- Title: MacGyver – Pilot
- wiki: link
MacGyver Monday takes us back to the very first adventure featuring science-adventurer Angus MacGyver (Richard Dean Anderson). Much of the pieces to MacGyver are already in place in the show’s “Pilot” episode which starts with an unrelated opening gambit of MacGyver saving a crashed pilot and retrieving the circuit board. We don’t have to wait long to get our first MacGyverism as MacGyver builds a contraption to divide the guards’ attention and uses a flare gun as as a rocket thruster to help secure their escape. The episode includes an appearance by Dana Elcar but as a different character than the one who would be incorporated as a recurring character later in the First Season.
The main mission of the episode also involves a rescue, however this one in a bombed laboratory where MacGyver slowly works his way down through the wreckage helping survivors including Darlanne Fluegel (playing the first one-off love interest of series). Along the way he’ll put his big brain to work deconstructing binoculars to deal with a laser field, using chocolate bars to prevent an acid spill (a solution MythBusters confirmed does indeed work), a fire house to carefully move debris, and a sodium bomb to get to the two trapped scientists (one of whom is responsible for the bombing in an attempt not to allow their research to be used for military purposes). All in all, it’s a solid start to a show that would run for 7 years as well as the inspired reboot.
