Reliving Happy Days

There's less of Leather here and the episode isn't as good, but I like the character insights, especially about the siblinghood of Richie and Joanie, so B. Notes: Hillary Horan, who usually has uncredited, lineless roles but has played the girl drummer before, here is Daphne, who plays the drums and had an apparently memorable date with Fonzie. Leather is going on tour with Fabian, who would be on Laverne & Shirley next week. And speaking of L&S, while everyone is out looking for runaway Joanie, Richie (offscreen) tries the Pizza Bowl, even though Joanie apparently never goes there.  We know Potsie goes to the P.B. (see "Excuse Me, May I Cut In"), but I do wonder about Richie's motives, especially since he says this at Arnold's, which technically is a restaurant. Joanie is definitely 15 here.  And for at least the second episode this season, we hear that the Fonz was on his own at 6. Al name-checks Rosa Coletti. And Jenny Piccalo has an older sister Ol...

I remembered liking Leather Tuscadero more than Pinky, but today she just blew me away on her premiere.  Suzi Quatro gives an indelible performance, not just as a singer but as an actress, playing tough yet vulnerable, and it raises the level of everyone's acting, especially Winkler, Howard, and Moran.  I'm going with a B+, because this is definitely one of my favorite episodes. Notes: Bringing Officer Kirk back, to object to former juvenile delinquents performing at Arnold's, is just right. Suzie Quatro would return in the role six more times. Leather stole Fonzie's wallet three years ago.  It's unclear if, like Pinky, she grew up in a convent, but I assume so. She's about 18 now. If you're looking for Ralph/Leather, it's there, especially on his side, and would pay off in her final episode. The cliffhanger has fifteenish Joanie planning to go to San Francisco as a Suede (Leather's backup singer), and Richie does not approve. Joanie gives Chachi a p...

I thought this was going to be the episode where Ralph and Potsie argue and divide the apartment, but, although they bicker, that I guess happens later.  In this one, they move into a rundown sort of studio with Richie, although their arguing, and bad housework, drive him back home.  The green laundry bumps this up from a C to a C+. Chachi's as yet unseen mother is the landlady, which I'm guessing will have significance later.  Poor Potsie says that his father would pay anything to keep him from moving home.  And poor Al seems to want to be one of the gang much more than Arnold ever did.

This aired on October 25th, which is pretty timely for a HD Halloween episode.  I bumped it up from C to C+ because of the costumes and Fonzie's ghost story. Notes: If you guessed that Garry Marshall's kids Kathi and Scotti play Allison and Patrick, you're right. And Tom Bosley's daughter Amy is back, as the "ten-year-old housewife" who steals his turkey leg. Jenny Piccalo remains unseen, including in her Lady Godiva costume, which her also unseen parents are aware of. Fonzie wants to dress as the Lone Ranger, as he did a few seasons ago, and he resents Ralph for taking that idea, and later Fonzie's date. Potsie as devil feels less like typecasting than it would've in the early days. Howard refers to his own tonsillectomy, "three years ago." Chachi hits on Joanie, she insults him.  Get used to that.

The first Chachi-centered episode is a C+.  It's fine as a stand-alone and deeper introduction, and certainly there were worse Spike episodes, but Chachi isn't exactly a character who injects new life into a three-and-a-half-year-old series. Notes: Chachi's father is dead and Fonzie is a father figure for him. His last name is Arcola. He is younger than Joanie, I'm going to guess 14 to her 15, although I believe this would be retconned later. I think this is the first (and second) time Al reminisces about his lost love Rosa Coletti, although Richie acts like he's heard of her often. Richie is definitely experiencing New Relationship Energy about Lori Beth offscreen, and we learn that she's a cheerleader. Chachi is still very infatuated with Joanie, but he claims to have dates with two other girls. Potsie is still an idiot in college.

