After watching the episode Off Limits, in which Kirby gets in a heap of trouble for starting a fight in a French bar, I thought there was no way possible for him to get any more unlucky. This extremely good episode of Combat proves this wrong, and might be my favorite episode of the show at this point, mainly due to the very special guest star featured. Right off the bat, the episode lets you know it's not messing around. We see a courtroom, and Kirby is on trial for running away from a German machine gun that apparently nobody saw but him. Saunders and Caje look on, realizing their troublesome but courageous friend could lose his life. This all started because Kirby was found by a soldier not from his squad one day while they were trying to attack hill 256, an enemy position. Opposing Kirby in the court martial is Sergeant John Metcalf (Robert Culp), the man who accuses Kirby of being a coward for not advancing alongside him. Metcalf starts butting heads with Saunders almost immediately due to the former having witnessed many of his men die in Normandy due to people like Kirby. Saunders knows Kirby will probably lose the trial and be executed unless he can definitively prove that there was a german machine gun on Hill 256 and thus had a valid reason to retreat. Saunders and Caje try to get the officers conducting the trial to cooperate and they attempt to interrogate a captured german who survived the battle of hill 256. They ask him in german if there was a machine gun on the hill, but he only responds with his name, rank and serial number (standard procedure for getting questioned). Unwilling to see his friend die, Saunders takes Caje on a journey to the sight of the battle itself to see if they can uncover evidence of a german machine gun. While in the woods, they are intercepted by British soldiers and held up until their identities can be verified. After being let go, Saunders and Caje make their way to hill 256 itself, and come across an entrenched position dug into the earth with a belt of ammunition inside. Now that they have the evidence, Kirby is basically in the clear, but germans show up to the hill in a truck, so escaping is now going to be an issue. After Caje stealthily kills one with his knife, they make their way back to the court and present the ammo belt to an armorer. He identifies it as a german 8 millimeter cartridge link, the type used in their machine guns. Kirby is saved, and everyone is happy (except one person). Metcalf enters the courtroom one last time, and plainly tells Kirby he saw no machine gun on that hill, and then leaves. This episode is great. I can't tell if it's the court setting or Robert Culp that makes it so good, but the latter has a habit of improving the quality of basically any show or film he appears in. I really didn't expect to see the words "Guest Star: Robert Culp" show up on the screen while watching this, but Combat is a show that managed to acquire some very talented big name actors. The episode is quite simple, with the only real events being the trial and Saunders trying to find evidence to clear Kirby before he is killed, but because Saunders is in a race against time, you never lose interest while watching. I did think the ending was predictable, since I knew the producers wouldn't have the stomach to kill off Kirby for the rest of the series, but I still stand by my opinion of this being one of Combat's best installments. I also liked Culp's performance as Metcalf, even if he is angry and vengeful for basically the entire runtime. This is a paragon of what World War 2 related tv should look like.
2 out of 3 found this helpful.
Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
