Storyline:  Mick is invited to a swank party, Joey isn't, but he crashes it trying to find out who Mick's date is.  The place is robbed and they are held hostage.  Mick helps to negotiate a settlement, while Fritz (Mick's date) does her thing to get them out of the mess.

Guest Stars: Stig Eldred (Jack McCarthy), Jim McLarty (Frank McCarthy)
Note: Stig Eldred was a guest on the Shanghaied episode.

According to US

This episode opens with Rick narrating, and Joey surfing. Mick is talking about how he and Joey do a lot of things together, like surf -but today is different, he is going somewhere on his own. Joey is shown now walking with his surfboard, trying to pick up girls with the offer of free surfing lessons. Mick is seen driving -dressed up, wearing a blue suit jacket and white dress pants. (reviewer sighing here, way too much forehead on Rick -again!) Mick gets out of the car and walks into a party. He meets up with the friend who has invited him, they are standing in front of a table with jewelry on display. The friend is talking about how all this was recovered from a sunken ship, and they hope to get more donations tonight to recover the rest. Two women walk up and introduce themselves as Margie & Joan. Joey then crashes the party. As Mick tries to get rid of Joey, Joey is quizzing Mick about who his date is; Joey starts to choke on a cracker. He taps a waiter on the shoulder and asks for some water. The waiter turns around and points a gun at Joey. Suddenly, more "waiters" come out of the kitchen with guns and the apparent man in charge is yelling for everyone to get down on the floor. They take all the jewelry and leave. The people start running out, and Mick goes to look for Pete. He finds Pete lying on the kitchen floor, he has been shot. The bad guys are shown trying to get in their get-away car, but the cops pull up. Joan is grabbed as a hostage. Mick then makes the longest call in history to 911 (C'mon, it's only 3 numbers for chrissake!!) and yells at Joey to leave. As Mick is still dialing the phone...he looks up at Joey coming back into the kitchen. He starts to yell at Joey, and Joey points to the man behind him with a gun in his back, "Davy Crockett here had different plans". The guy tells Mick to put the phone down.
Fritz pulls up outside to pandemonium. The police tell her there is a hostage situation. She tries to get in, but is escorted away. The bad guys gather all the party people into the main room, Mick is carrying Pete in who appears to be unconscious. Mick argues with the guys that they will have murder on their hands if Pete dies. While Mick is arguing, he is pressing a linen napkin on Pete's shoulder. I didn't know that shoulder wounds were deadly... Anyway, the Bad Guy in charge (herein referred to a BGIC) says if anyone tries anything they will be dead. A SWAT team pulls up outside. The head of the SWAT team starts talking to the news reporters. The BGIC appoints Mick as spokesperson, and sends him outside to negotiate. Mick walks out waving a white napkin. The commander recognizes him at the same time Mick mutters, "Harper - Great, as if my afternoon didn't already suck wind". (Huh? suck wind??) Rick does pull off a very good pissed off look with a shoulder shrug here -it's worth a rewind. :-) Back to the plot - Mick starts to narrate: "Robert Harper, he didn't understand much about law, but he sure liked the order part". Harper then tells Mick, "You weren't much of a cop, but I sure didn't think you'd sink this low." Mick tells him he is a hostage, Harper replies, "Small world, isn't it?" Mick says, "Yeah, claustrophobic." The BGIC notices that the two know each other. Mick goes back in after stating the BGIC's demands. Fritz then jumps all over Harper, telling him he endangered Mick's life. Harper has Fritz escorted away again, while she is leaving she makes note of the license plate number on the bad guys' getaway car. The BGIC roughs Mick up when he comes back into the club, yelling at him that he's a cop. Mick says he is not a cop anymore, the BGIC yells back that he is lying. Joey yells, 'He's not lying - check out his haircut!" The phone rings, Mick is forced to answer. It is Harper, and Mick says, "I thought I told you never to call me here Harper." A new deal is negotiated, a boat for hostages. Mick hangs up the phone and mutters, "Dip Stick".
An hour goes by, and the phone rings again. Mick answers, and it's Fritz, but he pretends it's Harper. She tells him about the BGIC, his name is Jack McCarthy -she had the plate ran from the car. Mick feeds her coded messages about a ceiling entrance; McCarthy notices out the window that Harper is talking to the press. He grabs the phone away from Mick and knocks him unconscious. The phone rings again and it's Harper, McCarthy tells him he's got 15 minutes to get a boat there. The boat arrives, and Harper calls and demands hostages be released. Mick tells Pete he'll see him on the outside (Pete is now walking and smiling-apparently no longer near death). McCarthy tells Mick to go out and check over the boat. Harper sees Mick come out and asks him if McCarthy was tired of his sniveling and let him go. Mick replies, "If he let me go, you'd know because I'd be standing on your throat right now." Harper asks why he is doing all of this, Mick tells him it's because his little brother is in there too.

