A word to the bad guys: ‘Hunter’ back in action

Hairlines, hemlines and headlines change, but at least one thing stays the same: scum roaming the streets of our fair cities. Or so you may conclude from “Hunter: Back in Force.”

Continuing television’s obsession with law and disorder, NBC resurrected the 1980s police drama, starring former pro football player Fred Dryer as the rogue Lt. Rick Hunter, with a TV movie in November. It did so well in the ratings that the network ordered up another two-hour reunion for tonight at 9, plus five new hourlong episodes starting next Saturday.

As you may recall from the original series, Dryer played a handsome, take-no-prisoners LAPD cop whom some critics deridingly called “a poor man’s Dirty Harry.” His partner, Lt. DeeDee McCall (Stepfanie Kramer), was a beautiful but tough cookie nicknamed “the brass cupcake.”

Tonight, they team up again as members of the San Diego police force trying to foil a ring of bank robbers. Though Hunter no longer commands the attention of the young ladies and McCall isn’t slipping into negligees to corner crooks, they still know how to crack a case -- and crack some skulls.

Still, their job isn’t particularly easy, thanks in part to a big distraction: Psychopathic murderer Randall Skaggs (Gregory Scott Cummins) is out on parole and more than a bit peeved that Hunter had put him in prison way back when, and shot his Rottweilers to boot. As if it weren’t bad enough that Skaggs and his brother tool around in a convertible with the classic rock cranked up, they also kill several people as they move in for a showdown with Hunter.

Unlike so many of today’s police procedurals that concern themselves with forensic investigation, “Hunter: Back in Force” is a throwback to the shoot-’em-up-and-let-Internal-Affairs-go-to-you-know-where era.

Indeed, of all the violent twists and turns tonight, what might be most amazing is that a suspect Hunter had once pursued actually lived to see the inside of a prison cell. Don’t count on that happening again.