Series Summary

Tough but not swaggering, serious but not solemn, S.W.A.T. won over its 1970s television audience with several unexpectedly interesting elements: A degree of storytelling sophistication; visually exciting, guerrilla-like street violence; and a subtle but determined fascination with the psyches of the show's five principal characters. To a non-viewer, S.W.A.T. looked like a fatuously reassuring, law-and-order shill in the aftermath of the Vietnam war and Watergate. In reality, creator-producer Robert Hammer (a Peabody Award winner for the 1979 POW TV drama, When Hell Was in Session) managed to make an ideal, mid-'70s Aaron Spelling cop show with an extra emphasis on the human factor in peacekeeping.

Premiered on: February 17, 1975

Cast

Steve Forrest ... Lt. Dan "Hondo" Harrelson
Rod Perry ... Sgt. David "Deacon" Kay
Robert Urich ... Officer Jim Street
Mark Shera ... Officer Dominic Luca
James Coleman ... Officer T.J. McCabe
Ellen Weston ... Betty Harrelson