The "Magnum Farce" of Sledge Hammer aims at
deserving targets and scores a bull's eye every time. Thanks to DVD,
one of the funniest, most unconventional sitcoms of the 1980s has
been gloriously revived, with an abundance of bonus features that
fans are going to love. This is sweet revenge given the show's
original ABC time-slot, buried under Miami Vice and Dallas
on Friday nights, but creator-producer Alan Spencer's savvy spoof of
Dirty Harry had critical praise in its favor when it
premiered (with a senseless laugh track, mercifully deleted here) on
September 23, 1986. Played to perfection by David Rasche and
introduced with an infectious Danny Elfman theme song, Sledge is a
trigger-happy male chauvinist pig (er, cop) in mismatched clothes
who thinks The Deer Hunter is a comedy, sleeps with his .44
Magnum (called simply "Gun"), drives a bullet-riddled sedan with an
"I ♥ Violence" bumper sticker, and somehow manages to always catch
his quarry. "I'm a nihilist, not a stylist" he says (in the
hilarious episode "Sledgepoo"), and that puts him at reckless odds
with his lovely, karate-kicking partner Dori (played with flawless
aplomb by former soap-star Anne-Marie Martin) and the vocally
volcanic Capt. Trunk (Harrison Page, a slow-burn master and vital
ingredient to the show's excellent casting).
Partly
inspired by Get Smart!, Spencer and a host of talented
writers and directors dished up consistent laughs and daring
anarchy, challenging broadcast standards with topnotch spoofs of hit
movies (in episodes titled "Witless," "Jagged Sledge," "The Color of
Hammer," etc.) while familiar guest stars like John Vernon, Brion
James, Clint Howard, Michael De Barres, and Mary Woronov raised the
comedy quotient even higher. After a deliberately outrageous,
go-for-broke season finale it's a miracle that the low-rated
Sledge Hammer! was renewed for a second season, but Anchor Bay's
DVDs do justice to the show's enduring quality, and Spencer's
commentaries (on four episodes) rank among the funniest ever
recorded (one of them during an earthquake, no less). All in all,
this is one of the most delightful DVD surprises of 2004, with more
fun to come in season 2. --Jeff Shannon
