Upon request, I am eagerly and happily beginning a "Short Fuse" thread open for discussion. I discussed certain ideas about "Short Fuse" in the recent "Middle of Columbo Episodes" thread.

The "middle," for those who have not viewed this thread, is defined as the scenes in between the committing of the first murder and the climax leading to the arrest within a typical episode of "Columbo." I believe that "Short Fuse" has a very entertaining "middle" among many other things.

Even though perhaps other episodes such as "Suitable For Framing" and "Playback" have more clever final clues than "Short Fuse," the "middle" helped to win me over because of several different things. One is the outstanding upbeat performance by Roddy McDowall. Secondly, I am very fond of Anne Francis, who played a terrific supporting role. The music score of "Short Fuse" was among the best.

In my opinion, the only scene of "Short Fuse" which comes close to boring or lagging is the one in which Everett Logan and Doris Buckner discuss the possibility of murder and Roger Stanford's supposed appointment to the legal department. Fortunately this is a very brief scene and does not slow down the tempo.

As I also stated within the "Middle" thread, I have strong reason to believe that I am the only "Columbo" fan in the world who rates "Short Fuse" as my favorite episode of the series. Perhaps it takes repeated viewings or a partiality to the beatnik-like music score involved to see my point of view --or perhaps my way of thinking is simply too different.

Nevertheless, Roddy I am sure that you are smiling if you are looking down at this post. Let's open it up for more discussion, both positive and negative.

"The Columbo Phile" referred to "Short Fuse" as the "least of the seven" with respect to Season 1. I totally disagree. What do you think?

(Thanks for doing this David. Although, considering it is your favourite episode, I am sure it is a labour of love! )

As you mentioned, the music throughout this entire episode is quite infectious. I can't help but bop my head around and play a bit of 'air guitar' as I am listening to it! (There's a visual, huh?? ) I love when Roger and Miss Bishop are at that disco club, The Narcisse, and the music is playing as they are cuddling, and then we switch to the interior shots of Buckner's limo still hearing the music!! Terrific!
In the opening scene where Roger is rigging the cigar box, I love the shots of him through the lighted magnifying glass....he is making all these wonderful expressions. There is some great use of camera work through the entire episode. The camera seems to be hand-held at times, like the scene where Rog is spraying the office workers with the silly string and of course the final scene in the tram.
As I said in the "middle" thread...I wasn't too thrilled with this one when I first saw it. But now I love it. I think the reason it took me a few viewings is because when you think about it, this episode has got to have one of the more complicated plot lines of any Columbo. All the back history of Roger, the paper shuffling of forged documents, the picture forgeries, the framing of Everett Logan, the supposed death threats (obviously staged by Roger), the firings of Miss Bishop and Logan...I could go on forever, but my head is spinning!
One line that always intrigued me was what Roger says after he is done rigging the cigar box. It is very hard to hear but I believe he says "Better than the Borgias". I looked up Borgias and found that there was an Italian family of nobility, with ties to the pope, that are notoriously known as the "First Crime Family" of Italy....they committed lots of murders. Could this be what Roger was referring to, David?
Roddy McDowall's performance in this is really quite remarkable. He keeps up his exuberance and his fantastic portrayal throughout the whole episode. He is a bundle of energy. And I also think that Peter is really great here. There is a bit of silliness in him, but nothing over done. He just seems extra Columboish here.
This really is a great episode....I think I may have to watch it tonight!
The one thing that I always found a bit odd though.....Why did Buckner have a picture of himself on his desk?!?!? What is up with that?!? Who has a picture of themselves on their desk???!!!

That first line of "Short Fuse" bugged yet intrigued me from day one. If you put the Season 1 DVD on closed captioned mode, it says "Better than a Borgia." I had thought he meant bourgeouise, which I believe means the upper class. I suppose I was mistaken.

There was no practical purpose of Buckner having a picture of himself of the desk. It was there for Roger to later put in face down and for Columbo to deduce that he did so, another clever Columbo subtlely.

I remember reading somewhere that a member of the Borgia family had some kind of trick goblet or ring that she used to poison the drinks of her enemies. I always thought that Roger was referring to that when he finished his "trick" exploding cigar case.

