12 O'Clock High

Seasons

1964

8.1

A WWII bomb group commander must fill the shoes of his predecessor and get the performance rating up to snuff. He struggles with his own men, until he is able to develop pride in the group and win the men over, but at a cost to him.

Episode List

S1 • E1

Golden Boy Had Nine Black Sheep

General Savage believes that Gallagher, part of a military family, is too quick to abort missions at the first sign of engine trouble. Savage rides Gallagher hard, assigning him a crew of slackers and misfits and ordering Gallagher to paint the name "Leper Colony" on his plane. Gallagher turns his crew into an efficient outfit but he despises Savage and wants to do anything to get a transfer.

S1 • E2

Follow the Leader

When a bombardier releases his bombs prematurely with the group ordered to hit the same spot , they accidentally destroy a Dutch school.

S1 • E3

The Men and the Boys

Gen. Savage decides to court martial a captain who broke formation to provide air cover for a crew bailing out of a plane, creating much anger.

S1 • E4

The Sound of Distant Thunder

A goofy bombardier Lt. who always hits his mark joins Gen. Savage's crew and finds out the hard way, that real people are killed when bombs drop.

S1 • E5

The Climate of Doubt

Gen. Crowe orders Savage to fly a dangerous mission in France to show support for the resistance, but he thinks it's because he's in love with a beautiful fighter there.

S1 • E6

Pressure Point

Gen. Savage outfits some of his planes with bigger guns to try to reduce heavy losses, but if a US senator remains unconvinced he could lose his command.

S1 • E7

Decision

Savage has one chance try to bomb a Nazi building next to his POW major friend and his crew, or the 918th will bomb the whole area.

S1 • E8

The Hours Before Dawn

Savage takes cover in a British mansion during an air raid but is trapped by a downed German colonel also taking cover there. The cynical and manipulative female owner is unsympathetic to both.

S1 • E9

Appointment at Liege

A pilot major assigned elsewhere when his crew was killed in combat, suffers a guilt complex and becomes reckless with his missions and the lives of his subordinates.

S1 • E10

Interlude

Suffering from fatigue, General Savage is ordered to take leave and decides to pay a visit to sunny Scotland. On his way, he repeatedly bumps into a female British officer, Ann Macrae, who is returning to her home - accidental encounters that become increasingly awkward. Naturally, their animosity slowly turns to grudging tolerance, and then to fondness on the way to true affection. Against his better judgment, Savage finds himself falling in love, and Macrae is caught in the same web. Unfortunately, she is hiding a secret that will cast a terrible shadow over their budding relationship.

S1 • E11

Here's to Courageous Cowards

Gen. Savage has to handle a major who's burning himself out after 35 missions and a conscientious objector corporal who still joined the Air Force.

S1 • E12

Soldiers Sometimes Kill

Gen. Savage is suspected by Scotland Yard of killing a pretty model in her flat and even he cannot remember all the events of that night.

S1 • E13

The Suspected

A reporter on the airbase is bent on trying to prove that one of Gen. Savage's gunners, is an escaped convicted murderer.

S1 • E14

An Act of War

Savage is shot down on a vital recon mission in France , kills a Frenchman in self defense, and gets captured by Nazi sympathizers who plan to lynch him.

S1 • E15

Those Who Are About to Die

Savage's elite squadron is picked for a dangerous, top secret bomb run, but his men start to crack waiting for fog to lift over the English Channel, while they are confined to base. One of his best pilots, Lt. Lockridge, is recovering from hepatitis, waiting to complete his 25th mission, which will get him sent back to the U.S. Gen. Savage, the medical officer, and the nurse who loves Lockridge debate: is Lockridge malingering, pretending to be A-OK, or is he too ill to fly on the mission in which 1/3 are expected not to come back from ?

S1 • E16

In Search of My Enemy

Due to illness and injury, including his own bum knee, General Savage finds himself short of qualified pilots to lead bombing missions. Help arrives in the person of Major Peter Gray, a highly experienced man with just the right credentials, but also some lingering pains from his own earlier mishap. Complications arise when Savage discovers that Gray's wife, Ann, is his former fiancee and that he still has strong feelings for her. Stressed by the awkward situation, he assigns Gray to command a mission that is supposed to be a milk run, only to discover too late that the Luftwaffe is laying in wait. The mission turns into a slaughter, and though he survives to return, Gray is convinced Savage is trying to get him killed so he can have another chance with Ann.

