Growing Pains: Season 02 (1986)

Season two of Growing Pains serves up 22 new episodes featuring the Seaver clan of Long Island: stay-at-home psychiatrist Jason Seaver (Alan Thicke), suburban-newspaper reporter Maggie Seaver (Joanna Kerns), and their children Mike (Kirk Cameron), Carol (Tracey Gold), and Ben (Jeremy Miller). In the season opener "Jason and the Cruisers," Maggie reorganizes Jason's college rock band to help him get over his middle-age angst. The next episode, "Fast Times at Dewey High," introduces Bill Kirchenbauer as Coach Lubbock, a recurring character who would ultimately graduate to stardom in his own spin-off sitcom Just the Ten of Us. In the same episode, freshman Carol begins her on-and-off relationship with fellow student Bobby (Kevin Gerard Wixted). Not surprisingly, the season has its share of crises, some amusing, others less so. Sensitive Carol raises over two grand on her own so that she can have cosmetic surgery; Mike continues prowling around for eligible girls, with a success rate of about 50-50; and elementary schooler Ben must deal with such standard exigencies as tough teachers and brutish bullies. Arguably the biggest crisis to arise from the season occurs when a nonplussed Carol discovers that both of her parents had previously been married to other people. This year's guest-star roster includes Hallie Todd as a homeless girl befriended by Ben; Renée Estevez as an assistant teacher who expects certain -- er -- favors from Mike in exchange for giving him a passing grade; Kristy Swanson as one of the guests at a party attended by Mike, who learns to his chagrin that he is expected to snort cocaine to pass the "cool" test; former Gilligan's Island damsel Dawn Wells as a bidder in a carnival auction scene; and Candace Cameron, sister of series star Kirk Cameron, as a young student whose school video report yields surprising results. In the season finale, Maggie is offered a major job at a prestigious magazine by a man whom nervous Jason knows to be a flagrant womanizer -- but is unable to warn his wife because of doctor-patient confidentiality! ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi