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The Best Episodes of Tour of Duty

Every episode of Tour of Duty ranked from best to worst. Let's dive into the Best Episodes of Tour of Duty!

Binge this in 2d 10h•Peaking at 8.9/10

The trials of a U.S. Army platoon serving in the field during the Vietnam War.

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Episode Rankings

  1. #1 Fan Favorite
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    Tour of Duty Season 1 Episode 14 - Under Siege
    8.9/10(120 votes)

    #1 - Under Siege

    S1:E14

    The men of Bravo are certain that Westmoreland has not yet informed the enemy that they are losing, as Firebase Ladybrid continues to come under daily long-range artillery fire. Suddenly a helicopter approaches and lands despite the fact that the base is taking fire. It is the new company commander -- Captain Larry Heath -- a man who initially wins over the favor of his troops with gifts, but he proves to be a complete fanatic. Heath wants to attack despite the fact that it appears that the base is about to be attacked. Zeke and Goldman set them men to putting up a defense and get in trouble because of it. A large attack proves that Anderson was right when the firebase is over-run and Doc Matsuda, with only 15 days left of his tour of duty, is killed when he refuses to abandon his patient.

    Director:Stephen L. Posey
    Writer:Steve Bello

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  2. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 2 - Doc Hock
    8.7/10(79 votes)

    #2 - Doc Hock

    S3:E2

    Goldman reveals to Zeke that it may be time for him to move to a desk job. Alex is glad to see Myron back but tells him that she is going to take the Paris job. Elsewhere, Taylor, Percell and Ruiz tease a new recruit who is a pacificist. Taylor knocks the new medic, Hockenberry on his butt. Zeke is just as horrified as the rest when he is told by Doc Hock that he won't carry a weapon. Afterwards, Anderson meets Goldman's replace, a no-nonsense but wet-behind-the-ears new LT who thinks he already knows everything there is to know. Zeke also learns that he has received a promotion. Alex arranges a final going-away party for her and Myron. Alex ends up missing her plane to Paris but not because of the party but because she has a chance to do an exclusive and dangerous interview with a VC officer. After getting out of the interview, Alex meets Myron in Saigon, for there last dinner, before going to Paris. As Alex waits for Myron in front of the restaurant, a bomb explodes, killing her with

    Director:Randy Roberts
    Writer:Unknown

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  3. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 8 - Thanks for the Memories
    8.7/10(74 votes)

    #3 - Thanks for the Memories

    S3:E8

    The men of Team Viking are receiving medals in a ceremony in recognition of their heroism. In the midst of the ceremony, General Higgins arrives and reads out Brewster. Higgins thinks Brewster should have kept his mouth closed about Phu An. Higgins leaves with the threat that he will destroy Brewster if the colonel keeps ""forcing the issue"". Anderson talks with Percell who is off drugs, finally, and is now spending time at the Psych Ward. Doc calls home and finds out that his girl friend is sleeping with someone else. Brewster takes the story of Phu An to the press and is relieved of duty.

    Director:Paul Lynch
    Writer:Unknown

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  4. Tour of Duty Season 1 Episode 12 - Pushin' Too Hard
    8.6/10(103 votes)

    #4 - Pushin' Too Hard

    S1:E12

    Anderson, Goldman, and Captain Wallace are checking out a new weapon that has been added to the platoon's arsenal: a flamethrower. Zeke and Goldman are unhappy that the next mission will also include a beautiful female reporter -- Vicky Adams. Zeke fights against the woman's urges to ""get the good stuff"" and his own men's attempts to impress her -- at the risk of their own lives. A prisoner is caught and tells the unit that they are surrounded by an NVA regiment. Wallace refusees to go back to safety, though, and a bad situation continues to get worse and worse.

