Episode guide
Frontline: Season 2
24 episodes · premiered Jan 15, 1984
Judy Woodruff's first season as on-air host.
- Episode 1: Crisis at General Hospital Jan 16, 1984 · 58m Investor-owned for-profit hospital chains are aggressively marketing themselves to treat only the insured or wealthy patient. But most Americans assume government and charity programs…
- Episode 2: We Are Driven Jan 23, 1984 · 58m As American corporations begin to adopt a Japanese management style stressing worker involvement in a family-like corporate environment, Frontline looks at the darker side of Japanese…
- Episode 3: The Old Man and the Gun Feb 6, 1984 Viewing the conflict in Northern Ireland through the eyes of Irish Americans who support the IRA and its strategy of violence. Profiles Michael Flannery, Grand Marshal of New York City's…
- Episode 4: Give Me That Big Time Religion Feb 13, 1984 Investigating whether the tens of millions of dollars raised through the appeals of television evangelists like Jimmy Swaggart goes more to doing God's work or to keeping the preachers on…
- Episode 5: The Campaign for Page One Feb 27, 1984 · 58m On the eve of the 1984 New Hampshire primary, the first of four national election reports. Correspondent Richard Reeves looks behind the scenes at the presidential candidates and the…
- Episode 6: The Mind of a Murderer (1) Mar 19, 1984 Kenneth Bianchi, who killed two women in Bellingham, Washington, and was one of the Hillside Strangler murderers in Los Angeles, almost escaped punishment for these crimes because he…
- Episode 7: The Mind of a Murderer (2) Mar 26, 1984 Amid questionable use of psychiatric evidence in criminal proceedings, Kenneth Bianchi is revealed to be an accomplished faker.
- Episode 8: The Struggle for Birmingham Apr 2, 1984 A special election report focuses on Birmingham, Alabama -- famously a battlefield for black civil rights. Frontline correspondent Richard Reeves examines black political power today and…
- Episode 9: Captive in El Salvador Apr 16, 1984 · 58m Filmmaker Ofra Bikel takes us into the heart of El Salvador -- a tiny Central America nation about which we know so much, and yet so little -- to examine the politics and the people the…
- Episode 10: Chasing the Basketball Dream Apr 23, 1984 Charlie Cobb looks at young men who make it big playing basketball, and many who will not. College recruiters promise an education in exchange for play, but 75% of players never obtain a…
- Episode 11: The Other Side of the Track May 7, 1984 An insider's look at the 'sport of kings' focused on tracks at Belmont, NY, where the rich indulge their interest in horse-racing, and at Great Barrington in Massachusetts where infirm…
- Episode 12: Return of the Great White Fleet May 14, 1984 · 58m Profiling Navy Secretary John Lehman and the growing debate inside the Navy establishment to build a multi-billion-dollar fleet which critics warn may not be suited to the kind of wars the…
- Episode 13: Warning from Gangland May 21, 1984 Explores what Los Angeles is trying to do about its gang problem. It's the worst in the nation, killing more than 1,000 people over the past three years -- the majority of whom were not…
- Episode 14: Bread, Butter and Politics Jun 4, 1984 Examines findings from a presidential commission and several private advocacy groups on hunger in America, and the extent to which they capture the human story as well as the political…
- Episode 15: Man's Best Friends Jun 18, 1984 · 58m Examining ethical arguments over the use of animal testing in American laboratories, hospitals, and medical schools. While some animal rights groups break into labs to 'liberate' research…
- Episode 16: So You Want to Be President Oct 9, 1984 · 1h 39m Following the 1984 presidential campaign of Gary Hart to reveal presidential politics as it has never before been seen on television -- from the early days of lonely ambition, through the…
- Episode 17: Welcome to America Oct 16, 1984 The bittersweet story of four unforgettable people who flee repression in Poland to find a better life in Chicago. They succeed, fail, fight, love, laugh, and confront an America unlike…
- Episode 18: Not One of the Boys Oct 23, 1984 · 58m As more women are voting and running for elected office, correspondent Judy Woodruff looks at women and politics in 1984 through the eyes of accomplished women like UN Ambassador Jeane…
- Episode 19: Living Below the Line Oct 30, 1984 It could never happen to you. One day it happened to Farrell Stallings. After 28 years at the same job, he was laid off-a victim of the recession. Now he's broke, afraid, and at the mercy…
- Episode 20: The Arab and the Israeli Nov 13, 1984 Two men, a Palestinian and an Israeli, born thirty miles apart, journey to America. In synagogues and universities, on television talk shows and interviews, they try to project a message…
- Episode 21: Better Off Dead? Nov 20, 1984 Frontline goes inside the hospitals where every day doctors, lawyers, and parents face the agonizing choice: how far do we go with medical treatment for infants born so physically and…
- Episode 22: Cry, Ethiopia, Cry Nov 27, 1984 In one of the first comprehensive reports broadcast in the U.S., Frontline presents the searing reality of the famine in Ethiopia. In desert camps described as 'the closest thing to hell…
- Episode 23: Red Star Over Khyber Dec 11, 1984 In 1979, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. On the fifth anniversary of the invasion, Frontline correspondent Richard Reeves reports from Afghanistan and Pakistan, examining the…
- Episode 24: Marshall High Fights Back Dec 18, 1984 Marshall High School is one of the poorest in Chicago-both academically and economically. But it is fighting back, trying desperately to upgrade academic standards and to make a difference…