Out of Sync (7.19)

Rate, review & discuss the episodes from the seventh season

Moderator: Styles Bitchley

How Would You Rate This Episode?

10 (Perfect!)
6
7%
9.5 (One of the Best)
4
5%
9.0 (Excellent)
9
10%
8.5 (Very Good)
18
20%
8.0 (Pretty Good)
24
27%
7.5 (Decent)
6
7%
7.0 (Average at Best)
6
7%
6.5 (Not So Good)
7
8%
6.0 (Pretty Bad)
4
5%
5.0 (Just Awful)
4
5%
 
Total votes: 88

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J.J. Walters
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Out of Sync (7.19)

#1 Post by J.J. Walters »

This is the official MM thread for Out of Sync (7.19). All discussions and reviews for this episode should go here. If you wish to rate the episode, please do so with the poll. The avg. score will be the official 'community rating', which will be used on the episode page (updated monthly).

This thread is also linked in the episode page of the Episode Guide.


Original Air Date: 3/11/1987
The path of true love doesn't run smoothly when Magnum's plans with his on-again, off-again fiancee are ruined by an actress who wants to help in catching a porn director.
Last edited by J.J. Walters on Fri Dec 28, 2007 3:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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#2 Post by J.J. Walters »

Previously, I'd only seen bits and pieces of this episode. A pretty darn good episode, IMHO. A wacky plot with lots of humorous scenes. The first 15-20 minutes are flat out hilarious at times! I really like the uncharacteristic, nonlinear, on camera, narration from Magnum. It's a refreshing plot device. And it's good to see Dana Delany and English cinema icon David Hemmings again!

I love how when Magnum is asked if Andrea is in trouble, he casually replies, "It's not that big a problem. I should take care of it in a couple of hours". Well, just a little bit earlier he learned that Andrea was running for her life from a twisted porn director and his goons. Andrea also mentioned her belief that said porn director was also involved in underground snuff films! Now, either Magnum just didn't believe her (which would be logical, but at this point in the story he really hadn't investigated anything yet), or he was so confident in his investigative abilities that he truly believed he could bust a porn/snuff film syndicate in a mere hours! :shock:
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#3 Post by rubber chicken »

Useless factoid of the day - the knife the big guy uses in the beach scene at the beginning of the show is a Buck Special. When I was around 14 or so my grandfather gave me one for my birthday. :)
Image

And did Magnum's moped driving remind anyone of Lloyd in Dumb & Dumber? I cracked up seeing that.
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Last edited by rubber chicken on Tue Sep 15, 2009 9:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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#4 Post by Frodoleader »

Don't know if this is a flub or not, but when TM was in the airport coffee shop, he mentioned playing football at Navy. He said his last game as a Midshipman was against the University of Michigan. Now, if I am not mistaken, isn't the Army-Navy game always been the final game for both teams? Isn't it pretty much the last game of the college football season?
Maybe "back then" it wasn't, but I know it is now.

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#5 Post by IKnowWhatYoureThinking »

I guess the one exception to that is if his Mids played UM in a bowl game.

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#6 Post by Frodoleader »

A bowl game - a good point I had not thought of. But I don't think TM said it was a bowl game though. My thought is that the writer missed the point that Army-Navy is traditionally the final game of the regular season.

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#7 Post by IKnowWhatYoureThinking »

I agree Frodoleader. I cannot remember when Army V. Navy was not the last game of the year. I guess this is just another inconsistency in the script that was overlooked.

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#8 Post by Italian Ice »

Yes another episode that I've NEVER seen until today. I really liked this one.

Magnum's face to face narration was a good new addition, breaking down doors while being tied up to a chair, renting adult movies using TC's membership card, TM "trading" his ferrari for a moped, TM supposedly turns down yet ANOTHER pay cheque.

Good episode overall.
Higgins: " Dispatch the pig!!! "

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#9 Post by Rutledal »

I like this episode, it's one of the funnier Magnum episodes. Seeing David Hemmings is allways great and this episode is no exception. I'm sorta glad Magnum and Cynthia didn't end up together after all since I like to think that T.M never really can move on from Michelle who was the love of his life.
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#10 Post by Jaybird »

Pretty good episode but with a strange ending. Dana Delaney returns and she and TM have an uncomfortable time. I am disappointed that his engagement to her never went anywhere....or did it?

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#11 Post by Carmen »

Nope, it didn`t
Sometimes I get so lucky, even I don`t believe it (TSM)

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#12 Post by IKnowWhatYoureThinking »

I often wonder why this engagement didn't go anywhere. It was a perfect time in Magnum's life as he was taking stock in what he had, and re evaluating his life. Maybe it was the distance, as well as the akwardness of the engagement that doomed this relationship?