    Director:Bill L. Norton
    Writer:Steven Phillip Smith

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  5. Tour of Duty Season 1 Episode 21 - The Hill
    8.6/10(89 votes)

    #5 - The Hill

    S1:E21

    Goldman and Nikki have a great time on a brief R&R that they spend together on China Beach. Their reunion is marred by the fact that Nikki refuses to marry him, fearing he will be killed in combat. Goldman returns to Firebase Ladybird to find that his unit has been assigned to help take Hill 1000. They've taken it before and lost it before. And this battle promises to be the worst. Even after the bunker is finally taken, it is found empty. They go back down so that a plane can spray a defoliate. They must go back and take that hill yet again. Horn has, in the meantime, gotten in trouble with a young -- and new -- officer. Sitting at the bottom of the hill and awaiting the court-martial, he sees a wounded Taylor and he decides to go back with his buddies and fight. Horn is seriously wounded and sent home.

    Director:Robert Iscove
    Writer:Steven Phillip Smith

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  6. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 1 - The Luck
    8.6/10(72 votes)

    #6 - The Luck

    S3:E1

    News that Goldman and Anderson are missing and believed dead devastates the platoon and Alex.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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    The 20 WORST Episodes of Tour of Duty

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  7. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 11 - Green Christmas
    8.6/10(69 votes)

    #7 - Green Christmas

    S3:E11

    Christmas finds Team Viking the bush trying to capture prisoners in Cambodia. Doc tries to show compassion to one of the captured men... who turns out to be able to speak English. Anderson and Goldman exchange Christmas gifts, back at camp. Ruiz takes flowers to Susanna. Taylor finds that he misses Johnson. Team Viking prepares for a Christmas party at the orphanage. Meanwhile, Sgt. Marvin Johnson returns home and finds out that bigotry is alive and well there.

    Director:Helaine Head
    Writer:Unknown

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  8. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 13 - And Make Death Proud to Take Us
    8.6/10(65 votes)

    #8 - And Make Death Proud to Take Us

    S3:E13

    Newbie replacements arrive, including a young man that gains Anderson's attention as he and Team Viking return from the field, as the boy proves to be 15 years old. FNGs are moving in all over Team Viking. Goldman (suffering from the same shortage of room) finds himself bunked up with McKay. Team Viking gets assigned a recon mission based on Fontaine's information. Anderson and Goldman spend as much time as possible breaking in the new guys. Zeke and Myron head out with 18 FNG's. Anderson's unit stops to dig in a defensive position to work from, but before completing the bunkers they are attacked by the enemy, and due to outstanding bravery and courage, a few actually survive.

    Director:George Kaczender
    Writer:Unknown

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  9. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 16 - Acceptable Losses
    8.6/10(68 votes)

    #9 - Acceptable Losses

    S3:E16

    Team Viking takes off on another Fontaine mission, where they run into heavy contact. McKay arrives back at the LZ to rescue them, only to end up being fired on by missiles. He has no choice but to leave without Taylor, Ruiz and Private Woznaik. They attempt to make it back to their own lines on their own. The team goes back to check for their men -- McKay gets tricked by the VC and nearly killed -- only Taylor's self-sacrificing smoke grenade gets the chopper pilot back up in time. Wozniak ends up dead of a snake bite, leaving Ruiz and Taylor on their own. As the days pass, Taylor and Ruiz are replaced by two new soldiers, including 44-year-old PFC Thoams ""Pop"" Scarlett, a lifer with a unique perspective on the war.

    Director:Bradford May
    Writer:Unknown

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  10. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 20 - The Raid
    8.6/10(70 votes)

    #10 - The Raid

    S3:E20

    The monsoon seasons starts. Pop goes back to the States for his son's funeral, only to be blamed for the death of his son (by his wife). Goldman is upset over Beller's suicide -- feeling that the ex-friend was only another type of victim of the war. Brewster enlists Goldman for a volunteer mission to rescue MIA/POWs. AN ex-POW (very fragile) comes back to Vietnam to help plan the mission. Doc is still on base but no one will speak to him. Doc goes to talk to Goldman, begging to be part of the rescue mission but gets refused. The mission turns out to be a nightmare. The POWs were moved before the Team got there, Griner is blinded, Pop and McKay are hurt and get shipped to a hospital in Japan, Brewster is hospitalized at China Beach.

