Most Wanted (1976 TV series)


Most Wanted is an American crime drama series shown on ABC from October 16, 1976 until August 20, 1977. It stars Robert Stack, Jo Ann Harris, Shelly Novack, and Hari Rhodes. This program marks the reunion of series star Stack with producer Quinn Martin, who had worked together previously on the ABC crime series The Untouchables.

Overview

The series focused on an elite task force of the Los Angeles Police Department named "Most Wanted". The mayor of Los Angeles, Dan Stoddard, created the force to concentrate exclusively on criminals on the mayor's most-wanted list. In bringing them together, Mayor Stoddard specified "As few people as possible", and that their motto would be "Brainpower instead of manpower - focus instead of force". Captain Linc Evers headed the force accompanied by his two assistants who used undercover tactics to bring down the city's most wanted and dangerous criminals. The series' original pilot featured a fourth member, played by Tom Selleck, but he was not used for the series. Actress Leslie Charleson was in the pilot as the female member of the unit, but was replaced in the series by Harris.
According to Robert Stack in his autobiography Straight Shooting, Most Wanted had become a top 10 Nielsen ratings hit, but was cancelled by ABC due to network politics after one season.
The theme song was composed by Lalo Schifrin and later used by the Sunburst Band for the house song "New York City Woman."

Cast

Episodes

Home media

On March 20, 2018, CBS Home Entertainment released the Complete Series on DVD in Region 1. This is a Manufacture-on-Demand release, available from Amazon.com through their CreateSpace MOD program.