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The A-Team

The A-Team was a 1980s television show about a group of fictional ex-US Army commandos on the run from the military. To support themselves, they operated as mercenaries, offering their services to the oppressed. The show has achieved cult status among some viewers.

The A-Team was one of a wide variety of successful creations from prolific television producer Stephen J. Cannell. Cannell is known for having a particular skill at capitalizing on momentary cultural trends, such as the machine guns, cartoonish violence, and joyful militarism of this series, which are now recognizable as trademarks of popular entertainment in the mid-1980s. The A-Team became somewhat emblematic of this kind of "fit-for-TV warfare" due to its depiction of highly sophisticated combat scenes, with extremely lethal weapons, but wherin the participants are never killed or seriously injured. Contrary to popular belief, however, the show did feature two on-screen deaths. In the series four finale The Sound of Thunder General Fullbright was shot and killed, and in the The Rabbit Who Ate Las Vegas gangster Gianni Christian was thrown from a high-rise hotel window into the swimming pool below. The black GMC van with its characteristic red stripe used by the A-Team has become an enduring pop-culture icon.

Each episode of the first season began with this spoken introduction:

"Ten years ago a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit. They promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire... THE A-TEAM"

Seasons two through four substituted "1972" for "ten years ago". The intro was dropped for the final season.

Cast

• Dirk Benedict as Lt. Templeton "Faceman" Peck
  • Suave, smooth-talking, loves the ladies. He served as the team's con man, arranging for supplies, equipment, and sensitive information by various methods of trickery. Tim Dunigan played this role in the pilot episode.
• George Peppard as Lt. Col. John Hannibal Smith
  • The leader of the A-Team distinguished by his cigar smoking, and his catch-phrase "I love it when a plan comes together!"
• Mr. T as Sgt. Bosco Albert "Bad Attitude" Baracus aka B. A. Baracus
  • Despite his reputed attitude, a nice guy at heart. He is most upset by Murdock and routinely informed him, "You crazy, fool!" He suffers an intense fear of flying, especially when the plane in question is flown by Murdock.
• Dwight Schultz as Capt. "Howling Mad" Murdock
  • The best chopper pilot of the Vietnam war, Murdock is somewhat insane. Although he was their pilot on the Hanoi bank raid, he was technically not part of the A-Team and so not tried by the military. Though interned at a psychiatric hospital he routinely escaped to accompany the A-Team. He was discharged permanently in the fifth season.

Statistics

Seasons : 5

Episodes : 98

First Original Air Date : January 23, 1983

Final Original Air Date : March 8, 1987

Best episode^*:

Black Day at Bad Rock

Worst Episode^*:

The Crystal Skull

^*As determined in the July [2000] Usenet poll on alt.tv.a-team entitled SURVIVOR: A-Team Style.

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