    Director:Jim Johnston
    Writer:Jim Johnston

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  11. Tour of Duty Season 1 Episode 11 - Roadrunner
    8.5/10(99 votes)

    #11 - Roadrunner

    S1:E11

    One of a GI's big events is the arrival of his mail. When Zeke opens his mail to find that his ex-wife, it is to find that she is complaining that he is not writing letters home often enough to their 3-year-old daughter. Zeke already has enough responsibilities... this one isn't wanted. However he has little time to worry about it before he finds himself out on patrol. Goldman orders the squad forward when Anderson warns that they are walking into trouble, Anderson scouts out ahead and ends up in a near-lethal mortar barrage. Anderson is nearing his limit when he finds out that the squad's next destination is a valley where Zeke's last outfit was nearly wiped out. Anderson fights going tooth-and-nail and it is obvious to everyone that Zeke is falling apart. There is little time to help him, though, as the men have to consider their mission first. The squad ends up going after a downed flyer... and while Zeke continues to deteroriate.

    Director:Jim Johnston
    Writer:Robert Burns Clark

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  12. Tour of Duty Season 1 Episode 13 - USO Down
    8.5/10(113 votes)

    #12 - USO Down

    S1:E13

    A USO band comprised of three female dancers, a sax players, and a singer, completes their performance at an outlying base, and are rushed to a helicopter to be flown to their next destination. None of them get a chance to even change their costumes. The helicopter is shot down and the entire crew is killed. Meanwhile, Bravo company is out on a recon, and Taylor who is on point, thinks he must be going crazy when he sees the girl in hot pants and leather boots. Bravo company takes the girls with them but can't call in for help because the radio's batteries are dead.The USO people make the transition to ""soldier"" with various degrees of success.

    Director:Ronald L. Schwary
    Writer:Jim Beaver

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  13. Tour of Duty Season 2 Episode 11 - Promised Land
    8.5/10(64 votes)

    #13 - Promised Land

    S2:E11

    Word of Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination lowers black soldiers' morale,

    Director:Helaine Head
    Writer:Unknown

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  14. Tour of Duty Season 2 Episode 16 - The Volunteer
    8.5/10(71 votes)

    #14 - The Volunteer

    S2:E16

    A young desk clerk seeking to prove himself is assigned to Anderson's platoon.

    Director:Stephen L. Posey
    Writer:Steven Phillip Smith

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  15. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 6 - A Necessary End
    8.5/10(63 votes)

    #15 - A Necessary End

    S3:E6

    McKay has a date with a ""killer"" blonde but on the way to take her shopping he ends up hitting a child with his jeep and comes in contact, for the first time, with a makeshift orphanage where he decides to get involved with the orphans. Doc finds Purcell high on grass and drugs. Purcell leave in a huff, seeking more drugs, and ends up arrested and assigned to a ""shit burner"" detail. Goldman goes to Brewster to report the massacre. Later, Goldman and Anderson are briefed on a mission into Cambodia to kidnap a defecting NVA officer. Percell tries to desert.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  16. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 10 - World in Changes
    8.5/10(65 votes)

    #16 - World in Changes

    S3:E10

    McKay decides he is personally going to get the sniper who has been taking out helicopters... but with Anderson and Goldman on the ground and him in the air, HE ends up the next target, crashing and killing his co-pilot. Johnson, with only 72 hours left, gets a bad case of ""short timer's nerves"". Meanwhile a crazy CIA operative -- Duke Fontaine -- takes several VC suspects up in a helicopter and starts throwing them out until one of them will talk. Anderson and the team are going to go out after a VC-recruiter and get permission for Johnson not to go but because Johnson has decided that he ""must stick to the routine"" he ends up going. Taylor and Johnson are captured by the VC and tortured by a sadistic Vietnamese man.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  17. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 15 - Road to Long Binh
    8.5/10(69 votes)