S1 • E17

The Albatross

A handsome Lt. with a upcoming movie career accepts one extra mission as a favor to Gen. Savage, receives a bad facial burn, and recklessly sinks into depression.

S1 • E18

The Lorelei

The Lorelei is a bomber that returns from a mission and lands intact, but with its entire crew dead. Gen. Savage assigns the plane to his new 2nd-in-command, Col. Royce, who he's supposed to evaluate for assignment as a group commander. Royce is a highly-experienced, decorated, and well-liked pilot with one apparent flaw; he's decidedly superstitious, and he's just been handed command of a Flying Dutchman that seems to have a mind of its own.

S1 • E19

Faith, Hope and Sergeant Aronson

Gen. Savage returns from a mission gravely wounded, requiring a delicate operation to remove shrapnel endangering his heart; an operation Dr. Kaiser doesn't feel confident to perform. While waiting for a specialist, Savage is placed in a ward next to Sgt. Aaronson who has just lost his lifetime friend to battle wounds and is also quickly losing his faith in God. Savage tries to talk him out of his closing shell, but the Sergeant slips deeper into melancholy, that is until he meets someone who could use a little of his disappearing faith.

S1 • E20

To Heinie, with Love

Gen. Savage keeps a skillful navigator he knows had a father that was a Nazi, and becomes more doubtful of him when an error kills a crewman.

S1 • E21

The Clash

Gen. Savage and a Nazi colonel are the only survivors in a raft after shooting down each other's planes at sea, but the Nazi tries to force him to surrender at gunpoint.

S1 • E22

The Ticket

A uncaring Lt. wins the lottery after accepting a very dangerous mission, and realizes things in his life are worth living for, but he is not allowed to back out of the assignment.

S1 • E23

The Trap

A pilot's worst nightmare - buried underground with no guarantee of ever seeing the open sky again. Gen. Savage and a group of Londoners are trapped in a cellar during an air raid, while the only man who knows they are there is wounded and incoherent. Savage has to deal with an elderly widow facing true fear for the first time, a young coal miner with a phobia about being buried alive, a charlatan confronted by the lies behind his life, and a girl about to become an unwed mother. Oh, and there is one other occupant of this hell under earth - an unexploded, ticking time bomb.

S1 • E24

End of the Line

Maj. Gallagher feeling guilty over the death of a friend who replaced him, tries to help the man's fiancee but she is a greedy, deceitful, person and only Gen. Savage can save him.

S1 • E25

The Threat

Gen. Savage becomes the target of Nazi assassination attempts by a spy on the base, while propaganda broadcasts continue to taunt him.

S1 • E26

Mutiny at Ten Thousand Feet

A Lt. conspires to make Gen. Savage appear to be mentally unstable, so he can take over his plane and land in Switzerland where the crew can sit out the rest of the war.

S1 • E27

The Mission

While preparing for a top priority mission, Gen. Savage replaces a sick crewman with a hotshot gunner, only to discover too late that the man has a bad reputation as well as a negative attitude. Joe Waller is a washed-out pilot trainee who takes out his resentment on his fellow crew members. The resulting friction threatens the integrity of the crew, even before Waller is forced to replace the fatally wounded bombardier, making him the most important man in the entire mission.

S1 • E28

The Cry of Fallen Birds

Savage is badly injured when his plane crashes near an ancestral mansion in the flight path of the base, and later fights with its beautiful female owner to have it legally demolished.

S1 • E29

V for Vendetta

Gen. Savage has been taking great loses by unsuccessfully trying to bomb factories making planes that wreak havoc on the 918th, and now he risks losing his command.

S1 • E30

P.O.W.: Part One

Gen. Savage becomes a POW in a Nazi camp after being shot down, and the commander there wants to use him to break the other prisoner's will to escape.