2.06: Vertical
Technical Information
![[Sledge and Angelica by the coast]](../../images/sh/season2/v04.jpg)
First Broadcast: Thursday, October 29, 1987, 8:00 PM
Production Code: B-87507
Number of bullets fired by Sledge: 3
Critical Info
TV Guide summary: An incident atop a high-rise building triggers a fear of heights in Hammer which gets him a ground-floor assignment guarding a gun moll who meets with a sudden demise when Hammer is unable to save her.
Ph episode rating on the Hammer scale (1 to 6 bullets):
1.
This episode continued the second season's shift from comedy to drama. Though the drama wasn't that great, seeing Sledge in a "relationship" was somewhat refreshing.
Episode references:
Act One
Hammer is chasing a crook across a rooftop. [gunshots 1-3] The crook makes a leap between buildings to get on another rooftop. Hammer tries to follow him, but cannot make the leap. Instead, he can only clutch onto the railing and look five stories below. The crook returns to step on Hammer's hands, but Hammer pulls himself up from the railing, pulling down the crook's pants in the process.
In Capt. Trunk's office, a doctor is describing how Hammer has chronic acrophobia, the fear of heights. Hammer enters, and the doctor suggests he be put on medical leave.
Hammer: If some quack is going to mess with my brain, can't it be somebody whose IQ doesn't match their bust size?
![[Sledge pointing to doctor]](../../images/sh/season2/v01.jpg)
Trying to prove he is fine, Hammer gets up on Trunk's table. Upon looking out the window, however, he becomes dizzy and crashes through the window. He falls, but clings to a flag pole.
![[Sledge crashing through window]](../../images/sh/season2/v02.jpg)
Though on medical leave, Hammer is called in on an assignment Trunk believes he can handle even with his condition. Trunk is working with the FBI to bust Pete Crane, an extortionist. Hammer is to guard his girlfriend, Miss Del Monte, who is ready to assist the authorities.
At dinner, Hammer and Miss Del Monte share similar woes: failed relationships and a love for violence.
![[Sledge crashing through window]](../../images/sh/season2/v03.jpg)
While a burly man tries to pick her up, she bruises her right collarbone when flipping him to the ground.
The two seem to connect, as they later walk along the coast.
In the distance, she spots her lighthouse, "her hideaway" and the only place where she feels at peace.
![[the lighthouse]](../../images/sh/season2/v05.jpg)
Unfortunately, Hammer gets dizzy upon trying to climb the spiral staircase to the top. In the midst of Hammer's dizziness, a man comes and grabs Angelica. Hammer is unable to help:
Hammer: My vision is as bad as those people that colorize black and white films.
![[Sledge looking down staircase]](../../images/sh/season2/v06.jpg)
With Hammer useless, the attacker takes her to the top of the lighthouse, then throws her off.
Act Two
When the police arrive, Hammer laments to Doreau how he was falling for her and how he was sure she'd fall for him.
Hammer: We had so much in common. We even hated some of the same people. Did you know that she carried a bigger gun than I did? (an Uzi)
Back at the precinct, Trunk must again place Hammer on medical leave, against his will, of course.
At a bar, Doreau consoles Hammer, who continues to see Angelica's face in random objects. He cannot get her out of his head. As a passing thought, Hammer wonders why she didn't scream on the way down. When a brunette waitress (Angelica was a blonde) comes to clean up the tables, Hammer gets hysterical, thinking she is Angelica and has come back.
Doreau: Sledge, give it a break.
Hammer: Trust me. I know what I'm doing.
[36 KB WAV file]
When the waitress denies this, saying she is Susan Taylor, Hammer forces her back to his apartment for an experiment which he claims will determine if she is Angelica.
At the apartment, Hammer makes her dye her hair. Then, he comes to his sense and realizes he was mistaken. However, as he helps her put on her sweater, he recognizes the collarbone bruise. She still denies she is Angelica.
Hammer then drags her to the lighthouse to "refresh her memory." On the way up, she finally concedes she is Angelica, Hammer having blown her cover. It turns out Capt. Trunk was using Hammer's vertigo to fake her death, so she wouldn't be killed before she had a chance to testify. At the top of the lighthouse, they embrace and kiss. Hammer then looks and exults that he has conquered his vertigo.
Hammer then spots a black car below and rushes down thinking it's the FBI. Angelica tries to stop him saying it isn't, it is too late. There, the hitman springs a gun on Hammer and Angelica, but Trunk arrives to shoot the hitman just in time.
Tag
In his office, Trunk tells Hammer and Doreau that while the racketeer was sentenced to 50 years, he and Angelica have made up and will be married at the end of his sentence. Though saddened, Hammer is consoled by Doreau, saying he longer has a problem. To demonstrate he is fine, he gets up on Trunk's table. In trying to stop Hammer, Trunk himself falls out the window.
