Sledge Hammer!

Inspector Sledge Hammer (David Rasche) is a stubborn, narrow-minded, opinionated, sexist, and reactionary (all of this by his own admission) detective from the San Francisco Police Department. According to many of his fellow detectives, he "makes Dirty Harry look like Mr. Peepers." Hammer's most prized possession is his .44 Magnum Smith & Wesson Model 629 revolver (a stainless steel version of the Smith & Wesson Model 29) with a customized grip, featuring an engraving of a sledgehammer. Hammer sleeps and showers with his gun, (it has its own satin pillow) and even talks to it, referring to it as "her." He believes in shooting first and asking questions never. Despite this, Hammer is never seen killing anybody on-screen during the whole 41 episodes of the show. In the pilot episode, he deals with a sniper on a skyscraper roof by blowing up the entire building with a M72 LAW...after which he utters "I think I got him" to onlooking cops. In "Witless," a mob assassin hides in Hammer's closet; Sledge guns down his would-be-murderer through the closed door (which has a bullseye on it) without ever knowing he's there. Later in the same episode, Hammer fatally kicks a Mafia boss through an open window. Sledge also mentions that his favorite charity is "Toy Guns for Tots". Hammer's father was Jack Hammer, a legendary carnival trick shooter whose repertoire of shooting tricks included catching a bullet in his teeth, which saved his son's life in one episode (another episode reveals that Jack gave Sledge his Magnum). His mother's name was Armin Hammer. In the episode "Brother, Can You Spare A Crime?", while Doreau and Trunk were researching Hammer's family tree, his roots go back to Ivan the Terrible; coincidentally, he had an uncle named "Ivan". He is also a distant relative to Genghis Khan, through an aunt named "Joan Khan". He is a direct descendant of Mahatma Gandhi, whom he refers to as a "black sheep" in his otherwise violent family.

While purportedly a stickler for law and order, Hammer is rather lax when it actually comes to following police procedure and adhering to regulations. He enjoys roughing up suspected criminals, whom he frequently refers to as "brain-dead mutants", "yogurt-sucking creeps", and the like. He is often suspended from duty, over such infractions as firing warning shots at jaywalkers; his police file requires three wheelbarrows to transport.

Hammer drives a beat-up, bullet-riddled, lime green Dodge St. Regis with an "I ♥ VIOLENCE" bumper sticker. He prefers to wear sports jackets, loud neckties, and dark sunglasses. One episode had him visiting a friend of his who worked in the coroner's office, with the friend saying that no bodies with clothing Hammers size had come in recently. His favorite music consists of classical, "Taps" and "Ballad of the Green Berets". He is divorced, and frequently makes jokes at the expense of his ex-wife, who makes an appearance in the final episode, played by Rasche's real-life wife, Heather Lupton.

Despite his irresponsibility and highly destructive urges, Hammer always ends up getting his man (or woman), often through sheer luck, brute force, the initiative of his partner, or the rare flash of brilliance. Hammer's unintentionally ironic motto is: "Trust me, I know what I'm doing", and disaster usually follows. Another expression he favors is: "Don't confuse me", typically in response to any remark that challenges his markedly one-dimensional worldview.

Hammer's partner is Detective Dori Doreau (Anne-Marie Martin), who is sensitive, intelligent, and sophisticated, though also a tough, agile cop who can handle a gun and deliver a well-timed karate kick when necessary, and who frequently saves Hammer from the extraordinary predicaments into which he invariably gets himself. Doreau is often shocked and offended by Hammer's crass behavior and obnoxious attitude, but she appears to see "some" redeeming qualities beneath his gruff exterior. It becomes apparent with time that she has some romantic feelings for Sledge. Hammer's blatant male chauvinism is a running gag in his dialogues with Doreau (from episode "Under the Gun"):

Doreau: What, you think all women should be barefoot and pregnant?

Hammer: No, I encourage women to wear shoes.

Captain Trunk (Harrison Page) supervises Hammer and Doreau. He is a chronically uptight, Pepto-Bismol-guzzling, apoplectic parody of police precinct captains from popular 1970s and 1980s TV cops shows. Trunk spends most of his time yelling at Hammer for his incompetence or complaining about his migraine headaches and hypertension brought on by Hammer's antics.

• Officer Fletcher Majoy (Leslie Morris) – desk sergeant at the precinct, he is depicted as rather lazy and slovenly, rarely making any effort to help the other officers.
• Officer Daley (Patti Tippo) – another officer at the precinct.
• Coroner Norman Blates (Kurt Paul) – the precinct's medical examiner, he specializes in the sudden deceased at crime scenes. According to executive producer Alan Spencer, the character is a play on Norman Bates, the character from Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. Coincidentally, the actor who portrayed him, Kurt Paul, actually portrayed Norman Bates in Bates Motel and even worked as a stunt double for Anthony Perkins as Norman Bates in Psycho II and Psycho III.
• Newscaster Lisa Ellerblub (Diane Sainte-Marie) – a local news anchorwoman (a play on Linda Ellerbee), she is usually on the receiving end of Hammer's chauvinistic insults.

