So, once again, we tread into Bionic Territory.

Honestly, I'm afraid to trek into this land again:  upon doing more research on the topic of the last (and first) Six Million Dollar Man episode I did, "Return of the Robot Maker," I found it was the THIRD episode that Henry Jones had been in as the mad Dr. Dolenz.  While that episode's name escapes me now, I've finally decided not to include that elusive one in a revised review of "Robot Maker."  Mistakes are the fluctuations of life, the imperfections.  And let it not be said that I am perfect.

In public.

But, despite this, I have done my research on this episode before us now.  In fact, I'm quite certain that the character of Barney the Seven Million Dollar Man has not shown up before this episode.  Why?  Because this is the first episode.  The origin episode.  Yes.  I'm sure of that.  Nobody will stop me from saying otherwise.    In fact, the only other episode Barney the Seven Million Dollar Man showed up in was future Odd Cinema material "The Bionic Criminal."  But enough of promises and banter, let's get into the meat of the story.

The episode starts with Steve Austin (Lee Majors, once again) being interviewed by Rudy Wells, the doctor who gave him the bionics which still allow him to 'live as a normal man.'   Uh, sure.  I think they mean him to walk.  I don't know if bionics are THAT remarkable.  Anyway, the very same nurse that helped Steve through the hard road to recovery and learning to live with bionic limbs is caught giving valuable tapes to a stranger outside of the building.  Steve witnesses this and gives chase, only to find that he isn't a real match for a speeding car, especially after hurtling a twelve foot fence.  The story gets stranger when Steve interrogates the nurse and finds that Oscar Goldman and Rudy Wells back up the nurse!  In fact, they claim that no tapes have been stolen at all.  Steve rightfully assumes that they're giving him the slip, and finds out the truth:  the man the nurse gave the tapes to is another bionic man (hence the title) that was created in case Steve wasn't able to fulfill his duties as an agent for the US Government and OSI (the organization that rebuilt Steve).

Enter Barney Miller.  No, not Hal Linden, but rather the championship race car driver who the nurse is now dating.  It turns out that Barney was in a nasty car crash a couple of months ago and hasn't been heard from since.  In fact, OSI has rebuilt him into another bionic man.   But Barney is having quite a problem with adjusting to his new life and has turned to outbursts of rage and alcoholism.  Considering that, unlike Steve, all of Barney's limbs are bionic (Steve has his original right arm), I can see why.

Also, I should point out that the actor playing Barney, a Mr. Monte Markham, might be familiar to most of you from the Golden Girls show.  He played Rue McClanhan's younger gay brother.  Small world, eh?

To cure Barney's problem with accepting his new life, he gives Barney an assignment with Steve to retrieve some stolen stuff.  Everything goes well until Barney, while defending Steve, gets a little too cocky and starts taking a little too much fun with beating bad guys senseless.  Steve pulls him away just before he kills and reports him to Oscar, asking the head of OSI to 'tone down' Barney's bionics, allowing the former race car driver to maintain his limbs but no longer yield superhuman power.  Needless to say, Barney dislikes this very much and takes his anger out on Steve by beating him up and holding Rudy Wells hostage in order to destroy OSI's bionic database, which holds all the information on bionics and is the McGuffin to what everyone has been waiting for:  the battle between two bionic forces.  From which, in this series, had not yet been seen.

Hell, we haven't even gotten into the Bigfoot stories or even the Bionic Woman.  This is a long time coming.

And it's worth it.   Thanks to Universal's way of making a lot of story for a lack of budget, we get to see Steve Austin and Barney Miller (not Hal Linden) beat the living shit out of each other, complete with rocking camera effects and excellent crashing/rumbling foley (sound for you laymen).  Finally, Steve knocks Barney out by whipping him facefirst into a door and Barney gets toned down to normal human strength, against his will.    Maybe he will recover...of course, thinking that the next episode involving Barney is called "The Bionic Criminal," I wouldn't put money on it.

RATING:  Gee, I got to the rating fast this time, didn't I?  Well, there isn't much to complain about.  The drama of Barney is well portrayed and not as one-sided as shows of this era would make them out to be.  The acting is fine as usual, and the fight is better than I expected.  Of course, it was the '70s, so I didn't expect much.  All and all, a good episode by itself and leaves one hoping that "The Bionic Criminal" lives up to the leadup.  I hope it does.  Three and a half Stars out of Four.