Today, we launch Miamilandia, an Islandia podcast.
We’ll be recording and sharing conversations, narratives, and dispatches from the space-time continuum of Miami and the tropics.
Our first episode is conversation between publisher Jason Katz and poets Erika Meitner and P. Scott Cunningham about one of our favorite Miami Vice episodes: The Great McCarthy (Season 1, Ep. 8), which originally aired on November 15th of 1984.
There are dozens of freestanding and reddit forums dedicated to Miami Vice lore. One thing many MV “thinkers” agree on is: this episode kinda sucks. As a scripted piece of television, the three of us agreed that it did. The dialogue is clunky, continuity isn’t as strong, and also the actress who plays Tubbs’ love interest (Maria McDonald), who is arrested for murder at the end of the episode, somehow comes back in season 3 as an entirely different character.
But also, this episode rules. Why? The set pieces—like the banana leaf bed where Tubbs and Vanessa “make love” and the eponymous character’s epic party scene, and the finale boat race—are high budget, cocaine fueled, classically Miami Vice excess.
Enjoy this lengthy dialogue full of Miami Vice lore and City of Miami philosophy from three people who have loved it, known it, and lived it.
Watch “The Great McCarthy” yourselves and drop thoughts in the comments!
This episode is published in conjunction with the release of our 11th print issue: The Islandia Vice issue. Check it out in our shop today!
Issue 11: Islandia Vice PRE-ORDER HERE
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