Suppose you had been lost on a desert island with a complete set of the original 45 Columbo episodes. Now you are being rescued, but you only have enough room to take 42 of the 45 episodes. Which three episodes of the original series would you leave behind? Assume you would not be able to find replacements.

These are the three that I would miss the least:

Short Fuse
Identity Crisis
The Conspirators

This is getting silly!! But I love it!!!!

Mind Over Mayhem
Lovely But Lethal
Etude In Black...........ONLY KIDDING!!!
A Deadly State of Mind

1-Any Old Port In A Storm (I don't find Donald Pleasance the least bit sympathetic)

2-Old Fashioned Murder

3-Bye-Bye-Sky High IQ Murder

Short Fuse I like because of the great guest cast and the Gil Melle score. It's a case of great style compensating for weak substance in an episode.

1. Lovely but lethal (easy, such a dull episode and one of the few episodes where my minds wanders throughout).

2. Greenhouse Jungle (very slow and always get the feeling Columbo deliberately takes ages to solve it to make it last the time)

3. Dead Weight (mainly because the general was an idiot - really gets on my nerves).

Havent included the later episodes to be selected from.

God bless,

Matthew

Gosh, E, Identity Crisis is my all-time favorite! I would leave behind:
Short Fuse
Swan Song
Old Fashioned Murder

My issue with Identity Crisis (and also The Conspirators) was strictly setting-related. They are not bad episodes and have good guest stars, but I just can't get into the stories. But I can see why others may be big fans of these episodes.

Old Fashioned Murder - everbody in this episode annoys me. I have it on tape but I'll never watch it again.

Dead Weight - Another episode where everyone annoys me.

Fade into Murder - despte there being some good scenes the alibi was terrible and the final clue uninspired. But above all I can't stand Shatner. Never liked him in Star Trek and don't like him here.

Hey BG...don't hold back...tell us how you really feel!!

And Steinmetz...considering your name, I would never have guessed that Identity Crisis was your favourite.

Well Cassa, there are only a few episodes I dislike, and these are the only three I'll probably never watch again. On the other hand, there are so many episodes I love that I'd never be able to narrow down my top three for a desert island thread.

I just found your post so funny....how everyone was annoying you!! Thanks for the laugh.

Hmm... I'd have to go with:

1.) Old Fashioned Murder

2.) A Matter of Honor - I thought they really wasted Richardo Montalbon in this one. Incredibly slow-moving

3.) Last Salute to the Commodore - I felt like I was on Speed while watching this episode. Everything was off-kilter, Columbo seems to go completely insane, and every single character is a horrible person

Dishonorable Mentions - Lady in Waiting (am I the only one who doesn't find Beth sympathetic?); The Most Crucial Game (aaah! that mustache!); Lovely but Lethal

I find Beth Chadwick annoying, conniving, ruthless and very unsympathetic. She goes by the guise that she is this sheltered poor soul in need of independence from her brother. And then she "blossoms" into this power-hungry domineering being....I think her character is dispicable.

And I was going easy on her!

Lady In Waiting's real weakness is its payoff clue to me. There is just no logical reason why the point about the shots first, then the alarm, should not have come up right at the outset. If anything, the anomaly about Bryce's newspaper would have worked better as a payoff clue than as the first thing wrong that Columbo noticed.

Having said that, I generally feel that weak first season episodes are usually miles ahead of weak episodes from later in the run because there is still a distinct sense of superior style. Especially because Columbo has yet to be weighed down by the gimmicks and the sense of self-importance that I think affected the series more as the years went on (and really suffocates most of the ABC Columbos IMO).

I don't have the dvd with me right now, so I can't check the exact dialogue. But I believe when Peter Hamilton first says the bit about hearing the shots and the alarm..he really doesn't specify which he heard first. Does someone have this on dvd or tape that they could check it out? It is in the beginning when they are gathered at the murder scene.

Do you mean this scene Cass?

Lady in Waiting clip



WD

You will never cease to amaze me!!
Thank you.
Now you see...he doesn't say which came first. He said he heard the 3 shots and then the detective says, "and the alarm was going." But I believe later when Columbo is going over the transcripts from the court case he says that Peter didn't say at the hearing which came first but when he had originally heard Peter talk about it....In the scene that you provided Welsh....that he made it clear that he heard the shots first and then the alarm.
I am starting to confuse myself!!!
Thanks again WD.

I just re-watched Last Salute. It IS extremely quirky (Columbo's shouted conversation with the foreman, Mac and Kramer's little vaudeville bit at the climax, Clay's "erratically" response, Columbo mumbling, "yaaaaawwwwwwwl", and so on.) In addition, the "'t'isn't" slip by the murderer was sure a lucky break for Columbo! But I still enjoy it because of, not in spite of, its goofball qualities. Although the first time I saw it it drove me crazy!

Well..it still drives me crazy...but whenever it airs on tv I still watch it....yes it is quite a departure...and Columbo is waaaaaaay over the top...(a foreboding for the newer episodes..)...but it is Columbo nonetheless..even though I get a headache (not a Headache2112! ) everytime I see that scene in the shipyard! It is indeed, a very bizarre episode.

The Conspiritors- Just generally lame. All that TV techno nonsense looks too dated now.

Dagger Of The Mind- As much as I love Honor Blackmon, this farce was a US snapshot of a London which doesn't exsist.

Last Salute to the Commodore- Eh? What the hell is going on here? It threw the Columbo rule book out the window, but not in a good way. Just a load of weird nonsense. As a director Patrick McGoohan is an absolute maniac. I met him and he's a mentalcase in real life too. Totally tonto!

Lady in Waiting, Old-Fashioned Murder, and probably Make Me a Perfect Murder. No sexism intended -- just in order very dull, very lackluster, and two unrelated TV movies welded together. Perfect Murder reminds me of the last CBS Rockford Files movie that was actually a social issue-of-the-week TV movie that just happened to star Jim Rockford.

And no sexism here either....even though I am a woman...but I prefer the episodes where the murderer is a guy. It just sits better with me. Any thoughts on this?

I think a lot of the writers went out of their way to make the female murderers sympathetic. Rather than making those episodes better, it often interfered with the "he got the killer" satisfaction we get when Columbo nails a really nasty villain.

The best episodes are usually those when an arrogant jerk gets what's coming to him - "Murder by the Book", "Suitable for Framing", "Murder Under Glass". A lot of the episodes with female killers try to show that the killer really isn't all that bad and that Columbo regrets nabbing them. Sometimes it works ("Forgotten Lady" is a standout). But a lot of times it doesn't.

Though I loved Ruth Gordon, and thought Vera Miles and Honor Blackman were both pretty cattily good. For some reason, though I've only ever liked her on the X-Files, I feel that Gillian Anderson could do a good job.

Most definitely, Dirk. Maybe it was a sign of the times....but boy!! it was annoying!...I always wanted to see a male murderer..I never really enjoyed the murderer to be a female...........and as you say, the writers tried to make the females sympathetic...a ploy they used with some male ones...it worked for Donald Pleasence...and possibly Johnny Cash...but not for some of those women.....they were tyrants..Beth Chadwick??

All from season 5:

Dagger Of The Heart
A Case Of Immunity
A Matter of Honor

The only out of country episode I liked was Troubled Waters.

Last salute is simply too weird and spooky to grade. I still watch it and wonder whats going on and ive seen it a fair few times.

Forgotten lady is an amazing episode and is on Hallmark on sunday. I forgot all about that. 10 hours of columbo.

God bless,

Matthew