The series was originally part of a logical progression by Spelling (with and without partner Leonard Goldberg) that traced the thread of the detective drama through the fraying social fabric at the end of the 1960s. Beginning with The Mod Squad (cops as hippies), this thread took him in logical sequence to The Rookies (cops as hippie commune), S.W.A.T. (cops as hippie commune turned collectivist cell/paramilitary cadre), and finally Charlie s Angels (ex-cops as burgeoning feminists/Manson Family pinups). This was before Spelling jettisoned the cop show altogether and simply leached the raw hedonism out of 1960s liberal­ism-with The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Family (sauteed in hubris), and, ultimately, the neo-Sirkian Beverly Hills, 90210 and Melrose Place.

     In this context, the freewheeling duo of Starsky and Hutch might seem the perfect bisecting point on a straight line between Adam-12's Reed and Malloy and Miami Vice's Crockett and Tubbs. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) had ushered in the "buddy film" cycle, just then reaching its culmination with All the President's Men, and, in fact, the pair physically resemble no one so much as the high-gloss Redford and Hoffman assaying the golden boys of broadsheet ex­pose, Woodward and Bernstein.

     Yet viewed in retrospect, the bond between Starsky and Hutch seems at very least a curious one. Putting aside the ubiquitous costumes and leather or Starsky's Coca-Cola-striped  Ford Torino and  Hutch's immense .357 Magnum handgun, which Marshall McLuhan or Sigmund Freud might well have had a field day with, the drama always seems built around the specific gravity of their friendship. There is much of what can only be termed flirting--compliments, mutual admiration, sly winks, sidelong glances, knowing smiles. They are constantly touching each other or indulging in excruciating cheek and banter-or else going "undercover" in various fey disguises. All the women  who pass  between them-and their number is considerable, including significant ones from their past-are revealed  by the final commercial break and liars or users or criminals or fatal attractions. And should one wind up alone with a woman, the other invariably retreats to a bar and drowns his sorrows. Following the inevitable betrayal, it is not uncommon for the boys to collapse sobbing into each other's arms.

     This apparent secret agenda is perhaps best demonstrated in the opening credits themselves. Initially, these merely comprised interchangeable action sequences-Hutch on the prowl, Starsky flashing his badge. But by the second season, the action footage had been collapsed into a few quick images, followed by split screen for the titles. To the left are three vertically stacked images: Hutch in a cowboy hat, both in construction outfits, and Starsky as  Charlie Chaplin and Hutch in whiteface. Meanwhile, to the right, Starsky takes Hutch down in a full romantic clinch, the looks on their faces notably pained.

     Next follows a series of quick clips: Starsky waits patiently while Hutch stops to ogle a bikini-clad dancer and  finally gets his attention  only  by blowing lightly on his cheek. Both gamble  in a casino, decked out   in   pinstripe  Gatsby  suits  and   fedoras, a la The Sting.Starsky, in an apron, fastidiously  combs  out a woman's wig, while Hutch sits dejectedly, shoulders squared, a dress pattern pinned around him. Hutch watches straight faced while Starsky attempts the samba, festooned in thick bangles, flowing robes, and a Carmen Miranda headpiece. Each is then introduced individually-Soul shouting into the camera in freeze­ frame, his mouth swollen in an enormous yawning oval, and Glaser as he ties a scarf foppishly to one side, frozen readily in mid twinkle. Finally, a boiler-room explosion blows Starsky into Hutch's arms. The entire sequence takes exactly one minute, with no single image longer than five seconds. And each scene is entirely explained away in context. Yet in the space of 60 seconds, these two gentlemen are depicted in at least four cases of literal or figurative transvestism, four cases of masculine hyperbole (encompassing at least two of the Village People}, several prominent ho­mosexual cliches (hairdresser, Carnival bacchanalian), a send-up of one of filmdom's most famous all-male couples, a wealth of Freudian imagery (including the pointed metaphor of fruit}, two full-body embraces, two freeze-frames defining them in both homoerotic deed and dress, and one clear-cut instance where the oral stimulation of a man prevails over the visual stimulation of a woman . This would seem to indicate a preoccupation on the part of someone with something. (And this does not even begin to address their dubious named informant Huggy  Bear-a  flamboyant and markedly androgynous pimp.)

     The tone of all this is uniformly playful, almost a parlor game for those in the know (not unlike Dirty Harry, whose most famous sequence-the bank robbery-is bookended on one side by Clint Eastwood biting into a hot dog and on the other by a fire hydrant ejaculating over the attendant carnage). Meanwhile, the rather generic storylines consistently play fast and loose with gender. Altogether, Starsky and Hutch is a fascinating digression for episodic television-especially considering that it was apparently conducted entirely beneath the pervasive radar of network censors.