Tad Kimura (Frank Michael Liu), a martial arts movie star, drops dead while he is making a movie after finishing an intense action scene. He is a cousin of Quincy's assistant, Sam Fujiyama (Robert Ito), who gets a phone call at work about this.
When Quincy shows up at the movie studio, the doctor there says the cause of death was likely a heart attack. Quincy is suspicious, thinking that there may have been drugs involved.
Sam butts heads with Quincy after he takes his cousin's body to a funeral home. He says that there can't be an autopsy because this would conflict with Tad's father's Buddhist religion. The two of them go to visit Tad's parents, and Quincy promises that he will do an autopsy without "violating" the body. Sam points out that legally Quincy can do the autopsy without asking anyone's permission.
Back at the lab, Quincy does some tests on Tad's body, but can't come up with any conclusions. He wants to do his regular procedures, but Sam is pissed and leaves after saying, "I've already disgraced myself in the eyes of my family. Staying here with you would disgrace me in my own eyes."
Lily, a blonde lab assistant (Joanna Kerns, later of "Growing Pains"), shows up to replace Sam, and Quincy tells her to make coffee. She is not particularly amused.
The producer of Kimura's films, Otashi Hiyedo (Key Luke) arrives at the office to try and persuade Quincy not to do the autopsy because if the results are negative, it could impact the box office results for the almost-finished film which was supposed to be released soon. Quincy's boss, Dr. Asten (John S. Ragin) tells Hideyo to get lost.
Quincy goes to see Kamura's wife Takayo (Classic H50 babe Irene Yah-Ling Sun), asking her if there was anything unusual she noticed which might have led to her husband's death. While he is at her apartment, he is introduced to her "uncle," Mr. Yamaguchi (Mako), who says that he is against the autopsy. Quincy says he is going to perform it despite what both of them want (i.e., not to do it), and leaves. Quincy goes to the funeral home where several "friends" of Tad try to prevent him from taking the body, but Quincy threatens to call the cops to help him deal with the situation.
The friends suddenly co-operate, and the body is taken back to the lab again, where Quincy finds out that Tad's liver was ruptured, resulting in a hemorrhage. Quincy goes to visit Sam and convinces him to help him with the case, especially after revealing these new details, which mean that Kimura was likely murdered. Interested now in helping, Sam tells Quincy, "I once heard of a kind of secret blow that people die from days or weeks later," known as "dim mak, the delayed death touch [or "the vibrating palm"] ... According to the Japanese folklore, the method was passed on to a clan of ninjas."
Quincy and Sam go to this martial arts joint to talk to Master Sensei Tobi who knows about this technique, who is played by Harold Sakata, "Oddjob" in Goldfinger (and actor in one H50 episode), whose voice is obviously dubbed, very badly. They get some information from him, but still are stumped as to who might want to knock Tad off. Later that evening, a ninja attacks Quincy as he goes to his boat! Quincy goes back to the martial arts place to ask Tobi more questions, and starts saying things as if he is accusing him of being the killer. This is not a good idea, and Quincy quickly leaves.
Quincy goes back to Takayo's apartment, telling her that Tad was murdered. After some grilling, she tells him, "I was his wife!" Quincy points out that she was "not his only woman ... which happens to be common knowledge." But Quincy has deduced this from what she told him earlier: "He would come home very late every night. And sometimes, not at all. But always exhausted, irritable, isolated. In other words, I was a widow even before he died." (!!!) Takayo belts Quincy in the face.
Yamaguchi is still there, and he tells Quincy that "The secret [of dim mak] was passed down to me many years ago in Japan." He was the one who gave Tad the fatal punch recently when Tad got him a job as an extra on the movie that he was making. (But Tad didn't make any connection here??)
Yamaguchi says, "I could no longer stand by and watch him disgrace a pure woman." Takayo, who obviously didn't know any of this, is shocked by his admission, saying, "You interfering, blind, murdering fool ... You have not preserved my honor, you have destroyed my life." Yamaguchi says, "Then I am the one who is disgraced. Forgive me." He leaps through a nearby window, falling several stories to his death.
And here is the H50 connection!
The shot of him plummeting to the ground is exactly the same as the one from Classic H50's episode S04E15, "Bait Once, Bait Twice," where Loretta Swit's husband is assassinated, later reused in S04E22, "Didn't We Meet At A Murder?" where Bill Edwards jumps to his death from his apartment after realizing his life as a homosexual may be exposed.
This Quincy episode ends with a sucky finale involving a get-together in a bar where Sam is back at work and Lily is soon going to get married to her boyfriend.
This show is kind of lame, as one of the user reviews suggests, "obviously meant to cash in on the recent and mysterious death of Bruce Lee." Irene Yah-Ling Sun is in the show for 6 minutes and 18 seconds. Mako gets "special guest star" billing. He is there for a mere 2 minutes and 10 seconds!
I don't think I have ever watched an episode of Quincy before, and, based on this one, I don't think I am going to do anal-ysis for this show!