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#13 Post by Frodoleader »

I think this episode always left me wanting more. More Dana Delany obviously, but even more. Maybe TM & Cynthia getting engaged? Of course, that would upset the dynamics of an already perfect cast. Maybe if Cynthia returned at the end of season 8, and instead of Rick marrying Cleo, TM married Cynthia? I think that would have made an interesting series ender: TM choking on the "I do" as the series ends, like Rick does.
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#14 Post by Zudobug »

I thought that this episode had the potential to be a truly great one with Magnum getting back together with his love interest from the beginning of the season but it was ruined by Jay Huguely's strange sense of humour. I've never liked any of the episodes he has written and this is no exception. The woman trying to run away from a porn baron and enlisting Magnum's help just ruined what was a perfect love story. She was so annoying and all she ever seemed to do was conveniently get in Magnum and his fiances way.

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#15 Post by Jay-Firestorm »

I was particularly looking forward to this one, as when Five ran the series in 2002-3, this was one of two episodes they skipped, and until watching it on DVD last night, I had never seen this episode.

[rating=9.0]

Thomas has a hard time juggling his latest case – hired by an adult film star to investigate what she claims is a director making ‘snuff’ movies – and spending time with his fiancée Cynthia, who is visiting Hawaii from L.A. Some good moments…

-----

This review contains spoilers.

Re-watching the series on DVD to review, I was really looking forward to this episode, and with good reason: when Five ran the series here in the U.K. in 2002-3, while they edited some episodes for the daytime slot, they completely skipped two episodes – the second season opener ‘Billy Joe Bob’ and this one.
‘Billy Joe Bob’ was probably dropped due to the attempted hanging at the climax of that story, while I imagine ‘Out of Sync’ was not shown due to the (suggested) violent nature of some of the pornographic movies glimpsed during the episode.
But either way, I was really excited, because to me, it was like a brand new episode of MPI. I’ve seen most other episodes over a number of times, but never this one.
And to my pleasure, it turned out to be a very reasonable story.

The plot sees Magnum’s fiancée Cynthia Farrell (Dana Delany) visiting him in Hawaii, after they met in the feature-length / two-part season opener ‘L.A.’. Although ‘L.A.’ ranks as my least favourite two-hour story of the series, I did enjoy it more this time around, and it was good to see Delany make a return appearance here. Delany and Tom Selleck have a very good chemistry on-screen, and it makes for some good scenes.

But it’s not all plain sailing – at the same time, Magnum has been hired to investigate a director making ‘snuff’ movies. The director is played by David Hemmings, who had previously played a different character in the fifth season episode ‘Compulsion’, and who directed several episodes of the show (he also worked on ‘Airwolf’ and ‘The A-Team’ amongst many other shows). Hemmings is typically good value for money, although here, maybe we don’t see quite enough of him to give him anything to really get his teeth into.

There is also none of Magnum’s usual narration in this episode, with him instead addressing the viewer to camera at the start of each act. With him all bruised, and his suit tattered, this works well, as we gradually find out throughout the episode how he came to be in this beaten up state.

As I have said with many episodes from the latter end of MPI’s run, this story plays as more of a drama (or in this case, comedy drama) than the adventures of earlier season. Sometimes I dislike that, but in this case, it doesn’t work too badly.
The story has some really good moments, and the sequence of Magnum escaping his captors and trying to race back to Robin’s Nest (still tied to chair!) before Cynthia leaves, is one of the best extended sequences of the season in my opinion.

The only thing that really lets this story down is the abrupt conclusion to the ‘snuff movie’ thread – it turns out that Andrea, the actress who hired Magnum, often pulls such stunts and is just playing games with director Danny (Hemmings). I found this sudden turn of events much too sudden, like they ran out of screen time and wrapped it up best they could, and it leaves several plot holes.

But other than that, this is a very good episode. I like the final scene, with Magnum’s rushed goodbye to Cynthia at the airport, and his final slow walking away. This is the last we see of Cynthia in the series, and I personally think it would have been better to bring her back in the show’s finale, ‘Resolutions’, instead of Linda from ‘Forty’ (a couple of episodes previous to this one).
But all-in-all, a good story with some very nice moments – even when I’ve got past the novelty of this being a ‘new’ episode to me!

-----

Other notes, bloopers and misc.:

* Yet again, the DVD version abridges the act breaks. In this case it is particularly annoying, as each act opens with Magnum addressing the camera, and it needs the breaks to distinguish these sections from the rest of the story.

* I don’t think he is credited, but is the guy on the beach at the beginning Bob Minor (Roger E. Mosley’s stunt double, and who has parts in several episodes?).

* On the scene on the beach, where Magnum tells Cynthia to just “relax”, does he deliberately mess up the word, or was this a blooper from which her recovered? He says “just ra—relax” and laughs, but they continue.

* Magnum smokes his fourteenth cigar of the series in this story.
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