Some notable figures who made guest appearances on Sledge Hammer!:

Sledge Hammer! executive producer Spencer made a Hitchcockian cameo appearance on the episode "Witless".

Actor Jackie Cooper directed a few episodes himself.

Image from introduction

The introduction to the show features long, near-sensual closeup shots of Hammer's .44 Magnum as it rests on a luxurious satin pillow. The show's ominous theme music, composed by Danny Elfman, plays in the background. Hammer then picks up his gun, spins it expertly like a cinematic Old West gunslinger, and utters his catch phrase ("Trust me, I know what I'm doing") just before firing into the screen, making a hole in it. According to the DVD release extras, the original version had Hammer firing directly at the viewer, but ABC executives feared this could be too shocking, possibly even causing heart attacks (and leaving the network liable). Thus, Hammer fires into the screen at a slight angle.

According to the DVD release, Hammer's original catch phrase was "I'm crazy, but I know what I'm doing." ABC executives objected to a lead character being "crazy", so they insisted on a change.

The DVD release uses an updated heavy metal version of the theme music by Baboon Rising on the main menus.

Despite critical acclaim, Sledge Hammer! struggled in the ratings. In the documentary on the second season DVDs, David Rasche remarks that the only series getting lower ratings than Sledge Hammer! was Fox's The Tracey Ullman Show.

Sledge Hammer! attracted weekly viewership of nineteen million viewers who followed the show religiously through its many time slot shifts. The fact that the series appealed to key target demographics also kept it on the schedule.

Because ABC intended to cancel the series, the last episode of the first season ends with Hammer accidentally destroying the city when he attempts to disarm a stolen nuclear warhead; just before the explosion Hammer embarks on his infamous catchphrase "Trust Me.....". The last scene shows the Beneath the Planet of the Apes-style ruins of the city with Trunk's voice screaming "HAMMMMMMMER!", and a graphic flashed:

"To Be Continued... Next Season?"

However, this episode got much better than expected ratings, in large part because the network had moved the show to a better time slot. ABC changed its mind and renewed the show for a second season.

The second-season premiere perfunctorily explained that it and following episodes were set "five years before" the explosion, though Doreau is Sledge's partner in the second season, despite being introduced to him in the pilot, and despite the presence of references to contemporary events, rather than those of five years earlier.

Bill Bixby (of The Incredible Hulk fame) was brought in to direct numerous episodes.

In the final moments of the final episode, Sledge asks Dori to marry him, but then claims he was only kidding. The viewer is left to imagine what happens next.

The second season suffered from another extremely undesirable time slot (this time against The Cosby Show), a reduced budget, and lowered filming standard (down to 16 mm film from the previous season's 35 mm). The cutbacks contributed to the show not being renewed for a third season.

The episode "Wild About Hammer" sparked viewer confusion when the epilogue satirized the trend of coloring black & white films. Following the commercial break, a disclaimer read, "The following tag was shot in black and white, then artificially recolored. We promise you will not be able to see the difference." The scene was intentionally altered not only in color, but also in tint, hue, brightness and contrast – prompting viewers to call their local ABC stations and complain about the broadcast quality. In response, Spencer recorded an apology message for ABC's phone lines.[3]

• The series was marketed in Japan as I Am Hammer! (俺がハマーだ!, Ore ga Hamā da!).[4]
• It has aired in Pakistan under its original title on Network Television Marketing.
• It has aired in the Philippines under its original title on RPN-9.

• In Denmark the title was translated into For Fuld Hammer! (lit. 'To the Full Hammer!'), a Danish idiom meaning to use the entirety of one's force.
• In Finland the title was Moukarimies, meaning 'Sledgehammer Man'.
• In France the series was called Mr. Gun.
• In Germany was called Der Hammer until 1993, also Sledge's gun is named "Susi" in the German version, a joke created during dubbing (the gun has no particular name in the original version).
• In Iceland was named Barði Hamar (Pounding hammer).
• In Italy it was known as Troppo Forte! ('Too strong!').
• In the UK the series was shown on ITV throughout the 80s-90s.
• In Russia the series was called Кувалда (Kuvalda), which is a literal Russian translation for sledgehammer.
• The Spanish dub that aired in Spain only called the show Martillo Hammer ('martillo' means hammer in Spanish), effectively renaming the series "Hammer Hammer".

• In Brazil, the series was aired under the title Na mira do tira which means 'To be under a cop's gun-sight'.
• The Mexican dubbing for Latin America kept the series´ name unchanged, some episodes had to be renamed to match with the Latin American versions for the movie titles and american sayings they were based on, also he called his gun Compadre in spite that he considered it to be female and bears an absolute loathing for Telenovelas.

A podcast series about Sledge Hammer! was created in 2016, examining each episode of the show.[10]