Monday 2 May 2016

390 Sword of Justice


First  viewed  : 2  June  1979

Another  long-forgotten  series, this  was  like  an  American  version  of  The  Saint  which  went  into  the  pre-Match  of  the  Day  slot  on  Saturday  evenings.  It  starred  future  Dallas  man  Dack  Rambo  as  Jack  Cole  a  rich  play  boy  who , in  the  series  pilot, gets  three  years  in  prison  for  a  fraud  actually  committed  by  a  business  associate  ironically  played   by  Larry  Hagman.  After  a  thorough  grounding  in  criminal  techniques  inside,   Jack  comes  out  with  a  mission  to  take  down  white  collar  criminals  by  beating  them  at  their  own  game  then  leaving  a    number  3  playing  card  with  a  cryptic  message , usually  lost  on  its  recipient.

The  series  was  not  a  great  success. Despite  having   a  comic  sidekick  Hector  ( Bert  Rosario )  , the  revenge  aspect  made   Jack   a  brooding , humourless  hero  and  the  fact  that  much  of  the  action  took  place  at  nighttime  gave  it  an  overwhelmingly  dark  feel  that  audiences  found  hard  to  take. Only  nine  episodes  were  made.

The  producer  Glen  A  Larson  later  recycled  some  of  the  elements  for  the  much  more  successful  Knight  Rider.  As  noted  above  Rambo  re-surfaced  in  Dallas   for  a  couple  of  years  until  the  return  of  Patrick  Duffy  made  his  character  redundant. He  popped  up  again  in  long -running  US  soap  Another  World   in  1991  until  an  HIV  positive  diagnosis  prompted  an  abrupt retirement  from  acting. He  died  of  AIDS  three  years  later.        

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