Bad Guy Clients...

[sidney]

So if there is a guy who tries to hire the team to do something bad... What would Hannibal do? Would he take the job in order to actually give this bad guy what he deserves and save who the bad guy was targeting? Or would he just tell the bad guy no?

[amyk]

That's kind of what happens in WAITING FOR INSANE WAYNE (except the bad guys don't think they are actually hiring Insane Wayne, not the A-Team), so yes, I think Hannibal would take the job (and the money!) and then turn it around to help whoever the bad guys were targeting.

Edited: I meant "the bad guys think they are actually hiring Insane Wayne"!

[Katia]

I think maybe that ties in a bit with when I was once wondering if there ever jobs the team turns down?

And what was the episode where Hannibal says to Lynch or Decker or somebody, basically, "We can give you some real bad guys"?

[sidney]

I don't remember him saying something like that. I depend on amyk for things like that. She always remembers details from every episode. I think I just remember how things made me feel.

AND I always get my story mixed up with canon. In fact, I think I have corrected many things in the A-Team world and actually believe it to have actually happened. Nobody has read my story for a long time now, so I'm not held accountable anymore. For example, I never killed off Ray. Because my story starts as an origin story, I wrote a lot of Ray for a long time. When it got to the 80s, I loved him so much, I couldn't do it. So he's alive, married to Trish, and has two sons now!

[Katia]

I can't remember which episode it was. I don't think it was the one with the coke runners. It could've been the Insane Wayne episode? But I seem to remember that Decker puts priority on the real bad guys, and I was proud of him.

[sidney]

That's why it doesn't fit that they made his character seem like a 'shark'. Or remember when Hannibal said Decker would bomb hospitals in vietnam? Decker seems quite complex, I guess.

[amyk]

I do love it in RANGE RIDER when Decker has to admit to Amy and Daniel that the people hauling the wild horses off to be slaughtered are committing a federal offense. I will hand it to Decker to at least go ahead and arrest the real bad guys, even when the team leaves them for him. Even at the beginning of CURTAIN CALL, I believe Decker says something to indicate that the bad guys (one of which shot Murdock) are going to be arrested.

[sidney]

Do you think he does so resentfully?

[HoudiniDerek]

In some ways, yes; but in most ways, no.

I think at the heart of the issue, Decker doesn't really believe they are true criminals...outside of them being on the run. I don't think he believes or cares what they did in Vietnam.

[amyk]

That's an interesting perspective! I so wish it had been Decker instead of Fulbright who hired the team. Would have loved to see him working with the team instead of against them.

[Katia]

Feb 9, 2024 18:36:30 GMT -5 amyk said:

I do love it in RANGE RIDER when Decker has to admit to Amy and Daniel that the people hauling the wild horses off to be slaughtered are committing a federal offense. I will hand it to Decker to at least go ahead and arrest the real bad guys, even when the team leaves them for him.

Maybe that's the one I'm thinking of?

Feb 12, 2024 21:53:58 GMT -5 amyk said:

That's an interesting perspective! I so wish it had been Decker instead of Fulbright who hired the team. Would have loved to see him working with the team instead of against them.

You know I'm always saying he could be a good guy.  (But I just can't get around the "bombing the hospitals" thing.  I wish they hadn't added that part.)

[amyk]

I also wish they had not added that part. But perhaps we could give Decker some character growth and hope that he has changed since those days. Maybe someone can write some fanfiction where Decker regrets some of what he did back in Vietnam.

[Katia]

Feb 14, 2024 19:18:57 GMT -5 amyk said:

I also wish they had not added that part. But perhaps we could give Decker some character growth and hope that he has changed since those days. Maybe someone can write some fanfiction where Decker regrets some of what he did back in Vietnam.

Honestly, if I wanted to retcon for fic, I'm sure I could spin it in a way that it doesn't sound so bad.  Maybe the bombing was a horrible accident, it wasn't actually him, whatever...

[amyk]

Oh, that would be interesting, if the guys who are "wanted for a crime they didn't commit" think that Decker committed some horrible action that he didn't actually commit!

[HoudiniDerek]

I agree that it's a bad look for Decker, but he was also younger and we know he was ambitious. If given that order, he would have carried it out, believing in it or not.

As for making it more palatable, maybe the Viet Cong was operating underneath it or the hospitals were fronts. Much like what people say Hamas is doing in Gaza?