| MacGyver Season 1 | |||
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"Always Prepared for Adventure" |
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| Country of origin | United States | ||
| No. of episodes | 22 | ||
| Broadcast | |||
| Original channel | ABC | ||
| Original run | September 29, 1985 – May 7, 1986 | ||
| Home video release | |||
| DVD release date | January 25, 2005 | ||
| Season chronology | |||
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The first season of MacGyver, an American television series, began September 29, 1985, and ended on May 7, 1986. It aired on ABC. The region 1 DVD was released on January 25, 2005.[1]
| № | # | Title | Directed by | Written by | Original air date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | "Pilot" | Jerrold Freedman | Thackary Pallor | September 29, 1985 |
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On top of a vertical rock face encampment, MacGyver rescues a downed Air Force pilot in Central Asia from his Soviet captors. Contrary to his beliefs against using guns later in the series, MacGyver is seen using a gun in the beginning of the pilot episode. After coming home, he is called in to rescue a group of scientists trapped in an underground New Mexico laboratory after a major explosion. The explosion causes a sulfuric acid leak that puts MacGyver in a rush with time before the acid leaks into the aquifer. It turns out that this explosion was not an accident; it was planned by one of the trapped scientist to prevent his ozone research from getting turned into a doomsday weapon. MacGyver survival techniques include using chocolate bars to plug the sulfuric acid leak (the sugar forms a sticky paste when it reacts with the acid) and making an alkali metal (sodium in a cold pill) and water bomb to blow a hole in a wall. |
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| 2 | 2 | "The Golden Triangle" | Paul Stanley & Donald Petrie | Dennis R. Foley & Terry Nation | October 6, 1985 |
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MacGyver is in a junkyard trying to stop the transaction of top secret missile launch codes. MacGyver has 24 hours to get in and out of Burma to retrieve a canister of deadly toxin from a crashed American jet. However, during his mission, he gets captured by a local opium drug lord, Truang, who mistakes him for a narcotics agent. Truang and his General, Narai, have the local villagers enslaved to produce the drug harvest. MacGyver escapes and then completes his initial mission by returning the poison canister to his escape helicopter. However, instead of fleeing, MacGyver decides to stay in Burma to help the villagers fight the drug lords and their henchmen. Survival techniques include creating a choking gas by igniting fire ash and alcohol inside bamboo and creating a diversion using foliage in the road that looks so phony, the enemy takes a detour route, leading them into the real trap: a dug out pit that incapacitates their vehicles. |
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| 3 | 3 | "Thief of Budapest" | Lee H. Katzin & John Patterson | Terry Nation & Stephen Downing & Joe Viola | October 13, 1985 |
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MacGyver's mission is to retrieve a very valuable horse from Arabian tribesmen who stole it. After a wild horse chase along a beach, a helicopter airlifts him and the horse away to safety. MacGyver goes to Hungary to meet with his Russian double-agent Grotsky. Grotsky has valuable intelligence information about Russian spies hidden inside his pocket watch. However, prior to MacGyver obtaining possession of it, the watch was pick-pocketed by a little Gypsy girl named Yanna. MacGyver's new mission now is to retrieve the stolen watch from the girl before Russian agents, who discovered this secret, do. The car chase from this episode, featuring three mini coopers, was taken from the British Film "The Italian Job". It was filmed in Turin in 1969. |
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| 4 | 4 | "The Gauntlet" | Lee H. Katzin | Stephen Kandel | October 20, 1985 |
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MacGyver's mission is to sneak into a compound in a Middle Eastern country and retrieve a planning map that reveals locations marked by terrorists. He is spotted when he tries to escape and uses the map in various resourceful ways to aid in his escape, eventually eluding his pursuers by lifting off in a hot air balloon. When he returns, he is sent to Central America on a mission to bring an American journalist, Kate Connolly, back home. Kate agrees to go home but only when she completes her big story which is an American criminal named Dave Reyerson and a military general named Vasquez negotiating a deal over weapons with evidence of a brewing coup d'état. After Kate photographs her incriminating evidence, MacGyver and she must now escape from Vasquez men by fleeing to the Mexican border. |
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| 5 | 5 | "The Heist" | Alan Smithee | Larry Alexander & James Schmerer Teleplay by: James Schmerer |
November 3, 1985 |
| MacGyver helps a politician's daughter steal back $60 million in diamonds that were stolen. Both this episode and the pilot credit Alan Smithee as director. Alan Smithee is a pseudonym directors use when their work is taken away from them and heavily cut against their wishes. It is also an anagram of "The Alias Men". | |||||
| 6 | 6 | "Trumbo's World" | Donald Petrie & Lee H. Katzin | Stephen Kandel | November 10, 1985 |
| MacGyver rescues an American geologist being held by Basque terrorists. Then, in a story based on Leiningen Versus the Ants, MacGyver helps a man in the Amazon jungle defend his plantation against billions of ants. | |||||
