The BEST episodes written by Paul Playdon
#1 - The Gantlet
Combat! - Season 5 - Episode 20
Captured by Germans, Saunders is aboard a prison train bound for Germany. He escapes and is saddled with Sgt. Decker (Tom Skerritt), who would have been content to sit out the war in a POW camp. Saunders is hounded by dogs, wounded, and, in a German uniform, taken to a German aid station where he trips on morphine and tries to run again.
#2 - The Falcon (3)
Mission: Impossible - Season 4 - Episode 16
Just as Jim and the others unwittingly become caught up in a royal power struggle, a bomb goes off, seriously injuring Paris and revealing his disquise.
Watch Now:Amazon
#3 - The Catafalque
Mission: Impossible - Season 5 - Episode 19
In San Pascal Premier Miguel Fuego and his nephew Ramone have signed a secret arms treaty with a Communist power to permit nuclear weapons aimed at the U.S. into their country. The IMF must expose the treaty before the missiles are installed. The team has Paris claim that Ramone's late father was killed by Miguel and that Paris' father at the closed Madrena Prison can verify this. The IMF secretly reopen Madrena prison and have Ramone arrested for fake-killing Doug, and Paris plays his previous character's father, who claims a diary will prove his claim. Ramone escapes and rejoins the younger Paris' character, who makes him believe the diary is on his father Victorio's body, lying in state. Barney and Doug have secreted replaced the body with a wax dummy behind the backs of the guards and planted a diary "proving" Miguel had Victorio lobotomized. Upon recovering it, Ramone goes to an asylum where a braindead "Victorio" is being kept. Enraged, Ramone takes Paris to the safe containing t
Watch Now:Amazon
#4 - The Falcon (2)
Mission: Impossible - Season 4 - Episode 15
With the king's sister rescued during the wedding, the team must now turn its attention to the true heir, who's locked up in prison.
Watch Now:Amazon
#6 - The Mind of Stefan Miklos
Mission: Impossible - Season 3 - Episode 13
Walter Townsend is discovered to be a double-agent: the U.S. government has leaked false information to him to give to the enemy which will cause them embarassment if believed. However, Townsend's contact Simpson has discovered the information is false and reported to his superiors Townsend is a defector. Simpson's superiors know of his jealousy toward Townsend and send their best intelligence officer, Stefan Miklos, to discover the truth of the matter. The IMF must make Miklos believe the information is true and Simpson the liar. Rollin-as-Miklos gets Simpson out and then takes Simpson's place. The IMF sets a series of clues to make Miklos belief that Townsend truly is a traitor and preparing to defect, including tickets and a passport. However, Miklos spots a planted "clue" that convinces him the IMF are doing exactly what they are doing: framing Townsend! He identifies them and then receives the information from Rollin-as-Simpson and Jim when he's spotted Jim as one of the IMF opera
Watch Now:Amazon
#7 - Ten Thousand Dollars a Page
Banacek - Season 1 - Episode 6
Banacek must solve a murder and the disappearance of a valuable book from a theft-proof display case.
#8 - The Bunker (2)
Mission: Impossible - Season 3 - Episode 20
With Cinnamon-as-Anna in place, she is taken to her "husband" and tells Dr. Rojak to be near an air vent. Jim as a security officer has placed a small remote-control flying disk in the bunker's air vent system and it holds a hypo. Barney steers it to Rojak's monitored cell and he uses the hypo to induce a heart attack. Jim summons Rollin (as a heart specialist) who advises surgery and instructs that "Anna" be at her husband's side. Ventlos the assassin plans to disrupt the operation by taking Rollin's place in disguise and the IMF quickly has to readjust when Ventlos tries to kill Rojak and destroy the installation.