I vaguely recalled this episode as I watched it, although I would've guessed that Fonzie would've dated the librarian rather than Lori Beth's roommate (whom we would never see again).  And, yes, we've got Richie making out a lot with his future wife, and him dressing in drag with Fonzie.  So the first B- of the season. Notes: The tag with Marion & Howard as Laurel & Hardy is cute. Richie references Some Like It Hot, which came out in March of 1959, so that works. Richie has just started college but is already worried he can't date college girls, at least not in time for the homecoming dance.  (We don't actually get to see Richie and L.B. attend.) This episode was my main introduction to panty raids. Disc Jockey Harvey L. Kahn would be Dickie and a Narrator on Laverne & Shirley. Librarian Susan Cotton was Miss Radcliff earlier in '77. Marcia Lewis, who's [dorm] Mother Dunbar, would be a Matron in '79. By this point, 23-year-old Lynda Goodf...

Yes, this is the episode with the actual shark-jumping, with characters, even Fonzie, admitting it's a stupid idea.  I'm going with a C+, since the actual jump is filmed well and the father-son talk with Howard & Richie isn't bad, although not classic.  There's also a pre-stepfather & stepson scene with Al & Chachi, as they wait for the others to return from their vacation. Fred Fox, Jr. wrote this episode and in 2010 wrote an L.A. Times article defending it.  Interestingly, he didn't point out the obvious: Jaws was a huge hit in 1975 and sharks were sort of hot.  ( Jaws 2 was do very well in '78, as the highest-grossing sequel until Rocky II the years after that.) This episode is set the week before Richie, Ralph, and Potsie start college, and later that night Laverne piloted a plane in the "Airport '59" episode, while Jack looked for a job on the racy nude-modeling-and-encyclopedias episode of Three's Company.  We are sort of wher...

It's September 13, 1977.  I am in the fourth grade and when Howard is shocked that Joanie has a figure, I am not because I (in my baby bi way) noticed that last year.  I do not know that it is one week before THE TUESDAY NIGHT LINEUP THAT WILL DEFINE MY PRETEENS.  Laverne & Shirley is off this week so that Happy Days can kick off with another one-hour premiere, but my new favorite show is starting its second season in its new 9 p.m. slot, as the platonic trio in Santa Monica establish "ground rules."  I will not know for years and years that Fonzie jumping the shark will take on huge cultural significance.  I'm mostly noticing (in my baby bi way) that Richie looks a lot cuter with his "beach boy" look. So I sit down to watch these episodes more than 40 years later, back-to-back, as they aired, and the biggest moment is actually OMG, Lorne Greene.  And there's no real payoff, just Lorne Greene, and by the way Bonanza had debuted almost 18 years to the...

An odd episode, in of itself and in the larger arc of Fonzie's character.  Even though Fonzie has risked his life before, this time he wants to have "home plate" covered, so he meets Al's twin brother, a priest named Anthony, and decides to get baptized.  And then the tag doesn't really fit the mood.  So a C. A few notes: This time Sally Hightower is Mary Lou. There are various Cunningham relatives mentioned, but Chuck is very officially erased, with Marion calling Richie the firstborn. Al allegedly got a nosejob, a joke that Bickley & Warren felt bore repeating. The baptism takes place on "Sunday the 17th."  If this is 1959, that would make it May, although Richie has already graduated (as he mentions).  If it's '58, then it would be August, which fits better, although Laverne & Shirley would very definitely be set in '59 the following Fall.  Then again, it's supposedly cold out. Fonzie doesn't like getting his hair wet, whic...

This would be a C if not for the return of Jack Dodson as Ralph's father.  The structure is odd, starting in media res, with Ralph already a bookie, and there's a subplot about Fonzie (poor guy) having chicks constantly wanting to drive him around while his motorcycle is out of commission, and it doesn't really pay off.  On the other hand, I dig Ralph's bookie outfit, so C+. A few notes: Paul Linke returns as Bruiser and has more of an impact on the plot. Ralph says he owes $80, but that's just the amount to Bruiser.  I could see Richie and maybe Potsie forgiving the debts, but what about all those nameless extras? This being the HD timeline, an episode that aired in March of course involves hockey and football. Richie and Potsie are playing hockey against the Shotz Hot Shots, and now I really wish there had been a Lenny & Squiggy cameo. Ralph tells his father he doesn't want to be an optometrist but instead a comedian.  I can't remember what career Ralp...

