Highway To Heaven Cast: In With The “In” Crowd

Airdate: 12/09/1987

Directed By: Michael Landon

The Los Angeles crowd.

They are going to revisit a familiar assignment dealing with one of Landon’s three obsessions.

Complete show available here.

Assignment: Jonathan and Mark are assigned to work as narcs in a school to stop drug dealers.

Basically, Jonathan and Mark have to work in a school where a girl was found dead because of drugs.

So their job is to find those responsible for it.

But it’s hard for an angel to get in the “in” crowd. In order to help ’em, it turns out that there’s already a girl in the school, Denise, who is actually an undercover narc investigating into the same case.

It sounds like a very gritty, unflinching, and bleak assignment. It also feels familiar: the premise is very similar to Parents’ Day, in which Jonathan and Mark worked as narcs in a school to help a student who had recently been busted with some dope. On that occasion, however, the assignment was also about family issues, since the student’s father turned out to be hooked as well. Here, instead, the episode feels much more like an investigative procedural show.

Actually, the entire episode feels much more like a cop show than Highway to Heaven, and that is not necessarily a bad thing. It is simply different: as Landon reported, Highway was never meant to be a series about car chases, as much as a show about people, something he felt he could watch with his children, as he described. At the same time, though, the show was never afraid to tackle difficult subjects such as drugs, which it had already done multiple times.

However, in those earlier episodes (As Difficult As ABC is an example, or Parents’ Day), the assignment centered on the consequences dope leaves on people—showing what using drugs is like. But this episode is about the criminals themselves, and cops and the busting process. That’s something new.

• Background

The episode starts off with Jonathan and Mark already on the job, as though they have always been cops.

That makes the timeline difficult to place, since there’s no moment Jonathan tells Mark that they are going to become feds again, nor is it stated how long they have been working in that role. It is possible that this was not their only case; perhaps they handled other assignments as cops in the meantime that the series never showed.

That sounds very similar to the cold open in For the Love of Larry, in which they worked as undercover cop to bust pushers.

Considering the similarities between these two assignments, it is possible — though not certain — that the two episodes take place relatively close together in time.

If that were the case, it means that Parents’ Day happens around the same time: the job is essentially the same (undercover narcotics agents), and so is the premise (working in a high school to solve a drug-related case); and they both have Jonathan lecturing students on drug risks.

And it was already suggested that Parents’ Day and For The Love Of Larry cold open where connected. Actually, neither this episode nor Parents’ Day show Jonathan and Mark moving on to the next assignment at the conclusion of the episode.

So, it would make more sense if these assignments happened within a short span of time rather than having Jonathan and Mark work as narc in a school, leave the job entirely for unrelated assignments, and then suddenly return to undercover narcotics work again one year later. That would feel strange.

There’s something familiar in this.

Additionally, For The Love Of Larry Cold Open concluded with them quitting the job when Mark says he’s had enough of this.

That further strengthens the connections between these three episodes, or at least it would not contradict the idea these three episodes are consecutive; actually, it’s plausible that Mark’s line in that episode were addressed to his being nearly killed in this. That suggests that cold open follows this episode directly.

Either way, it seems like this episode took place during season three, or those episodes took place during season four. It’s unlikely that episodes were scattered across seasons unless they are holiday specials, but that really seems to be the case here.

Anyway, the school is the fictional Woodbury High in Los Angeles, where it was produced.

• Characters

Being one of the obsessions, Jonathan looks terribly serious. But he does some weird things. At the party, when Denise is thrown out and Mark decides to stop recording because he thinks the whole thing is a waste of time, Jonathan does absolutely nothing.

Even if Mark is rusty as a cop — exactly as he himself admits — Jonathan could still have intervened somehow.

Unless you cared about pollution and tape waste.

As a comparison, there was that season three episode in which a lonely writer had to get over her spy obsession and Mark suggested she could buy a car, and Jonathan spent much of the assignment warning Mark that he felt there was something off. And then it turned out Jonathan was right and the car was haunted.

Here, by contrast, he remains strangely passive despite the situation escalating right in front of him. And when Mark erases the tape, Jonathan doesn’t say anything and just drives off.

It’s just too strange that he now won’t even try to warn him or stop him, nor does he use the Stuff to restore it when he seemingly could have. Like when he repairs broken things.

Or he uses a recording camera instead of a spying one.

He doesn’t even do anything to prevent Mark from doing it: even without using the stuff, it doesn’t take a cop to understand that Mark is doing something wrong. Actually, Mark himself admits that cops should know better.

Jonathan is a cop too in this episode, he could have done something.

But he’d rather let his friend feel responsible for the accident.

But you could: you were there.

It could be argued that Jonathan wants people to make their own choices and therefore cannot use the Stuff to fix the problem directly because they must learn to do so themselves. However, this would not be the first time he used the Stuff to force someone into doing something. In season three, for instance, he used it to silence a man and give the floor to another senator. The same principle would essentially apply here. Yet he chooses not to act that way.

