The Fugitive (TV Series) Right in the Middle of the Season (1966) User Reviews

The great Tuna Strike of 1966....

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 18 May 2017]

Tony Donovan (Dean Jagger) owns his own tuna fishing boat. Ironically, his son is behind a strike of the various tuna boats and that is a problem since Tony is a pig-headed guy and insists that he keeps working despite the strike. Richard Kimble has signed on as Tony's mate...now knowing the crazy mess he was getting himself into by being on a boat loaded with Albacore. When they return to port, striking men attack and the police end up arresting...and fingerprinting the men. Kimble knows it's just a matter of time before the police return to arrest him for the murder he did not commit. Working in his favor is Tony as well as his daughter (Nancy Malone)--as they both have come to love him and will do just about anything to help him escape. Working against him, aside from the police,...Tony's serious heart disease.

This is a good though not great episode...worth watching though occasionally hard to believe...even for "The Fugitive"...especially the happy ending.

Plot summary

[ynot-16 · 7/10 · 10 January 2007]

Kimble is working for Tony Donovan (actor Dean Jagger) on his fishing boat. Tony is a crusty old salt suffering from heart trouble, but fishing is his life. Tony's son Joe (actor James Callahan) thinks Tony is old fashioned and ought to retire.

When Kimble and Tony get back to port with a full load of fish, they walk into a strike. The union, led by Joe, insists Tony cannot unload until the management raises their buying price on fish. Tony has a big load and is willing to take the offered price rather than see his fish spoil.

The owner of the packing plant calls in the police to get the boat unloaded. This leads to a fight, and many arrests, including Kimble. When his prints are taken, Kimble decides he must leave town, but finds he cannot because of a police blockade. Meanwhile Joe is angry at Kimble, thinking he is encouraging Tony to keep working, and Tony's daughter Nedda (actress Nancy Malone) is also concerned.

Kimble, trapped in the port, faces severe danger from the police, from Joe, and from striking fisherman angry at Tony and Kimble for defying the strike.

More Malone please!

[hmoika · 7/10 · 24 July 2021]

I agree with another reviewer who said that this episode wasn't great, but still worth watching. And was it the same reviewer who also noticed the beauty of the color in this episode? Sea.....the old fishing boat....the docks, etc. I agree: this was one instance where The Fugitive in Color really paid off.

I was sorry, though, to see Nancy Malone stuck in a very small role. Surprisingly, her budding relationship with Kimble was already going before Act I appeared. There just wasn't much for her to do. I know, I know: not every episode can have a strong romance factor; but I would have wished for more with Nancy Malone!

11/29/66 "Right in the Middle of the Season"

[schappe1 · 13 February 2016]

Dean Jagger plays a tuna fishing boat captain who hasn't been having much success – until now. The big tuna are running and he's catching them, although the ones we see in the episode seem a bit small- about the size of bowling pins. Kimble has become his assistant- his only one. He has two main problems: his son is organizing a strike which will prevent him from unloading his catch- his best in a long time. And he has a heart condition. There is a brawl and they and many of the strikers get arrested- and finger-printed. Kimble has to leave but Jagger wants to go back out- so much he'll do it alone.

I have to think a tuna boat would have a crew of more than two. And I don't think a tuna boat would out-run a coast guard cutter or that the police would give up because the tuna boat disappeared in the smoke from an exploding shell from the cutter. But the sea looks beautiful in color, a rare instance in which color enhances an aspect of this show.

Good color episode

[Guad42 · 8/10 · 7 December 2021]

The plot has been covered by others so a few observations. As pointed out, this outing makes you glad it is in color. The episode is more enjoyable and realistic because of it.

There are some standard Fugitive tropes in play here. A woman who likes Kimble a lot, although the love story doesn't occupy as much of the plot as in other Fugitive outings. People who will help Kimble regardless of what the authorities say. Kimble's medical expertise coming in really handy. A character who wants Kimble caught for his own motives rather than for law-and-order reasons. Kimble being caught up in a police net due to reasons having nothing to do with him. (Being in the wrong place at the wrong time happens to him a lot.)

The cast is good. Oscar winner Dean Jagger, forever General Waverly in White Christmas, is great in any role. The daughter/love interest is Nancy Malone and is quite good. The son is James Callahan and is suitably a pain in the rear. Douglas Henderson, as the cop, is a TV veteran of several decades. David Janssen is always watchable. Is that guy ever bad?

One thing is a not too believable. A small Coast Guard boat chases the fishing boat as she runs toward a fog bank. The Coasties happen to have a 60mm mortar on the foredeck and lob a shell across the bow of the fishing boat. Nothing comes of it but I highly doubt that would ever happen. Two maneuvering boats at top speed and pitching and rolling in the water and they think they can put a mortar round across the bow? Not likely and if you hit the fishing boat and kill or wound someone, there would be serious consequences. I never heard of a Coast Guard vessel with a mortar. Machine guns and mounted deck guns - yes. Mortar - no. They must have borrowed it from Combat.