This episode feels awkward in timing, in race relations, and otherwise, but the dog is pretty cute, as are the two drawings of it, so C+. A couple notes: After a couple years of dues-paying in various uncredited roles, Hillary Horan is Peggy here. The sassy Erin Blunt (yes, the first name is spelled correctly) plays Wilbur here, was cast as Jody Foster (with that spelling) on The Waltons, and is probably best known as Ahmad Abdul Rahim in the Bad News Bears movies. I have no memories of Fonzie's dog, but apparently she would return.

I felt like this episode didn't live up to its full potential, as with the presentation scene, but it was somewhat interesting watching Howard and Fonzie try to invent the trash compactor.  (And I kept thinking of Tom Bosley's later Glad trash bag commercials.)  The funniest part was the running joke about Joanie and welding school, so I'm giving a C+. I don't really have any notes this time, other than Marion says she has a daughter as well as a son, and yep, no mention of Chuck.

The title is ambiguous, since it seems at first to be about her nerdy boyfriend Roger (Marc McClure in a different role), who says "keen" a lot and doesn't kiss her at the end of the date.  And then, tired of being treated like a child by her family and flattered by the attentions of the gangleader of the Red Devils, she dresses in a Jenny-Piccalofied outfit, including heavy makeup.  Then she is at the risk of being "initiated," i.e. gang-necked.  Until the guys ride to the rescue, with help from a guest star. Notes: One of my all-time favorite YouTube comments is on a clip of this episode, something about "the Grandpa's Trunk Hat Gang." Derrel Maury's first role on the show is Leroy. This is set on St. Patrick's Day and aired on March 1st, which is pretty timely for HD. It's presumably set before "The Physical," since Richie says that he, Ralph, and Potsie are almost eighteen. As when Joanie had her first date, Richie is prot...

I'm generally not a big fan of "Army" episodes, so I'm going with a C+ on this.  There is a somewhat poignant moment at the end, again with viewers supposed to have a post-'77 viewpoint, where Howard and Marion talking about the possibility of future wars. A few notes: Warren Berlinger, who was pushing 40 and had previously played DJ Charlie the Prince, this time is Army Sgt. Betchler (whose name of course gets deliberately mispronounced). Linda Henning, of Petticoat Junction fame, was then 32 but still attractive enough as Army Lt. Quinlan that we can believe not only Fonzie but Ralph flirting with her.  (She'd be Jean Kelly in an '84 episode.) I think this is the first episode in awhile to not have a scene at Arnold's. Potsie and Ralph as well as Richie must be 18 by now. And, yes, you get to see the four young men (and extras) in their underwear.

This has conflicts spring up and then get quickly solved, but there are some fun moments, so I'm going with a B-. Many more notes: I was mistaken, Sally Hightower actually plays "Sally Hightower," and other usually uncredited cast also appear as "themselves." It's a tiny graduating class, like 20 or 25, so who cares if they add on one night-school graduate? Richie is valedictorian, as is Fonzie for his class by default. I honestly thought we were going to see a montage of high school memories, which would be hilarious, since Richie has been a junior-senior sixteen-to-eighteen-year-old forever. Fonzie is naked under his graduating robe. He dropped out three years ago, so he must be twenty-one at most by this point, unless he was ever left back. Joanie, as an almost sophomore, wants to start having "car dates."  And she is very specifically referred to as graduating in three more years.  The original age gap between Richie and Joanie has shrunk from ...

I found this to be one of the funnier episodes of this season, even if part of the humor was the cheesiness of Potsie's song.  The scene of Potsie and Ralph interrogating Mrs. C, and then Ralph getting scared, was just right, as was Howard's garish but not too garish blue tux.  And there's some nice stuff about the Fonzie & Marion relationship.  So I'm going with a B. Many notes: Jenny P is now 15, and presumably Joanie is as well. I don't know if it's lampshading that Richie is finally going to graduate high school (five years after America first met him as a senior) and then something has to go wrong and the entire class, except ironically Fonzie, flunks due to just one Health & Hygiene test.  (And does this have something to do about their ignorance about the human body, especially reproduction?) Richie's Jimmy Stewart impression is inarguably terrible, and Stewart is probably in the Top Five easiest 20th-century celebrities to imitate. Marion sti...

