Saturday, January 7, 2017

Hawaii Five-O Review: Dealing With The World's Dumbest Criminals

Hawaii Five-O returned from winter break last night and paraded a lot of dumb criminals onscreen for our entertainment. Since we'd ended on a cliffhanger in December (will Chin live after he's traded himself to a cartel for his niece Sara?) this was the wrap up of an intense first half.

We start out with Kono looking worried about her cousin. Grover is trying to comfort her with, "Chin's alive and he knows we're coming to get him." He probably should have said, "Chin's been abducted so many times in the past. Our entire team has, really, and all our loved ones. Chill, sista! We know the drill." The doorbell rings and Kono and Grover pull their guns and inch toward the door. It's Adam! He's somehow found out where they are (I'm sure asking around didn't alert anyone to the fact he was leaving Hawaii. Hey, do you guys know where my wife is at? I'm not going to leave Hawaii, though. I just wanna know! *side eye*) But he figures it out and hotfoots it to Mexico to join his bride and her friends. Everyone seems happy to see him and when Steve comes out of the bedroom after questioning the cartel member they captured, he gives Adam a nice bro hug. (Remember when Adam was the head of a criminal organization and no one liked him? Well, except Kono. But you know, back then he had something to do and a purpose in life beyond being Kono's arm candy. Poor guy. Things have changed a lot.)  Anyway, the cartel member, who is breathing heavily in the background (but other than that looks generally unhurt besides a little cut on his cheek. Maybe McG just gave him the Steve Stare and he caved) and he told them where the cartel's secret compound is in the jungle. It's thirty minutes away, so the team has gotta hurry and skedaddle. (I hope Adam stays in the car or wears a mask or something. It's not going to look great to his parole officer if someone spots him at a murder scene. Because you know there's going to be a lot of shooting in a minute.)

Now we cut over to Chin being manhandled and frogmarched over to a pit of snarling dogs. (Didn't the people who kidnapped Kono and Adam a couple of months ago have snarling dogs, too? Maybe it's a criminal thing.) The cartel leader strolls out of a car (he sort of looks like a poor man's Antonio Banderas). Chin is wearing a dog collar and Poor Man Antonio grabs it and proceeds to look down at the dogs (who haven't been fed for six days) and chat with Chin. He says that they didn't start out using the dog collar, but it will protect Chin's artery so the dogs don't bite it right away and the killing is over too quickly. Chin doesn't look all that impressed (the guy's had a bomb strapped to his neck before so this is nothing!) and says you're doing all this for your brother's honor, but he didn't have any. That makes Poor Man Antonio annoyed and he just says Chin didn't know his brother. Chin is all, yeah, I did. He was going to sell you guys out! Ha! Bet you didn't know that! Poor Man Antonio is all, well, never mind about that, I liked somebody else you killed that day, too, so go say hi to him! (And wouldn't that be an awkward conversation. They get to the next world and Chin goes to have a sit-down. Hey, remember when you were a criminal and our task force killed you? Antonio says hi.) Well, after that remark, they both lean over like Chin is going in the dog pit, but then gunfire breaks out! All the cartel people are killed. (Cartels these days must have terrible jungle security. Also, why aren't they in a warehouse or something and not out in the open? No wonder this cartel doesn't have leaders live very long. They're obviously rookie cartel people.) Anyway, only Poor Man Antonio is left alive holding Chin's collar. He points a gun at Chin and says he's going to kill him, but gets killed before he can really finish speaking. Not a smart criminal. I was surprised Chin didn't just stand up and say it took you guys long enough, but he seems a bit surprised to see Steve. They don't take the dog collar off and just run off into the trees. (I hope someone comes to feed those dogs. Poor things!)

They go back to Sara's house and even though Chin is bloody (they did take the collar off, yay!) he goes up to Sara and hugs her. Because hugging bloody Uncle Chin won't traumatize the poor girl any more than she already has been, right? Well, Chin goes in the bathroom to clean up and Steve knocks on the door. Chin thanks him for helping him keep a promise to see Sara again and they hug. Steve also gives him back his Five-O badge, cause he left it in the dirt and as Jerry can attest, those are hard to come by. Chin is saying goodbye to Sara when her uncle presents Chin with guardianship papers all ready for Chin to sign! He can have Sara! (And it's not weird at all that they had guardianship papers transferring custody drawn up while the girl was missing, right?) Everyone is happy and Sara goes home to Hawaii.

The next scene is Steve in the office putting stuff away from their Mexico trip. He is surprised to see Grover coming in on a Saturday, but he's helping with a SWAT seminar. They are both surprised to see Jerry sleeping in Steve's office. On the floor. Jerry is couch-surfing and sometimes uses Steve's office. He can't get an apartment because he has no credit history, so Steve says he'll vouch for him. There is a box of donuts on Steve's desk that say, "Commander McGarrett please say yes, Dr. Kimbo." (If I wanted Commander McGarrett to say yes to something, I don't think I'd use donuts, just sayin') Of course, Jerry ate some of them but doesn't know anything about where they came from. They go down to ask Max about it because he's the only doctor they know and he might know Dr. Kimbo, I guess? Max is doing an autopsy of a random guy found in his own car trunk. Steve and Grover are bored, so they take the case. And call the team back from vacation to help with it. All except Danny, who is already gone. (Which is sad because the team has a little more sparkle when he's there.)

