they’d still be doing something that can be considered useful for the community at large, more than having a bonfire at the beach as Mark proposed earlier.

And how would their superior react to that?

Also, it’s odd that Mark would ever want to make a waterfront cookout again, after the last time he had one — which was in Help Wanted: Angel falling in love with Stella in season one. I mean, does he really want to have another experience like that.

Either way, it’s the first time this season he complains about never having a holiday — which is true, for that matter.

Then, something that is not odd but should be pointed out all the same: after taking the job at the plant, one of his colleagues asks him to get a beer, and Mark agrees.

That seems like a detail, yet it should be remembered that Mark is a recovered alcoholic (more in the Pilot) and he has never been shown drinking in the series after being saved by Jonathan and turned to angel’s friend.

Actually, the only time he got close to drinking again was in Help Wanted: Angel, after discovering Stella broke up with him — but on that occasion, it was during an emotional outburst, not for recreational purposes. Maybe he just got over that phase, and now he has learnt how to drink without getting drunk as he used to.

• Highway Of Mysteries

There’s plenty of mysteries here — or it wouldn’t be such a peculiar episode. First one, of course, it’s the whole premise: why the heck is Jonathan acting that way, why is he going against his superior’s order, and why can’t he just handle this matter in the downtime between assignments (the same way it happened on Plane Death, when they went to visit Mark’s friend and found out he went missing). It has already become apparent that the series doesn’t show all the people Jonathan and Mark help in their assignments, and that they take some time off after concluding one assignment (more at the Guidelines and Map, at the assignment parts), so why couldn’t they just handle the “real” assignment and then working on this one later.

Actually, it is also known that the time Jonathan and Mark have to work on an assignment is decided by their superior (more about it at the entry “Assignment Schedule” in the episode A Match Made In Heaven, after the introduction), and it is plausible that Jonathan fears he won’t have time to work on it. Yet, he could have at least tried to, instead of going astray and begging Mark to join him in this personal endeavor.

The second problem is about the Stuff, and there’s a lot going on here. After being attacked by some thugs, Jonathan starts bleeding, and it turns out he didn’t have any power during the assignment.

Now, that means that he didn’t have the powers, and everything he has done here was just as a human. Yet, they never explain if he doesn’t have the “Stuff” because it’s not an official assignment or rather for something else, or if he was turned to a human (similarly to what happened a couple of episodes back). Even though it’s implausible, because then he should have needs like drinking and sleeping, and it doesn’t seem to be the case. Maybe he was temporarily stripped of his powers only when the thugs beat him, and not for the whole episode. Yet, if that were the case, it would be weird: it wasn’t Jonathan that wanted to start fighting with them (as in other instances), but it’s the thugs that started it, so why take the “Stuff” away from him the moment he needed it. Then, it’s more likely he never had the powers over the course of the episode.

But, again, if he was really stripped of his powers the whole time, it’s unclear how he could do all the things he does in the episode: for instance, where in the world he found that costume with feathers that he uses for his demonstration.

Where did he get that?

He can’t have plucked the feathers from the dead bird (those birds are white) and he can’t have bought it, as he has no money (because he never needed it). So, it’s just a mystery.

And then, if he didn’t have any powers, how could he sneak in the secretary’s room to warn her about the contamination.

And she doesn’t even ask him how he got in, because you can’t just walk in a facility like that and pass unnoticed.

But then he probably got in the same way he gets out: he simply walks away.

At this point, it could be possible he still had the “Stuff” by now, and yet for some reason he didn’t have it anymore when the thugs approached him. Or maybe he just walked in through the door because there was no security, as in the Pilot or in Hotel Of Dreams or many other times in the series.

The biggest mystery, though, is the conclusion — which is probably one of the most puzzling moment of the whole series: for his last demonstration, Jonathan lays all the dead birds around him, lies back and dies, apparently.

Now, there are so many problems here, and one is about the cause of the apparent death: Mark and everybody else assume it’s because of the contamination — as he touched the dead seagull with his bare hands — yet there can be other plausible reasons, like his injuries from the fight with the thugs, considering he was assaulted the previous night and Mark didn’t even take him to the hospital. Also, if it really were for the pollution, then why would Mark be touching him with no gloves or anything, like he wants to get infected or something.

Then, it remains unclear whether his death was planned or not: after the beating with the thugs, Mark begs him to leave right away and Jonathan first looked up.

Then he says they’ll be leaving soon.

So, what is that supposed to mean: maybe that his superior told Jonathan he only has one more day to complete this personal assignment, and Jonathan makes a final, desperate attempt in order to prove the existence of contamination by dying as his final demonstration. But in that case, it is plausible that Jonathan didn’t know he was gonna come back to life: he decided to pass away to prove his point yet he didn’t know what would have happened then, whether he would have come back to life and how Mark would have reacted about that.

Otherwise, Jonathan telling that line might imply that his superior allowed this to become his assignment, and told him what to do — and dying was his superior’s idea. But if that were the case, why Jonathan kept Mark oblivious of everything— at least he could have reassured him that passing away and having his corpse stolen was all part of the plan and that he would be coming back as angel once the assignment was over. Instead, he doesn’t inform Mark, who actually believes his best friend has just died in his arms — and the series is over, basically.

Maybe he knew that Mark is not as good as actor as French is, and he wanted his reaction upon seeing the dead corpse to be as convincing as possible — to make everybody believe it’s not a trick or something.

Or maybe that was just a joke to playfully scare his friend (and that would make it a Friendly Jonathan instance).