Yep, another clip show, this time airing on February 5th and purporting to be Howard and Marion's twentieth wedding anniversary, even though on "Marion Rebels" they were married twenty-one years.  There are just two clips from the non-studio-audience days: Marion giving Joanie the "sex talk" and a bit of Diana Canova as one of the "chicks" Richie has dated.  It's sort of a crossover episode, in that it introduces Nancy Blansky a week before her own series premiered.  (More about that below.)  I'm going to have to go with a C- because the clips and the frame weren't particularly interesting this time. Notes: I get that Garry Marshall was eager to promote Blansky's Beauties, but this is a heck of a way to cram it into the Marshallverse.  Nancy is Howard's favorite cousin because she introduced Howard and Marion, even though it's been strongly implied that H & M met in high school.  Not only that, but they've made no attemp...

This is an improvement over the previous season's "Dance Contest."  Marion is again feeling frustrated by her life as a housewife, and this time she does indeed get a job: waitress at Arnold's.  What she really wants to do is expand her skills as a music teacher (referenced on at least two other episodes already) and after Richie has to fire her (Al isn't assertive enough), Howard is understanding enough that he agrees to her going to get a teaching certificate.  I can't remember if this actually has consequences, since it seems like Marion mostly was a homemaker in later seasons.  And I'm not sure if the thing about Fonzie encouraging Marion's independence, while getting a massage from the girlfriend of the week, is fully realized by director Paris.  I was actually leaning towards a C+, but the men's room scene, especially Joanie barging in, is genuinely funny, so B-. A few notes: Patricia Wilson was a nameless Carhop before and is Paulette Barker...

This already has a strike against it being a sports episode, but then the plot gets muddled and there are some definitely creepy moments, so it earns the first D+ of the series.  The whole thing of Sheena tricking a very gullible Richie to meet her at Arnold's right before the game is dubious, but then when Fonzie tells Sheena that he'll fight the guys from Fillmore High (incidentally Laverne and Shirley's alma mater) and deal with her alone, I know it's meant to be seductive, but it sounds a bit rapey.  Then the whole thing of her slavishly doing what he says and him "retraining" her to be loyal to Jefferson High adds to the creepiness. Notes: The Lifesaver joke at the end was then very topical, as the audience's reaction suggests. There's yet another Arlene character with long, blonde hair, but this time it's someone Ralph is interested in. And speaking of girls with long, blonde hair, it looks like Jill Higgins, the Charlene Tilton character, is...

It's funny that I do remember, from the time, the coin-catching part of this episode, because otherwise it's pretty forgettable and I have to go with a C.  Still, I've got notes: Heather Warren, who plays Elizabeth, the girl Richie is carrying around on his shoulders for much of the episode, had been paying her uncredited dues on the show since '74, but she lucked out that week and actually got lines. What do you know, it's Bag, in his final appearance, here trying to set a hand-stand record and knocking over Richie and Elizabeth, although at least this time he's not actually intending to be a dick. I've already lost track of the Jenny P references, but when Joanie says that Jenny could boost Angie's confidence, we know what she means. Peter Hobbs was a nameless Doctor before and is Mr. Dugan here. Charles Galioto has no other IMDB credits but he's adequate as Fonzie's cousin Angie.  It's not his fault that it makes no sense that a boy who ke...

This is another episode that doesn't quite come together but is interesting, especially in retrospect.  I feel like the "time capsule" aspect could've been developed more, but then we don't even know what year this is set.  The capsule will be opened in the 2050s, by which point Marion hopes women have more say (Howard shushes her), and Fonzie expects to be still alive and known.  Anyway, another C+. Notes: It was definitely a trope, especially on ABC sitcoms, for people to be trapped in a small place and learn more about each other, most notably on The Brady Bunch and Three's Company, and even Welcome Back, Kotter had the gang trapped in a museum with John Astin as a loon, because hey. Susan Cotton plays the "icy" but meltable-by-Fonzie Miss Radcliff, and she'd return as a Librarian later in '77, so I guess she was typecast. And, yes, yes, yes, that is Lynda Goodfriend as Kim, the "Mixed Nut" ("Chestnut" if you're cur...

