Recap / The A Team S 5 E 10 The Crystal Skull

The team is sent to retrieve a crystal skull from a couple of Australian mercenaries so it can be returned to its original owner. While the mission is a success at first, a bullet holes the aircraft's fuel line and they are forced to bail out over the island of Toga, whose inhabitants decide to worship Murdock as a god. However this proves a Spanner in the Works for some fake monks using a rival island chief to conquer the other islands for their own scheme.

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This episode includes examples of the following tropes:

• Agony of the Feet
  Frankie: I told you it would work.
  Murdock: (trying to smile through gritted teeth) I think I have blisters all over the bottom of my feet. Do you want to kiss them?
• As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Parodied
  • While disguised as one of the natives, Frankie shouts "Ooga booga!" for want of anything better.
  • At the end of the episode when the natives pay homage to Murdock with chanting, the words are clearly: "Who wrote this? Who wrote this?"
• Artistic License – Religion: The mercenaries should be posing a missionaries, not monks. Then again it probably gives them an excuse to isolate themselves from anyone who might figure out they're phony.
• Bad Habits: The monks carry automatic weapons under their robes and the chanting in their monastery is revealed to be a tape recording. Later a couple of the team dress up in robes themselves when the Australian mercenaries turn up.
• Battle-Interrupting Shout: The tribe from Togo Togo is about to attack the tribe from Toga when the team parachute in between the two rows of warriors. When it looks like they'll be killed instead, Murdock descends Firing in the Air a Lot causing Chief Saderaka's tribe to flee. Then when Murdock takes out the skull to make sure it's not damaged, the Toga natives all start worshipping him as their saviour.
• But Now I Must Go: Murdock to Leesa. At least he gets a kiss out of it.
• Chekhov's Gunman: The two Australians pursuing the team in the Action Prologue follow them to the island to complicate matters just when they've defeated the fake monks.
• Combat by Champion: Chief Saderaka declares his people will fight to the death rather than hand over the skull. He's convinced to try this trope instead, but rather than the two best warriors fighting each other (B.A is entirely willing to volunteer) insists the chiefs must do so (the other chief is older than him). However as Murdock outranks the chief as their god, he gets to fight instead. He's not happy about this, but wins.
• Crystal Skull: Which for some reason comes from the Middle East instead of South America. Naturally the half-naked savages of the South Pacific regard it as a religious artifact; not that modern Westerners would ever think that a crystal skull has supernatural properties...oh, right.
• Damsel in Distress: The tribe from Togo Togo do a raid and steal the skull, taking Leesa with them. Chief Saderaka tries to stop the mercenaries taking her away, but he's forced at gunpoint to back down.
• Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: Murdocka must past the Test of Tattoopoo, which is a test of immortality.
  Face: Wait a second here; the only way to test immortality would be to see if a guy is ah...ah...mortal!
• God Test: The god Murdocka is asked to summon thunder, but he says he only does that once a week. Then when he's balks at being presented with a wife he's told he's free to take his time sampling all the women of the village (Face gripes that this would have been a perfect assignment for him) but if he can't satisfy any one of them he'll fail the God Test and be put to death. Then when the monks say he's not a god, the natives make him do a firewalk to prove he's immortal. Fortunately Frankie does up a flame retardant to protect him from the heat.
• Hollywood Atlas: There is a South Pacific island called Toga, though it's not clear if it's the same one here, as the government of Vanuatu which has jurisdiction over that island is doing nothing to stop what's going on. It's one of the Torres Islands but none of the others are called Togo Togo.
• Hollywood Natives: Oh Lord, yes. The primitive natives who mistake a white man with his 'thunderstick' who falls into their midst as a god and present him with a beautiful native girl as a wife, wear loincloths without the slightest sign of a wristwatch or T-shirt, and spend their time warring with headhunters and dancing barechested around a totem pole asking Who Writes This Crap?!
• Kick the Dog:
  • Just to hammer home how evil they are, the diamond smugglers are shown giving A Taste of the Lash to the natives who have been Made a Slave.
  • Lampshaded when Stockwell warns what will happen if the skull isn't delivered on time.
  Stockwell: If he can't return that skull to King Fassad, King Fassad can't put his country's oldest religious object back in his museum. That means he's broken a promise to his people, the President's broken his promise to him, I've broken my promise to the President, and you've broken your promise to me. Now in that scenario, whose dog gets kicked?
• The Men First: Stockwell insists the crystal skull must be returned in time for a state banquet that is somehow crucial to peace in the Middle East. Hannibal says the Middle East is just going to have to wait as his first priority is rescuing his men.
• Missing Steps Plan: It's not exactly clear 'how' the mercenaries are helping Chief Saderaka's tribe conquer the other islands, seeing as all they do is walk around in robes and refuse to take direct action until the team gets involved.
• Not What It Looks Like
  • Murdocka says this when a couple of Christian monks turn up when the tribe is bowing down to him. The monks are quite understanding—as well they should given that they're the ones who are the frauds.
  • At the end of the episode, Stockwell turns up in an aircraft to find the team being feted with dancing and bowls of fruit, and decides they've been lying about what's happening so they can have an island vacation.
• Pun: The god Murdocka is asked to adjudicate a case where one man's hut fell down in a storm, so he burned down the hut of the man who built it. Mudocka communes with the skull and declares that the two men must live together until they've each built the other a hut.
  Mudocka: Hut very important! As in the words of the great god Joe Namath...Hut, hut, hut, hut!
• Slavery Is a Special Kind of Evil: The fake monks are using Chief Saderaka as a Puppet King to conquer the other islands and use the captives as slave labour to dig up the diamonds so their employer can sell them. Chief Saderaka admits he knows the monks are phony but is powerless to do anything to stop them in the face of their superior firepower.
• Sleeping Dummy: Clay dummies are created of the natives and Murdocka (along with a tape recording) so Wo Tung's mercenaries can be Lured into a Trap.
• Tempting Fate:
  • "This is the easiest assignment Stockwell has ever given us!" And that's even before the shooting starts in the Action Prologue.
  • Face denies the skull is cursed right before a severed fuel line forces them to bail out.
• Tonto Talk: All the Hollywood Natives of course, as does 'Murdocka' whenever he's trying to sound godly.
• Tropical Island Adventure
• Unwanted False Faith: Murdock finds himself mistaken for a god. In fairness he's reluctant to abuse his position, though that's also because if he fails a God Test the natives will put him to death. Then Hannibal turns up and decides the Great God Murdocka is just the authority he needs to pull off The Plan he's got in mind.