    #17 - Road to Long Binh

    S3:E15

    All of the enlisted men of Team Viking end up with food poisioning. Goldman is forced, because of that, to take on an assignment himself that he had intended to assign to someone else, drafting Anderson to come along. They pick up a deserter who Anderson has known as the ""ideal"" soldier for years. As the two men spend time together they talk about their early meetings, etc. Zeke gets a letter from Johnson. The next day Digby (the deserter) escapes before Anderson and Goldman get there but is recaptured. They start off to Long Binh prison. Digby has been a soldier for 14 years but gave it up when some soldiers started to give him and his Vietnamese wife a hard time. Digby ends up saving their lives, a number of times, and he ends up ""accidentally"" escaping

    Director:Steve Dubin
    Writer:Unknown

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  18. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 17 - Vietnam Rag
    8.5/10(70 votes)

    #18 - Vietnam Rag

    S3:E17

    Taylor and Ruiz are still listed as MIA. At the camp there are still more FNGs, including a peace-loving photographer. Anderson is told by Goldman that Team Viking is about to be back to SOS (same old shit) missions -- no more special operations. Pop's son is reportedly one of the new guys. Suzanne returns from leave to hear that Ruiz is missing. The photographer gets permission to go out with Anderson's team. Things go bad fast, and they are soon losing soldiers to stupid reasons -- and mostly just because they are FNGs.

    Director:George Kaczender
    Writer:Unknown

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  19. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 19 - Three Cheers for the Orange, White & Blue
    8.5/10(72 votes)

    #19 - Three Cheers for the Orange, White & Blue

    S3:E19

    Anderson & Pop are having a good time at a local bar when a young trooper turns up and gets insulting to Pop -- it turns out to be Robby (Pop's son). The Phu An Board of Inquiry starts. As the situation develops and Beller realizes what his men did -- he had blocked it out -- he kills himself. Zeke and Team Viking go out with Robby on another SOG mission. They end up getting sprayed with Agent Blue. Before the end of the day, Robby ends up killed, leaving Pop to bring his son home in a body bag.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  20. Tour of Duty Season 1 Episode 6 - Burn, Baby, Burn
    8.4/10(111 votes)

    #20 - Burn, Baby, Burn

    S1:E6

    In a time of great racial tension and violence in America, the same problems were carried over to Vietnam, where it was not unusual for bars -- or sometimes entire sections of towns -- to cater only to whites, blacks or hispanics. To wander into the wrong ""territory"" was a mistake that could lead to violence and death. Taylor and three of his brothers encounter such a problem when Percell asks them to meet him at what turns out to be an all-white redneck bar. A fight breaks out between one of the blacks, Tucker and a KKK member, Innis. Both end up in Bravo Co, and while on a patrol, Tucker's friend is killed when Innis fails to provide coverage. Racial tensions mount. As the black soldiers discuss their own people dying at home to obtain some equal rights, they see Innes put up a Confederate flag. Violence breaks out, and, in the end, Johnson gets accused of starting it. A conflict at the brig nearly ends in gunfire but, in the end, Tucker -- the trouble-maker is transfered out and thi

    Director:Reynaldo Villalobos
    Writers:Steven Phillip Smith, Steve Duncan, L. Travis Clark

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  21. Tour of Duty Season 1 Episode 15 - Soldiers
    8.4/10(95 votes)

    #21 - Soldiers

    S1:E15

    The squad is in heavy contact with a group of enemy soldiers, and after taking several casualties manage to be retrieved by two helicopters. Danny hears that his father is hospitalized after a near-fatal heart-attack and is given emergency medical leave. Danny finds that his father and mother have separated and his father has taken up with a younger woman who is loyal to him. Danny feels left out and alienated from a man who he already wasn't close to. While waiting for his father to get better, Danny meets Rudy Morales, a vet handicapped by wounds -- a bitter, broken man. Danny is seriously upset by this and further upset by an argument with his father. Meanwhile, Taylor and Ruiz decide that they need to be by Danny's side, so they talk Anderson into pulling some strings and getting their R&R in Bangkok changed to Honolulu. Once in Hawaii they are exposed to the ""real"" world of mini-skirts and negative attitudes about the war.