It is now 1977, another very important year in the Marshallverse, although this January episode has a spring dance.  And Richie and his friends are starting to go to college recruiting sessions.  Anyway, I feel like this episode doesn't quite gel but it's interesting.  The title character is actually the middle-aged niece of an old lady who brought in a car for Richie to repair.  Adriana, played by Diana Hyland (about more shortly), is not only older but a bit posh (she speaks Italian with Al and she plays tennis), yet she clicks romantically with Fonzie.  Then it turns out she's married and has an "understanding" with her absent husband, and Fonzie, while not judging her, can't keep seeing her.  With sharper writing, this could've been as good as the first half of the Three's Company episode "Jack's Older Woman" from a couple years later.  So another C+. Notes: Hyland would die of cancer a couple months after this episode aired, at the a...

This episode is somewhere on that border of sweet and creepy, as Richie lies and schemes to meet his dream girl, who's of course flattered.  But I always like seeing Ralph dressed as a businessman.  So I'm going with C+. Notes: This aired on December 7th, so it being set two weeks before Christmas works. Fonzie is again doing Christmas cards at Arnold's, this time with fewer girls and with Al as an elf, even though Al has a blind date later. I think it was on the previous episode that we learned that the Hooper Triplets are named something like Happy, Joy, and Sunny, while here the "better" Pulaski Twin is named Linda. I think it was also the previous episode where we learned that Jenny Piccalo is "boy-crazy," and she again is a bad influence on Joanie in this one.  Joanie had lots of unseen friends in the first couple seasons of HD but I don't remember any of them as recurring, even the one who was going to show her a book explaining where babies co...

Although the studio audience is reacting as much as if they're at an old-timey melodrama, this is another B- for me.  I enjoyed it but it's not amazing.  Officer Kirk has been appointed sheriff.  (Good thing Laverne DeFazio wouldn't be arrested for shoplifting for another few weeks.)  His main mission is to run Fonzie out of town, although he'll pressure Fonzie's friends as well.  Everyone comes through for him, dressing as Fonzie in solidarity. Notes: After twice playing a nameless Drunk on HD (and many other shows), Jack Perkins here is Bob, the McCarthy-loving mortician member of the Leopard Lodge.  Kirk hates Commies and Pinkos, but Bob realizes that anyone can be a victim of a witch-hunt. Alan Oppenheimer, who was a very frequent television guest star (four times on That Girl for instance), momentarily takes over the role of Mickey Malph, who has a neon eyeball to advertise his optometry practice, although it's somehow a wedding gift from his aunt!...

I laughed out loud a few times at this episode but the structure feels off, with the whole "bad meat in the cafeteria" thread being resolved quickly and easily*, and then things shifting over to Richie and Fonzie going through a friend-break-up that the audience is audibly upset about.  So I'll go with a B-. This aired on November 23rd, which makes the Turkey Hop surprisingly timely. Richie is emphatically a senior. I think his nickname of "Scoop" Cunningham came up before and I did always like the character arc of him as a reporter. Fonzie not only identifies with the Lone Ranger but thinks of Richie as his Tonto. Liver is Fonzie's kryptonite. Howard is on to the way that his wife is training their daughter to manipulate him. It's borderline skeevy that Fonzie praises Joanie's legs in front of her parents, but no one seems to mind. They're back to calling Al "Alfred," but he's already one of the gang, even singing along to "Sh...

This episode is of particular note for fans of the Jodie Foster version of Freaky Friday, being shot around the same time and featuring not just a pre- Dallas Charlene Tilton (in I believe her first TV role) but Marc "Boris" McClure as the other point in the triangle.  Tilton plays Joanie's bitchy rival, who won't let her be on the cheerleading/pom-pom squad and who is her main competition in a dance marathon.  The prize is a cheesy golden foot, but with Fonzie as Joanie's partner, there are soon side bets.  I really enjoyed this episode, which I vaguely remember from the time, and it's getting the first B of the season.   A few other observations: McClure is the cute but nerdy Jimmy Bradkip here but would be Roger in "Joanie's Weird Boyfriend" the following year.  I have no idea if that's as the title character. Gary Epp plays Tilton's character's brother Bubba here and would have two other HD  roles later, as well as one on Laverne ...

