3/3 Vehicle Patrol Report 2 – Season 1 Episodes 9-15

Welcome back to the second Vehicle Patrol report! Woo-hoo! This is the final installment for this VP Report; enjoy…

Some amusing vehicle moments/trivia

Sudden Death

Amanda learns automobile surveillance on the job, while following the baddies who’ve kidnapped Bela, thanks to the Agency audio tape she has handy (“Automobile Surveillance. Refresher Tape.”)…

Audio Tape: “Four: Anticipate traffic congestion and obstructions before you encounter them. This, of course, includes traffic signals. Don’t call attention to yourself by running a red light.”

Amanda (runs a red light): “Oops.”

The Long Christmas Eve

In TLCE, Agent Lucas and Billy are discussing Scarecrow’s “unorthodox” methods, and Lucas mentions that the “… naval attaché is still a little hot under the collar about his Jaguar, not to mention his daughter.” ROFL. Bad Lee!

Remembrance Of Things Past

In ROTP, Billy notices that Lee is driving a nondescript sedan and, while smirking, asks Lee “Your car in the shop again?” Lee responds “Oh, come on, Billy… It’s a classic.” Billy simply says “Oh” and walks away. ROFL! The SMK Porsche 356 was surely a “classic”… a classic “bathtub with wheels… that constantly died” (quote from BB at the 30^th reunion, referred to in the inaugural Vehicle Patrol report).

Also in this episode, when dressed undercover in Dean’s overshirt/jacket at the King Edward Hotel, Lee makes the comment: “I hate plaid. I look like the front seat of a DeSoto.”

Note: DeSoto was a make of car produced by Chrysler from 1928 to 1961. I actually think he looks like the front seat of a Chrysler Highlander, but whatevs:

Image source: http://www.thedetroitbureau.com/2010/02/interiors-mousey-to-rainbow-to-mousey-again/

Lost and Found

Lee makes a brilliant play in LAF when he chooses to stuff Eva into the boot of the 1959 Edsel Ranger after she outs herself as KGB (and attempts to shoot him with the gun that Amanda emptied—go Amanda!). “I hope you’re not claustrophobic.”

I Am Not Now, Nor Have I Ever Been… A Spy

In IANNNHIEBAS, we can see where the baddies got one of their cars from. (Or where/how it was previously used on film; whatever…) The brown Ford LTD II coupe that Amanda escapes in—and then crashes—shows the remnants of lettering indicating prior ownership by the County of Riverside (east of Orange County; southeast of Los Angeles).

And, in the same episode, does anyone not chuckle when Polo says to Amanda (in the cockpit of the plane, while taxiing before take-off): “Now fasten your seatbelt, or fix me a snack.”

Dead Ringer

In the tag for DR—after Amanda attempts to take Magda to the airport, but crashes the station wagon into the “swamp”—Dotty talks to Amanda:

Dotty: “Have I said a word? Have I said a word about the condition of the station wagon after a simple trip to the airport?”

Amanda: “No, Mother, you haven’t said a word.”

Dotty: “And I won’t… although, if I was inclined to ask questions, I might ask how a simple trip to the airport could result in at least $800 worth of bodywork.”

Amanda: “Mother, I thank you very much for not asking…”

The Mole

In TM, Amanda wants to get the attention of the sheriffs in order to save Lee from baddie Agent (Mole) Benson, but they’re engrossed in changing the tyre for the helpless (?) blonde Corvette driver… so Amanda returns and whips the station wagon into a 180° in front of them. “Let’s go, let’s go!”   Wah hah hah!  Go, Amanda!

Also in this episode we see Lee’s first contact with Blue Leader: “Scarecrow, this is Blue Leader”.  Lee fiddles with his radio, checks the side mirror, and looks around the interior of the car, before finally responding to the voice…

 

Of course, the Blue Leader scene with Amanda after they’ve captured The Mole has its funny moments, too…

Amanda (to Lee): “Where do you talk to when you talk to him?”

Lee: “Uhh… I usually aim for the… (pointing to the middle of the steering wheel)… steering wheel.”

(I think that pic is begging for a meme…  Anyone want to play with it over at Ned’s?)

 

Now, what you’ve probably all been waiting for:

Oopsie! Blooper reel!

It seems that SMK really outdid itself with the vehicle “bloopers” in these episodes…

Sudden Death

In SD, Amanda’s jewelry (and fingernails) magically change when she puts the audio tape into the car stereo…  her usual signet ring suddenly turns into a knotted rope ring:

But, to their credit, at least SMK used a Ford stereo for the second unit hand shot…

Lost And Found

The car that Amanda and Angelo hide in to avoid the KGB goons during LAF is awesome… it’s at least three different cars—possibly four. We first see A & A climb into a green Ford LTD sedan:

Note, especially, the door handles, the emblem on the rear pillar, the trim falling off the bottom of the front door, the rusty front brake rotor, and the rust patches on the front fender. (The escaping trim can be seen better in the next pic.) The car gets picked up by the magnet, and suddenly the pillar emblem is gone (someone snagged a souvenir???):

Then, in the close-up “Hello!” (help—we’re trapped) shots, we see the second incarnation of the car:

Note, particularly, the different door handles and the giant dent in the rear door panel.  (I can’t see enough of the car to determine whether this an earlier-year Ford LTD or whether it’s a completely different make and/or model—but it’s clearly not the previous car.) Moving on, we see the first car being swung around on the magnet chains—loose trim and rust clearly visible, but sans rear pillar emblem—then, we see the third car:

Uhhh… it’s another Ford LTD, very similar to the first car, but: the rust on the front fender is gone, there are many visible weld-marks, the front brake rotor is shiny, there’s a big crease on the rear door, and the trim is suddenly in place (but this car is also missing the rear pillar emblem ).

