Hart to Hart Returns

Old Air Force buddy Bill McDowell (Mike Connors) wants self-made multi-millionaire Jonathan Hart (Robert Wagner) to buy his massive aeronautics laboratory. Defense contracts are drying up, and McDowell thinks it's time to transition to peace-time applications for his company's products; a transition he doesn't think his tech-savvy son, Peter (Lance Guest), is capable of running. Like any good businessman, Jonathan begins his homework on McDowell Aviation, but when acquisitions/merger researcher Eric Hayden (Brian Reddy) winds up dead, Jonathan's poking around in McDowell's army contracts begins a series of frame-ups that could cost the mystery-hound Harts their lives.

And Jonathan's wife, gorgeous freelance writer Jennifer Hart (Stefanie Powers), is working on an article about Dr. Paul Menard (Ken Howard), of the World Team Medical Organization, a quasi-military/U. N. unit that drops doctors into troubled political hot spots all over the globe.

Hart to Hart Returns ably recreates the lighthearted charm of the original show, particularly when chemistry-loaded Wagner and Powers are on screen, however it's not as striking as the actual TV series. It takes some time to pick up, but on the whole it's a decent and watchable mystery, and is aided by a solid supporting cast and typically lush production values.