Title: Jack Soo: A Retrospective
Directed by: Noam Pitlik
Written by: no credit
Air Date: May 17, 1979
Previous: Graveyard Shift
Next: Inquisition
Guest Starring: James Gregory
"Jack Soo: A Retrospective" is the 22nd and last episode of the fifth season of Barney Miller.
In fact, it is not a regular episode of Barney Miller at all. It's a tribute to Jack Soo, who played Detective Nick Yemana, and who died of esophageal cancer on January 11, 1979 while Season 5 was in production. Everyone who was still in the cast—Hal Linden, Max Gail, Ron Glass, Steve Landesberg, Ron Carey, and James Gregory—shares their memories of Jack Soo, the talented performer and Deadpan Snarker extraordinaire, as well as "Nick Yemana", who never could make a decent cup of coffee. Interwoven with the memories of the actors are some of Soo's highlights from the show, like his warbling of "It's Almost Like Being in Love" from one of the most famous episodes, "Hash".
Tropes:
- Bad to the Last Drop: A montage of gags about Yemana making terrible coffee is introduced by Landesberg wandering over to the coffeepot and saying that it was where "some of the worst concoctions in America were brewed."
- Clip Show: A collection of Jack Soo highlight clips, interspersed with the actors out-of-character talking about both Soo and the character Nick Yemana.
- Corpsing: In-Universe Discussed Trope, as Landesberg reminisces about how he used to look over after a funny line and see Soo at his desk shaking with laughter.
- Evolutionary Retcon: After having visibly thin hair on top and an extreme combover for the first couple of episodes as Wojo, actor Max Gail was given a thick hairpiece which he wore for the rest of the series—apart from this episode, in which Gail went without the toupee and revealed himself to be quite bald on top.
- In Memoriam: In-Universe, the whole episode is this.
- No Fourth Wall: The actors address the camera directly throughout.
- Silent Credits: Sort of. The credit for director (Pitlik) and creators (Danny Arnold and Theodore J. Flicker) comes up against a silent still picture of the entrance to the 12th Precinct. The rest of the credits then play normally after that with the regular theme.
- The Show Must Go On: Hal Linden notes that the show will continue without Soo (as by this point it had been renewed for a sixth season), even though they know it will never be the same.
- To Absent Friends: The episode ends with the whole cast raising their coffee cups in a gesture of remembrance of Jack Soo.
