Airplane! (1980)
Drowning his sorrows after that botched mission during WWII, the traumatised former fighter pilot with a fear of flying, Ted Striker, still hasn't got over his old flame and flight attendant, Elaine Dickinson. Determined to win her back, Ted boards a domestic flight from Los Angeles to Chicago, only to come face-to-face with a severe case of in-flight food poisoning that is threatening everyone's lives. Now, with most of the passengers and the entire cockpit crew down with the food-borne illness, Striker has no other choice but to confront his inner demons and take over the control of the ungovernable aircraft with the help of a gruff air-traffic controller and his former commander.
Airplane II: The Sequel (1982)
Still haunted by that fateful wartime incident and the nearly catastrophic events of Airplane! (1980), Ted Striker, the pilot who hates flying, escapes from the funny house. But, as the first passenger lunar shuttle, the state-of-the-art but untested Mayflower One, is about to take off on its maiden flight, once more, an unforeseen malfunction forces Ted to take over the controls of the shuttle. Now, the traumatised commander is holding everyone's lives in his hands, and as if that weren't enough, Striker has to patch up his already complicated relationship with his engaged former lover, Elaine Dickinson, and confront an unhinged voyager bent on destruction. Can Ted Striker, the reluctant hero, save the day for the second time?