There is also something amusing about Jonathan’s lines when he tries to convince Denise to step forward and help him bust the dealers. When she hopelessly asks who cares about fighting dope anymore besides the police, Jonathan replies with a punchline.

Landon does?

Of course.

And Jonathan then adds that, if Mark were ever to recover fully, he would continue fighting against drugs.

Except that he won’t.

After this episode, they’ll move to new assignments and leave this battlefield to somebody else.

As for Mark, he faces danger of his own: at some point, he pretends to deal drugs with some thugs.

That’s like As Difficult As ABC in season one, and the For The Love Of Larry cold open.

Although this time he is wired with a microphone in order to frame them. At least he learns something.

Also, he takes drugs very seriously.

That’s the same thing he asked in For The Love Of Larry cold open.

Again, these episodes are too alike.

• Production and Setting

The episode was filmed between late October and early November 1987, coincided with Landon’s birthday, and was the final episode produced during the first half of the season. But they didn’t take any time off: they already had a two-month break in the summer, so they had to work all the way until the Christmas Holidays. Actually, there’s going to be a three week break two episodes from now. The pace this season was definitely relaxed.

The episode was written in August by David Thoreau, one of Highway’s most recurring writers, and the same behind Parents’ Day. Maybe he realized that Parents’ Day fell short of the investigative part to deal with family issues, and he decided to write this episode partly recycling that premise but with more care about that.

Really, these episodes are very similar: just that there are more investigations in this than the last one.

Or maybe Thoreau was well aware that procedural shows were the most popular ones in the 1980s and wrote this trying to draw in good ratings.

Also, he would later go on to write another investigative episode this same season involving Jonathan and Mark working as cops, as well as yet another one during the following season. He probably specialized in these kind of stories.

One curious thing: in a 1988 article on the Los Angeles Times about the series, French was reportedly struck by an episode shot at a high school and dealing with drug abuse, and praised Landon’s boldness stating that: “There probably aren’t many people who would have the guts to do it straight“; for the record, it was during the shooting of this episode, though French was probably talking about the whole series, not just this.

The setting is California, and the school where the assignment takes place is Alexander Hamilton High School, attended by adults. The odd part is that Lar Park Lincoln who plays Denise is supposedly 21, but she doesn’t stand out in the school for everybody else looks basically as old.

The youngest here is probably 30 or something.

Even French could fit in there and pass unnoticed.

He’s like: “What’s that supposed to mean”.

Or Ken Swofford playing Denise’s father.

He’s like: “I could be the principal, again”.

One curious thing: Swafford portrayed Vice Principal Quentin Morloch in the TV series Fame, which aired around the same time as Highway to Heaven during its early seasons.

And in one episode in season three he was directed by French, who worked on Fame in late 1983, in the six months following the conclusion of Little House and before the beginning of Highway. (The network probably moved directors who had finished working on Little House over to Fame until more stable projects became available.)

Curiously, that episode directed by French was about a narc disguised as a student working undercover at the titular school to bust drug dealers. And that episode was written by Perine, who would later become one of Highway’s recurring writers (though he’s not behind this episode). That’s uncanny.

Also, that series ended in 1987, the same year this season and this episode of Highway to Heaven were produced. In a way, it almost feels as though the network brought in several actors and crew members who had recently become available after Fame ended. Again.

Glossary:

Angelic Recovery: at the end of the episode, Mark’s at the hospital and has almost no chance of recovery, as the doctor says to Jonathan.

And then he wakes up.

That’s a rare angelic recovery, after Heaven On Earth.

If Mark died, he’d probably come back to Earth as a probationary angel, so Jonathan won’t have to worry about getting him involved in dangerous operations like this anymore.

BBD: it’s a drug assignment. There’s a growing number of those now.

Cute: there’s one by Mark when Jonathan tells him there’s nothing wrong with talking about lipsticks.

Highway Of Mysteries: this episode is a fitting mystery in the assignment. And what’s probably the biggest mystery involves Mark: after screwing up erasing the tape, Jonathan doesn’t do anything to restore it.

But that’s not the point.

Actually, the problem is that Mark decides to go on a solo quest to bust Ray and the dealers by pretending that erasing the tape was part of a plan to deal drugs with Ray, and takes him some to win his trust.

How did you do that?

No, really: where the hell does that come from.

So, Mark explains it’s of police property, but that is no excuse: you can’t just walk in the property room and take out some dope like that, with no security guard or anything.

And how did you get this?

Even though this series is known for its faulty security measures. Maybe that locker wasn’t guarded like the one in Hotel Of Dreams.

Also, it’s never explained whether Jonathan was aware of this plan or not. It seems like he wasn’t, or he’d have done something to protect Mark before he got himself in that situation. But then it remains unclear what he’s been up to: the meeting takes place at night, so Jonathan could have noticed that Mark wasn’t at the motel as he said he’d be, and Jonathan could have used the Stuff to locate him and do something. It is possible that Jonathan couldn’t have used the power even if he did want to (the same way he couldn’t use it to find Charlie in Plane Death season one), but then it means that the drug Mark wanted to sell Ray is real, and that comes back to the first mystery—how did he find that.