Finally, another mystery is at the conclusion: when Jonathan comes back to life, he walks towards Mark and shouts to have the cookout Mark talked about earlier. The problem is that they should have an assignment now: the episode began with Jonathan telling Mark they couldn’t have a waterfront cookout because they had an assignment — then Jonathan changed his plan to handle this personal environmental matter that was so important to him instead of getting to the assignment he was supposed to work on. So, basically, now they have a pending assignment: there’s someone out there who needed an angel and his human friend but couldn’t have them because they were busy taking down a plant. And now that someone is still waiting for their help — while they are having a cookout, just because.

How about that pending assignment, Jonathan?

And lastly, there is something about Mark that’s left unclear: at the beginning of the episode, Jonathan complains that Mark only cares about food.

But Mark does, apparently.

Yet angels don’t eat, and you were just discussing about food.

What Mark really meant by that, and what he thinks about besides food, currently remains a mystery in the series.

• The “Stuff”

The way Jonathan uses the “Stuff” in the episode is a mystery on its own, no kidding: it’s unclear whether Jonathan has the Stuff at all or not, if he does, when he used it. Now, so far it seemed that Jonathan couldn’t use the “Stuff” against his superior’s will, but right now he doesn’t have the stuff (at least, when the thugs beat him up) and it’s seemingly because he shouldn’t be working on this assignment. So, now, it’s unclear whether every time Jonathan goes astray, he’s bereft of his power, or whether it was just this assignment having something peculiar.

Also, the implications of Jonathan’s death and rebirth are actually unclear: they never explain if, the moment Jonathan comes back, he’s still an angel on probation, or if he was promoted to just “angel”, or if anything has changed in his relationship with other angels. Because, considering the whole assignment stems from Jonathan’s own initiative, maybe his superior wanted to punish him for going against the order and made him lose some years of probation, or maybe the superior wanted Jonathan to take the initiative some day, and this episode marks a watershed in his career as angel. Actually, in this light, it is possible to assume that Jonathan has now reached a new “probationary” ground, with some new features: for instance, he will be now able to use the Stuff even without asking for his superior’s permission. If that were the case, it will be possible to justify some of the future events in the season, in which Jonathan uses the “Stuff” against the order of his superior. Or it is also plausible that Jonathan always has the “Stuff”, yet sometimes he refrained from using it because he knew that would have been against the rule: for instance, in this case, Jonathan actually had the “Stuff”, but he didn’t want to use it because he knew that it was against the rule, so he’d rather have those thugs beat him up than being the one to beat them and then face the consequence with his superior later. Again, it’s unclear which possibility is correct (if there’s a right one), yet, considering how peculiar this assignment was in the series, it is plausible to believe that Jonathan has different rules now.

• Production and Setting

The episode was produced in the first week of October, around three weeks before its airing. It’s unclear why they rushed to get this episode ready in three weeks instead of airing others that were produced earlier (but would air in the following weeks). Maybe they thought that Landon in bird costume would make for a good post-Halloween show. Or maybe they thought that an episode about dead seagulls wouldn’t make for a good Christmas story, and wanted to air it as quick as possible.

Instead, the settings is unclear, although they remained in California, as usual.

Glossary:

Bins: the category of the assignment, sort of.

Cute: one instance by Mark, upon realizing Jonathan isn’t dead, or at least that he’s an angel again.

The way he says it makes it seem that Mark believes Jonathan had planned from the beginning to fake his death — but that remains unclear.

Highway Actors: the character of Eric, the secretary’s son who helps Jonathan with his demonstration, is played by Paul Walker, in his first role of his whole career.

He’ll be coming back in another episode in the third season.

Recycle: when the head of the plant realizes that Jonathan is about to expose their pollution, he calls some Mr. Egan, who apparently lives in a huge house.

That’s the same mansion where Jonathan and Mark worked in Catch A Falling Star, during the first season, serving as Lance’s house.

Actually, the scene was directly recycled from there (it was during the blooper switching day and night).

However, on that episode, it was followed by Lance walking in.

Instead, now there’s a mysterious Mr. Egan answering the phone — and a shadow of a vase.

Just because otherwise it would have been too empty, and the audience realized they made this scene on a set, and didn’t actually come back to the house.

Because it is much likely they used a set here.

Also, it can’t be that Lance knew this Egan and invited him over dinner: first, because Lance is now a reformed man that shouldn’t have nothing to do with industrial corruption, but should rather spend his days hanging around his kids. But most importantly because Egan confutes this idea through a line.

So, maybe Lance just quit acting and sold his place to Mr. Egan — or maybe it’s just they needed to show this man lives in a huge house and they recycled that one.

The Job: for the episode, the job is actually a double one (similarly to one episode here), as Jonathan works on his one man demonstration while Mark is basically an undercover agent at the pant. However, it’s unclear how Mark got it.

So, considering there is no Stuff, the only way Mark got the job is through his own credentials, without resorting to fictional ones as in most occasions. It can’t be that hard, considering all the jobs he has had over the course of the first season until now. Yet, there was no way to know the plant wanted to hire in the first place. Maybe they didn’t need any other man, and the episode would have concluded much sooner.

Ratings: 34 million audience, 17th weekly TV programs, 3rd TV genre show.

The episode aired on November 1985 and kept up with its predecessor in the ratings. The audience liked peculiar assignment, or maybe they were attracted by the promotional videos of Landon in a bird costume. That’s another possibility, and a very likely one.