Watch Now:Amazon
#9 - The Glass Cage
Mission: Impossible - Season 3 - Episode 16
Anton Reisner, a reistance leader in a tyrannical country, has been imprisoned in the automated Trast Prison and is being tortured by Major Zelinko in order to get the names of the other resistance leaders. The IMF must get him out of the prison. Reisner is in a video-monitored escape-proof glass cubicle. Barney and Willy get themselves imprisoned when Cinnamon as head of the country's prison system arrives for an inspection. She distracts Zelinko long enough for Barney and Willy to escape, wreck the video system, and get to Reisner. But..they tell him to stay in the cell but act different, then get recaptured. Zelinko notes the discrepancy between the door counter and the written log and puts two and two together (incorrectly) with Reisner's odd behavior and assumes Reisner is an imposter. Zelinko and Gulka plot to keep the switch secret but Cinnamon arranges for Zelinko's underling Vasney to overhear it. She has Zelinko arrested and takes Barney, Willy, and the Reisner-as-the-imposte
Watch Now:Amazon
#10 - Decision
Combat! - Season 5 - Episode 9
Saunders is uneasy about Pvt. Charles Harris, who is with the squad as a demolition man. The assignment is to destroy a communications station. On the way, Doc learns that Harris is a doctor. Harris must make a decision whether to continue running away from what he is.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#11 - The Bunker (1)
Mission: Impossible - Season 3 - Episode 19
Dr. Erich Rojak and his wife Anna are being held in an underground laboratory/bunker by a totalitarian enemy government. Another unfriendly government has sent an assassin, Ventlos, to kill Rojak. The IMF must rescue Rojak and his wife, destroy the test missile Rojak is working on, and stop Ventlos. The IMF infiltrate the base and Jim introduces a handstamp system, unaware that Ventlos has already replaced the bunker's security chief. Jim uses his system to expose security officer Cinnamon as a phony and she is imprisoned near Anna. Willy breaks in via the furnace and rescues Anna while Cinnamon takes her place...
Watch Now:Amazon
#12 - Entombed
Combat! - Season 5 - Episode 16
After rescuing captive French resistance fighters, the squad regroups in an abandoned mine. When the Germans attack, Germans, French, and Americans are all trapped. They form a pact to work together to dig their way out of the cave, and soldiers learn something about the humanity of the enemy.
#13 - The Interrogator
Mission: Impossible - Season 3 - Episode 25
Agent Norvan Kruger knows about his country's plans to launch some kind of attack which will devastate the world. he's been captured by a second country unfriendly to the U.S. Kruger's interrogator, Spindler, hasn't broken the agent but even if he does the U.S. needs the plans. The IMF capture Spindler and Kruger during transport and lock Spindler up. To convince them he's who he is he tells them of Kruger's knowledge of the plan to launch nuclear missiles from submarines against the U.S. The IMF use drugs to scramble Kruger's memories and convince him he is an interrogator assigned to break a prisoner (Rollin). He's told he must get the information from Rollin or his superior Kutzof will have him shot. Rollin claims to have the same submarine-location knowledge Kruger does. Kruger grows steadily more confused, particularly when he can't hear what Rollin is saying. Jim as a psychiatirst tells Kruger he's blocking out the words. When "Kutzof" shows up, under pressure Kruger blurts out h
Watch Now:Amazon
#14 - Time Bomb
Mission: Impossible - Season 4 - Episode 12
The IMF team has to try and gain access to a nuclear reactor complex, where a terminally ill officer plans to detonate an atomic bomb.
Watch Now:Amazon
#15 - Orpheus
Mission: Impossible - Season 4 - Episode 22
An unknown assassin must be stopped, so Barney infiltrates the foreign agency that employs him while Jim poses as a drug addict with information to sell.
Watch Now:Amazon
#16 - The Furlough
Combat! - Season 5 - Episode 15
When Private Vincent is killed shortly before he is to go on a week's furlough, Saunders travels to England to deliver his bequest to Ann Tinsley, the director of an orphanage. During his time in London, he gets to know the children, and sees how they have suffered during the war. In addition, he becomes friendly with Ann, and an attraction begins to develop between them.
Watch Now:Amazon
#17 - The Falcon (1)
Mission: Impossible - Season 4 - Episode 14
Paris masquerades as Zastro, a magician who has come to entertain during an arranged wedding between the king's sister and a ruthless usurper.
