It Takes a Thief
 (original air date  10/22/94)

Storyline:  Mick and Joey are vacationing in Australia and they have a car stolen.  Mick tracks down the thief, but then goes undercover to trap a bigger criminal.

Guest Stars: Paul Chubb (Bennie), John Cairney (Hans), Ross Girven (Cool)
Note: John Cairney also guests in The Runaways episode and Ross Girven guests in Match Point.

According to US

This episode starts in Australia with Rick on the beach. We know it's Australia because that's what it says at the bottom of the screen, and Rick is narrating this episode, so we get to hear him say Australia in that oh-so-sexy way that he does. Oh, and he's also in swim trunks, lying on his stomach while
a woman is putting suntan lotion on his back. (where do I audition for that role?) Not a bad way to start off a show, eh? Mick & Joey are taking a vacation, and Joey is out tooling around in a sports car borrowed from a friend. He's with the standard blond bikini -clad babe and they come upon a
car stalled in the middle of the road. Joey gets out to see if they need help and ends up getting car-jacked. The sports car is stolen and they are left standing on the side of the road.

Joey returns to the beach and is trying to explain to Mick what happened. Mick in turn ( in that spandex surfer outfit, woohoo) is being followed by another bikini -clad babe who is demanding, "But, you're the one I want" ..."I want it
now" (hey, stand in line sister!) Mick turns and puts a hand on her face, and emphatically says, "Not now" and walks away from her, and she mutters, "What's a girl gotta do to get a surfing lesson?" :-)

Mick then calls Gordon for a favor ( wearing bathing trunks & open shirt -WooHoo chest hair!!) he and Joey want to borrow money to cover the deductible on the stolen car. Gordon mentions that the famed cat burglar Ian Mallory has
been arrested at LAX on his way back to Oz. Gordon would like Mick to check out what Mallory was after in exchange for the "loan".

After the commercial, Mick and Joey are now sitting across the street from a parking lot watching a Porsche. It turns out they have rented this Porsche and are using it as bait to lure out the car-jacker. The guy steals the car, they follow him to a museum where they get out and follow him in. As they are
eavesdropping on the conversation this guy is having with an older man (here's where the Beavis & Butthead line came in) Mick recognizes the older guy as Hans Royter, a known art "collector". He concludes this is who Ian Mallory was
supposed to meet, so then decides to pose as Mr. Mallory.

Mick & Joey are then on a stakeout with a "friend" of Gordon's who is a local (very thick Aussie accent) who is there to help them out, Benny. They wait until the car-jacker guy comes back and goes into a restaurant and then steal
HIS car. Mick calls the restaurant from the car and tells him that he is Ian Mallory and he has taken his car and he is to meet him. Cecil, Cool, whatever the guy's name shows up and Mick tells him to take him to Royter. Mick then meets with Royter, who is quizzing him to be sure he's Ian Mallory. The line I loved here was Mick's reply to Royter that he didn't look like the burglar type, to which Mick said, "What --I'm supposed to have a pencil mustache, trenchcoat and ponytail for god's sake?" Now, if you check out my Rock of Life
video...

Royter asks "Ian" to steal an artifact from the museum that night. Benny gets blueprints of the museum (I guess it's true you can get just about everything on ebay) and they plan the robbery. Rick/Mick/Ian gets all duded up in black from head to toe (ya know, typical burglar attire) a look that totally works for him by the way, and then goes thru a sewer up to a roof (I dunno how that works either, but hey it happened here) and plays spiderman by sliding across a rope between two buildings. He drops down into the museum, and Joey was
supposed to be there dressed like a security guard. But the guard is not Joey, who shoots at Mick...who then breaks the glass case and steals the artifact and knocks the guy out and gets away by diving through a glass door unscathed. He
finds out the next morning after Royter chews him out for making the newspapers that Cool/Cecil arranged to have the guard there. So we get a little Tae Kwon Do action from The Man, he kicks Cool in the face, while he's wearing jeans. 
(good rewind/rewatch scene). Royter then tells him the plans for the next heist, which is a residence. He keeps Mick/Ian locked in a room all night and Joey, Benny & Gordon are getting worried because they haven't heard from him. 
Cool then shows up in the middle of the night and tells him it's time. During the break-in (which Royter decides to attend - yah THAT's realistic) Joey and Benny and Gordon figure out it's Royter's ex-wife's residence. Upstairs in the bedroom after they have gotten into the house, Royter tells Mick he knows he's not really Mallory, and is going to kill him. Joey jumps up out of the bed dressed like a woman and they knock out Royter. They then laugh at Joey's get-up and Benny is asleep on the other side of the bed.

Back to lying on the beach (chest hair alert again) the bad guys are put away once again and the Barrett brothers are back doing what they do best.

