Hogan's Heroes: The Complete First Season

All these years later, the mind still reels at the notion that Hollywood TV producers believed they could build a successful sitcom around Allied prisoners in a Luftwaffe-run POW camp during World War II. But they were right: Hogan's Heroes lasted six years (1965-1971) and 168 episodes. Inspired by the 1953 feature film Stalag 17, it focused on the adventures of Colonel Robert Hogan (played by Bob Crane) and his fellow prisoners in Stalag 13, a camp run rather inefficiently by Kommandant Klink (Werner Klemperer) and the bumbling Sergeant Schultz (John Banner). Together with his intrepid cohorts--LeBeau (Robert Clary), Newkirk (Richard Dawson), Kinchloe (Ivan Dixon), and Carter (Larry Hovis)--Hogan worked to further the Allied cause by undermining the Nazi campaign with sabotage and psychological warfare, often pitting rival Luftwaffe officers against each other with casually dropped bits of misinformation. Presented in a disappointingly extra-less five-disc set, the first season's 32 episodes maintained a tricky balance, milking comedic situations while portraying the prisoners as ingenious, resourceful combatants whose ostensible confinement camouflaged their successful efforts to defeat the enemy. The first aired episode, “The Informer,” has Carter being welcomed into Stalag 13 as Hogan tries to ferret out a spy. “Happy Birthday, Adolf” finds the prisoners attempting to destroy a nearby gun emplacement on Hitler's birthday. “Hello, Zolle” features future The Love Boat star Gavin MacLeod as a German officer being detained at the camp to allow the Allies to complete a troop deployment, and “Cupid Comes to Stalag 13” introduces character actor Hans Conreid as a pacifistic Italian officer who'd rather make pizza than fight the war. It's nothing short of remarkable that Hogan's Heroes so consistently overcame the basic tastelessness of its central conceit, but that it did is plainly evident in these enjoyable and frequently hilarious episodes. Recommended. (E. Hulse)