#18 - Wednesday, Ladies Free
Hawaii Five-O - Season 4 - Episode 3
Vic Tanaka is murdering women and painting their faces to resemble a prostitute he once knew, who is now happily married. McGarrett and his team must find the killer before he does any more damage.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#20 - Nightmare
Daniel Boone - Season 4 - Episode 24
One of the better episodes of the series is this tale about Daniel, Israel, and Rebecca's efforts to elude a group of bloodthirsty Shawnees on their way home to Boonesborough.
Watch Now:Amazon
#23 - The Night of the Sedgewick Curse
The Wild Wild West - Season 4 - Episode 4
When people start disappearing from the Sedgewick Hotel and Spa, Jim meets Lavinia Sedgewick who asks him to dinner at her home. But when Jim's not welcome, he and Artemus must learn the truth behind the mystery.
Watch Now:Amazon
#25 - The Reunion
Hawaii Five-O - Season 3 - Episode 8
A Japanese computer research company executive is recognised by a veteran as his former captor in a Phillippine prison camp in World War II.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#26 - The Freeze
Mission: Impossible - Season 3 - Episode 11
Albert Jenkins, who robbed an armored car five years ago, double-crossed his associates and hid the $10 million. He then managed to get himself arrested as "Raymond Barret" on a burglary charge he did not commit. In this way he can outwait the statute of limitations on the armored car robbery from the safety of his cell. The IMF must bring him to justice. To do so, IMF ally Dr. Bowman tells Barret he has a fatal disease and gets him released early. Rollin as a doctor confirms the diagnosis and reveals that Jim, pretending to be a cryogenic doctor, can put him in stasis. Barret/Jenkins "wakes up" 12 years later in a futurstic IMF set and a graying Rollin tells him currency is no longer of value and the police want to question him. Barret escapes only to discover that it's a scam...but in the scam-within-a-scam, he thinks it's one day after the statue of limitations expires. He goes to the cemetary where he hid the money, along with his partners thanks to an IMF ploy, and all of them are
#28 - The Werewolf
Kolchak: The Night Stalker - Season 1 - Episode 5
Bernhardt Stieglitz, a NATO soldier bitten by a wolf, leaves a string of murder victims behind him. When Vincenzo is forced to abort his long-awaited vacation and report on the last cruise of an ocean liner, the USS Hanover, Carl takes his place, only to find that Stieglitz is one of the passengers on board...and the full moon is rising. Trapped aboard the liner, Kolchak must use a shotgun and silver buckshot to kill the creature once and for all.
Watch Now:AmazonApple TV
#30 - Nicole
Mission: Impossible - Season 3 - Episode 22
Jim is sent in to recover a list of Allied agents from the enemy's highest ranking intelligence minister, Anton Valdas. Nicole Vedette's, Valdas' secretary, is apparently on the IMF's side but Jim decides not to use her. Instead Jim and Rollin plansto break into Valdas' safe during a party. Jim and Nicole meet and have a romantic attraction. The effort goes awry and Jim is shot and captured while helping Rollin to escape. Nicole is imprisoned on suspicion but tells Jim that no one is looking for Rollin. Nicole also tells him that Rollin's contact is a double agent. Jim believes Valdas substituted a fake list that he wants them to take back. The two escape and Jim collapses from his wound in a barn. Nicole reveals she is the double agent and reports the success of their charade to Jim. But because of her attraction to him she blackmails Valdas into letting them escape for real. Jim realizes the deception and Nicole confesses, unaware that Valdas put a bug on her. They are caught by Vald
#31 - The Ordeal of Israel Boone
Daniel Boone - Season 4 - Episode 2
Israel must call upon all he has learned to save Boone from a rattlesnake bite; guest Jim Davis.
#32 - The Night of the Egyptian Queen
The Wild Wild West - Season 4 - Episode 8
Agent Artemus Gordon and the curator of the San Francisco Museum are attacked in the Egyptian exhibit by three men wearing gas masks. When agents West and Mr. Heisel, the Egyptian government's representative, enter the room, they are also attacked. After regaining consciousness, the men discover that a priceless ruby has been stolen from the eye of the statue of Sun God, Ra.