Airdate: 11/12/1986

Directed By: Michael Landon

After the strange introduction, the episode finally begins in the usual way. As anticipated, and as the title makes clear, this is a love assignment, much like many that came before it. Curiously, it’s the fourth episode this season with the word “Love” on the title. And there isn’t a single episode with that word in either season one or two. Perhaps Landon wanted to make up for that absence forcing it everywhere in this early third season.

Also, for some reason, when it originally aired, it ran one hour and ten minutes, unlike the usual forty five minutes, and aired on a single night as a sort of “special” episode. Although there’s nothing special about it. So, it’s unclear whether they wanted to make a ninety minutes episode to be divided in two parts and air in two weeks, but it was shorter than that, or if they originally meant to make a single forty five minutes episode (as usual), but it turned longer, although not as long as a two part episode.

Either way, that’s the way it is. And Mark now looks the same as in the earlier episodes.

Assignment: Jonathan and Mark are assigned to both help a woman who feels insecure about her impending marriage and reconcile two generations of married couples.

The assignment is partly a family issue and partly a love one. As hinted at in the prologue, Mark is contacted by Frank, an old friend and former colleague from the police—yet another one he supposedly has not heard from in years—who invites him to attend his daughter’s upcoming wedding.

Now, that’s quite far-fetched: Mark has not heard from this colleague in years, yet Frank now expects him to attend his daughter’s wedding. Perhaps word has spread that Mark has now recovered from his alcoholism, so all the friends who disappeared when he needed them most are suddenly reappearing. Or maybe they just hoped that people change over the years, and Mark is better now.

Although the odd part is that Frank’s daughter keeps calling Mark “uncle”, even though she doesn’t even remember him. And he can’t recognize her either.

He’s way too precipitous allowing people to be that close to him, and then being abandoned by everyone when he needs them the most.

Anyway, Mark can’t wait to see Frank’s family, including his parents.

But, upon getting there, it turns out that people change (something Mark should know by now).

So, Frank’s father Clarence announces he wants to get a divorce.

And then Frank’s wife wants it too.

Upon discovering it, Frank’s daughter Trish calls off her own wedding.

Just because she doesn’t want to feel excluded from her family.

So, it becomes a triple assignment, which they deal with separately: Mark will help Frank’s parents reconcile, by invading Clarence’s dreams.

Then, Jonathan will help Frank and his wife reconcile, by turning Frank’s wife into another woman for a short time.

And eventually, together, they’ll help Trish make up her mind, and realize she’s acting like a doozy, calling off the wedding just because of her parents.

That’s a long assignment.

• Background

Here it gets complicated: so, the assignment spans one week, as confirmed by Trish when she says that in the last few days her mother has started seeing a man, without knowing that’s actually her father.

The problem is the way it fits with the rest of the season: excluding the posthumous cold open, its immediate predecessor, Love At Second Sight, concluded with Ted telling Jonathan he has an assignment, and Jonathan replying the same.

However, this episode begins with Jonathan and Mark going to the wedding without any assignment, and Jonathan receiving it just as they are on their way there. Even that cold open started without any assignment (unless they had already solved it by the time it started). But it doesn’t count now, because that isn’t really part of the series.

Again, this confirms that either the series won’t show all the assignments that Jonathan and Mark work on in their journey (and they had already solved an assignment by the time this episode started), or that the episodes do not follow a chronological order, and there’s one episode taking place between Love At Second Sight and this assignment. Or both, of course.

Instead, as for the setting, it’s problematic too, in the way it connects to the prologue: at the conclusion of that cold open, Mark told Jonathan they had to leave right away, implying the wedding was somewhere far. However, in this episode, they show that the exterior of the motel Jonathan and Mark are staying at is the same motel as they were in the prologue (which was a recycle from Change Of Life, for that matter).

So, it wasn’t that far away, if they came back to sleep at the same motel.

Anyway, there’s another familiar setting: the place where Brad is going to drink, once Trish broke the engagement, has already been featured before.

That’s the place where Jonathan and Mark recruited the conman in the Halloween Special of season two.

