Land's End

Syndicated TV in the US was in its heyday in the mid-1990s, with Hercules, Xena and other fantasy dramas showing that off-network programming could draw big audiences. Fred Dryer, formerly of NBC's Hunter, moved into syndicated drama with this show, in which he played Mike Land, former LAPD cop and now head of security at the Westin in Cabo San Lucas. Alongside Land were Dave "Thunder" Thornton, played by Tim Thomerson, and Willis P. Dunleevy, played by Geoffrey Lewis -- characters who were drifters in the best sense.

To its cost (it lasted only a year), Land's End eschewed the syndicated-show tropes of flash cars, hot bods, and explosions, and ended up instead as a slow-burning, character-driven comedy drama. More Rockford Files than Baywatch, the show centred on this unlikely trio of middle-aged men and their adventures.

A sample of the decidedly quirky plots: the cross-town chase for a missing cockatoo, the trio's mothers being imprisoned while visiting Cabo, frustrated talent-show contestants throwing a lounge singer into the sea after his feeble rendition of a Cole Porter classic, and a crazed couple's wild ride after stealing Mike's prized Pontiac GTO.

Land's End was perhaps doomed to fail in the syndicated realm, where older viewers were hard to reach and tight budgets meant that the writing and production values were variable rather than consistently top notch. But, thanks to the glorious Mexican vistas, offbeat stories, great chemistry among Dryer, Thomerson and Lewis, and first-rate incidental music from Marco Beltrami, Land's End was always entertaining.

The acting and production are good to very good, there is an adequate supply of eye candy, and the basic plots are basic tropes. What's not to like? Plot holes, blind alleys, major plot points that are obvious but still only implied, and, my pettiness is exposed, truly dumb errors. Telling us we can fish for 200 lb marlin when marlin hit around 2000 lb. Pretending a GTO, which is a Pontiac, is the same thing as a Camaro. And that is not some minor silliness, since a cop actually tells them the registration is wrong, so the subject of car identification gets glaring attention. Or inattention, as it were. These errors do not rise to the level of a spoiler alert and they certainly do not hurt the plots, which have their own problems noted above. Okay. On a more basic level, the ocean and beach scenery is breathtaking, the Mexican mafia is very civil, and the FBI is not stalking PTA meeting folks. On the other hand, the FBI had just finished the disaster of Waco, Texas a couple of years earlier, so it was bad to see a crime show with the sitcom sub theme that the FBI is made up of morons... instead of dangerous thugs.

The episode that we are watching now was the last straw, I needed to get this off of my chest--- WTF?!?

There are blatant, noticeable inconsistencies throughout this entire series and it makes me crazy. Currently watching episode 16 and, at the beginning, Mike Land buys a blue GTO convertible. The only problem is that he was driving this same convertible in the previous episode, and earlier ones as well.

In episode 14, Mike practically introduced himself to the police chief when, in several episodes before that, the chief and Mike were hanging out, driving around, acting like they knew each other (which they did).

And often, the conversation becomes so... stupid. Mike going on and on to Willis about how the Chicago Cubs should have "Chicago" on the front of their uniforms, not "cubs". Absolutely nothing to do with the story.

Fred Dryer is not a great actor, perhaps he used all of his talent playing Hunter. Willis P Dunlevy is not much better, delivering many lines in a very wooden, unemotional way.

Sometimes it's painful to watch.

The writing, the plots, are predictable and sometimes just plain odd.

That being said, it's a decent way to pass time during several cold winter evenings. Even with all of its faults, Lands End is better than many of the series on network television now.