Hogan’s Heroes Episode Review: “The Antique”

Guest stars include Mari Oliver and Brenda Benet.

I didn’t get an opportunity to watch the full episode when I was home for lunch today. But, I have seen this one before and, unfortunately, it is one I’ve never been a huge fan of.

My biggest problem with this episode is the same issue I have with many of them. Hogan’s plan, which involves getting Klink to buy a bunch of the clocks (believing they are antiques) so Hogan can hide the plans inside and send them out to his contacts on the pretense they are antique dealers, is kind of interesting and funny. But, because it is so simple and he pretty much reveals the details (in case the viewer can’t figure it out on their own) ahead of time, it does lose something.

I’m also a little confused about where exactly Hogan got the money to buy the first clock from Klink. That was an awful lot of money for a prisoner of war to be carrying around with him and would think that would raise some suspicion, even from someone as clueless as Klink.

I think probably the funniest scene from this episode (and this honestly isn’t saying much) is early on, when Klink is under an armed guard because of fears the prisoners might try to kill him and the cuckoo clock goes off right as he is asking Hogan what the prisoners think of him. I did get a bit of a chuckle out of that one but, unfortunately, the episode pretty much goes downhill from there.

Even the part with General Burkhalter (Leon Askin) hearing the clocks and thinking a time bomb has been planted was much too predictable to be overly funny. I pretty much figured out what would happen the second Klink hid the clocks.

This episode has an interesting premise but, because it is so predictable, just wasn’t that funny. It would have been nice to see the writers at least attempt to throw in a joke or two that I wasn’t expecting to see.

My Grade: C