It’s in Culver City, but it’s not a recycle: they didn’t change the name or anything.

• Characters

There are a couple of things to point out. About Mark: he now looks the same as he used to before that cold open, but that was obvious.

Instead, what’s important is that Mark hangs out with Frank, from the police force.

By this point, it is the fourth time Mark is called by someone from his days as a cop. Now, if he truly had so many friends and colleagues, why did none of them try to help him when he became an alcoholic? In the Pilot, it was revealed that, after being suspended from the police force, he spent five years living with his sisters and working various jobs, apparently abandoned by everyone, until Jonathan helped turn his life around. It seemed that he really had no friends, if nobody stepped in to help him before Jonathan. Maybe it really did take an angel to save an alcoholic cop—or maybe these friends were never very good friends to begin with.

Also, at the end of the Pilot, there was Jonathan dropping a punchline telling Mark to get off his sister, even though she was all he has got. And that further confirmed he didn’t have anybody else. So, it’s become too hard to accept that he has so many secret friends. Mark should really be more careful in selecting his “best friends”, if all of them has abandoned him. Or maybe he’s just so desperate he latches onto anybody who is remotely polite.

Another problem: at the end of the cold open, Frank only invited Mark to the wedding, and Mark didn’t even mention Jonathan in any way. But, apparently, Mark has invited him too.

You should have asked Frank.

That wasn’t new: he also brought Jonathan along on Plane Death. Because Mark can’t do anything without his buddy.

Instead, as for Jonathan, at the beginning of the episode, he receives the assignment looking at the sky Curiously, this is the first time in two seasons that Jonathan is actually shown in the act of receiving an assignment, glancing upward as if his superior were directly speaking to him.

Even so, the mechanics of how Jonathan receives assignments remain unclear (more details about it here). It appears that he hears the voice of a fellow angel (who is not on probation), who tells him where to go or whom to observe, but not what the problem actually is, and Jonathan must then determine the nature of the assignment on his own.

So, it seems that he was not explicitly told that three couples are falling apart—only that these people are his responsibility.

• Production and Setting

The setting is in Los Angeles and Culver City: in particular, the church where Trish is supposed to get married is the St. Barnabas church.

Instead as for the production, it took place in August 1986, before Love at Second Sight and after the following episode (for some reason they misplaced all the early episodes). That’s with the exclusion of the cold open, which was added at some point later.

Normally, two-part episodes are filmed in two separate phases, making the entire part one before part two, but in this case it was made at once. That’s because, again, this episode is not really like the two part episodes, which last 45 minutes each part for a total of ninety minutes. Instead, this episode is one hour and ten minutes long, and it all aired in the same night (without the prologue at the motel).

Now, it’s unclear whether this was an intentional choice or not. However, considering that each season of Highway was ordered to have 24 episodes, if this episode were to be divided in two parts, they would exceed that. So, it’s likely that it wasn’t planned to be a two part, ninety minutes episode. Instead, they probably meant to make a single forty five minutes episode as usual, but exceeded that — similarly to what happened for One Fresh Batch Of Lemonade in season one. However, in that case they expanded the assignment and introduced more random characters just to stretch the episode long enough and divide it in two parts. Instead (maybe in order to avoid exceeding the number of episodes this season was scheduled to have), now they just aired this as a single, “special” extended episode. Later, when it went to syndication, they improvised a prologue to make it longer and divide it in two parts.

Even though the actors were older.

Otherwise, it’s also possible that it was meant to be a two part episodes which didn’t last long enough. But, instead of adding new scenes, they just aired it the way it was, and they made up by adding a new episode by the end of the season, to get to the scheduled number of episodes for this season. Or maybe it was always meant to be like this: after the popularity of season two, the network just ordered to make a “special” assignment that lasted one hour and a half (commercials included), to air in a single night.

Actually, it’s not the first time this has happened: there are some Little House episodes that last one hour and ten minutes and, in syndication, air either as two parts or as a single episode (for instance, The Hunters in the third season, or The Fighter in the fourth). However, there are very few of these, and on Highway this was the only exception.