All in all, a nice outing for this series as it is winding down in its last year.

Once again, Dick is the one who got away

[jsinger-58969 · 9/10 · 28 March 2023]

Deck hand Dick is working on the world's smallest tuna boat with the old man of the sea, Dean "Mick" Jagger. They bring their catch, 6 tons worth, back to shore. That must have been hard work, since they caught them one at a time. And The Minnow didn't look big enough to hold 6 tons of anything. But when the two man crew gets back, they find a strike going on, organized by Mick's son, Keith. With the price of tuna $325 a ton, no wonder there was a strike. But Mick doesn't care and starts unloading his catch, which starts a pier 6 brawl. Dick unleashes his fury to protect Mick and winds up being arrested on ten charges, fingerprinted and everything. So he's gotta get out of there, except the whole island is on lockdown. He gets surrounded by a bunch of big fishermen and jumps in the water when a fat one who resembles the skipper comes at him. He then swims back to Mick's place, where Mick has been made aware of who his little buddy really is. Mick believes in Dick though, and offers to take him to Mexico for another shot at the tuna before dropping him off. Dick agrees, and they barely elude the cops and Mick's son. Now, Mick has been taking nitro pills, so there's that. They catch a few flopping tuna before Mick has his inevitable heart attack. Mick's daughter, who of course loves Kimble, is somehow on the boat, which has eluded the approaching coast guard by making it into some friendly fog. Dick stays and tends to Mick until a plane lands on the ocean and Keith and the cops also get there, at which point he jumps into the ocean and hides. Keith sees him but decides to let bygones be bygones and says nothing. When everyone leaves, Dick swims to Mexico. In the Epilog we see that Mick has recovered and goes fishing with Keith, but just with a pole to catch one fish, at least at a time. Dick's world class swimming skill came in handy as he made it to Mexico, and apparently did not have to swim back.

Stretches believability

[Christopher370 · 1/10 · 8 April 2023]

There's so many things wrong with this episode that when you notice them, it pulls you right out of the story wondering what they were thinking when writing it.

For one, I really don't believe Kimble would take a job on an island where he'd be surrounded by water and easily boxed in if someone on the island got wind of who he was. As a fugitive after 3 years on the run, he would know at this point how important it is to leave open avenues of escape. And an island is one of the worst places you could be when you're on the run from police and there's just no way he would take a job on one, unless he was an idiot which we know he's not.

Then there's the strike. As soon as the boat was pulling to shore and Kimble saw the angry picketers glaring at them ready for violence, he would've rabbitted out of there quickly knowing it would bring police. You don't get involved in other people's troubles when you have troubles like Kimble does. I believe the writers were ruining the character by making him willingly get in the middle of that big strike brawl.

Of course he gets arrested and fingerprinted which actually just happened in a recent episode so you would think this would still be fresh in Kimble's memory and he would want to avoid that happening again at all costs but he doesn't and I blame it on the writing because Kimble isn't dumb.

But what really stretches believability was how he managed to escape even with the Coast Guard hot on his trail. It was almost comical how that fishing tugboat managed to outrun a GC boat. And when the CG shot an explosive device at the boat causing a huge fog bank to conveniently appear giving Kimble his escape, it was too much to take without laughing at the absurdity of it. Not to mention how dangerous that was to the innocent people on the boat.

And even after CG and police reach the fishing boat and is told Kimble began swimming to shore "an hour ago", police don't even bother to contact shore to try and pick him up. It was also stated that shore was only a mile away (yet in the previous scene with the fog bank they were clearly in the middle of a vast ocean)---so even if Kimble began swimming to shore an hour ago, and even if he made it to shore by then, he would be seriously winded from all that swimming and easy to be picked up. Why didn't police contact the mainland authorities?!

But instead, the police just throw up their hands and say "Oh well. He got away again!" lol....and when police go up in the plane immediately after leaving the boat, they make absolutely no effort to at least look down in the water to see if he's swimming in the vicinity! It's just too many plot holes to ignore with this one. The first 3 seasons weren't nearly this bad.

I think by this point they were just running out of ideas and stretching things out until the series finale. A few times already this season they've rehashed previous stories and situations and things seem to be going in circles now.

I guess putting Kimble on an island was something different for them to try, since they did almost everything else, but it really stretches credibility because I just can't believe he would box himself in on an island like that, especially since he never bothers to wear any kind of disguise or even grown a mustache or beard so he's most likely going to be recognized by someone again.

I really hate giving low ratings for this show because I was so riveted with it for the first 3 seasons, but the quality seems to be dropping fast in this final season. When I finish the series, I want to rewatch the first 3 seasons again, but once is enough for season 4.