    Director:Bill L. Norton
    Writer:Rick Husky

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  22. Tour of Duty Season 1 Episode 16 - Gray-Brown Odyssey
    8.4/10(99 votes)

    #22 - Gray-Brown Odyssey

    S1:E16

    Goldman, Horn, Calhoun, and Pointer are retruning to the base after spending two days int he rear. Their jeep hits a mine, wounding Calhoun and Pointer. Goldman is blinded when a fire extinguisher blows up in his face. A squad of VC arrive and open fire. Calhoun and Pointer are killed by the attack, Goldman is blinded. In the end Horn chases after the sole surviving VC only to find that she's a woman. He captures her and takes her back to the hut where's he's left the blinded Goldman. Horn then, after much argument, goes after help for Goldman. The woman manages to signal to other villagers for help and so Goldman, blinded, must rig his rifle to her head, marching her off into his ""blind landscape"" so that they can escape the VC that she has called on to help her. As they escape they run into a great deal of trouble, starving families, groups of VC and even a group of Americans who fire on them. In the end, by the time Horn finds them, the woman has died in Goldman's arms, leaving Myro

    Director:Randy Roberts
    Writer:Bruce Reisman

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  23. Tour of Duty Season 1 Episode 20 - Angel of Mercy
    8.4/10(90 votes)

    #23 - Angel of Mercy

    S1:E20

    In a small South Vietnamese hamlet, an NVA officer arrives to brief his men that they will soon begin infiltrating towns and villages through-out the country in preparation for the Tet Offensive. Meanwhile, Bravo is in the bush, while Baker is losing a battle with his dysentery. As he ""answers the call of nature"" he sights VC closing on the unit and then, pulling his pants up, gets a frog down them, and starts screaming. As the American's come running, a fire fight starts, ending with the capture of an NVA Colonel Trang. Goldman catches a bullet in the helmet and in his jacket as they try to retreat. Though saved by his clothing, he still does need to go to the hospital along with Anderson, who is hit with shrapnel. While Goldman and Anderson recover, Trang dies under mysterious circumstances during interrogation.

    Director:Bill L. Norton
    Writer:Unknown

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  24. Tour of Duty Season 2 Episode 7 - I Wish It Would Rain
    8.4/10(71 votes)

    #24 - I Wish It Would Rain

    S2:E7

    Alex and a French correspondent investigate illegal incursions of Cambodia by U.S. troops.

    Director:Bradford May
    Writer:Rick Husky

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  25. Tour of Duty Season 3 Episode 9 - I Am What I Am
    8.4/10(66 votes)

    #25 - I Am What I Am

    S3:E9

    Team Viking goes out to capture a Soviet chopper but ends up surrounded and captured. Luckily the mission was just practice. Myron discovers that his father -- Gernal Goldman -- is back on the base. His father has 2-3 months left to live because of cancer. While Myron and his father fight, Johnson attempts to decide if he should re-up or go back to the World. A Mexican/American WAC takes up with Ruiz. Johnson finally decides to go back to the States. Percell wonders if he is yet ready to return to the field. Anderson and McKay butt heads when McKay tries to take over the leadership of a mission.

    Director:Bradford May
    Writer:Unknown

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Best Episodes Summary

"Under Siege" is the best rated episode of "Tour of Duty". It scored 8.9/10 based on 120 votes. Directed by Stephen L. Posey and written by Steve Bello, it aired on 2/11/1988. This episode scored 0.2 points higher than the second highest rated, "Doc Hock".