Either way, it was produced all at once, much like the Pilot. The only exception is the prologue at the motel, which didn’t air that night with the rest of the episode but was added later when they sold it to syndication, making it a “two part” show. But that’s only in syndication, and in the old DVD versions: in the latest distributed versions of the series, the episode is shown the original way, as a one part, extended episode — without any random anniversary.

• The Stuff

This episode confirms some aspects of the Stuff that has been already implied before. One important confirmation is in the dream part: order to solve one part of the assignment, helping Frank’s father, Jonathan orders Mark to sleep and invade Clarence’s dream.

Once again, it’s a dream in which people visit their own past. It seems that in this series people only dream about memories of their past, often involving doors that lead them there.

Anyway, it’s the fourth time in the entire series that Jonathan uses the power to invade someone’s dream: other instances are in the season one for the Christmas Special (“Honest” Eddy’s) and Going Home, Going Home (in Mark’s), and in season two in To Bind The Wounds (invading several people).

But this raises several points. One is about Mark’s will.

In the other instances, when he invaded someone’s dream, he never seemed aware of that. For example, in the Christmas Special, he woke up saying that he had a weird dream about Eddy, but only that it was just a dream. And Jonathan never explained whether it was real or not.

Similarly, in Going Home, Going Home nobody ever revealed whether the entire assignment was just a dream, or some hallucination. And that case is even more peculiar because Jonathan seemed oblivious of that too.

The idea Mark never knows whether he’s invading someone’s dream was also confirmed in To Bind The Wounds: after waking up, he told Jonathan of his bad night but unaware of the dream.

However, now, he says that he hates when Jonathan supplants him in other people’s dreams. So, maybe Jonathan has revealed the truth to Mark about the dreams. Although it’s unclear why he’d kept the secret before (for instance, why he didn’t tell Mark that they invaded Eddy’s dream in the Christmas Special, instead waiting for Mark to find that out by Eddy when they met him). The only explanation is that Jonathan was unaware of invading dreams too, but it’s not the case here. Or maybe, he just wanted to wait Mark to find out, because he’s a friend. But it’s still unclear if either Jonathan or Mark are aware of what happened in Going Home, Going Home.

Also, there’s another important revelation: every time Mark enters someone else’s dream, he seems to already know what to do and how to act to solve the assignment. For instance, in the first-season Christmas special, he knew it was a reenactment of that book and that he was the Ghost of Christmas Present.

And the same thing happens here: Mark knows he’s in a dream, and that he has to lead Clarence through the early years of marriage to Rose.

Now, the series never explains whether entering a dream also gives Mark the knowledge of what is happening and what he must do to complete the assignment successfully, but this episode again confirms it.

Unless Mark were completely oblivious of anything, and Jonathan is manipulating him all the time.

Glossary:

Angel Revelation: Jonathan drops it to Frank’s wife, but only when she’s in her new body.

The odd part is that her husband is Mark’s “best friend” (supposedly), and no other cops from the Oakland Police has ever known Jonathan’s identity. So, if she decides to tell her husband that his best friend Mark is hanging out with an angel, Frank would likely realize Mark still has to get over his booze problem.

Blooper: there’s one sort of blooper, although it can also be justified in some way. As Mark instructs Clarence on what to do before entering the bathroom that leads them to Clarence’s bachelor party, they are in his room.

But as soon as he opens the door to go to the party, it’s different one.

It’s is noticeable because a crack that wasn’t there before appears in the wall on the left. And because, on the edge of the set wall on the left, there’s a man who is not dressed in a proper way for a party in the 1930s.

However, it could be justified assuming that they are in a dream (Clarence’s), and anything can happen.

Cute: the episode has one at the beginning, when Jonathan refuses to use the Stuff to help Mark digesting his food.

But you have the Stuff.

That’s weird too: Mark is going to be useful for the job, and Jonathan might as well want him to be in shape for it. But he’s so friendly he’d rather not.

