I’ve tuned in for Hawaii Five-0, but I seem to be getting Magic Mike.
CBS? Check. 9 p.m.? Check.
Still seeing a male stripper, though he’s moved from the stage to a table of women who appear to be having Barbie’s Bachelorette Party. Eventually, the stripper moves on and the women do a round of shots. There doesn’t appear to be a designated driver. I bet something bad is going to happen.
But first it’s time for the next stop in their bacchanalia. They walk/stagger out of the strip club, pile into a red Beemer and pull out of the lot, singing at the top of their lungs. As they pull out onto the main road, a black sedan sedan slams into the women’s car, spinning it about 100 degrees to the left. The sedan comes to a stop right in front of the Beemer.
“Everybody okay?”
The women appear to be shaken but otherwise fine. Uh oh, the driver is getting out of the black sedan. He’s wearing a dark hoodie and holding a gun. He walks toward the BMW, then turn and pops the truck of his own car. He raises the gun and pops two shots into the trunk. A passenger emerges from his car, also wearing a dark hoodie, and the pair run away in the direction from which the came.
Cue the iconic Hawaii Five-0 theme song.
Next we see Steve entering a lavish home – designer interior, bikini babe emerging like a Bond girl from the pool and ocean just beyond. Reaching the backyard, Steve is greeted by Treat Williams (Everwood, Attack of the 50-ft. Cheerleader), playing Mick Logan, a retired intelligence operative and gray-haired playboy.
Mick Logan (Treat Williams, center) picks up Doris McGarrett (Christine Lahti, left) for a date, much to the chagrin of her son, Steve (Alex O’Loughlin).
Yes, Steve is still trying to find somebody capable of spying on his mom.
- Mick: “Kid, you don’t need a PI. You need a therapist.”
- Steve: “Trust me. She’s not your average mom.”
It’s been nine episodes since we last saw Doris McGarrett (Christine Lahti). That was when she entered a whole new realm of crazy, torturing a dude with jumper cables. But this is a stupid subplot, so I’m just going to get it out of the way. Doris detects Mick following her around the supermarket and confronts him in the wine aisle. His only play is to pretend he’s hitting on her. Thus follows a lunch over more than one bottle of wine, and they’re dating. When he comes by the McGarrett residence a few nights later, Doris remarks that he already knows Steve, so obviously the jig is up. “Chemistry.” That’s all Mick can say to Steve.
Main Story
The main plot of Season 3, Episode 16 involves the guy in the trunk of the black sedan. The gunshots killed him, but he’d already been beaten so badly that he’d have died anyway without treatment.
The episode is a solid whodunit. Not too complicated; no need for Catherine to ping a satellite.
My only real criticism is that CBS gave away the climax in the episode’s promo. We’ve already seen a crowd cheering two fighters in a drained swimming pool. Maggie Hoapili, the daughter of the dead man, is played by sci-fi ass kicker Summer Glau (Firefly, Serenity, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and Alphas), so we already know a girl fight is coming. The only real question is whether Kono – played by H50 regular Grace Park (Battlestar Galactica) – will be involved, making it a battle of the sic-fi sirens. (As it happens, she’s not.)
Had the “fight club” scene been early in the episode, the preview might not have been such a spoiler. But the more time passed without what we knew was coming, the more obvious the plot became.
Komekonnections
The initial victim was a relative of Kamekona (Taylor Wily). The way Steve handles the big guy says a lot about the ex-con’s relationship with Five-0.
Steve discovers that Kamekona had lent the victim a gun. As a parolee, Kamekona could be sent back to prison for that. But more to the point, Kamekona had given Steve a gun, no questions asked, when he was on the lam in the Season 1 finale.
So Steve and Danno back off to see what the big guy will do. He immediately hops behind the wheel and takes off. But this is all a bit of kabuki: There is no way Kamekona won’t notice that Silver Camaro two cars behind; instead, he puts himself in a position to be caught before he can get into any real trouble.
Maggie calls Kamekona “uncle,” and he appears to be her only living relative by the end of the episode. He promises that he’ll always be there for her, which I suppose leaves the door open for Glau to appear in future episodes. Hey, a guy can hope!
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Stuart J. Robinson, a college friend of the TV Tyrant, is a writer, editor, media-relations practitioner and social-media guy based in Phoenix.