Dead Guy worked at a car dealership so they send Grover in undercover as Roy Watts, car salesman. They even replace the poor dead guy's picture on the dealership team wall, with "Roy's." I guess his boss didn't draw the line at that even though one of his best employees has only been dead for twenty-four hours. Poor dead guy with no friends at work or a boss that cares! Grover finds out from Sad Loser Employee Bob that there's a $50,000 bonus up for grabs and Dead Guy and Paul, his nemesis, were really the only two that had a chance of getting it. Grover reports to Steve that Paul has been holed up in his office all day with the blinds drawn and won't come out. In order to get in and check the office out to see if it's the crime scene, Grover has Kamekona come in to test drive trucks with Paul, who goes for it. But all they find are Dead Guy's lead sheets that Paul has been poaching. They have Kamekona drive Paul to an overlook where Steve is waiting. He doesn't announce who he is, (he could have been anyone!) and just tells Paul to get out of the car so they take him to the Blue Room of Doom. Does everyone just know Five-O now or did Paul follow orders because he was afraid of the Steve Stare combined with the gun on his hip?

Steve questions Paul and finds out he has an alibi. He's a jerk, but when he's told he'll be here for a while so they can check his alibi, (which means everyone else at work will get his sales), he tells them that he overheard a heated conversation with Dead Guy and someone on the phone. Seems that Dead Guy was having a car delivered and some other salesman poached it. He was very angry. And guess who the car poacher is? Grover pays Sad Loser Employee Bob a visit and he claims that Dead Guy attacked him for poaching the car. Grover sees a tall potted plant in the middle of the floor and moves it, and surprise! There's a big bloodstain under it. Bob admits he killed Dead Guy with his Employee of the Year Award. And Bob might get another award for Dumbest Criminal of the Year. He doesn't bother to at least attempt to clean up the bloodstain and just puts a potted plant over it? Makes it obvious he drove Dead Guy's car last night because he had to drive his wife's car to work this morning, and still has his own car in the parking lot? Offers a bribe to keep it quiet? *slaps forehead* No, Bob. Just no. You suck as a salesman and a murderer. Do not pass Go and head directly to jail.

Grover thinks something isn't quite right and does more digging. They figure out that Dead Guy was working with a drug syndicate and smuggling drugs onto the island inside the cars. They track down the head of the syndicate and bring him to the Blue Room of Doom. He's a Sang Min lookalike and has a lot of attitude. Maybe a relative? Anyway, he says they weren't working with Dead Guy anymore. He got a better offer. So, with that lead gone, they look to HPD to help them track down the narco-car with the oblivious new owner. The poor policeman who finds the new owner barely has time to tell the guy there's a problem before he's run over and killed. The killer also shoots the new owner and grabs whatever was hidden in the car. But, thankfully, the shot out dashboard cam still had some recoverable footage so they manage to get a pic of the shooter and it's a terrorist named Jared. I'm sorry, but that made me laugh. Jared the Terrorist is VERY SCARY. And it wasn't drugs in the car! It had radiation! Jared the Terrorist is pulling out a canister of uranium at home!

Jared the Terrorist is a a terrible terrorist, though, and missed the class about not leaving a financial trail when you're a wanted criminal. (How have Interpol and everyone else not been able to track this guy until now?) Kono easily finds the apartment he rented and his car is still outside. The team rushes over in bio suits and tac gear (haha, I know! It was a funny combination.) and they break in, but Jared the Terrorist runs away and just kills himself. Maybe no one liked Jared the Terrorist in his organization either, and his boss wouldn't mind changing his team picture. Well, with the radiation poisoning on Jared the Terrorist's face, it's not like he could ever get a new picture to look good, anyway. Poor Sad Loser Employee Jared the Terrorist. But everyone just stares at his body on the floor, like the bloodstain on Sad Loser Employee Bob's floor. Who knew they'd have so much in common? After this moment of silence, the team takes the radioactive suitcase out and all is well. For now.

Chin goes over to Kono's and has a sit-down with Adam, thanking him for coming to help and putting Kono first and promises he won't tell his parole officer Adam broke parole. Aww. What's a parole violation between brother-in-laws? Then they have a beer together.

Jerry is in Steve's office and tells him he found an apartment for rent, but it's Max's. Steve goes over to talk to Max, and he finds out that he's leaving and didn't want to tell Steve, because Steve would have been disappointed in him. Steve says he's so proud that Max wants to help people and he'll always have a job and Five-O ohana waiting for him at home. Awww *sniffle* The moment is broken when Steve gets a call from Grover that the radioactive suitcase was empty. What if Jared the Terrorist already gave the uranium to someone? Then they could kill half the population of Hawaii! Dun, dun, dun.

So, in the space of an hour, the team dealt with Poor Man's Antonio, Sad Loser Employee Bob, and Jared the Terrorist, (and have a secrecy pact on Adam's little lapse in judgment) AND had two suspects in the Blue Room of Doom. It was like a parade of dumb criminals, which really makes me miss Wo Fat.

Next week looks like a farewell to Max, so I'll have the tissue handy. Don't goooo, Max. *sigh*

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