Best Barney Miller Episode Ever: "Werewolf"

"Werewolf," Season 3 of Barney Miller, has the perfect collection of cases. They involve the characters' personalities without straying (too far) into their home lives. 

Members of the 12th are working a night shift. Police officers are down with "swine flu." A nurse shows up to provide inoculations. A elderly tourist couple gets robbed. And the detectives collect a man claiming to be a werewolf. 

"And you wouldn't go to Yellowstone because of the bears," the elderly husband chides his wife. 

The episode starts with one of the show's funniest exchanges between Yemana and Harris:

Yemana: Pick up some coffee—2 lbs, drip grind.

Harris: Hey, man, look, I have to go out into the dark streets of this asylum to try and find some wacko who’s threatening to go off on a killing spree and you expect me to remember to pick up 2 pounds of coffee--drip grind?

 Yemana: Sorry.

Harris: Write it down!

The man who believes he is a werewolf, Koepeknie, played by regular Kenneth Tigar, begins to "change" at midnight. A hilarious routine ensues during which Koepeknie climbs the cage walls and Yemana calls plaintively for Barney. 

In terms of organization, the episode's events play out rapidly with no sags in pacing. And the characters expand their repertoire without losing their fundamental personalities. Wojo faints. Harris gets giddy around the nurse. Fish mutters, "Nothing's funny anymore." Yemana exhibits an artless fondness for the uncanny. 

Barney is authoritative without losing his wry gentleness. In response to Koepeknie's worry, "The doctors can't help me. You don't see a lot of lycanthropy anymore," he points out, "Then someone should be making progress." 

"I'm cursed. I'm not stupid," Koepeknie tells his minders at the end.

Life is weird. But people still function.

Fantastic episode.