Unfortunately, I am not a "Short Fuse" fan. I thought Roddy McDowall was annoying, and the episode does not contain one clue that I consider clever or interesting.

David, I've always gotten a kick out of Buckner having a photo of himself on his own desk. To me, this simply implies that Buckner thought very highly of himself. Or in other words, the guy was stuck on himself. This was the sort of thing which must really have irritated Roger about his "uncle".

And if you notice there is the same picture in his home...only in B&W......maybe he thought he was sexy!

I've said it before but will gladly do it again in this thread. "Short Fuse" succeeds solely from style (cast, music, cinematography, and directorial techniques) but substance wise it's on shaky ground, because there is just no way Roger could ever have made his whole grand scheme work unless he ended up bumping off both William Windom and Anne Francis at some point. The stylish execution though keeps one from realizing it until you've seen the episode several times and try to logically plot out just how Roger was pulling this off, which is a point ultimately in its favor, but I think it needed some tightening in the writing overall.

That said, I would rate "Short Fuse" better than two other first season episodes, "Dead Weight" and "Lady In Waiting."

I just saw "Short Fuse" for the first time.
I agree with the rest of you...the music is
superb, a lot of great camera work, a lot
of colorful sets and shots. I also like
the scene where they are driving the cart
through the chemical plant--this reminds
me of the supermarket scene in "Double
Exposure". They both give the viewer
a lot to look
at besides the actors. Of course
the final lengthy scene in the tram
car is really great. BTW-the aerial
tram is called "the Palm Springs
Aerial Tram". Its bottom is near
Palm Springs, California and the top
is on Mt San Jacinto which is about
at 10,000 ft altitude. The original
Mission Impossible had a episode with a
fight scene
where two men duked it out on top
of the car...really scary. There is
another great aerial tram scene in
the 1960's World War II movie "Where
Eagles Dare" with Richard Burton
and Clint Eastwood.

I do not think Buckner thought extra highly of himself. The picture was there as a prop, for Roger to put it face down and for Columbo to notice that he did so. Nothing more.

Strange that this is my favorite episode. One of not many in which someone named David gets killed.

I was really just joking about the picture.

Yup...A David kicks the bucket!

I prefer "Lady in Waiting" to "Short Fuse" because "Lady" at least had some good clues, and I thought Susan Clark performed adequately. The final clue is too obvious, but it was a believable mistake for Beth Chadwick to make in her panic...it just should not have taken Columbo 90 minutes to discover it! However, it is not believable that Roger Stanford could not see through Columbo's trap.

But "Dead Weight" is skimpy in the clues department, although the plot is slightly more suspenseful than "Short Fuse" and the final clue is mildly interesting. And I enjoy Suzanne Pleshette's character.

Looking at it im not that big a fan of season 1. Short fuse, lady in waiting and Dead weight i dont like for a few reasons, dead weight being the most annoying as as soon as the general goes dating Helen Stewart anyone would know he was guilty of murder, an incredibly stupid move.

Going back to short fuse, yes he's meant to be but quite simply Roger is irritating and makes it far to easy for Columbo to catch him which completely ruins it unlike How to dial a murder which yes its easy for Columbo in the end but its a wonderful episode that i love to see.

God bless,

Matthew

Roger's arrogance and enthusiasm makes for a strong sense of self-confidence. Keeping his great self-confidence in mind, I do not believe it is such a cinch that he will fall into Columbo's trap. Regardless, the final scene helps to make "Short Fuse" end with a bang (not literally.)

Without going into specifics about the final gottcha (Heaven knows cassa doesn't want to be a "SPOILER" ) I think Columbo (or who ever did it) makes the piece of evidence look quite authentic..and at this point Roger is sinking deeper and deeper into his complicated plot...so maybe his mind was a bit rattled and he wasn't thinking clearly or rationally.

The final scene of "Short Fuse" was very well directed, well coordinated with the flashback to the opening darkroom scene and the building tension. Terrific work by Edward Abroms, who also did an excellent job directing the final scene of "The Most Dangerous Match" one season later.