We get to see car number one again in the crusher, and more close-up “Hello!” shots of car number two, then the last we see of Amanda and Angelo in the car… they’re either in a fourth version, or—as well as smashing the car—someone threw mud on it (after they washed off the brown stain from the missing emblem ):

Wheeee… Did you keep all that straight? 

I Am Not Now, Nor Have I Ever Been… A Spy

In IANNNHIEBAS—while Amanda is taking flying lessons from Polo —we see some mismatched plane footage… The plane the action is centred around (a 1962 Boeing 720-047B) has thin orange-ish stripes above a brown stripe on the body and the top of the tail, but the stock footage tailshot—after Polo faints—shows a plane at the end of the runway with a red logo/stripes on the middle of the tail and red stripes on the body. Also, the number of sets of wheels changes—three sets on the orange/brown-striped action plane, but five sets on the red-striped stock footage plane:

Not only that, but we see conflicting numbers/sizes of wheels… the action plane has two sets of four wheels each to the rear and a set of two wheels at the front, but we see a close-up with four sets of four at the rear, and another close-up with a set of two front wheels and a set of two (much larger) wheels to the rear :

(Note: The 1962 Boeing 720-047B registered N93146 used in this episode was initially purchased and flown by Western Airlines—merged with Delta Airlines in 1987—for about 17 years, according to info on the web.  At the time of the SMK episode it was used as a corporate jet—a photo of it in the colour scheme shown here, taken at Nice Cote d’Azur [France] in June 1982, can be found at JetPhotos.net.  [More photos of the plane are available around the web, for example, in the Western Airlines paint scheme from San Diego Lindbergh Field—LOL—and some photos under the other—temporarily used—registration for this plane [N92GS], which was also assigned to at least one other plane. This plane—N93146—was scrapped in the mid- to late-1990s…)

 <– Amanda sneaks onto Polo’s plane.

The more impressive vehicle blooper in this episode, though, comes from the baddies’ brown Ford LTD II coupe license plate. It starts out—waiting on the street by Milo’s Daffy Dogs—as Washington DC 8B3-259. After Lee jumps onto the bonnet (hood) and it goes down the alleyway and aims for a pile of boxes, the plate is magically Washington DC 8Z3-526 (this is the fifth occurrence of this plate—hinted at previously in Magical moving license plates—different episodes )… but after plowing through those boxes, and some others, it’s back to 8B3-259. Then, after Lee is thrown off the car, the plate disappears from the rear—but magically reappears just in time for Lee to note the number so that Francine can later report “I ran the plate. The car was stolen from Delaware and P about 3 o’clock this morning.” (Sorry—too distant for me to figure out which plate…) Finally, when Amanda escapes in the car, the plates are back to 8Z3-526. Note that all of the following pics are cropped for ease of viewing…

On the street – 8B3-259:

Yipes—boxes! 8Z3-526:

Hold on, Lee! 8B3-259:

Oh no! Where’d the plate go?

Whew! There it is – illegible:

Yay! Amanda escapes (before crashing) – 8Z3-526:

Bwah hah hah hah! (And don’t forget that Iwsod pointed out the appearing/disappearing blob on the windscreen [possible rear view mirror mount] in her coverage of this episode.)

Dead Ringer

I’m not sure that stock footage alone really counts as a blooper, but when the vehicles are obviously out of date, I figure it deserves an honourable mention…

In DR, the cars outside the embassy are decidedly vintage (they look like early-/mid-1960s Cadillacs—possibly Series 70/75, judging by the three full-size side windows). Similarly, in that same episode, the cars outside the baddies’ office building are old—I’d guess 1960s/1970s (pic cropped for clarity).

 

The Mole

Don’t you hate it when your vehicle teleports you places—the scenery around you changing drastically in the blink of an eye? Yeah, that happened to Amanda in TM; she was driving along the elevated road to the park, then she’s out on the plains in horse country, then she’s back to another wooded back road, then back to the elevated road to the park…

Oy. Oh, whatever—we love the show, regardless!

There’s also a moment in this episode, when Blue Leader’s limo is turning away after talking to Lee for the first time, where I believe we can see a pair of motorcycle cops holding back traffic for the filming on the street (pic cropped for clarity):

What do you think (and is it a blooper)?

 

Well, that’s it for the second Vehicle Patrol report; thanks for hanging with me—I hope it was a fun journey. Vehicle Patrol, signing out.

Y – M – C – A …