Flight

The baddie in this one is Manuel Ferrar and he's played by John Colicos...a guy who nearly always plays villains. Ferrar is planning on assassinating the pro-American leader of their country using an assassin known as Pluto. But no one other than Ferrar know who Pluto is...and it's the team's job to get this information. Naturally, this involves being very tricky and staging a fake plane crash which Ferrar thinks is real. But there is a glitch in the plan...Dana (Lesley Ann Warren) is captured!

The story has a few familiar story elements, such as the faux plane crash. But despite the familiarity, it's a strong and enjoyable episode...one well worth seeing.

Manuel Farrar, security chief of a Caribbean country, orders an assassin code-named Plato (Shepherd Sanders) to kill his country's progressive president Rojas before he can sign a mutual aid agreement with the US, whereupon Farrar will take over the government.

The mission if Jim accepts it is: find the identity of Plato, something only Farrar knows, before the assassination. The scheme is to intercept Farrar when he boards a flight to the US separately from Plato. Scurry him out by the usual devious means and put him on a fake "plane" and make him think he's going to crash. The next minutes he's on island - a prisoner.

Meanwhile, Dana gets caught and is grilled by the Chief of Police and has to play it by ear to slip out of this tight situation ...

A fairly strong entry with the team using deception and psychology to get Farrar to let it leak regarding who the assassin is - the mission goes well until Dana gets caught. The tension rises up too.

By season five, the series was beginning to rebound after the departure of Martin Landau and Barbara Bain, although the ratings were another story. MI failed to rank in the Top 30 Neilsens for the 1970-71 season. Still producer Barry Crane (who directed this episode) pushed on, and with good reason, adventures like this held up.

A hit is called on the leader of a Caribbean country, President Rojas (Dan Tattoli), working in tandem with the US. John Colicos returns, playing the chief of security (Farrar) who has ordered the hit. The assassin is called Plato, and only Farrar knows his true identity. This is where it gets tense, all because as the MI team closes in and attempts to fake out the security chief, Dana is also put in jeopardy. Note the acting here, again thanks to director Barry Crane, who also added some clever touches. The staged plane crash is a camp scene by itself.

Also starring Sam Elliott and Tol Avery, a natural in these type of hide and seek stories.

MI Notes; The caves where Farrar and Paris are holed up are the same used a few years later in the Hawaii episode of the BRADY BUNCH, where Greg, Peter and Bobby were being held by loony professor Vincent Price.

SEASON 5 EPISODE 5 remastered Paramount dvd box set. 7 dvds. Stylish box cover artwork for fans, highlighting Peter Graves and Lesley Ann Warren.