#110: Target MacGyver (22 December 1985)

A female General has been kidnapped, proving yet again that women shouldn't hold positions of power in the military, and it's MacGyver's job to rescue her.

Rather than going for the tried and tested abandoned warehouse, the kidnappers decided that a beach house situated mere feet from the sand was the perfect hideout. MacGyver does some of his finest work on and around the beach so I don't suspect this rescue mission should prove too taxing.

Penetrating this fortress of security was MacGyver's first task, made all the easier by the fact that the backdoor was left unlocked. Once inside MacGyver had to come up with a rescue plan using only the utensils found in the kitchen. The plan was simple yet effective, pile a heap of pots and pans on a bag of ice placed next to a toaster oven and oil the floor. The toaster oven melts the ice, causing the pots and pans to fall on the floor which will coax the kidnappers out of the living room and into the kitchen where they will slip on the floor and be unable to get up for a period of time long enough for MacGyver to get the general out of there. MacGyver also took a bag of carrots but that probably had more to do with his vitamin C deficiency than rescuing the General.

The set up goes according to plan and MacGyver is able to get the General out of there. After slipping on the floor for a comically long period of time the kidnappers finally get out of the kitchen but their attempt to apprehend MacGyver is foiled as he is able to trap them under a sun bed.

MacGyver makes a call to his ridiculously named contact "Pacman" informing him that the "lady General" is safe and then hits the beach to have a chat to the chicks playing beach volleyball he was checking out earlier.

ROLL CREDITS

Not 5 minutes after returning from rescuing that fucking lady General, MacGyver is sent to the Middle East to destroy a nuclear refining plant that the CIA believe is being used to manufacture nuclear weapons.

Security is usually pretty tight at this particular refinery but MacGyver is able to get in and set the detonator by simply wearing ninja attire.

After blowing up the refinery MacGyver heads home only to find some asshole sitting on his fucking couch. MacGyver has just rescued a lady General and blown up a nuclear refinery so the last thing he wants to do is get home and have to deal with some guy from head office. All he wants to do is chill the fuck out and have some time to himself. Is that too much to ask?

It turns out that the guy isn't there to give MacGyver an assignment but rather to warn him that he is now a target after the nuclear refinery incident. A guy by the name of Axeminster has been hired to take MacGyver out. Apparently he is the best there is which is lucky as you don't want to be a pussy with a name like Axeminster, which is the most fucking badass name in existence.

MacGyver decides to get out of town for a while just until things cool down, so heads to Denver to visit his Grandfather who he hasn't seen since he was 10 years old. It is an icy reunion with MacGyver's Grandfather telling him he shouldn't have come. Fucking old people. MacGyver took the time out to come and visit his Grandfather and that is all he gets. It's not like he has anything so important to do that MacGyver's presence is a hinderance. He should be grateful for the company the stupid old cunt. 

Axeminster is able to intercept a message MacGyver had sent to his Grandfather previously and makes his way to Colorado where he assembles the best team of killers Denver has to offer.

Henchman: How do you want MacGyver, dead or alive?

Axeminster: ... DEAD.

What a fucking badass.

Back at MacGyver's Grandfathers house, the old guy reveals that after his son, MacGyver's father, died he just broke down and had to get away from everything which is why he'd moved to Denver and hadn't contacted MacGyver since. MacGyver still has a few issues with his Grandfather that he needs to deal with, but this confrontation is a good start. The healing has began.

Axeminster finds MacGyver's Grandfathers cabin easily enough but the two are not inside, they've made their way to a river for a spot of fishing. Just as MacGyver hooks a big one, bullets start raining down on them so they are forced to jump overboard and sacrifice the fish, which Gramps is more than a little pissed off about.

The two narrowly avoid being shot and make their way to shore unscathed. It's eight armed men, one of them the ruthless and brutal Axeminster, against two unarmed men, so MacGyver is going to have to use every trick he knows to get out of this situation.  

Denver just happens to be home to a plant from the Urtiga family that is highly toxic to humans and will knock you out for hours if you get some in your bloodstream. MacGyver stumbles across this plant on the banks of the river and constructs a blow gun and poison darts out of the plant and some reeds.  

