Tour of Duty (TV series)

Overview

Not simply an action program, Tour of Duty was also groundbreaking as it addressed the issues of politics, faith, teamwork, racism, suicide, fragging, terrorism, civilian deaths, drug abuse, and the shattered lives and confused feelings of those troops who finally made it home alive. The story focused mainly on Bravo company's second platoon under the command of 2nd Lieutenant (1st Lieutenant from the start of season 2) Myron Goldman (Stephen Caffrey) and Staff Sergeant (later Sergeant First Class) Zeke Anderson (Terence Knox).

The first season was filmed on location in Hawaii at Schofield Barracks. For the second and third seasons, the series was filmed around Los Angeles, California in order to reduce costs. This also enabled the producers to re-dress a studio backlot as Saigon. The move also meant reusing the same locations, notably a small river with grass on one bank and woods on the other which turns up in a number of episodes. A lot of filming was undertaken on the old set of M*A*S*M*A*S*H. Helicopter scenes with 1st Lt. McKay were filmed on the ground with the rotors running.

The first season opens in 1967 and follows a standard light infantry platoon. In the second season, the troops found themselves relocated to a base near Saigon while conducting the typical "search and destroy" missions. Production staff interviewed in VIETNAM Magazine cited this change as a change in premise that doomed the series, as female characters were also introduced (in hopes of gaining more female viewership and because of the premiere of the ABC Vietnam Army Nurses drama China Beach, which was aimed at a more female audience), and the show ceased to be a realistic chronicle of life in the field for the average line infantryman in favor of being more romance- and action/adventure-oriented. In the third season, the remaining female character was killed off, and the platoon was transferred to a SOG (Studies and Observation Group) unit under the command of Colonel Brewster (played by Carl Weathers), conducting covert operations in Vietnam and in Cambodia, culminating in the fictional version of the raid on Son Tay Prison. The third season was the show's last.

In its third season, CBS moved the show to the Saturday 9:00 p.m. time slot. Being forced to compete with NBC's The Golden Girls and Empty Nest, the show's ratings dropped, and the show was canceled at the end of the season.

Awards

The series won an Emmy Award in 1988 for Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Drama Series, and it was nominated again in 1989 and 1990.

Emmy Award nominations:

Eddie Award nominations

International broadcasts

In Australia, Network Ten originally aired the series at 7:30 pm. In recent years, repeats have returned to Australian television with the Seven Network repeating the series in 2006 in late night Thursday timeslots airing at 11.30 pm then later bumped to 12:00 midnight. Repeats also returned with Channel Ten repeating the series in 2010 in late Sunday nights airing at 1.30am. FOX Classics started airing the first series on the 17 September 2012.

In the Netherlands, it was broadcast by Veronica on the national television network.

In the United Kingdom, Tour of Duty was screened on ITV on Friday nights at various times, usually around midnight. It was later broadcast on the FX channel.

The French-speaking version was called "L'Enfer du devoir" (The Hell of duty) and aired in France and the Province of Québec (aired on the Historia channel in Québec Monday through Thursday at 5 PM in July and August 2005).

In the Philippines, it was weekly aired in English on GMA 7 every Monday night at 9:00 pm. The American service members stationed in the Philippines routinely watched it on the local network because the episodes were newer than the ones on Armed Forces Radio and Television Service's Far East Network.

In Costa Rica, it was aired by channel 9 and then by channel 7 as "Misión Vietnam" (Mission Vietnam).

In New Zealand, the show was aired by TVNZ. It was a very popular show in New Zealand and re-runs were also shown on the Orange TV network throughout the 1990s.

In Mexico, it was aired by Televisa's canal 5 as "Misión del Deber" (Duty Mission).

In Argentina, it was broadcast by TELEFE as "Nam: Primer Pelotón" (Nam: First Platoon).

In Spain, Telecinco aired the show as "Camino del Infierno" (Road of Hell) in late night hours Wednesday and later on C+ as Tour of Duty at 12.00 M.

In Italy, the show was aired by a local TV Network Italia7 with the title "Vietnam Addio" (Goodbye Vietnam) in the form of a TV-movie. It was also aired on the national network Italia1.

In Israel, the show aired in the mid-2000s on the now-defunct local version of the AXN cable channel under the name "Sherut Kravi" (Combat Service). It was also previously broadcast on the METV channel.

In Germany, the show was aired by RTL with the title "NAM – Dienst in Vietnam" (NAM – Service in Vietnam).

In Japan, the show with the title "Good Luck Saigon" was aired through the Wowow, a paid satellite broadcast around 1991. For this reason, the show is least known by the Japanese public.

In Zimbabwe, the show was broadcast in the early 1990s, showing on the national television channel ZBC TV1 (Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation Television 1) at nine o'clock pm on Thursdays and developed a cult following, becoming a hit television series throughout its screening.

In South Africa, the show was aired with the title "Sending Vietnam" (Mission Vietnam) in Afrikaans by the SABC.

In Sweden, the show was originally scheduled by the public service SVT network as "Pluton B i Vietnam" (Platoon B in Vietnam). In the late 1990s, the show was picked up by Kanal 5 under the same name.

