Strike Force is an American action-adventure/police procedural television series that aired on ABC during the 1981–1982 television season, and was produced by Aaron Spelling Productions. The program starred Robert Stack as Capt. Frank Murphy, the leader of a specialized unit of detectives and police officers whose job is to stop violent criminals at any cost (usually with a hail of gunfire).

Overview

Mixing elements of Stack's classic television series The Untouchables from 20 years earlier with doses of Mission: Impossible and Dirty Harry, Strike Force immediately provoked controversy over its violence – at one point the series was labeled the most violent in American TV history. The series attempted to balance the violence by interjecting liberal amounts of humor into its regular characters and focusing on the detectives' personal lives.

Cast

Guest stars

Notable guest stars during the series run included:

Episodes

Reception

Although initially popular, the novelty of the series quickly wore off; only 19 episodes were produced, plus the 90-minute pilot. According to Todd Gitlin's 1983 book Inside Prime Time, Strike Force finished a dismal 76 out of 105 shows in the Nielsen ratings for the 1981–82 season. Another factor in the series' demise was the competition: ABC pitted Strike Force against the successful CBS soap-opera Falcon Crest, which had, as its lead-in, the then-number one show on television, Dallas.

Home media

The first episode of Strike Force was released on video in North America in the late 1980s. As of 2018, there has been no official DVD release of this series, though there have been several requests for its release, and bootleg copies have circulated in the "collectors market" for the last three decades since Strike Force ' s cancellation.