MacGyver informs his Grandfather that for it to work you need to get them in the neck, which he does when he comes across two of the guys who want him dead. MacGyver's Grandfather is a little more old school and takes the second of the guys out with a piece of wood.

Two down, six to go.

It's around this time that MacGyver's Grandfather deems it appropriate to ask what the fuck is going on in which MacGyver replies with "it has to do with freedom and peace and some people who don't like either". Yeah whatever dude. It has to do with some guy who wants you dead because you blew up his factory. Gramps replies that he hasn't done this much running since being chased by a Grisly showing he is just as badass as Axeminster, just a little older.

We find out at this time that MacGyver's Grandfather's name is Harry and that he taught MacGyver everything he knows about creating decoys, a technique employed by MacGyver on a daily fucking basis ever since. Without his knack for creating diversions MacGyver would be fucked, actually he'd be dead by now, so he has a lot to thank his grandfather for.

This conversation proved to be the perfect segway into MacGyver and Harry constructing a diversion, the first of what I anticipate will be many.

Harry fills a jacket with twigs to make it look like a person and MacGyver drops it out of a tree into a passing jeep causing the jeep the crash into a ditch. While not technically a diversion and more of a dropping-something-from-a-tree-into-an-oncoming-vehicle it did what it intended killing or at least critically injuring the passengers.

And then there were four, and only one jeep.

In what can only be described as extreme bullshit part 2, MacGyver creates a land mine out of a buried pine-cone covering in tree sap that when detonated has the power to blow up a jeep.

Unfortunately for Harry extreme bullshit doesn't extend to immunity from gunshot wounds, an he takes one in side. While not critical, the gunshot wound certainly slows him down, but with Axeminster's jeep recently destroyed by a flaming pine-cone his posse are also on foot now.

MacGyver and Harry make it to the nearest town where Harry thought they'd be able to get help from the local police or at the very least get in contact with some law enforcement agency, unfortunately Harry hadn't been there for about 25 fucking years and the place was a ghost town.

They find shelter in an old tavern and MacGyver treats Harry's wound with a mixture consisting of fools gold and clay, much the same as used in hospitals. Harry reveals that he was hurt with the loss of his wife and daughter, MacGyver's mother, and wanted to avoid MacGyver because of the bad memories seeing him brought back, but he did miss him all these years. This was a touching scene, perhaps the most touching of the series, so touching in fact that it made me almost forget that MacGyver had treated a potentially serious gunshot wound with mud.

With night near, MacGyver decided to set up some traps around town to help take down Axeminster and his remaining posse at the inevitable showdown. These traps included an explosive made out of grain dust, a diversion created using a hook and thread tied to a curtain and a loose veranda awning. 

No sooner has the sun risen than Axeminster and his team roll into town. Gramps breaks out his curtain diversion instantly, two of the dudes check it out and MacGyver blows them up with the explosive grain dust.

Gramps then gets in on the diversion action by shoveling some pine nuts in a fire creating a gunshot sound luring one of the other henchmen over giving Gramps the opportunity to hit him over the head with a plank of wood. Gramps just loves beating the shit out of dudes with pieces of wood.

So far the traps have worked perfectly leaving only Axeminster alive.

MacGyver jumps off a roof landing on Axeminster and blows are exchanged. This is a fight for the ages, not too dissimilar to that between Rocky and Ivan Drago in Rocky IV, except much, much shitter. Unlike in Rocky IV the decisive blow in this battle involves a loose awning and a falling roof crushing Axeminster. It was a sad demise for one of MacGyver's most badass enemies.

Although the odds were against them, MacGyver and Harry were able to defeat Axeminster and his goons.

It was time for MacGyver to leave Colorado. To say it was an emotional goodbye is an understatement. MacGyver was reunited with his Grandfather after almost 20 years, a man that taught him the art of diversion and how to catch a fish. There were laughs, there were tears and there was lots of killing. MacGyver said he'll be back and this time it won't take 18 years.

MacGyver taught us that if you're outnumbered eight to two you'll always win provided you have flaming pine-cones and explosive grain dust in your possession.