Legend of the Lost Art (8.10)

Rate, review & discuss the episodes from the eighth season

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How Would You Rate This Episode?

10 (Perfect!)
13
14%
9.5 (One of the Best)
4
4%
9.0 (Excellent)
20
22%
8.5 (Very Good)
8
9%
8.0 (Pretty Good)
10
11%
7.5 (Decent)
8
9%
7.0 (Average at Best)
3
3%
6.5 (Not So Good)
12
13%
6.0 (Pretty Bad)
6
7%
5.0 (Just Awful)
6
7%
 
Total votes: 90

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Carol the Dabbler
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Re: Legend of the Lost Art (8.10)

#51 Post by Carol the Dabbler »

[from Episode Note 1] The episode of commonly referred to as "The Raiders of the Lost Ark Episode".
I think that's a typo, James -- the first "of" should probably be "is" or "was."

[from Episode Note 3] In attempting to figure out Peter Ridley-Smythe's plan, several classic movies are mentioned [including] ... Perils of Nyoka, aka "Nyoka and the Lost Secrets of Hippocrates" (1942).
I believe I've spotted a flub here, though I'll admit it's only a technicality. Magnum says that when he and his fourth-grade classmates watched Nyoka and the Lost Secrets of Hippocrates, they all thought Nyoka had died at the end of Chapter Four -- until it was revealed the following Saturday that she had actually jumped out of the chariot just before it went over the cliff. Clearly, they were watching the 1942 Republic serial. The only problem is, the title of the serial was Perils of Nyoka. According to Leonard Maltin's Movie and Video Guide (I have the 1993 edition), the Hippocrates title was used for a feature-length version re-edited from the serial.

But it just now occurred to me that I can let Magnum (and the writers!) off the hook -- we had already seen him watching what could well have been Hippocrates on his tv. Maybe he said to himself, "Hey, I remember this -- I saw it in fourth grade!" Since he had forgotten the title of the serial, he assumed that it was the same as on his feature-length copy.

[from Episode Note 4] The scroll ... was created by a highly advanced prehistoric group of people ("of small size & gargantuan intellect") called "The Ancients".
This is apparently a reference to the Menuhune.

[from Episode Note 8] Out of the blue "Bogie Rick" returns, complete with white tux and cigarette.
But in this campy episode, it fits so well that I didn't even notice it!

Tralfaz wrote:... while paying homage to Raiders they go out of their way to show Magnum clearly never thinking of it as the obvious film being emulated by Ridley-Smythe
Actually, I believe that he does, he just "isn't allowed" to say it. When Connie asks how come he's making the torch out of her clothes instead of his own, he says, "Because I've seen the movie." And just before that, he had said that he had figured out which movie it was. He had mentioned the titles of all his previous guesses -- but not that final one.

lutherhgillis wrote:Would TS have made a great Indiana Jones? .... Could Harrison Ford have made a great TM? .... I would say TS could have been a huge star in the Indy films and that HF could have been huge in MPI.
I think they could each have been excellent in the other role -- but each of the characters would have changed considerably.

*************

At the beginning of the episode, when TM is going through various parts of the tunnel on his way to the burial chamber, he enters a small room with bats in it. One or more bats fly out past him, but one is left circling in the room. It sure looks to me like it's a fake bat (duh!) tied to a string, being whirled in a circle by a propman on a ladder!


As the chopper approaches the camp by air, we can very clearly see a clearing with a number of structures in it. But once Magnum & Co. are walking around within the camp, everything seems to be covered with camouflage netting. Is that a discrepancy-type flub -- or did the baddies simply do a lousy job with the netting?
Last edited by Carol the Dabbler on Mon Apr 18, 2011 10:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Legend of the Lost Art (8.10)

#52 Post by J.J. Walters »

Carol the Dabbler wrote:
[from Episode Note 4] The scroll ... was created by a highly advanced prehistoric group of people ("of small size & gargantuan intellect") called "The Ancients".
This is apparently a reference to the Menuhune.
Interesting! :)
In the experimental 1970s Aloha network developed at the University of Hawaii, the packet controllers were called Menehune, a pun on the equivalent IMP (Interface Message Processor) in the early ARPAnet.
The IT guy in me is screaming with laughter! :)
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#53 Post by timm525 »

This was a kinda silly but yet a very fun ep.

I too have/had the Indy game on my Atari 64. I have to go up in the attic and dig that sucker out and see if it still works.

The girl was hot!!! Too bad she wasn't in more eps. I think she would have made a great mommy for Lilly.

Loved the Higgins' "hi-ya" as he gives his "love tap" to the bad guy at the King Kam club. I bust a gut every time I see him do that. And his expression is so serious like he actually believes that "tap" will be anything more than a mosquito attack. :lol:

At the estate when TM and Connie kiss, notice that their heads are almost evenly aligned with her slightly lower. My first thought was wow! He's 6'4" and not even bending down to kiss her, she must be a giant! Then in the next scene you see them walking arm in arm on the beach and you can see his chin is over the top of her head. Obviously she was standing on quite a platform to meet his height or else they dug a hole for him!

The shoot out at the estate was good in that TC actually had the forethought to raise the shot gun up instead of crossing TM's body with it after Higgins was shot. You don't always see that detail with guns in TV. Especially back then.

Also got a kick out of TM dropping Riddley Smythe in the tent. Smythe puts up his dukes and TM pops him with a left. That was too funny.

Loved how TM tries to get the guy with the whip but it is too short and he missed and TC shoots the guy instead. Loved the look TC had, rolled his eyes and shook his head as TM says "worked before".

Higgins: "That's it. We've found it. The Ark..."
TM: "Art...Don't you mean Art, Higgins? The lost Art?"
Higgins: "Of course I do. The lost Art is in the Ark."