In Norway, the show was broadcast with the title "Pliktløpet" (Run of duty) by TV Norge in the 1990s.

In Denmark, the show was broadcast in the 1990s as "Platoon B" on various local-TV networks, mainly on Kanal 2.

In Brazil, the show was broadcast by SBT with the title "Combate no Vietnã" (Combat in Vietnam).

In Colombia and Chile, the show was aired with the title "Misión del Deber" (Duty Mission), based in the Mexican dub of the series.

In Poland, the show was never aired, but there was a VHS release with the title "Rok w Piekle" (Year in Hell).

In Sri Lanka, the show has been aired at least twice, once in 1990s and once in 2007/8 by MTV.

In the United Arab Emirates, it was aired on Dubai's channel 33.

In Korea (Republic of Korea), the show was aired with the title "머나먼 정글" (Faraway Jungle) by MBC from 1990. It was initially aired at 11:00 PM Monday but due to popularity it moved to 6:00 PM Saturday.

In Taiwan (Republic of China), the show has been aired on China Television Company, Ltd. (CTV) as 霹靂神兵. The Ministry of National Defense (Republic of China) also purchased the series, renamed 天降神兵 and aired it on Chinese Television System (CTS) and CTS Education and Culture.

In Saudi Arabia, it was (as of July 2013) being shown with the original title and in English with Arabic subtitles. It is broadcast on the MBC Action channel.

Music

The opening theme song was an abbreviated version of Jack Black'screen version of The Rolling Stones hit "Paint It, Black" that had featured in the end titles of the 1987 Vietnam War film Full Metal Jacket, this was removed for the US DVD release. The closing consisted of an instrumental, synthesized tune with a distinctive Asian sound mixed in with acoustic guitar; it was performed by Joseph Conlan, and was never released for public consumption other than in the series. That music was used as background music for most of the series. On the US release DVD most of the Vietnam War era popular music was replaced by instrumental bits to cover the blank spots of music.

All three seasons that have been released in the United Kingdom, has the complete original soundtrack including "Paint It, Black".

The show was known for its classic American rock soundtrack including Creedence Clearwater Revival, Jimi Hendrix, and Jefferson Airplane. One first-season episode, "USO Down", used "live" versions of "Wooly Bully", and "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" as performed by a USO band, the latter song being used also for ironic comment. The songs in this episode were retained in the DVD soundtracks. But for copyright reasons, the VHS and DVD soundtracks of the majority of episodes were replaced with sound alikes—a move which was widely protested by buyers, and resulted in a significantly lower sales volume for the third-season DVD set than for the first two.

In the Netherlands, amongst other European nations, a total number of seven albums were released, containing most of the songs featured on the show. As a result, "Paint It, Black" was re-released as a single, again hitting the number 1 position in the Dutch top 40 popchart in May 1990.

The original soundtrack albums

The Tour of Duty television series soundtrack was released by CBS on Columbia Records as four different compilation albums during 1988 and 1989. The original albums are now out of print. Their track listings are as follows:

Compilation soundtrack CDs

In 1992, Sony Music released a compilation CD titled The Best of 'Tour of Duty'. It contains only twenty of the songs featured in the four original Tour of Duty Soundtrack albums.

DVD releases

Sony released all 3 seasons in the USA for the very first time in 2004-2005. All original music was replaced with sound-alike versions. These releases have been discontinued and are out of print.

On August 27, 2013, it was announced that Mill Creek Entertainment had acquired the rights to various television series from the Sony Pictures library including Tour of Duty. They subsequently re-released the first season on DVD on September 16, 2014.

On April 21, 2015, Mill Creek released a budget priced complete series set, an eleven-disc set featuring all 58 episodes of the series.

On November 7, 2011 Fabulous Films (licensed from Fremantle Home Entertainment) in the United Kingdom released the complete first season as a region 2 PAL boxed set. This release has improved sound and picture quality and the complete original soundtrack, including "Paint It, Black". The release consists of 5 DVDs covering all 21 episodes. The fifth disc contains extras including hundreds of behind the scenes stills and images and a brand new documentary that runs for 55 minutes. Fabulous Films filmed a series of interviews in Los Angeles in July 2011 with 7 of the key cast: Terence Knox, Josh Maurer, Steve Akahoshi, Tony Becker, Eric Bruskotter, Kevin Conroy and Miguel A Nunez Jr. and key members of the production crew that included Zev Braun (producer) Bill Norton (writer/director), Steve Smith (writer/producer), Steve Duncan (creator) and Paul Sinor (military advisor). Additional documentaries are being produced for the season 2 and 3 releases.

The complete second season was released on May 14, 2012 in the UK. Featuring a brand new making of documentary 'The Story of Tour Of Duty' Part 2 (30 mins) featuring Cast and Crew, Character Biographies, Original Cast Biographies, Original Crew Biographies, Action Stills, Behind The Scenes Stills, Publicity Stills, Synopses and Glossary of Tour of Duty Military Terms.

On November 26, 2012, Fabulous released the complete third season on DVD in the UK, along with the complete series set which was released simultaneously. The third instalment of the documentary features Dan Gauthier AKA Lt. Johnny McKay