| 7 | 7 | "Last Stand" | John Florea | Judy Burns | November 17, 1985 |
| Armed thieves take MacGyver and a small group hostage at a rural airport—so MacGyver must figure out how to defeat the thieves and free the hostages, including himself. | |||||
| 8 | 8 | "Hellfire" | Richard Colla | Story by: Douglas Brooks West Teleplay by: Stephen Kandel & James Schmerer & Douglas Brooks West |
November 24, 1985 |
| MacGyver's friends, Bill and Laura, are drilling for oil in a remote area when the oil well catches fire. MacGyver suggests calling for help but Bill says that they don't have enough time to wait because their lease expires in two weeks. MacGyver says that he will help put it out. The two of them travel to an old abandoned mine to look for dynamite. Their hope is that by dropping explosives into the oil well shaft, it will explode and consume all of the surrounding oxygen, thereby extinguishing the fire. They manage to find some crates of dynamite in the mine and return with it. To get close enough to drop the explosives, they fashion a rail system using an old car and a refrigerator that acts as a heat shield. After a collection of team work, the fire is finally extinguished. MacGyver offers his assistance to rebuild the rig and help them drill. | |||||
| 9 | 9 | "The Prodigal" | Alexander Singer | Story by: David Abramowitz & Paul Savage Teleplay by: David Abramowitz |
December 8, 1985 |
| MacGyver goes to meet Frank Bennett, a man who is considering testifying in Federal Court against his mobster brother, Joey. When Mac steps inside to see why Wylie - the Federal Marshal - hasn't joined them yet, a black car drives up and two men grab Frank. The two men take him to Joey, who knows that Frank has been talking to Federal Agents. Frank wants Joey to shut down his drug business. Joey says that will not happen and is on the verge of killing him when MacGyver sets up a diversion, and helps Frank escape. Frank goes to Wylie's office to give a statement, after asking MacGyver to visit his mother in the hospital. MacGyver learns that Frank's mother is dying and wishes to see her son one last time. The Feds disapprove of this because it is too risky for their key witness. However, MacGyver needs to keep his promise to Frank's mother and so he frees Frank from Wylie's men. They later discover that Joey moved Mrs. Bennett to her home. MacGyver warns Frank that it's a trap, but Frank insists on seeing her. Frank is allowed to visit his mother, who then passes away. MacGyver must then extract themselves from the house before Joey and his mob crew can kill them. | |||||
| 10 | 10 | "Target MacGyver" | Lee H. Katzin & Ernest Pintoff | Story by: Mike Marvin Teleplay by: Stephen Kandel & Mike Marvin & James Schmerer |
December 22, 1985 |
| MacGyver destroys a Middle-Eastern nuclear reactor, whose operators then set a professional assassin on him. Mac goes to visit his grandfather in order to lie low, but the assassin tracks him down. | |||||
| 11 | 11 | "Nightmares" | Cliff Bole | James Schmerer | January 15, 1986 |
| MacGyver is poisoned with a hallucinogenic drug and he only has a short time to find and take the antidote before the poison kills him. | |||||
| 12 | 12 | "Deathlock" | Cliff Bole & Alexander Singer | Jerry Ludwig & Stephen Kandel | January 22, 1986 |
| MacGyver must escape East Berlin in a coffin. When MacGyver is taken to a safe house following an operation, it turns out that the place has been booby trapped by an assassin. | |||||
| 13 | 13 | "Flame's End" | Bruce Seth Green | Story by: Hannah Louise Shearer Teleplay by: Stephen Kandel |
January 29, 1986 |
| An old girlfriend is in trouble and calls MacGyver when she discovers a plot to steal Uranium from the nuclear reactor where she works. | |||||
| 14 | 14 | "Countdown" | Stan Jolley | Tony DiMarco & David Ketchum | February 5, 1986 |
| MacGyver teams up with an old buddy from 'Nam to defuse a time bomb aboard a cruise ship loaded with passengers. | |||||
| 15 | 15 | "The Enemy Within" | Cliff Bole | David Abramowitz | February 12, 1986 |
| MacGyver must discover the identity of a mole within the agency who is responsible for the deaths of four top agents. | |||||
| 16 | 16 | "Every Time She Smiles" | Charlie Correll | James Schmerer | February 19, 1986 |
| While trying to escape Bulgaria with secret microfilm, MacGyver meets an American actress who accidentally gets him caught by the secret police. | |||||
| 17 | 17 | "To Be a Man" | Cliff Bole | Don Mankiewicz | March 5, 1986 |
| Sent to Afghanistan to retrieve a downed satellite, MacGyver is shot down and wounded. He is sheltered by a woman and her son and must rely on their help to escape the Red Army. | |||||
| 18 | 18 | "Ugly Duckling" | Charlie Correll | Larry Gross | March 12, 1986 |
| MacGyver helps out a young genius computer hacker who gets kidnapped by arms dealers who need help with stolen missiles. | |||||
| 19 | 19 | "Slow Death" | Don Weis | Stephen Kandel | April 2, 1986 |
| MacGyver helps Afghan tribesmen who hijack a train in search for two men who sold them poisons disguised as medicine. | |||||
| 20 | 20 | "The Escape" | Don Chaffey | Stephen Kandel | April 16, 1986 |
| MacGyver cooks up an elaborate plot to break a medical missionary out of a prison in French North Africa; once they escape, a big surprise awaits. | |||||
| 21 | 21 | "A Prisoner of Conscience" | Cliff Bole | Stephen Kandel | April 30, 1986 |
| MacGyver must fake insanity so that he and Pete can get into a Russian mental hospital and break out a political dissident. | |||||
| 22 | 22 | "The Assassin" | Charlie Correll | James Schmerer | May 7, 1986 |
| MacGyver helps to nab an assassin and then must disguise himself as the assassin in order to unravel the rest of the plot. | |||||
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