Hawaii Five-0 Recap: Black-Mail and Blue Steel.

Alright, guys, can we stop with the high school kids episodes? Geez. This one starts out at some beach party with a band of long-haired Asian kids playing some Hendrix. That’s bad enough, but I really can’t believe the level of hedonism these kids are engaging in…

To my Bible Belt eyes, this is a fucking orgy. Dancing AND drinking?!? Oh, mercy!!

Ok, I’m really not much of a prude…just making a joke at the expense of the mass of Southern Baptists I grew up around.

So one kid shows up really late, and a couple of his friends start giving him a hard time about why he’s late, and he just kind of dodges the question. They ask about his girlfriend, and apparently she’s grounded. They decide to go spring her, but the boyfriend wants nothing to do with it, because her dad hates him enough already or something. So they head out to her house, and climb in her bedroom window…how does this count as springing her? Basically if she’d wanted to sneak out, don’t you think she’d have just climbed down out of her window on her own? Anyway, they get in there, and after lots of conversation about how they have to be super quiet, they decide the best way to wake her up is 3….2…..1…..BOO!!!!! Thankfully that doesn’t wake up her dad, but it also doesn’t wake the girl. They roll her over, and…

Looks like someone’s grounded…permanently…

INTRO!!

So Locke has apparently been traveling again, and Jin surprises him by picking him up at the airport.

This smile always means that someone is gonna bleed. 

In the car, Jin runs a stop sign, then proceeds to let Locke know that HPD thinks that he killed Mr Noshimori. Locke says that it had to be Wo Fat, but that song and dance is getting kind of old. Just then, Locke notices an SUV hauling ass up behind them, and somehow is immediately aware that it’s the Yakuza after him. They ram Jin’s car a few times, and finally he spins out and they pull up next to him…

I think the kids call this “sending a message.” 

So it looks like we’re gonna have another one of those 2 simultaneous episode stories again…I mean, don’t we have a hard enough time just keeping one storyline straight?

At the crime scene, Boomer informs McG and Danno about the victim. The girl is 17, and her name is Emily. She was smothered with a pillow from her own bed. That’s kind of a shitty way to go. They determine that her dad was home and asleep when she was killed, and the time of death was between when she went to bed at 10:30 and when her friends snuck in at 1am. How is someone gonna slip into the house and kill a girl and not wake up her dad? Oh, right…her dad slept through her friends yelling BOO! The check the window for prints, but apparently everyone climbs in through that window, so…not gonna have much luck.

Taylor talks to the Emily’s dad, who says the usual stuff about how his girl was a ray of sunlight and no one could ever hate her and she’s a great girl. However, he tells them she was grounded because she stole a check and made it out to cash for $5,000, but she wouldn’t tell him why when he confronted her about it. He tells them that he’s sure she stole the money for her no-good boyfriend.

McG and Taylor have a conversation about how no dad of a 17 year old girl will like her boyfriend. Ever. Taylor insists that her dad loved her boyfriends, and McG asks if he was a eunuch. Boomer lets them know that apparently the two had been fighting the night before, and the boyfriend was like super late to the party, and didn’t come back to the house to spring her from her room, either. Then she gets a phone call informing her that the boyfriend’s prints were found on the window frame.

And THIS is the evidence that convinces you to finally investigate him? The knowledge that the boyfriend snuck in her window?!?

At the boyfriend’s house, his mom keeps yelling for him, but he doesn’t come out…she keeps telling them that he’s a good kid, just…“spirited.” Then they hear a crash from behind a door, and the sound of glass breaking. McG takes action and busts the door down to find the boyfriend passed out on the ground with a bottle of pills spilled near him.

Luckily, or not, he’s ok. At the hospital, after the doctors pump his stomach, McG pumps him for information. He confirms that he climbed in her bedroom window all the time. Also, he tells them that she didn’t steal the money for him…because if he’d needed $5,000 he’d have stolen it from his own parents. Oh, and of course he also insists that he’d never ever ever ever hurt her.

Danno and Taylor head to Emily’s high school to check out her locker. Inside the locker, they see a bunch of pictures of her and another girl…so they head to the gym to talk to the principal, who is holding an assembly for the whole school to address the murder.

The gym is apparently full of nothing but pretty, emotionally compromised underaged girls. 

Danno and Taylor talk to the principal about the photos, and find out that it’s Emily’s BFF, as if they didn’t already know that. They ask to speak to her, and he informs them that he’s got to notify her parents first. So her dad shows up, and they have a nice little private conversation in the middle of the school courtyard. Seriously, wtf this is where you ask someone about a murder?

They ask the BFF about who the $5,000 was for, and she tells them that she doesn’t even know what $5,000 they’re talking about. They try to press her, but her dad steps in, even though it’s obvious she’s lying. She starts crying, and her dad tells them the interview is over. This episode (and show, in general) is pretty awesome at exemplifying bad parenting, isn’t it?

