Mission: Impossible
The Crane
TV Flash files “The Crane” as hour 101 of 171 in the TV Flash guide — Mission: Impossible (1966–1973) on CBS, season 4, episode 23, aired 1970-03-08, 60 min.
From the desk
How this hour is filed
This leaf is S04E23: listed hour 101 of 171 in the Mission: Impossible guide, hour 23 of 26 in season 4. It aired 1970-03-08 (60 min). The listed hour before it is “Orpheus” (S04E22). Next is “Death Squad” (S04E24).
Catalog log
Broadcast listing — not a TV Flash recap.
After rescuing a prisoner from execution by a dictator, the IMF has to find a hiding place so conspicuous it will be overlooked by police hunting the fugitive.
Viewer FAQ
Where does The Crane sit in the Mission: Impossible guide?
S04E23 is listed hour 101 of 171 — hour 23 of 26 in season 4, season 4 episode 23.
When did Mission: Impossible S04E23 air?
The Crane aired 1970-03-08 and is listed at 60 minutes.
Do I need to watch Mission: Impossible in order?
No. It is a procedural. Assignments reset. Cast changes are the serial. Start with the pilot for the briefing grammar, then hop to praised hours such as “The Mind of Stefan Miklos.”
In the series
Why this series still plays
Watch the original team as instrument: briefings that self-destruct, disguises as structure, and a weekly procedural that treats competence as drama. The movies later sold spectacle; the series sold method, still the rarer on-screen trick.
The tape still matters more than the stunt. A briefing, a team, a plan that will not survive contact with a living room's commercials — Mission: Impossible, 1966 on CBS, is the century's heist novel told in weekly chapters. Bruce Geller's series argues that competence is a kind of glamour. The later movies sold faces falling off cliffs. The original sold faces falling off in a workshop. That is not nostalgia. That is a different theory of suspense.
Filed against
- Peter Graves as Jim Phelps
Peter Graves led the IMF as Jim Phelps on Mission: Impossible — self-destructing briefings, team-craft heists cool as a Cold War martini, a table of specialists as the weekly set piece. The movies later bought explosions. Graves sold…
- Barbara Bain as Cinnamon Carter
Barbara Bain’s Cinnamon Carter made Mission: Impossible cool as a Cold War martini — glamour, disguises, and team-craft heists with Emmy-winning poise. Self-destructing briefings never looked sharper. TV Flash salutes the original IMF…
- Martin Landau as Rollin Hand
Martin Landau’s Rollin Hand is Mission: Impossible as disguise craft — the IMF specialist who made competence a set piece before the movies bought altitude. Bruce Geller’s 1966 CBS procedural treated method as glamour; Landau, with…
- Greg Morris as Barney Collier
Greg Morris played Barney Collier on Mission: Impossible — team craft as drama, gadgets as structure, a Cold War procedural that treated method as the set piece later films would replace with altitude. TV Flash files him as the original…
- Peter Lupus as Willy Armitage
Peter Lupus’s Willy Armitage was Mission: Impossible’s human set piece — IMF muscle as a specialist, strength as one instrument in a weekly machine of disguises and briefings. Competence was the glamour. TV Flash still files the strongman…