THE HITCHHIKER, VOL. 2

Description: Page Fletcher is "The Hitchhiker," walking a lonely road where darkness is always by his side and terror lurks around every turn. Pick him up if you dare. He will guide you to your destination, where the good are spared and the wicked are damned. Episodes: OD Feeling, True Believer, Perfect Order, Cabin Fever, A Whole New You, Dead Heat, The Curse, Out of the Night, Secret Ingredients, Man of Her Dreams.

The Hitchhiker (not to be confused in any way with The Hitcher which starred Rutger Hauer) was a Twilight Zone / Alfred Hitchcock Presents wannabe that ran on HBO during the mid- to late-1980s.

Typical of an HBO show there is some mild T&A and violence, but really nothing like in the shows (such as The Sopranos) they would show later on.

Also typical of HBO is the fair amount of well-known actors featured. Even if you don't watch a lot of movies and TV, then you'd still recognize many of the faces appearing in the show's episodes even though you probably won't be able to put a name on most of them. "Famous" faces you'd recognize include those of Virginia Madsen (Dune), Kirstie Alley (Star Trek II - The Wrath of Khan, Cheers), Sandra Bernhard (Hudson Hawk) and Harry Hamlin (Clash of the Titans, L.A. Law). See why I used the quotation marks?

I also didn't use the word wannabe lightly since the episodes range from the simply mediocre to poor. The fault lies with poor writing with muddled plot points, but also because this sort of format has been extensively exhausted with shows such as The Outer Limits, Twilight Zone, you name it. Is there anything fresh and new still to be said?

THE DISCS: We get a selection of several episodes from the show's entire run on two discs. Unfortunately the video compression on some episodes are a bit on the poor side, often regressing to that wave-y effect one often gets from watching poorly encoded VCDs. The only extras are audio commentaries on two of the episodes, one by a director and one by ?star? Harry Hamlin.

WORTH IT? According to some users at Amazon.com you can get a Canadian DVD set consisting of more episodes for cheaper. That is maybe an option to investigate if you want this TV show on disc.

RECOMMENDATION: Despite the show's faults, the episodes make for mostly passable little half hour fillers for those nights that you're pooped and simply want to watch something short before you knock off.