Episodes: 174 (half-hour)
Seasons: Seven
TV show dates: September 21, 1968 — May 20, 1975
Series status: Cancelled/ended
Performers include: Martin Milner, Kent McCord, William Boyett, Art Gilmore, Claude Johnson, Jack Hogan, Chuck Bowman, and Marco Lopez
TV show description:
Pete Malloy (Martin Milner), a six-year veteran of the L.A.P.D., plans on quitting the force after his partner is killed. However, prior to his handing in his resignation, Pete is asked to break in recent Army veteran and rookie officer Jim Reed (Kent McCord) on his first night on the force.
The two officers deal with a hysterical woman who thinks her son’s salamander has crawled down the back of her dress, a pair of liquor store robbers, a baby in distress, and a group of trigger happy teenagers.
At the end of the night, Reed disobeys Malloy’s orders but succeeds in making several arrests. Malloy dresses him down but his longtime friend, the Division’s Watch Commander (Art Gilmore), reminds him of Malloy’s own beginnings and he decides to stay and help mold Reed into one of “L.A.’s finest.”
During the course of the series, both are wounded in the line of duty, kidnapped, and held hostage (separately and together), and face disciplinary measures for their mistakes from Sergeant William “Mac” MacDonald (William Boyett).
Over time, Reed matures and becomes a regular LAPD officer and Malloy is promoted to Field Training Officer. The duo eventually become members of their division’s SWAT team.
Episodes 173 & 174 — Something Worth Dying For, parts one & two
Reed is frustrated by his job and wants to do more to help society. He volunteers to work with the narcotics division for a month. During a drug raid, Malloy is shot and Reed risks his life to get him to safety. Reed earns the Medal of Valor for his bravery and his wife initially doesn’t want to attend the ceremony because she’s struggling with his new role.
When Malloy returns to patrol, he finds that Reed is considering taking the investigator’s exam at the urging of his wife. If he passes the exam, he’d leave the patrol division and have a desk job. The series ends before we learn his choice.
First aired: May 13, 1975 and May 20, 1975.
There haven’t been any official reunion projects thus far but there have been a few related projects.
Shaaron Claridge, the voice of the series’ police dispatcher, was a real dispatcher for the LAPD. After the show ended, she played the same role on an episode of Lou Grant, Columbo, and in the movie Blue Thunder.
In 1989, a new version of Adam-12 began airing in syndication and lasted one season. None of the original show’s cast returned to reprise their roles.
Milner and McCord reunited on October 21, 1989 for a TV movie called Nashville Beat. The two played former LAPD partners but were not called Malloy and Reed. McCord co-wrote the story. Coincidentally, actor Ed Beechner appeared in both this TV movie and multiple episodes of the Adam-12 series remake.
On September 18, 1997, Milner and McCord appeared as LAPD detectives in the “Murder Blues” episode of Diagnosis: Murder. The pair weren’t named Malloy and Reed however.
In the 1990 feature film, Predator 2, McCord plays Captain B. Pilgrim of the LAPD.
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