Season 3, Episode 17 of CBS’ Hawaii Five-0 – in which the gang must solve a corporate murder/espionage case – takes place amid the hoopla of the NFL’s Pro Bowl weekend in Hawaii.

It doesn’t advance any of the series’ backstories but otherwise has all the elements of a great H50 episode: snappy repartee, popular secondary characters, real Honolulu settings and a nod to the past. The most implausible aspect of the episode was the idea that anyone cares about the Pro Bowl.

The hour begins with what appears to be a helicopter dropping commandos to attack a desert compound. Another McGarrett flashback? Nah, just some corporate group on an expensive team-building exercise. At the end, the participants start to remove their paint-splattered gear and yuck it up, only to discover that one of group is dead from a real bullet to the head.

Cue the iconic Hawaii Five-0 theme song.

At the shrimp truck, Kamekona (Taylor Wily) is running a Pro Bowl Special: same food, jacked-up price. Business must be good, because he’s brought in cousin Flippa (Shawn Mokuahi Garnett) to help out. Flippa, who I’ll call “Mini-K” from now on, made his first H50 appearance backstage at the Victoria’s Secret fashion show in this season’s Episode 9.

Danno has asked Big K to obtain some primo Pro Bowl tickets, one row from the AFC sideline, because he wants to meet Peyton Manning.

• Danno: “I’m not going to miss my opportunity to meet the greatest quarterback of our generation.”
• Steve: “Okay. Wait a minute. Stop. The greatest quarterback of our generation?”
• Danno: “That’s what I said.”
• Steve: “First of all, greatness is measured in championships.” He looks to Kamekona: “Am I right? If we go by that measure, Tom Brady … Tom Brady is the greatest quarterback of our generation. He has three rings to Manning’s one.”
• Danno: “I knew you would say something stupid like that.”
• Kamekona: “Debating on which one of those guys are better is like arguing over which is the greatest rock ‘n’ roll band of all time: Beatles or Stones.”
• Danno: “Well, that’s easy. It’s the Stones.”
• Steve: “Beatles.”
• Danno: “Of course, the Brady fan says The Beatles. See this?”
• Kamekona: “Look, I think the takeaway is: We are living in the new golden age of quarterbacks. We’ve got Brady, Manning, Rodgers, Brees. It’s almost an embarrassment of riches.”
• Steve: “That’s a deeply insightful analysis.”
• Kamekona: “I just hate to see you two guys fight.”
  [Steve’s phone rings.]
• Danno: “We’re not fighting.”
• Steve: “This isn’t fighting.”

Onto the crime scene, where the writers have followed the old maxim that the only thing better than lots of guns is hot chicks with the guns. First, there is a gratuitous shot of Grace Park’s ass, packaged in tight denim and framed by wooden beams. Then there is an attractive female ballistics expert to provide a rundown on what police found.

Yet this remains the Pro Bowl episode:

• Danno: “Okay, so we’ve got 12 men on the field.”
• Steve: “Yeah, 11 players and one killer.”

Later, as Steve and Danno leave the office, Catherine pulls up in front of the building and pops out of her car wearing a Dallas Cowboys shirt.

• Danno: “That’s very cute. You’ve got a Cowboys fan dating a Redskins fan. It’s like the Capulets and the Montagues.”
• Catherine: “That’s good. I’m going to give you an A-plus for that literary reference.”

Someone has given Catherine tickets to the Pro Bowl, and she assumes Steve will be thrilled. But he he turns down her offer because he’s going with Danno (and Kamekona, who obtained an extra ticket for himself).

• Danno: “We’ve got 50-yard-line seats. Best seats in the house.”
• Steve: “We got ’em this morning. I’m sorry.”
• Catherine: “That’s cool. …  My tickets are pretty good, so I sure I can find someone else to take.”

A bit of foreshadowing there?

As Five-0 pursues the murder investigation, the task is complicated by a separate corporate-espionage plot that targeted the victim.

The paper trail leads Steve and Danno to La Mariana Tiki Bar – an actual Honolulu nightspot since 1957. They enter to the tune of Frank Sinatra’s I’ve Got You Under My Skin (actually written by Cole Porter in 1936).

• Danno: “All right, don’t quote me, but I think I like this place.”
• Steve: “My dad liked it here too – a lot. He was a regular.”

Steve is greeted by the singer, Nicky “The Kid” Demarco, played by … Larry Manetti from Magnum P.I.

H50‘s homage to Magnum P.I. (1980-88), began in Episode 11 with a helicopter painted somewhat like the one on Magnum, continues with the actor who played Orville “Rick” Wright on the Tom Selleck detective show – which had a theme song almost as good as H50’s.

Nicky describes a beautiful woman who scams male tourists and points the boys to a bouncer who might be involved, but the man flees when they approach. Steve and Danno give chase, but Nicky employs Kono’s signature move: using the back door to cut off the suspect and deck him. “Frank taught me that,” Nicky says.

Chin Ho traces the grifter’s cell phone to the security office at Waikiki Beach Marriott hotel, where Kono finds the officer on duty reading Michael Connelly’s crime novel The Black Box. The guard shows her a video of the woman arguing with a man at the poolside bar. She gets up to leave; when he tries to stop her, he’s slugged by a Good Samaritan the guard identifies as Houston Texans running back Arian Foster.

It’s a moment for equal-opportunity objectification: “He’s even hotter without the pads and the helmet,” Kono says.

Naturally, Steve and Danno must visit a Pro Bowl practice to question Foster. As they arrive, B-roll video shows Drew Brees and Eli Manning, among others. Steve and Danno talk with Foster and borrow the ring he was wearing when he slugged the guy. Then Danno embarrasses himself by criticizing Foster for a late-season fumble that Danno says cost him his fantasy-league title. This leads to a cargument once they leave.

• Danno: “Foster’s the one who should be embarrassed, okay. I’m not the one who fumbled that ball. He holds onto that ball and I am a fantasy champion.”
• Steve: “Instead, you’re a real-life imbecile.”

The plot barrels to its conclusion, however Steve injures his right shoulder taking down the killer. Danno accompanies him to the hospital, but not before phoning Kamekona and telling him to give away their tickets because they can’t make it to the game.

Flash forward to Aloha Stadium, where Big K and Mini-K are wearing Troy Polamalu Steelers jerseys and Max is wearing a Japan soccer jersey.

• Kamekona: “You realize this is not that kind of football, right.”
• Max: “I’m being ironic.”
• Kamekona: “Ironic …”

Also at the game are Chin Ho — wearing the 49ers No. 61 jersey of University of Hawaii graduate Jesse Sapolu – and Honolulu Police Sgt. Duke Lukela (Dennis Chun).

As Danno watches on TV in the hospital waiting room, the AFC scores and a couple of the players high-five Catherine and Kono on the sideline. Yes, Catherine had even better tickets.

All is not lost for Danno, though. When he and Steve finally get to the stadium, she has a football signed by Peyton Manning for him. Steve persuades Danno to go out for a pass, which he completes despite just having had that shoulder popped back into place at the hospital.

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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.