This is why all kids are so fat in this country…

At H50 HQ, Jin is bringing McG up to speed on Locke’s possible transgressions, and the Yakuza threat. Suddenly, after weeks of McG not believing Locke on anything, now he’s in full-on blind support and denial mode. They’re interrupted by Boomer, who tells them she found an email on Emily’s computer from her BFF, who was apparently being blackmailed by someone threatening to post a sex tape of her online. They call Danno and Taylor, who are all like SON OF A BITCH WE WERE JUST TALKING TO HER!! Taylor makes some comment about how she’s “a brick wall.” Seriously, brick wall? She started crying and hugged her daddy…

They see the BFF again, hug her daddy goodbye, then immediately pulls out her cell. Taylor grabs something from the trunk, and points it at her, and the thing magically tells her what number the BFF is calling. Boomer uses that number to activate the GPS on the cell, and they all move out to chase down the signal. Danno and Taylor get there first…and it’s the principal!!

Somehow they are able to make the jump in the commercial break to “oh the principal is sleeping with the BFF!” How did they put that together? They didn’t tap the call…and considering all the shit that’s gone down, it’s hardly a reasonable conclusion to jump to (there had to have been a more logical conclusion on the map, right?)…I mean, Emily’s BFF is distraught and calls the buddy-buddy type principal of her school…isn’t it just as likely she’s looking for some support/counseling?

Anyway, McG and Danno have him in their dark, concrete interrogation room, and he insists he’s done nothing wrong because she was 17, and the age of consent in Hawaii is 16, so “she’s legal!”

The fact that you’re calling it that tells me you’re not ready…

Seriously, guys, if any of you ever hear someone over the age of about 22 (ok, ok, I’ll go as high as 24) say “she’s legal” in reference to a girl he’s sleeping with…go ahead and chop his balls off with a rusty knife. If you have to say “she’s legal!”, you already know you’re doing something wrong…

So clearly McG now thinks the principal is the killer, but the guy insists otherwise. He tells them that Emily told him he had to break off the cradle-robbing because someone else had found out (such as the guy blackmailing her about the sex tape). The principal thinks that Emily figured out who the blackmailer was and that’s what got her killed!

McG gets a call and rushes out, and it turns out we’re back on the Locke storyline now. Apparently lock is in interrogation at HPD. McG keeps trying to help him out, and get Locke to let him in on what’s going on, but he’s having no success. Locke insists that everything he’s doing is to try to end the killing.

A world without violence? That is not a place I want to be…

Locke then stands up and tells McG he’s GTFOing because the cops have nothing on him.

Fong magically reappears back in this episode, just long enough to inform Boomer of how the blackmailer got ahold of the sex tape. It turns out there was a trojan horse imbedded in the school’s digital yearbook that apparently gave someone access to the webcam of all the computers it was installed on. Also, the IP address for the black-e-mails traces back to the school’s computer lab…

Boomer and Taylor head to the school and find some kid and start asking him questions about who was using a computer before him in the lab. Apparently that’s all some kind of elaborate ruse, because I guess they already knew it was him. They see a stack of the digital yearbook CDs on his desk, and ask who gave them to him. He said he made it, and they tell him they’re gonna have to take him in…so he takes off running. Taylor delivers one of my favorite moments in H50 thus far…

“Oh my God, really? Is he seriously…” (takes off after him). 

I’m kind of surprised none of the kids just sticks out a foot to trip him, shouting something like “haha yearbook queer!” or some other stupid shit that high schoolers like to shout at nerds. Regardless, Taylor and Boomer descend upon him like a pack of hungry lions. I, myself, wouldn’t mind Taylor and Boomer descending upon me like a pack of hungry lions. However, for this kid, it’s not such a great experience.

Being a genius and all, he makes it pretty clear that he’s blackmailing all sorts of people, not just the principal and the BFF.

So, they head into his secret lair, where he is displaying live feeds of various different computers. For some reason, Taylor and Boomer don’t make him shut those down. They ask him to pull up the feed from the night of Emily’s murder. The fact that he’s not only monitoring, but apparently blindly recording, this many students is laughable.

Seriously, I know storage is pretty cheap these days, but there is literally no way he would have any way of storing even all the video he recorded from finals week, so why does he have archived footage of a girl he stopped monitoring because she’s a “snooze fest.”

Also, has anyone else ever used a webcam? Apparently all of these are super fancy futuristic webcams, because they are crystal fucking clear from across the room, even in the dark.

Also, I would NOT want to run a blacklight over this guys little voyeur station…

Another point of weirdness…rather than confiscating all the footage and leaving this guy to getting spank material like every other high school boy (on the internet), Boomer has him just queue up the footage of Emily’s room, and together her, Taylor, and the kid watch her murder. Seriously? And through this state-of-the-art webcam, they’re able to get a usable face which they run through facial recognition and actually get a confirmed hit. Sigh. C’mon guys, my bit about the raptors (I’m really whoring this out, because I posted it when no one was looking for a H50 recap and all…) over break was more believable than that…

Also, on a side note, nothing further is mentioned about this creeper despite evidence of literally dozens of felonies. I mean, he’s CURRENTLY blackmailing “7 or 8” people. Not to mention he probably has terabytes of kiddie porn on his computer from all of this voyeurism. And they don’t even make a show of arresting/murdering him?!?

