Mission: Impossible: The Final TV Season

The missions are just as inscrutable, the gadgets are still cool, and the theme song still sizzles, but the thrill of this defining series from the espionage era of the 1960s and ‘70s is pretty much gone, along with Martin Landau, Barbara Bain, Leonard Nimoy, and for much of this stretch, Lynda Day George. Filling in are worthy replacements, including Barbara Anderson and Marilyn Mason, but the only remaining regulars are Peter Graves as missions team leader Jim Phelps, Greg Morris as special-effects wizard Barney Collier, and Peter Lupus as muscle man Willy Armitage. In the 22 episodes of this seventh and final 1972–73 season, the IMF (Impossible Missions Force) continues to go to incredibly complicated lengths to foil assassins, mobsters, drug dealers, terrorists, and other nefarious types. But surely there must be easier ways to bring down a New Orleans syndicate than posing as a pool shark and using a cue ball rigged with missile guidance technology. And how about trying to convince a plutonium-stealing nuclear physicist that he has been catatonic for nearly 30 years? The episodes do offer some serious guest star power, with stints by William Shatner, Robert Conrad, Vic Morrow, Robert Goulet, Roddy McDowall, and Kim Hunter, but the earlier seasons are better and the time was right to self-destruct. A strong optional purchase. (D. Liebenson)