This one does work on a farcical level, and it has a nifty little cameo by a pre-Mork Conrad Janis, as Mr. Kendall.  He plays well off of Bosley, especially with their military rivalry and shared fatherhood.  So I'll go with a B-. Notes: Jenifer Shaw (then with two N's in her first name) plays Cindy Kendall, who has lived in Greenwich Village but is also a Navy brat who's new in town.  She has nice chemistry with Ron Howard (as she would with John Ritter on Three's Company  as two of Jack's girlfriends), and it's too bad their relationship is built on a lie.  Then again, if she hadn't pressured a high school senior about being tired of the "kids' stuff" of necking in cars, maybe he wouldn't have lied. Richie is eighteen.  I have no idea when this is set (it aired on November 9th), but maybe his birthday was after the cutoff date for kindergarten.  I can't imagine him being left back, unlike, for instance, a Sweathog. Howard is as compet...

Little details came back to me watching this episode, like the sounds that Ralph's car makes.  Still, I think it's a C+ because why do we have to watch Fonzie try to skate, when we could've seen him at Potsie's family reunion? Notes: This is the second episode to mention Jenny Piccolo, although she is not yet Joanie's unseen slutty friend (maybe because Joanie is still only fourteen). In contrast, it's the second episode in a row to mention the Aloha Pussycats, and then they actually show up!  (I had been remembering them all these years as the Aloha Sextuplets, maybe because Fonzie dates twins and triplets elsewhere.) Potsie envies Ralph's playful relationship with his dad, and Richie's dad even told Richie about sex, but Richie says, "He got most of it wrong."  (I'm almost positive Richie is still a virgin, so how does he know?  Did Fonzie tell him?  Or did he learn things in school?) Potsie wants Fonzie to be not just a pal but a father ...

This episode doesn't work.  I mean, it's not terrible, but it doesn't work on a farcical level and it doesn't work on a realistic level.  A very pregnant woman named Louisa shows up at Arnold's and at first she's looking for Richie but actually she's looking for Fonzie, but she's the wife of one of his best friends, Danny Corrigan, who of course we've never heard of before.  Danny wants Fonzie to look after Louisa while Danny is on the road, so Richie, who's been hoping to throw a big party (three kinds of pretzels!) with his family out of town, invites her to stay in Joanie's room, leading his parents to think he's the father, even though he "gets such good grades." But then Fonzie thinks that since his life is more interesting than Richie's (debatable), Richie should be the one staying home with Louisa every night.  (It's not explained how she manages while Richie's at school and Fonzie is at work.)  Richie resents...

I'm going with a C+ for this somewhat odd episode, where Fonzie keeps losing his temper and getting in fights, so he goes to see a shrink, who wants tips on picking up women, since Fonzie has 150 to 200 "girlfriends."  (Pinky had teased him about it being 100, but maybe he's busier since their breakup.)  And Fonzie builds some admittedly cute birdhouses. A few notes: Joanie is still fourteen and Richie is going to college "soon." Bill Idelson plays the Doctor and had already written two of his three HD episodes. Fonzie fixes Alfred up in the tag and Al hopes that the woman is Italian.  (It's already been established that he's Italian, and he sometimes serves pizza at Arnold's.)

I'm going with a C+ on this conclusion, where poor Glauberg has to break up Fonzie & Pinky in a plausible manner, while trying to acknowledge their love and chemistry. A few notes: L&S' s second season kicked off that night.  And  Eight Is Enough,  which was a one-hour dramedy, began Season Two, after being introduced the previous March.  More people were watching  M*A*S*H  at 9 p.m. though, as it hit #4.  ( HD  was #1,  L&S  #2, but more about that later.) Fonzie is homophobic enough that he doesn't want Richie to touch his arm in comfort, and yet he'll let Richie ride on the back of his motorcycle, make of that what you will. I'm sure someone has tracked all the mentions of "Pfister" on this show and Laverne & Shirley, but I will mention Pinky is staying at Pfister Hospital, which appears to be Catholic.  (We learned earlier that her parents divorced and she grew up in a convent. Decorative checks were not yet comm...