Highway Actors: the episode marks the first appearance of a new Highway actor, Bill Erwin as the character of Clarence, the grandpa whose dream Mark invades as part of the assignment.

That’s the first appearance, and Erwin will come back in the fourth-season Christmas special, playing Santa Claus (or something like it).

Doozy: even though she’s supposed to be a grownup, in the entire assignment Frank’s daughter Trish acts like a doozy, no less nor better than old kids.

Highway Of Mysteries: this episode has some mysteries, particularly about the Stuff in the dream part. So, the moment Clarence is having a dream with Mark, he is told that, by opening the door of his bathroom, he’ll go back to his bachelor’s party.

That means the party is taking place in his bathroom. But the point is that, after successfully convincing his younger version to break the engagement and run off, Clarence says he wants to go home now.

Did they have to use the “vanishing” power?

They should be already home: they crossed the bathroom’s door to get to the party, so they should only walk back there. Instead, Mark and Clarence slowly vanish away.

Next, they are shown walking down the street.

If they had to disappear, why reappear on a random street instead of already inside the house? Of course, this happens because it turns out the house is no longer there, but they could at least have reappeared near the missing porch or something similar. It feels strange to see them vanish and then immediately see them walking, skipping the moment when they reappear altogether.

Then, when they are at the station after helping Clarence reconcile with Rose, they disappear again. But this time, while they walk.

Again, there’s no use in walking if they can disappear and appear. Which is also what happened earlier, when they used the power instead of walking back to the bathroom, and they vanished while standing still, not walking anywhere.

Again, there’s no use in walking if they can disappear and appear anywhere they want, Which is also what happened earlier at the bachelor party, when they used the power instead of walking back to the bathroom. Or maybe it’s because it’s a dream, and everything is odd.

But there’s another mystery, perhaps an even more puzzling one: the entire dream is unnecessarily overlong. When Mark woke Clarence up, he told him that it was just a dream, which means whatever happens will not alter his life, as soon as he awakes, supposedly.

But then, when Clarence successfully convinces his younger version to give up on Rose and leave town, and then realizes that he actually loves Rose and wants to convince his younger self to come back, none of it truly matters then. Because, if it’s all just a dream, he could simply wake up. The purpose is making him realize how much his wife has played an important role in his life, and that purpose was accomplished upin seeing the missing house. The rest of the dream in which he rushes to the station and convinces Rose to talk Clarence out of leaving town is just unnecessary then.

You already have your life, you just have to wake up from this nightmare.

Unless it’s not a dream, and they are actually changing his past. If that were the case, it would have huge implications, because it also means that Mark’s hallucination in Going Home, Going Home wasn’t really one, the same way this dream isn’t a dream. But, more likely, it’s just Landon (or Gordon, who wrote it) realized the episode would have been too short otherwise.

And there’s a mystery with that too: it’s unclear whether the dream had actually happened, or if it’s been completely made up by Mark for the assignment. Because, it seems that the dream is just some hypothetical one, stemming from Clarence’s wish to be a bachelor (as he revealed at the party).

However, after the dream, he goes to talk to Rose and mentions what occurred at the beginning of their relationship, when Clarence ran away from her. So, it seems like the dream is actually based on a real memory, and what happened that night at the station was real. In that way, it’s similar to Going Home, Going Home, where Mark’s hallucination was actually his own memory. But then, the problem is that it remains unclear whether now, Mark and Clarence have actually traveled back in time or not. Because, again, if it’s a real memory, then it means that Clarence and Rose’s marriage was saved by an old Clarence traveling back in time with his son’s friend he has never met. Or yet.

Sunday Suit: for much of the episode, Mark wears his Sunday Suit, which is the gray coat rather than his usual one.

It’s only the third time in the series he has worn it: once in the season two finale and once earlier this season. It seems that, after the success of the previous season, the production may have been allowed a slightly better wardrobe. Or varied, at least.

Also, Mark was invited to the wedding specifically to be there for Trish, yet he’s just sitting like any other guest. It feels like the show forgot he was supposed to be treated as someone special. That Frank suddenly remembered Mark was an alcoholic.