The match sticks in Higgin's toes was too much not to mention TM's machine gun was empty.

All in all this was a very comical ep. I really enjoyed it. It is in my top 10.
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#54 Post by steveadl »

Had it's funny parts, but not a huge fan of this episode.

Very contrived and movie like in parts - which is fine, I know that's what they were going for. But then to me it would have made more sense to make it all a dream sequence or some other sort of alternate realityy for the episodes sake. So much of the episode was too outlandish to have supposed to be really taking place in the actual lives/Magnum universe of the characters.

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#55 Post by Carol the Dabbler »

You're right, Steve -- it would have been much more "believable" as a dream!

Maybe it was a dream, and they simply neglected to show us the part where Magnum wakes up. (Or Higgins, or whoever's dream it was.)




Or maybe the entire series was just a TV show. :wink:
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#56 Post by MagnumsLeftShoulder »

The ending elevates this ep a whole lot for me. TS/TM wearing his iconic jungle bird shirt and putting on his Tigers cap is a nod to the fans of the show that Selleck has no regrets about the Indy vs Magnum issue. One of the reasons I love the show so much is that Selleck and the entire cast appear to be having a blast in every episode. He seems to absolutely love this character. Besides, TS probably realized that Thomas Magnum was a much meatier role than Indy anyway. I haven't seen the Indy movies in a long time, but I don't remember them being very thought provoking and MPI often was.

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#57 Post by Carol the Dabbler »

MagnumsLeftShoulder wrote:... Thomas Magnum was a much meatier role than Indy anyway. I haven't seen the Indy movies in a long time, but I don't remember them being very thought provoking and MPI often was.
True, the Indiana Jones movies seemed to have no intention of provoking much thought. They were pure action-adventure. However, I always thought that the role of Jones had a fair amount of depth in the first film. I loved the contrast between his shy professor persona and his ruthless soldier of fortune persona. But the subsequent movies not only failed to expand on that, they dropped it entirely. I am intrigued by the thought of what Tom Selleck's Indiana Jones might have been.
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#58 Post by mandolabar »

J.J. Walters wrote:Image
Higgins is clearly breaking the fourth wall here--is this the only time he does it? Magnum does it all the time, but I can't recall seeing Higgins do it before.
"What I would have done, Magnum, is what I did." (Mad Dogs & Englishmen)

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#59 Post by steveadl »

mandolabar wrote:
J.J. Walters wrote:Image
Higgins is clearly breaking the fourth wall here--is this the only time he does it? Magnum does it all the time, but I can't recall seeing Higgins do it before.
Yeah Higgins has done it a few times, though actual episodes escape me at the moment. Think there is a thread on here somewhere regarding characters other than TM breaking the fourth wall.

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#60 Post by J.J. Walters »

By my count, this was the fourth and final time he broke the fourth wall, following "China Doll", "Never Again ... Never Again" and "The Ugliest Dog in Hawaii". He did it in Seasons One and Eight, with nothing in between! Odd.
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#61 Post by mandolabar »

J.J. Walters wrote:By my count, this was the fourth and final time he broke the fourth wall, following "China Doll", "Never Again ... Never Again" and "The Ugliest Dog in Hawaii". He did it in Seasons One and Eight, with nothing in between! Odd.
I don't remember those! Well, dang. I guess I'm just going to have to watch them again. Such hardship.... :lol:
"What I would have done, Magnum, is what I did." (Mad Dogs & Englishmen)

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#62 Post by Croix de Lorraine »

I normally don't like silly episodes too much, but I like howhere Tom Selleck gets an homage and is given the chance to finally play Indiana Jones (well, sort of).

As a matter of fact I was never a big fan of the Indiana Jones saga when growing up,and I think that charisma vacuum called Harrison Ford had a lot to do with it. Tom Selleck had much more presence and charisma as a semi-comic action hero and would have made a much believable Indiana Jones, in my opinion.

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#63 Post by stewpot01 »

Hi everyone.
First post for me. I loved this episode and have not seen it since the original broadcast up until last week when I purchased the Season 8 DVD.
The spoof was excellent. considering they had to squeeze the story line into
45 mins.
Like how everyone kept saying "ark" instead of art :lol:

My only beef is that Universal don't have subtitles on the UK release and I am very hard of hearing :x

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#64 Post by Danno »

It seems you either love this episode or hate it.

I've been a fan of Indiana Jones and particularly Raiders Of The Lost Ark since I was about five, so I was extremely curious to see this episode. Raiders to me is possibly a perfect movie. Everything about it is right- including the casting of Harrison Ford. I have the hat, the whip, the jacket... the whole crazy kit.

You may have seen footage online of Selleck trying out for the part of Indiana Jones with Sean Young as Marion. It would have been such a different film.

The episode though is obviously just a lot of fun- a light hearted caper for the cast. Whenever Higgins does a 'hi-ya!' karate chop it has to be some of the best parts of the series. Selleck and Margaret Colin work well together and I agree with some of the previous suggestions- she would have been a perfect partner for Magnum- it's a shame we never see more of these two together...

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Re: Legend of the Lost Art (8.10)

#65 Post by runawayselleck »

I loved this episode. And this is why. I love Magnum PI, but if I have a problem with it it is that it steered too far into the heavy drama when it got to the later seasons and always seemed to be bogged down in flag waving and Magnum falling in love with women who ended up breaking his heart. There was still humour, but it was less than in the first few seasons. Here though the whole thing is great fun, and is exactly what the show was about, humour, adventure and Selleck being a hero without having a thousand flashbacks to "nam". A great episode!

Runaway Selleck

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