The killer was apparently a real deal hitman. Who hires a hitman (especially one STARTING at $250k) to take out a 17 year old girl?? However, Taylor comes in to inform them that the hitman is already en route to Manilla, and so they can’t really reach him now. However, they are able to use the airport footage and ZOOM! ENHANCE! on the boarding pass to see he was using an alias, and so they run that through local hotels and car rentals, etc. Strange to me that a hitman would use only one alias for his travel and lodging and other expenses. Seems like a good way to leave an easy-to-follow trail.

They head back to Emily’s father’s house, and ask him some more questions. He has no idea why someone would have a hit on his daughter, and tells them he has no enemies (“c’mon, guys, I’m a physical therapist”)…unless…

I’ll take “the rapist” for $200, Alex…

He tells them he was on jury duty for a small civil suit about a construction worker who was hurt on the job when a balcony gave out. The case wasn’t over, and he was excused because of his daughter’s death.

They visit the judge, who informs them that this kind of thing doesn’t cause a mistrial, just they seated a new rural juror in his place and continued. Just then, the defense team walks in…like 4 lawyers, and apparently they’re all big guns. They also hired Hawaii’s most expensive Jury Consultant. For a civil case? Something doesn’t add up…

Jin and Boomer visit the rental car company, but the car has already been cleaned and the GPS has been wiped, so there’s not much to go on…except a valet stub that’s left under the wiper.

Locke gets back to his place, and as he’s unlocking his door he notices a very large man walking towards him. Not being a complete idiot, he tries to bolt down the stairwell, but there’s another large man…this time pointing a gun at him. They knock him out and toss his phone on the ground.

Jin and Boomer track down the valet stub, and it leads to the building where the Jury Consultant works. Then Danno comes in and informs everyone that the new rural juror, who replaced Emily’s dad, seems clean. But then he looked at the guy’s wife, and she just received a $50k wire into her bank account, coinciding with her husband being seated on the jury.

Here comes the scene that’s always present in these types of shows. McG and Danno catch up with the jury consultant, and start with the innocent questions, and slowly start building up to accusing him of paying off a juror and murdering Emily. Then he gets enraged…

We’re done here!

…and storms off.

McG tracks down the new rural juror, throws a bag over his head, and takes him out to a cliff somewhere. He tells the guy that he’s on the edge of an 80 foot cliff, and starts asking him questions. Apparently the guy’s role on the jury is to make sure the jury doesn’t think or ask questions about “the steel,” and to make sure they’re focusing on the worker’s safety violations. He says it’s working, and the verdict will be the one he was paid for. McG pushes him anyways…

Thud…

They then proceed to arrest the guy. I’m pretty sure there are like 9 million things that McG did illegally here that will quickly result in this guy getting off the hook…

It turns out that a company involved…namely the one in charge of providing the steel for the apartment building, falsified invoices, and was selling good, home-grown Pittsburg steel…only they were actually providing the company with Chinese steel, which apparently doesn’t necessarily meet US construction standards. Therefore, the accident would have been negligence. More importantly, though, they only used 5% of that shipment on the apartment building in question…the rest is being used to build a new building. So they’re trying to keep people from investigating the steel, because obviously that will not bode well for the construction company, nor the steel company…

They hurry out to the construction site, and find the foreman and the Jury consultant arguing. McG tells them they’re both under arrest, and the construction guy punches the asshole jury guy, who falls off the building. McG reacts in an instant and catches his hand, and there’s a very Cliffhanger moment, and McG can’t hold on, and the guy falls 5 stories to his death.

For some reason, they felt the need to additionally impale him on rebar…

So now that case is all wrapped up, McG heads over to Locke’s place to talk, only he sees Locke’s keys still in the door, and his cell phone on the ground, and realizes something is very wrong.

Lock is being punched on by Adam Noshimori’s goons, trying to get info about his dad. McG employs his ninja skills and sneaks in to the compound. McG shoots one guy in the leg, and points the gun at Adam, and makes the others drop their weapons. Locke is untied and stumbles out, and McG drives off. Locke tells him that now there’s a war between Yakuza and H50, but McG’s like “Oh well, I’ve handled worse.” Locke tells him that he didn’t kill Hiro Noshimori…but rather that he helped him fake his own death. He refuses to say why, so McG dramatically slams on the brakes and demands answers.

This backfires, however, when Locke just unbuckles his seatbelt and hops out of the car and walks away…

When will this storyline be resolved?!? At the end of this season? Who is Shelbourn?!? WHO?!? What if it’s Locke, and now HE’S the one trying to tie up any loose ends. Could it be that? I don’t even know what’s happening anymore. It’s all very confusing.

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