Jonesing Once More

Barnaby Jones enthusiasts, take note. The Web site TV Shows on DVD announced yesterday that CBS DVD-Paramount will release the opening season of that 1973-1980 detective series to disc on February 16 of next year. The news prompted Ivan G. Shreve Jr. to recount the appeal of that Buddy Ebsen drama:

Contrary to people’s memories, Barnaby Jones was not a good-old-fashioned, folksy crime drama--no doubt considered so due to the participation of friendly Buddy Ebsen--but a fascinating study into the evil minds of some really twisted people.

The basic storyline of a Jones episode usually involved a nice, middle-class husband and wife who commit a depraved act in a temporary mindset of idiocy, and then commit blunder after blunder as the noose tightens around their necks. They’d race around like mad trying to cover up their crime ... and there’s ol’ Barnaby, everywhere they go, just being his folksy, avuncular self until he had the evidence he needed to convict the hapless pair and send them to the chair. It used to remind me of Tex Avery’s Droopy cartoons, where the wolf character would literally bust his ass running away from the Droopster (usually representing the law) only to find Droopy greeting him with his typical deadpan cheer: “Hi there.”

Shreve’s full piece can be found here.