‘CHiPs’ Retro Recap: ‘The Grudge’

Written by John Edward Betancourt 

I think we can all agree, that few things in this world, are more irritating than people who simply do not take responsibility for their actions. Because when people refuse to do that, or they blame others instead for their woes, they become outright annoying to be around. For they take every opportunity to talk about how they’re a victim or how the system or others are out to the get them and well, it’s something we’ve all seen more often than we care to through the years and we always wonder precisely why these folks refuse to own up to the fact that they’re at fault and that really is quite the complex mystery when all is said and done, one that oddly enough, the next episode of CHiPs took the time to explore, in the most fascinating way imaginable.
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Because ‘The Grudge’ started off in an innocuous manner, with Ponch and Jon on patrol and trying to help out an RV that was heading toward a tunnel too quickly, and if the driver of that vehicle reached his destination, they would ram into construction scaffolding and well, the driver simply didn’t pay attention and hit the gear as expected and that’s when things took a turn for the interesting. For we came to learn that this car was filled to the brim with Frat Boys who were trying to evade Ponch and Jon because they had a boatload of weed stashed in their ride and unfortunately for them, our dynamic duo found the marijuana when their wreck set it ablaze, putting these boys in a world of trouble because hey, this is 1978 and pot was still the Devil’s Lettuce back in the day.

But all jokes aside, the fallout from this particular meeting is what made this episode so frustrating and intriguing all at the same time. Because rather than take responsibility for their actions and live with the consequences, they blamed Ponch and Jon for all of their ills and set out to get revenge upon them by way of quite the elaborate scheme. Phase one of the plan was to put a little fear into our dynamic duo’s hearts by leaving them cryptic notes at work and on the road since they took the time to leave a parked car with a note on the highway, and they accelerated their plan by tossing fake money onto the highway, all in the name of making life hell for Ponch and Jon and while that’s all pretty creepy and awful in its own right, since their money scheme nearly got some people killed, they weren’t quite done just yet with the plan.

For the final phase of this twisted scheme, involved the Open House that the Central CHP office was hosting, and the idea was to embarrass Ponch and Jon by delivering pot laced brownies to the event that everyone would consume and well, this was the only ‘genius’ part of the plan because that would definitely lead to a PR nightmare when the news has to report to the public that kids were high as a kite at a Highway Patrol sanctioned event and that would definitely put people out of jobs as well. But thankfully, it never came to fruition since Ponch and Jon were able to stop the and well, when all is said and done, this really was quite the gripping episode. Because this one, hands down, featured the most complex collection of Creeps of the Week to date, since these guys really did work overtime to assemble a dastardly scheme.

But what’s more impressive is that the series tried to put together a genuine threat for Ponch and Jon to deal with, without putting them in the kind of danger that would shatter what this series stands for and I have to say, it was successful in doing that. Because this scheme was just creepy enough to make you worry about our dynamic duo’s safety, yet at the same time, it was loose enough to at least give you hope that they would figure it out and well, I loved this episode, plain and simple. For this really was quite the unique tale, and I love that season two continues to try and experiment storytelling wise. Because while we’ve seen guys mad at Ponch and Jon before, we’ve never seen them go after our favorite Chippies like this and well, this made for one effective and engrossing story, one where you definitely hate the villain because these guys were just the worst and it’s clear that in this case, sometimes a sense of entitlement is what causes people to feign responsibility, and hopefully these punks learned a valuable lesson, in that, others are rarely the reason you find yourself in a bad place. Until next time.  

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