An elderly couple, desperate to draw attention to the poor living conditions in their old folks home, have rigged the trunk of their car with fifty sticks of dynamite and a timer, planning to set it off outside City Hall. But the car is stolen by two thugs on a spree of armed liquor store robberies, unaware that the car is loaded with explosives, ticking towards detonation in the trunk. Starsky and Hutch initially are on the hunt for the two robbers – when they learn that the car is rigged with dynamite, they have mere hours to track it down before disaster strikes...

A calculating criminal bumps off a loan-shark's collector and takes over the role, collecting debts for the head of the money-loaning racket – a washed-up former child star. The Detective pals investigate, only for it to turn out that the father of Hutch's girl-friend is one of the people owing money to the crooked racket, and that the vicious new collector is actually a notorious killer with an ulterior motive...