Dragnet 1967 The Big Prophet (1967–1970) watch online HD

This was my personal favorite of the entire series. The LAPD's Dynamic Duo engages in an episode-long debate with a Timothy Leary knockoff (beautifully played by Star Trek vet Liam Sullivan, surrounded by great 60s drug props) about the pros and cons of drugs and the laws that deal with them. What makes this episode unusual was that both sides score points ("No law that tells me what to do with my body on my land is a good law!") and Gannon actually scores several of them himself instead of playing his usual Tontoesque role. David Vowell's scripts were always among the best of the lot, but he outdoes himself with this one. Check it out.

Dragnet 1967: Season 2, Episode 18 The Big Prophet (11 Jan. 1968) I thought this did a pretty darn good job depicting effects of mind altering drugs versus the mindset of those who push them. I've been cleaning up after them for decades in my world. The argument that it was boring is so shallow. It was only a half hour! Taking a break from the nonsense on most shows, especially now, to ground oneself in the realities that have spoiled so much for so long is no great sacrifice. How can you call it fictionalized planktonrules? Most everything else you had to say was inspired. I just wish you hadn't cheapened it with your boring fiction declaration. The message was excellent then as it still is now and it needs repeating any way possible until gullible souls allow it to penetrate.

While I agree wholeheartedly with Sgt. Friday and Detective Gannon in this episode, the overall effect was terribly preachy and sort of like having a debate with a proxy Timothy Leary. I would have really appreciated if it simply had been Jack Webb and Leary recorded having such a debate.

Friday and Gannon visit a local 'church' that is run by a con-man. This church's message? Drugs, drugs and more drugs. Drugs (particularly LSD) are their gods and the man has come to police attention because he's been reportedly selling to minors. However, they have no direct proof and the men visit to have a talk with the guy. Probably not unintentionally, the drug guru looks almost exactly like Timothy Leary and his message is much the same--drugs are safe and cool. The problem for me is that instead of showing any sort of investigation, almost the entire show consists of Friday and Gannon verbally sparring with the drug guru. And so, they talk and talk and talk...and the overall effort is very dull and after about five or ten minutes, I was ready for something else--not just a fictionalized debate.

I have worked in drug rehab as well as with addicted mothers, so Friday and Gannon's message worked for me--just not in this long and boring episode. By the way, unexpectedly, Gannon has more than his usual share of good biting comments. Also, I think that the drug guru's comments about his followers one day being the leaders of our country is true to a degree.

"The Big Prophet" is a polarizing episode that will divide the opposing sides, and that's just the way it is. While I was surprised Liam Sullivan's drug-dealing, pro-drugs, spiritual guru con-man was able to spar at all with Friday and Gannon--detectives assigned to "check him out" and warn him that they were on to him--he remains to the very end a cipher whose views are a denigration to the society at large. Despite the selling dime bags to minors, Sullivan's views are shared by many, probably more today that even during 1968. The way marijuana (LSD and heroine, even) is considered by those who want it legalized as okay and not a "start to worse drugs once the effects lose their appeal" will look at Friday's point of view as prehistoric, there are those on the other side of the argument that perhaps have evidence that it was a catalyst towards harder drugs. The use of God and a path to spiritual enlightenment/growth through drugs as a source are a big part of the guru's shtick, and he even throws liquor at Friday and Gannon (which I agree with actually) as another mood altering danger. The law and following it are some of the detectives' weapons, but ultimately their experiences encountering those who suffered through the use of drugs and their damaging effects prove the be the most hard-hitting. I agree that a guru with connections being tied to small time distribution does seem to be a stretch (I can't imagine he would allow himself to be a direct dealer, considering there had been a following of his self-made doctrine; I can easily see him manipulating others to do the dealing), but the show always ends with a chief criminal being caught and facing San Quentin. Sullivan was excellent in this episode, though, and his guru has the confidence, self-belief, and swagger, along with an intellect that helps to forward his cause, to combat the moral crusade he's up against. So I think the rating of the episode, I figure, will be determined by where you stand in the argument. LSD seems to be the villain, while Mary Jane is used as a lure towards it. The guru is the voice towards drugs' seduction. I do think the argument that others are the ones who see the results of addiction and must deal with it has merit. I don't think, though, that marijuana will always result in its users devolving into harder drugs…but what is considered a functioning society differs from one individual to another. Handouts and working for what you get in life are quite topical right now as well, used in the "Big Drug Debate" (another title I'd might have given the episode). You could see this as a political battle of wills; Morgan's Gannon even uses the argument that he doesn't want the practice of the guru's believers intruding upon his own life. Still, the "drugs is a scourge on mankind" argument could turn you off or bring from its rather preachy from-the-pulpit proselytizing considerable applause. It comes down to your own side on the matter.

I give this ten stars as a time capsule for what >50 crowd must have believed about the sixties. While the script focuses on drugs, the show essentially indicts the entire counterculture. However, thanks to that force of gravity known as reality, the program betrays its pro-establishment stance when you think through what's actually going on. Let me get this straight: the guru is a world celebrity who's making filthy lucre from his records, books and speeches, but sells penny ante drugs to the local school kids. The guru has an advanced education, but gets caught in the simplest logical errors made by Friday and Gannon. Finally, would beat cops and a Timothy Leary character waste twenty-three minutes arguing about LSD? Doubtful.

That's what this episode wants you to believe. They got away with their ignorant diatribe back in 1968, but such phony milk-toast is boring today. If you are having any fun, then you must be breaking the law. If you are wearing anything other than a black/gray suit, then you must be doing something illegal.

It's a shame that Harry Morgan had his acting skills connected to this show. Playing the perpetual unsmiling character of Jack Webb must have been a burden. His yawning speeches of morality make me cringe. His fawning public wanted 4 seasons of this stuff? Is this the best he could do after appearing in Sunset Blvd?

This is the one in which Friday and Gannon get reports that a Timothy Leary clone who runs a phony church is really in the business of selling drugs to high school kids and any other customers.

I thought it was a riot when I first saw it, but seeing it again, so many years later, it's really dated and rather dull.

Who wants to listen to these arguments all over again, especially knowing that the two officers are going to win it with their quick-witted ripostes. Leary (or whatever he's called here) is obviously a fake guru but at least he's given some dignity in that he appears to believe that psychedelic drugs will lead to some sort of universal salvation. (Heroin is thrown in as a red herring.) There is a lot of dialog about "lapping acid up from sugar cubes" and the like. The deck in the script is clearly stacked against the pompous Leary. Not that Leary was actually right in his arguments; just that the arguments themselves were irrelevant because, no matter how important an issue it seemed at the time, the use of psychedelic drugs is now pretty much a historical curiosity.

The skeptical Friday and Gannon throw in familiar generalizations about pot being just the intro to drugs. How does Friday put it? Pot is the match, LSD is the fuse, and heroin is the dynamite? Something like that. If it were invariably true, half the members of Congress would be junkies today, not to mention at least two presidents and William F. Buckley.

Grass smoking seems spotty and occasional today. LSD and the other psychedelic drugs are positively uncommon. Heroin use rolls right along like the Mighty Mo. At least so it appears.