I give this one 4 waves also. I'm not sure if I liked it because it had less beach/bikini scenes than the others so far, or if we got to see alot of Rick action in this one..but it was a pretty enjoyable episode. - Michelle P.
I really liked this episode. I think mostly because "Mick" was just so hot throughout. One of the better scenes was when he was sitting around in his short/bathing trunks, with an open shirt, talking to Gordon on the phone and eating in between. Not a lot of people could pull that off, but I found it quite adorable. The shorts were a little high-waisted, though. Then Rick all in black, that was a great wardrobe choice. One thing I found kind of odd was the scene where "Benny" came in posing as a detective and he called Mick a "cabana boy" and Rick/Mick was almost cracking up. Mick (the character) was mad at Benny for coming in and risking blowing the cover, so don't think he would be laughing at that point, so it just kind of seemed like Rick (the actor) was cracking up instead. 
I give this one 4 waves - rlh
Who could complain about seeing Mick getting rubbed with `oil' in the opening scene!? (not by one beach babe, but two!) He looks like a man who's died and went to heaven. The stage is set in "Australia," and right away Joey's car has been stolen. 

Mick calls Gordon for help…$5,000 worth of help! Of course, Gordon won't just LOAN the money, he needs a favor in return. He needs Mick to locate a thief named Ian Mallory. Did anyone else catch the shorts and `naked' leg shot (shorts hiked nearly to his hip right there!) of Mick when he calls to speak to Gordon?! All this `fun in the sun' Rick had while filming High Tide gave him a nice bronze look, didn't it? *sigh* Anyway…The phone conversation was cute between Gordon and Mick. Mick tells him he isn't going to stick his neck out for Gordon's ego, but Gordon tells him, "it isn't ego Mick…it's professional pride." 

Joey comes up with a plan for he and Mick to `bait' Ian Mallory. They rent a Jaguar for the day, leave it parked and sit back and watch what happens. I thought it was cute how in Mick's narration he compared their trap to fishing, and then called the thief ("Cecil" "Mr. Ponytail" "Cool") a `tuna dressed in a $900 suit with jewelry and a haircut to match. Just the kind of creep to give the entire land of Oz a bad name.' LOL He steals the car and the brothers take off after him in a Jeep Renegade. They are hoping he leads them to a `chop shop' for stolen cars. Instead "Mr. Ponytail" enters a museum. I liked Rick's scene and dialogue at this point and thought Rick looked especially good in the part where he and Joey lean around the corner, spying on the thieves. For some reason, I saw a small glimpse of RS here (mostly in the cute little laugh he gives Joey)…rather than all Mick Barrett. He really pulls off the character of "Mick" so well, that I'm usually not seeing "Rick's" personality, but Mick's. But every now and again, it sneaks out! He tells Joey that these guys mean business and he thinks the lead man (Royter) "eats his young." 

Later, Mick informs Gordon he plans to go in on this operation pretending to be Ian Mallory. I thought it was comical when Gordon gives Fritz a B.S. answer as to what Mick is talking about over the phone and she gets this dumbfounded look! Gordon tells her, "Mick is very deep," and goes back to chatting with Mick!! 

Ok…eye-candy alert in the next scene. That man and his jeans! Mick goes to meet Royter…and honestly I had to rewind that darn scene about 3 times to totally get what they were discussing! LOL Mick actually has on a GREAT- looking outfit for a few scenes. He's wearing light colored blue jeans, a belt and a blue shirt with some white or gray designs on it. (shirt tucked in…very nice!) Oh yeah, and the script in this part…What script? I like how Mick is remaining so calm, cool and collective in front of Royter, as if he's `the man with the deal.' He's quite convincing, even under pressure and during Royter's "pop quiz" or array of questions he throws at Mick. Mick gets through the interrogation like a pro.

I think one of the things I really liked about this episode was getting to see Mick take the part of the `bad guy.' He breaks through the museum's security system, with the help of the ever-annoying Benny (the "local help" that Gordon hooked them up with!) and his layout of the place. Mick dresses all in black…a great color on Rick!….and slips in like a professional burglar, making his way out (barely!) with the stolen piece. I loved Benny's comment about how he wouldn't want to stand out "like a cockroach on a wedding cake." LOL 

I won't complain about the "loud" shirt Mick is wearing in the following scene, since it's unbuttoned, and again…..nice jeans! When Mick meets with Royter once again to find out what his next assignment is, he's wearing another pretty nice-looking outfit (90-ish, but still not bad for High Tide wardrobe): white pants and a thin long-sleeved shirt with some brown patterns. Ok, so I can't help but notice the `fashion' in this series! 

I like how Fritz gets huffy with Gordon because he won't send her out on a real `mission.' She feels Gordon is being a male chauvinist. I think she might be right.

Royter, "Cecil" and Mick enter a home and Mick "kills" the alarm system. Once the men sneak upstairs, it turns out that Royter really wants Ian Mallory (Mick) to shoot his sleeping ex-wife. It's an act of vengeance. But of course, the brothers were on to his scheme. Joey is made up in a blonde wig and a dress, lying in bed posing as the wife. The Barrett brothers have "foiled" Royter's plan!

Ending scene…well, there's just nothing like a High Tide ending in which Mick is lying shirtless, lounging back on the beach in his shades, hair blowing in the breeze. I give this episode 4 out of 5 waves. - Kelley Pearson