Superhero Sunday anniversary: ABC’s ‘Hardcastle & McCormick’

ABC had the Lone Ranger & Tonto, Batman & Robin, and the Green Hornet & Kato.  It was on this day 33 years ago that was a new dynamic duo of derring-do crime-fighters were born: Hardcastle & McCormick.

Created by Stephen J. Cannell and Patrick Hasburgh (The Rockford Files, The A-Team, 21 Jump Street, Wiseguy), the series premiered with the two-hour “Rolling Thunder” on Sunday, September 18, 1983.  Hardcastle & McCormick starred Brian Keith and Daniel Hugh Kelly as the titular characters: Milton C. ‘Hardcase’ Hardcastle and ‘Skid’ Mark McCormick.  After years of dedicating his life to justice on the bench, retired judge Hardcastle decides to continue the fight for law and order as a 20th-century Lone Ranger: hunting down criminals who’ve escaped justice through legal technicalities and loopholes.  Like the Lone Ranger, Hardcastle never rides alone in his never-ending crusade against injustice, so the judge enlists the aid of ex-con McCormick to be his fast gun – his Tonto.

The Lone Ranger had Silver as his trusty steed.  Batman had the Batmobile.  The Green Hornet & Kato had the Black Beauty as their rolling arsenal.  Hardcastle & McCormick had the Coyote X as their rolling thunder against lawbreakers.

Hardcastle & McCormick was racing against another modern-day Lone Ranger and Tonto on Sunday nights: Michael Knight (David Hasselhoff) and the Knight Industries Two Thousand – KITT – from NBC’s Knight Rider.  The series had two distinct theme songs: the hard-charging “Drive” and season two’s light-hearted “Back to Back”, but it was “Drive” that defined the premise.

Hardcastle & McCormick lasted three seasons and 67 episodes until its cancellation in 1986 alongside Knight Rider, which was also canceled that same year.  Still, H&M ended on a good note with McCormick becoming “A Chip Off the ‘Ol Milt”: going to law school and becoming an attorney.