It's September 21, 1976.  I am in third grade and among the many people who watched Mr. Cool fall in love in a one-hour special.   Almost 45 years later, I am most struck by how Roz Kelly created such a vivid character in such a short amount of time, when most of Fonzie's other "girls" have been forgettable and interchangeable.  It helps that she just has to be introduced to the viewer and that Richie and Joanie inform us that she is an old friend of Fonzie's.  Winkler does a nice job of showing what an infatuated Fonzie looks like, but it is Kelly's Pinky Tuscadero, sassy, sexy, and arguably feminist, who steals the show.  She causes Fonzie to compromise on some of his sexist notions, out of love, and that is actually a good development for his character.  When Pinky is injured, the viewer and the characters are all concerned.  Still, I'm not big on sports, even one shot outdoors, like the demolition derby, so I'm going with a B-. Notes: Doris He...

While it's nice to see Arnold get his own plot (even if the focus remains on best man Fonzie), the script is mildly racist, so I'm going with a C+. Notes: Some of the guest stars (and Morita himself) were cast as Koreans on M*A*S*H around this time, the most recognizable being Richard Lee-Sung, who's the chaperone Terukazu here and appeared eleven times on M*A*S*H. I guess Season Three made a pretty big impression on me as a kid, because I would've sworn that Arnold was on there longer as a regular before Al took over (but did not call himself Arnold). I like Marion telling off Fonzie, which I assume she's allowed to do because marriage is more of her domain. Fonzie thinks he has a curse, although it's only two weddings that he's supposedly ruined as best man. Laverne & Shirley, as a mid-season replacement, had more episodes to show, but this comes to 24 for HD's third season, a good number, especially for the mid-'70s. Ironically, L&S would ...

This is better than the last few episodes, actually making me laugh out loud.  Also, I've always had a soft spot for Ralph's relationship with his jokester father the optometrist.  And I like how Richie's friendship with Fonzie is used, that Richie can now influence the Fonz with just well-placed "huh-huh-huhs" of gentle scorn.  So we're back to B-. Notes: From the title, I thought this was going to be the episode where Fonzie is temporarily blind, but it makes sense that that comes later. We get a PSA about glasses being "cool," as Fonzie as role model for the kids at home starts to develop, which would most memorably lead to increased library card registration.  (We'll get there.) Jack Dodson would return in the punningly named role of Dr. Mickey Malph. I assume that Fonzie's boss who wants him to strain his eyes reading about foreign cars is the rich guy we met previously. I'm going to guess that Ron Howard was then busy with one of hi...

This is a transitional episode for Fonzie's character (from hood to father figure) but it's clumsily handled, so I'm giving another C-. Notes: The whole thing of Richie going to Chicago for a two-week journalism class at Northwestern (and to meet girls) is an odd subplot in that it's not really necessary and doesn't have much of a payoff.   I feel sorry for Potsie, who Ralph throws to the thieves, and Fonzie thanks everyone but him. This time Susan Lawrence plays Gigi. Spike is somehow still twelve (and looks that at most), while his former date Joanie is fourteen or fifteen. Ron Howard's younger brother Clint was sixteen when he played Moose, and he'd return in a different role. And speaking of siblings, we find out here that Spike, although he and Fonzie refer to each other as nephew and uncle respectively, is actually the child of Fonzie's aunt.  So I guess he's Chachi's first cousin, too?  Hm.

I suppose I could've gone as high as a C+ on this morally dubious episode, but it wasn't even funny.  Even on a cheesecake level, there are better episodes for that.  Heck, even Potsie's song is unmemorable, except for Richie interrupting him.  So C-. A couple notes: Richie claims he, Ralph, and Potsie have never dated cheerleaders, which is a retcon over the first two seasons. Garry's mother Marjorie is the Piano Player. The first non-Fonzie episode of Laverne & Shirley aired that night, "Bowling for Razzberries" [sic].