Chapter I

To give you an idea of what the real difference is between RICH MAN POOR MAN and RICH MAN POOR MAN BOOK II is the end of the original's first episode has a continuation of the story and characters, while the end of this episode has an older woman with a cat-ate-the-canary grin, thinking about how she's going to seduce a young man... one's a drama, one's a soap...

But for soaps, BOOK II is not too shabby, and this is the kind of cliffhanger that leaves the viewer wanting more, because the seduced kid is Nick Nolte's son played by Gregg Henry, who had quite a job to replace Nolte, who became a movie star and supposedly asked for his character to be killed...

Strange though because it's hard to imagine Nolte's Tom continuing his story since he finally finds his life going well, which isn't what his character was all about...

And these new characters, while not quite as perfect, are pretty great, and this episode... after having to sit through melodrama cutting loose ends with the previous series... sets up the new book pretty well...

Also it's nice to see William Redfield, who played Mr Harding in Cuckoo's Nest, in one of his last roles as the cuckhold husband of that dragon lady: wife of Redfield's dean of Wesley's (Nolte's son's) prep school... where he won't stay for long.