And another mystery: Mark uses Jonathan’s bag for this.

By this point, it has already been established that Jonathan and Mark each have their own bag, so Mark could have used his own instead.

That indicates Jonathan is aware of Mark’s plan. Or maybe Mark himself knew that Jonathan’s bag looks more like a convicted felon’s one than his own bag.

Recycles: there are a couple of recycles here. Besides Mark’s line wondering how come people don’t quit buying dope despite its dangers (that line is essentially what he said in For The Love Of Larry), there’s another recycle in the music.

The opening score — which continues throughout much of the episode — is a recycle from Fight For Your Life earlier in this season.

Rose put much effort into this.

Sunday Suit: like most episodes in which Jonathan and Mark work as cops, they have their Sunday Suits on. But there’s a change in their attire: Jonathan looks the same, while Mark wears a yellow tie for some reason.

That is literally the only time in the series he wears that color. It feels unnecessary and oddly specific, especially for someone who generally hates wearing ties in the first place.

The “Stuff” Power: this show has plenty of Stuff, both the angelic and the unangelic one. As for Jonathan’s stuff, he seemingly unlocks a new power: after lecturing the students trying to obtain a confession, he follows one to the restroom, quietly.

And then he becomes Mark.

That’s a huge power: metamorphosis. Now, it’s unclear whether that boy is just unconscious and Jonathan got into his dream or if that’s real.

But if it were real, this power is probably the most striking one of the series: it means Jonathan can actually become other people. And if he can, then there must be some rules to prevent him from becoming everybody, otherwise his assignments would be pointless. For example, in Jonathan Smith Goes To Washington he had to convince senators to change the budget: in that case, he could have just become one and cast his vote against it rather than allowing Fritz to come back to life.

He’s doing the same thing: using Mark’s body to carry out the assignment.

Really, someone stop this angel before he wipes out the world.

But there are even more problems with the Stuff: when Ray is exposed and drives away, Jonathan suddenly appears in his car and haunts him like a ghost.

When Ray tries to shoot him, Jonathan remains completely unfazed, and the bullets simply miss. It is unclear whether Jonathan jammed the gun or whether he is somehow intangible and the bullets are passing harmlessly through him (similarly to Plane Death). Yet, if that were the case, it would be strange that nothing hits the driver back or damages the car.

Then, suddenly, a woman appears in the back seat.

It turns out to be the student he killed a month earlier by selling her drugs.

It’s unclear whether she is literally there as a ghost, or whether Jonathan is invading the Ray’s mind and forcing him to hallucinate his victim. This would not be unprecedented: in season two, Jonathan briefly materialized a dying man’s dead relatives in order to convince him to keep living. (Actually, that case remained unclear as well, but whatever).

Though that situation served an entirely different purpose.

Another possibility is that the girl truly is a ghost who has been allowed to return temporarily in order to punish the dealer. Otherwise, it’s possible she never left Earth at all. The third season established that ascension to Heaven is not always immediate after death: in some cases, such as Jonathan’s — or Arthur’s, as he was as a man — the deceased becomes an angel or a probationary angel. In others, like the spy ghost featured in season three, no decision has yet been made, and the soul is forced to remain on Earth indefinitely until something happens.

Perhaps she was not immediately allowed into Heaven as she willingly bought and used drugs, so now she has been wandering Earth waiting for her redemption; which in her case is avenge her death by killing drug dealers.

And eventually, the car crashes and blows up.

What.

It seems that Jonathan is the one distracting the dealer and causing the crash that apparently kills him.

And Jonathan hard-stares at him.

The angel from Hell.

If an angel killed him, perhaps that implies that people dealing drugs can’t get a second chance.

The Job: it’s cops, again. Their work as cops has become an important recurring aspect of the series: it marks the third time they work as police officers after Bless The Boys In Blue and Parents’ Day.

They really cannot stay away from this kind of assignment — or, in Mark’s case, from his old job, the one he was suspended from because of his alcoholism back in season one.

He’d better keep it that way or he’d find out they were hired on fake references too.

Unless Jonathan didn’t fake them and reported that he’s not a cop and that has a long list of jobs he has quit after generally one week, and that Mark used to be a cop though he was suspended.

Ratings: 23 – 24 million audience. 35th Weekly TV program, 4th TV genre show.

The episode aired in early December, a somewhat unusual Christmas-season installment. Yet, for some reason, there always seemed to be an episode about drugs airing around Christmas — either in December or January.

In any case, despite being an investigative show — one of the most popular television formats of the time — and despite centering on cops, a job that had already proven successful on Highway during seasons two and three (the ratings of Bless The Boys In Blue and For The Love Of Larry and Parents’ Day are some examples), the episode still struggled to achieve particularly strong ratings. Instead, it remained weighed down by the generally low performance of the season, although it did improve over its predecessor. For some reason, this fourth season lagged behind the rest of the series in ratings, although by now it is getting better than it used to be when it first premiered a few months earlier.