Southern Comfurts

[MaximRecoil]

I have a couple of questions about this episode. Since when was Boss Hogg in the tire business? You would think that the Dukes would buy their tires from Cooter; even if Boss Hogg did take up selling tires for a day. Or; was it supposed to be implying that the Dukes got a loan from Boss to buy the tires? If so, what did they do? put up the tires that they were about to buy as collateral? That would be the only way they could be repo'd for failure to pay. It was an odd situation (even for the DoH) either way.

Why did they have their car hidden under a tarp and hay when Rosco and Boss Hogg arrived? That makes it kind of hard to make a quick getaway; you know, like the kind they have to do unexpectly several time per episode.

Also; why did they paint their car green, aside from the producers liking the novelty factor?

Bo: "We're in a jam and y'all are taking the time to paint the General..."

Luke: "Hey Bo, if the cops pick us up in this thing we're gonna have plenty of time in jail."

Say what? The only "jam" I could see was that they couldn't find the grey car. Did I miss something? As far as I could tell; they hadn't even been framed for anything in this episode. Boss Hogg and company spent the entire episode chasing after the grey car/money, not the Dukes.

One more thing. Is this the only time in history that someone has driven off (slowly by a drunk I might add) from Hazzard square and the Dukes aren't on their tail in seconds? No vehicle you say? What about Cooter's truck? Always worked for similar situations any other time. Instead they just stand there while a quarter million dollars drives away and don't decide to search for it until hours (?) later.

Very strange episode...

It was late when I watched it tonight (last time I saw it was about 25 years ago) and I'm headed to bed. I'll watch it again tomorrow to see if I missed something.

[Jamanda]

There are a lot of strange occurances in this episode. Let's see if I'm of any help.

The tire question. From what little I know about cars, you purchase tires from a special store, not really from your local mechanic. So perhaps Bo and Luke had to buy them from an autoparts store, that was owned an operated by Boss, just like everything else.

Hiding their car is easy. They were expecting Boss and Rosco to show up and try to take their tires, so they hid the car. Maybe it wasn't the smartest move, but even Dukes aren't perfect.

Painting the General green. I admit, it is strange that they did this here and not in any other episode where it would've been more useful. I'd say it was solely for the producer's novelty factor. Maybe the charger they had for the episode was actually green and they didn't want to paint it orange, so they filmed them painting a different kind of orange car green. Just a theory.

Chasing the other car out of town. Perhaps, seeing as it was a common gray car, it blended in too well. They did show the various Dukes pulling over various other gray cars. The traffic might have been too heavy to chase after it. Besides, the episode would've been too short if they caught it right away.

Anyway, those are just my theories. Hope they're helpful.

[MaximRecoil]

The tire question. From what little I know about cars, you purchase tires from a special store, not really from your local mechanic.

Specialty tire stores are a rarity around here and I suspect they are in most any small town. People around here buy tires from the Dexter Exxon station which is a local gas station/garage that has a couple of mechanics employed; or, they buy from Brooks Tire and Auto which is also primarily a garage (they were also a gas station until about 1982) with about 4 mechanics employed. The auto parts store in our town doesn't even sell tires. Another option is to buy used tires from local junkyards; or go to Bangor (our nearest "city") and get them from Sears or something.

Hiding their car is easy. They were expecting Boss and Rosco to show up and try to take their tires, so they hid the car. Maybe it wasn't the smartest move, but even Dukes aren't perfect.

Not only was it not a smart move but it was completely un-Duke-like. Standard procedure for the Dukes = make a getaway. A hidden car in a limited space (The Duke Farm) is going to be found; period. So what was their plan when the inevitable would happen?

Painting the General green. I admit, it is strange that they did this here and not in any other episode where it would've been more useful. I'd say it was solely for the producer's novelty factor. Maybe the charger they had for the episode was actually green and they didn't want to paint it orange, so they filmed them painting a different kind of orange car green. Just a theory.

Well; they certainly did have a green Charger on hand. You can see it about halfway through the episode before they paint the car; they have their trunk lid open. It is still green on the underside:

So they most likely filmed the scenes showing the "repainted" green Charger before they painted that Charger in the screenshot from its original green to the General Lee uniform. The thing is though; there is nothing unusual about that. All of the Chargers they used in that show had their own original color when they acquired them that had to be painted over in order to make them into General Lee's.

It was a pretty good stunt but made no sense in the context of this episode. No one was even after them. This was one of the few episodes where they weren't in trouble for anything (other than the tire payment which had been forgotten about as soon as Boss set his sights on the $250,000). And upon conclusion of the show; what good had it done them anyway? They chased the grey car and shot out the tire with an arrow while driving the green Charger. If they had left out the green Charger part of the show; it wouldn't have affected the way the story played out in the least.

Novelty factor I guess; because it just doesn't fit into that episode at all. You could splice it into countless other episodes where it would have made sense; just not this one.

Chasing the other car out of town. Perhaps, seeing as it was a common gray car, it blended in too well. They did show the various Dukes pulling over various other gray cars. The traffic might have been too heavy to chase after it. Besides, the episode would've been too short if they caught it right away.

Your last statement is true; but there are plenty of ways around it. In keeping with the Duke's established characters; they could have at least given chase in whatever vehicle they could round up on short notice; such as the old standby; Cooter's truck. The chase could have been unsuccessful for whatever reason and then they could have cut to the scene at the Duke farm where they come up with a plan. Just standing there and waiting an hour or so before even starting to do something was completely out of character; in a similar manner to the way hiding the General Lee earlier in the episode was so out of character.

[Jamanda]

have you ever considered debate? you're awful good at it.