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Alfred Hitchcock Presents Season 3 Episodes
Season 3 Episode Guide
21 Episodes 1988 - 1988
Episode 1
VCR - Very Careful Rape
Sat, Feb 6, 1988
While aspiring actress Laura Donovan is videotaping a scene for an acting class, a man breaks into her apartment and rapes her. She goes to the police but they are skeptical - she showered and laundered her clothing after the attack eliminating any physical evidence - and she's not quite sure what to do. She knows the man who attacked her, Paul Stevens but he claims to be innocent. When she remembers the video tape, she invites Paul to her home for a special showing.
Episode 2
Animal Lovers
Sat, Feb 13, 1988
Diane Lewis' pet bearded collie is both her best friend and the most precious thing in the world. Her second favorite person is Ray Tayler, a marketing executive and her dreamy boyfriend. When the dog suddenly gets sick, Ray suggests that they take it to his veterinarian friend, Dr. Hoffman. The good doctor sadly informs her that the dog is terminally ill and he puts it to sleep. However, there's something Diane doesn't know about her perfect boyfriend but there's also something Ray doesn't know about Diane. She invites both him and the doctor to a dinner at her place and they are all about to have a very illuminating evening.
Episode 3
Prism
Sat, Feb 20, 1988
Police Lt. Steve Rykker investigates the murder of a wealthy attorney, Jason Forrester. The man's wife found him dead in her house and is quite distraught. After questioning neighbors, he starts to track down several women Forrester has been seeing. He soon realizes that Mrs Forrester suffers from multiple personalities and has no memory of what she did while acting out a different persona. He also has a very personal reason for wanting to solve the mystery.
Episode 4
A Stolen Heart
Sat, Feb 27, 1988
Dr. Burke is a dedicated conscientious surgeon who believes that money shouldn't buy priority status when it comes to treatment. His latest patient is a dying nice young girl, Katherine Murphy, who needs a new heart. Burke's superior, Winters, informs him that a donor's heart is about to be brought to the hospital, but there's a catch. Influential old rich man Ted Richardson has donated two million dollars to the hospital to get the heart first. Burke is furious until Ted's wife Judith Richardson arrives and pleads with him to back off. Meanwhile, two masked armed men ram the ambulance that's taking the heart to the hospital off the road and steal the heart for ransom. From this point on, this dark and shocking story becomes a maze of lies, double crosses and murder.
Episode 5
Houdini on Channel 4
Sat, Mar 5, 1988
Jack Barclay is a master magician who uses his niece Alicia as his assistant. He also claims that he converses with Harry Houdini. When she is kidnapped, he calls on Houdini's spirit to help him free her from her kidnapper. He doesn't realize that his niece is a willing victim.
Episode 6
Killer Takes All
Sat, Mar 12, 1988
In this black comedy with a twist, elderly retired cop Art Bellasco and retired private eye Jimmie Thurson can't stand each other and spend their days in the Sunset Acres retirement/nursing home playing gin and arguing with each other. However, the only thing they can't stand even more is the Sunset Acres home itself and its director Dr. Stern who's in it for the money. The only people who seem to care about them are nurse Maxwell and their silent friend Boots. One night Art and Jimmie make a pact: Whoever dies first gets the other person's life-savings, even if one kills the other, and gets to finally leave the accursed place and travel to some dreamy and fancy beach resort in France. This sets off a deadly competition between them. Meanwhile, Dr. Stern tries to land a new client - uptight elderly book lover, Mrs. Haverford, but Art's and Jimmie's duel keeps getting in the way.
Episode 7
Hippocritic Oath
Sat, Mar 19, 1988
Dale Thurston is a greedy amoral medical student who plans to graduate by any means necessary, since a medical school diploma is the one condition he has to meet to get millions of dollars in inheritance. However, Dean Compton, who's also Dale's surgical anatomy professor, refuses to let him pass fearing that Dale might ending up killing someone if he tries to operate on an actual patient. Dale seduces Compton's cute assistant Mary to get answers to future tests. He tries to explain that he doesn't intend to actually practice medicine and even offers Compton a 100,000 dollars bribe, but Compton rejects his offer in disgust and plans to report him and fail him for good. Dale decides to kill him and hires an alcoholic coroner, Hank Stewart, whose life was also supposedly ruined by Compton's unflinching attitude that he shouldn't be a doctor, to help him cover it up. But what Dale doesn't realize is that there are bigger schemers out there even than him.
Episode 8
Prosecutor
Sat, Mar 26, 1988
Clark Taylor is an ambitious public prosecutor who's eyeing the position of his boss, district attorney Joe Metcalf, who's retiring. To make sure that he's noticed by the right people, he demands a death penalty for a suspected cop killer. He even brags about it post-coitus to his girlfriend and fellow prosecutor Pamela Vance, who also works for Metcalf. However, a Vietnam vet called Rourke appears and claims that he's the real killer. Fearing that this muck up will kill his chances for promotion, Taylor bribes desperate, guilt-ridden Rourke to keep quiet. But Rourke soon returns for more. However, all is not what it seems.
