Friends

Episode:  042 (S2.E20)

Production  No.: 40192-042

Airdate: 06 April 1987

Writer: Stephen Kronish

Director: Cliff Bole

Nielsen Ratings:  15.4 rating / 24 share / 3rd (29th for the week)

PLOT

At a surprise birthday party thrown for MacGyver by Pete Thornton & his friends, MacGyver reviews his life-threatening career and ponders resignation.

CAST

FLASHBACK SCENES

• Every Time She Smiles: Breaking through the wall and convey belt ride
• The Gauntlet: Opening gambit (The Map)
• Thief of Budapest:  Opening gambit (Pegasus)
• The Gauntlet – Campfire scene
• The Gauntlet – Barrels down the hill
• The enemy within – Opening gambit – no breaks on car
• Deathlock – Opening gambit – Jet-ski escape
• Pilot episode – Opening gambit – pilot rescue

TRIVIA

• This episode establishes MacGyver’s birthday as March 23rd, which is in contradiction to the date of Jan 23, we see on his drivers license in several scenes throughout the series as well as his passport in season 1.
• An exasperated MacGyver, at the party, threatens Dalton. “So help me Jack, someday..” ” I know, I know, bang zoom.” This is a reference to Jackie Gleason‘s character on The Honeymooners (1955), who frequently got angry and threatened his wife. “Someday, bang, zoom. To the moon, Alice, to the moon!”
• The segments showing the opening gambit of the pilot episode are missing the scene where MacGyver fires the rifle.
• The closing credits show “This production is dedicated to the memory of our co-worker WES TANSEY” The only information we can find about Wes is that he was a key grip and MacGyver was the last show he worked on.

QUOTES

• MacGyver: Three times in one day I came as close to gettin’ killed as I ever have. It could make you start to think, real hard. Your first brush with death could be an accident. The second could be a coincidence. . . . The third could be a message. And I didn’t like the sound of it at all.
• MacGyver: “The funny thing is, darn near every one of these things almost got me killed at one time or another.”
• Harry: I guess it just proves that a good map will always get you where you want to go.
  MacGyver: Yeah, provided you want to get there in the first place.
• Pete: Well, you always said you’d rather be lucky than good.
• MacGyver: For the past seven years, I have done nothing but travel around the world getting shot up, locked up, blown up – and all I’ve got to show for it are a couple of empty rolls of duct tape.
• Pete: Listen to me. There is no one else in the world like you. You’re a cat. You’ve got nine lives.
• Kate: I don’t know how you keep doing it.
  MacGyver: What’s that?
  Kate: Bouncing all over the world. I know I used to think that was the only way to live. But now that I have a home, and I’m going to have a family, well . . . I just couldn’t be happier in my life.
• Harry: Go with your gut. What’s up here [points to his head] can keep you confused. What’s here [points to his heart] most of the time, tells it plain.
• MacGyver: When I was a kid, my grandfather used to say to me that . . . “a fellow’s life wasn’t worth mentioning if he hadn’t shared it with some folks along the way.”

NIT-PICKS

• MacGyver puts the floppy disk with the evidence for Pete straight into his jacket pocket with no protective sleeve on it. These disks are easily damaged and MacGyver should know better than to do this.
• In the flashback of MacGyver saving the pilot in the opening gambit of the pilot episode, MacGyver’s voice over says that they knew about the pilot and implies that MacGyver was sent in solely to rescue the pilot.
  But in the actual episode his main mission is to disarm the missile and he even says that “no-one said anything about survivors” when he finds the pilot.

FILMING LOCATIONS

Hardware Apartment Keystone Building 56 N. Larchmont Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA	Phoenix Foundation ARCO Center 200 Oceangate Long Beach, CA