Fritz is putting on scuba gear. (I was gonna make a remark about her having this handy, but I'm giving her the benefit of the doubt that she lives in California by the beach) Mick goes to check the boat out, figures out the driver is a cop and takes his gun away from him. Fritz is swimming towards the yacht club. Mick looks up in the trees and sees SWAT officers ready to fire. He runs into the club, the bad guys start shooting out the windows and put the rest of the hostages in front of the windows. McCarthy threatens to kill them all if the SWAT does not move across the street. McCarthy motions to the bad guy (Marty) standing over Joey. Marty nudges Joey in the back with his gun and says, "Ok funnyman." Joey says, "There's a priest, rabbi and chimp..." the guy shoves him over to the window, Joey then says, 'Ok, so you heard that one." Mick tells the bad guys that Joey is his little brother. He goes over to McCarthy and says, "Sometimes he's a pain in the ass, but he's all I got. Take me, I'll owe ya." Jack then tells bad guy Frank to kill Mick. Fritz gets in the building. Jack goes over to the window and yells if the SWAT doesn't clear, Mick will be killed. Harper tells him he is bluffing. McCarthy shouts, "He's a dead man Harper!" Harper replies, "I can live with that." Mick says, "Great, he can live with that - that's terrific." Jack looks at Mick and tells him it's nothing personal, aiming the gun. Mick states, "Really? Well, it feels personal." Mick then starts to try to argue more with McCarthy, McCarthy tells him to just shut up. Mick says, "What are you gonna do, shoot me?" Fritz then throws a grenade into the room and it explodes. She jumps in, kicks the gun out of a bad guy's hand. Mick grabs McCarthy, and Joey is beating on Marty...hostages are running and screaming. The bad guys are all detained. Fritz picks up a glass of champagne and turns to Mick, "I just like to make an entrance. Cheers."
Mick and Fritz walk out of the club, Mick has his arm around her. Harper sees them and says to Fritz, "You just can't keep your nose out of other people's business, can you honey?" Mick looks at him and says, "Not only are you dangerously incompetent and a disgrace to the uniform, I don't like you calling her honey." Mick punches Harper out (Joey takes off Harper's hat first).
After the commercial, Mick and Fritz are at a swanky restaurant. Mick tells Fritz that Pete will be fine, and they discuss the incident. Mick asks Fritz if she is seeing anyone (looking at her again, like he could eat her up!) She replies that she is not, but she does have her eye on someone in particular. However, every time she tries to tell this person she is interested, they get interrupted. She thinks it's a sign. Just then, Joey walks up to their table and asks if he's interrupting.
All in all, this episode went by pretty fast. Not much surfing or naked chicks in this one, however the plot was just a basic hostage/bad guy story that anyone has probably seen dozens of times. Mick and Joey didn't even really solve a crime like they have in prior shows, the only thing memorable was the dialogue. (which is why so much of it was included this time) I give this episode about 2 1/2 waves -the 1/2 wave because Rick's wardrobe improved slightly. :-) - Michelle P.