Episode 9
If Looks Could Kill
Sat, Apr 23, 1988
Katherine Clark is a successful head of an interior design company. However, she can't stand the fact that she's aging, since she believes that with aging a woman loses her influence and position in society along with her beauty. Although married, she falls for a wealthy client, David Harrison, who turns out to have an obsession of his own - years ago he'd met his perfect woman in a girl called Anna but then he let her slip away and he's still haunted by and obsessed with her image to this very day. He sees some of her in Katherine and they hit it off well but eventually he faces facts and confesses to Katherine that he doesn't really love her but this other woman whom he sees in her. Katherine, believing that Harrison is her true love, opts for a desperate move and asks her plastic surgeon, doctor Austin, to make her look like the girl from David's past. Both him and her trusted assistant Kelly advise her not to do it but she insists. This backfires in a tragic way.
Episode 10
You'll Die Laughing
Sat, Apr 30, 1988
Stand up comedian Jed Salk is at the top of his game. The local stand up night club is always full when he's on, which works great for his colleague Ted Rawley, who always performs right after Jed. The club's owner Carl Gafsky thinks that Jed should change his manager Phil Halloran, a has-been fellow comedian and Jed's old friend and mentor, and find someone who could help him expand his career, but Jed has too much respect for the old guy and won't hear of it. Besides, Jed has other things to worry about like the fact that someone's been sending him anonymous death threats. His best friend Bishop tries to convince Jed to relax, but Jed becomes obsessed with the fact that he might die. And he has a very good additional reason for this, since his doctor has told him that he's suffering from inoperable cancer. The real kicker is that if Jed dies from that disease, his life insurance won't mean much to his wife Elizabeth and their kids, but if he's for exampled killed or murdered, the life insurance company would according to their agreement have to pay much more, which would help his family a lot. One way or the other, it would seem that Jed's days are numbered, but which will get him first - the horrifying illness, the psycho fan or his own gun?
Episode 11
Murder Party
Sat, May 7, 1988
A wealthy shady businessman is poisoned during his birthday party at his mansion. The main suspects are four of the people closest to him and they all had very good reasons to want him dead. Darkly comical plot twists ensue.
Episode 12
Twist
Sat, May 14, 1988
Alton Brooks is the trophy husband of somewhat older and very rich Georgia Brooks. He's a former asylum patient who cheats on her. She's terminally ill, wheelchair-bound and plans to take him down with her. One day, Alton is with his mistress Tirina when his wife suddenly calls. He plans to inherit her money, so he has learned to play the role of a caring worried husband well. He returns home to see what she wants only to find their butler dead. Georgia had shot him in the head. Georgia explains that she knows all about Tirina and Alton's other affairs and plans to kill both him and herself and end the charade that their marriage had turned into. He begs for mercy, so she shoots herself and leaves him to answer for their butler Hector's murder. Realizing that he's been framed, hearing the police at the door and not wanting to go back to the asylum or go to jail, Alton takes her gun and shoots himself in the head as well. However, this is just the beginning of a series of darkly humorous and more and more implausible plot twits.
Episode 13
User Deadly
Sat, May 21, 1988
N.Y.P.D. lieutenant Phil Mansfield is a week from retirement and he doesn't like it one bit, especially since he's trying to catch a brutal serial killer known as the Rainbow Killer. To make things worse, the killer is a computer freak who keeps sending taunting messages to Phil, a complete luddite. As Phil's captain, Andy Wilson, and his soon-to-be replacement, Brendon Casey, pressure him to wrap up the case fast, his computer-literate partner Dave Lawrence and tech-savvy nephew Jerry try to give him a hand and stop the maniac. One possible suspect is middle-aged mama's boy Danny Mosely, who's obsessed with the case. Meanwhile, Phil's daughter and Dave's ex, Carrie Mansfield, arrives back in town and the killer targets her next.
Episode 14
Career Move
Sat, May 28, 1988
Joey Mitchell is a washed up rock star who needs a comeback but his new album is not selling. Joey is also torn up because of his ex wife Alison, whom he still loves. Tommy is his personal bodyguard and best friend and he keeps trying to make Joey feel better and keep up his spirits. Marty Parks is Joey's manager and big fan who organizes a surprise party in the studio for Joey to get him to fell better about the new record. Unfortunately, one of the amps there short circuits and electrocutes Joey seemingly killing him. However, It turns out that the death was just a highly complex publicity stunt to boost the sales of the new record but what Joey doesn't yet realize is that someone really is trying to kill him.