Joey Chitwood: Early in the episode, there is a Joey Chitwood and reckless driving moment when Mark has a rear end accident.

If Jonathan had given him any sign he was going to disappear, Mark wouldn’t have been distracted.

Friendly Jonathan: there are two instances. One is when he orders Mark to enter Clarence’s dream, and simply leaves him sleeping like that.

Without even giving him a pillow or taking the sandwich out of his hands.

The second one is when Trish resolves to go on with the marriage and asks Jonathan where to found her husband. Now, that’s odd in itself, because everyone keeps asking Jonathan for help. Like, why would Jonathan know where to find him, according to Trish at least. Of course, he knows because he’s an angel, but she doesn’t know that — unless her mother told her the truth. If that’s the case, then there are now two people who know that Mark hangs out with an angel, or that he’s drunk again. But the problem is that he startles Mark up and orders him to come along.

There was no real reason for that. Jonathan could have gone alone, or he could have borrowed Mark’s car, as has already happened before. But he’d rather interrupt his friend’s sleep and forces him to go with them.

Recycle: the motel Jonathan and Mark are staying is a recycle from Change Of Life, the exact same one with the exacts same cars passing in the highway.

However, the also recycle this same part in the cold open, as though the motel were the same. But it can’t be, as the cold open concluded with Mark saying they had to leave because of the wedding. So, either Mark had no reason to leave so abruptly, or the motel is not the same. Likely, it’s the second one, because the room Jonathan and Mark are sleeping in is the same as in Change Of Life, and they are both different from the room in the cold open.

Anyway, a similar problem (recycling a setting in two episodes that are not set in the same place) was at the end of The Right Thing in season one.

The “Stuff” powers: the episode, Jonathan makes extensive use of the Stuff. He disappears out of Mark’s car. Then, puts Mark into Clarence’s dream, fourth time in the series they invade someone’s dreams. And when Frank’s wife is temporarily given a new body, Jonathan uses his powers to become invisible to everyone except her and helps her deal with her husband. Later, Jonathan seemingly uses the Stuff to make Brad hallucinate, seeing his wife everywhere. Jonathan does seem to enjoy messing with people’s mind.

Also, when Brad, who is real drunk, wants to drive home, Jonathan prevents him by tampering his car.

That’s exactly the same thing that happened in the season one finale, when a drunk character wanted to drive home.

The series seemed determined to remind the audience never to drive while drunk, or an angel will come after you.

The Job: Jonathan’s cover job in this episode is that of a minister.

That’s the fourth time in the series he takes on that role, and the second time he does so for a significant portion of the assignment, not merely to gain special access somewhere.

One curious anecdote: in one interview, Kent McCray revealed that during production of one Highway episode in which Landon played a priest, Landon decided to go home still wearing his priest’s robe. On the way, he stopped at a shop to buy some wine — which is not particularly angelic. Anyway, the owner, thinking Landon was an actual priest, refused to sell wine to him, and Landon had to call his driver in to explain that he was an actor.

Now, it’s unclear whether it happened during this episode, because it’s not the first time (nor the last time) that Jonathan dresses up as a minister. But, considering that in most of the episodes where he appears as a priest he’s one juts for a couple of scenes, while now he does most of the time, it might as well have occurred for this show.

Also, that goes to show that Landon may have played an angel, but he clearly enjoyed being unangelic from time to time.

That’s probably what the driver did too.

Ratings: 31 – 32 million audience. 16th weekly TV programs, 3rd TV genre show.

This episode aired one week after the preceding one, and it scored quite high in ratings that week. In some way, it seems to confirm this season is on the same track as the first one, which is not quite like the second in popularity, but still successful in their own. Also, being a special episode one hour and ten minutes long, and being the first one in the series, they had no way to know how it would go, and it worked fine.

Now that it’s gone, another important thing is seeing whether the audience will be carried to the next episode too, or if they didn’t like this and will look away. That’s something that will be revealed by the ratings of the next episode.