Episode 15
Full Disclosure
Sat, Jun 18, 1988
Aging journalist and former Vietnam War correspondent G. William Howe plans to write a tell all book now that he needs money to pay for his divorce. His best friend, who was also in Vietnam with him, publisher Dale Linseman, supports him wholeheartedly. On the other hand, elderly powerful senator, Powell, asks Howe not to publish the book since the intelligence community doesn't want to have their secrets outed and something bad might happen to him. Political aide Jeff Wyatt also gives a friendly warning to Howe since the presidential election is happening soon and his book could help one or the other candidate win or lose. When Howe's wife Sandy decides to make peace with her husband and drop the divorce issue, he can't be more happier. That's when she ends up dead and he's framed for her murder. Howe must now get to the bottom of this conspiracy before they get him as well. However, sometimes the obvious answers are the wrong ones.
Episode 16
Kandinsky's Vault
Sat, Jun 25, 1988
Old nice bookshop owner and book lover Yosef Kandinsky refuses to sell his business to indebted casino owner Adrian Gelthorpe. Yosef has a daughter, Charlotte Kandinsky, and he'd loved to see her marry nice and bookwormish Gordon Blake. Yosef also has a grandfatherly rapport with a cute little girl and fellow book lover, Missy, who frequents his shop. One night after some drinking Kandinsky decides to tell his potential future son-in-law about the real reason why he won't sell. There's priceless loot from a 1930s robbery hidden somewhere in the store's old cellar. Gelthorpe needs the gold to avoid bankruptcy and finds a way into the cellar. However, Yosef has one more secret that he never told anyone about.
Episode 17
There Was a Little Girl...
Sat, Jul 2, 1988
Donna is an unscrupulous, spoiled, rich thrill seeker who has a strained relationship with her mother Martha and uncomfortably close relationship with her rich stepfather Frank. Donna plans to seduce and murder Frank and get all of his money and uses her meek boyfriend Harry to do it. However, Martha hears about her plan to seduce her own stepfather and asks the town's sheriff, chief Pickett, for help. What follows is a string of double-crosses.
Episode 18
Twisted Sisters
Sat, Jul 9, 198823 mins
Sorority president Candi Miller dislikes sorority pledge Sara Fletcher after she shows interest in her boyfriend Ty. One night, Candi gets her best friend Denise to come with her and Sara to the house of horrors attraction in the nearby fun park and help her scare Sara out of her wits. This is the same funhouse where Amanda Hansen, another of their pledges, tragically died some years ago during a similar prank. However, once inside the place, Amanda starts appearing to Candi. Is she going crazy or is Amanda really haunting the haunted funhouse.
Episode 19
The 13th Floor
Sat, Jul 16, 1988
Morris Conrad is a cynical, unscrupulous land developer who's in the business of tearing down old condemned buildings. His next job is to demolish St. Sebastian, an old hotel of historical value to the local citizens, who organize a protest. Their leader Doug Frazer even starts a petition which Conrad rejects with disdain. The only one willing to give moral support to Conrad is his personal secretary and lover Alyson Hanks, who makes sure that they are inseparable. However, as a last-ditch effort to stop Conrad, the elderly elevator operator of St. Sebastian's threatens to stay on the thirteenth floor of the building on the day when the hotel is to be demolished in a controlled explosion. Conrad doesn't care and blows up the hotel with the operator inside. Some time later, a guestbook from the hotel appears in Conrad's private elevator. Then his car almost go off the road and crash. It becomes clear that someone or something wants Conrad dead.
Episode 20
The Hunted: Part 1
Sat, Jul 30, 1988
Elderly Scotsman in the US called Drummond wants to rent one specific office, so nice and pretty real estate agent Margaret Lord takes him to see it. While there, he becomes increasingly unstable and hostile and starts talking in a quite misanthropic manner about people. He also talks in a more melancholic fashion about his hunting adventures as a child with his father and how great hunting was. Margaret, who at first mistakes his aggressive monologues for a cry for help from a proud but lonely man, eventually realizes that something is very wrong with Drummond and tries to escape but he takes her hostage, pulls a sniper rifle out of his suitcase and announces that he will start killing people in the park across the office window "when the right time comes".
Episode 21
The Hunted: Part 2
Sat, Aug 6, 1988
Unhinged Drummond is still holding real estate agent Margaret Lord hostage while preparing to shoot at people in the park when the clock strikes twelve. Terrified and desperate, Margaret first tries to offer herself to Drummond to get him to spare the people in the park but he, ashamed and embarrassed, rejects her plea. She then tries to calm him down with words and get him to realize that what he's doing is wrong. He decides to explain his motivations to her but keeps his true intentions secret for the time being. He turns out to be a much more tragic character than what he seems.
