Murder 101 (5.8)

Rate, review & discuss the episodes from the fifth season

Moderator: Styles Bitchley

How Would You Rate This Episode?

10 (Perfect!)
4
5%
9.5 (One of the Best)
5
6%
9.0 (Excellent)
6
8%
8.5 (Very Good)
15
19%
8.0 (Pretty Good)
25
32%
7.5 (Decent)
16
21%
7.0 (Average at Best)
1
1%
6.5 (Not So Good)
1
1%
6.0 (Pretty Bad)
2
3%
5.0 (Just Awful)
2
3%
 
Total votes: 77

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Carmen
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#16 Post by Carmen »

Hey I found a flub (my first one)
While looking thru`the garbage Magnum is wearing a white shirt and a light blue jeans. Next scene he is sitting on his sofa, dirty dark blue jeans and some different dirty shirt and Higgins is telling him to take a shower and put on new clothes. 8)
Sometimes I get so lucky, even I don`t believe it (TSM)

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J.J. Walters
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#17 Post by J.J. Walters »

Hey, nice flub spot Carmen!
Higgins: It's not a scratch! It's a bloody gouge!

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lutherhgillis
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#18 Post by lutherhgillis »

I appreciate what SL said about Vietnam and the value of friends. That would explain a great deal and TM, TC, and Rick.

I love this campy episode. We get to laugh at Magnum's flaws. The book he wants to write gets another mention. His inability to teach a class is amusing. The sterotypical class members are hilarious.

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#19 Post by A P Leyland »

I thought this one was campy fun as well.

"Gnarly" made me laugh an insane amount.

Andy

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Jay-Firestorm
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#20 Post by Jay-Firestorm »

I started off really liking this episode, but sadly it loses its way in the middle.

[rating=8.0]

Magnum has got a job teaching a course on private investigation, but when the students insist on a real case to work on, they end up investigating the strange disappearance of the fiancée of one of class members. Starts off fun but sadly goes downhill…

-----

This review contains spoilers.

This is one of those episodes that some viewers really dislike. Personally, I started off really liking it – it was a welcome light-hearted story after the serious ‘Blind Justice’ – but sadly, it loses its way and really nosedives midway through.

As I say, it starts off reasonably enough. Most of Magnum’s students may indeed be stereotypes (not least the ‘surfer dude’ Danny), but I found them to be a fun group, and it was amusing to see Magnum playing professor.

The investigation that the class vote on taking isn’t exactly interesting, but it starts off with potential, as Magnum and the class pile into Danny’s beaten up van and begin searching for Stacy’s missing fiancée. But unfortunately, soon after, the plot really loses its direction.

I think it was a bad move script-wise to have the P.I. class cancelled halfway through the story. It causes the plot to lose its focus, and surely it would have been more fun for the class’ investigation to stumble through to the end of the episode before being cancelled.

With the class cancelled, all of the students other than Stacy disappear from the middle of the story, and it descends into a very average and generic investigation, and not a particularly interesting one at that.

Usually I am pretty good at following the twists and details of Magnum’s investigations, but I really lost the thread with the explanations of money laundering and suchlike – which was explained in a very awkward and unclear manner in my opinion.

The rest of the class return for the final ‘showdown’ with the villains of the piece, but after their sudden disappearance mid-episode, it doesn't work as well as it should.

In the end, Magnum’s struggling class becomes a huge success, from the publicity of solving the case of Stacy’s missing fiancée. Of course, the class is never mentioned again in the series, so presumably some other fate befell it.

I really want to like this episode, and parts of it I do indeed warm to. But it ultimately winds up so unfocused, not to mention the confusing explanation regarding the disappearance of Stacy’s fiancée, that it is just nowhere as could as might should have been. If it had come from an earlier season, I have a feeling it would have been much more focused and clever, but coming from the dodgy fifth season, it sadly falls down. At first I wanted to give it a higher score, but bearing in mind the problems mentioned above, I can only give it an 8.0 rating – which some will say is higher than it deserves anyway.

-----

Other notes, bloopers and misc.:

* I’ll have to double check this one, but when the class are in Danny’s van, the shots looking out over the hood seem to be from a different van. The hood of Danny’s van is white, but this one seems to be blue. Also, Danny’s van seems to have a strip of yellow fabric across the dash, whereas this second van doesn’t appear to.

* When the class are searching through the garbage, and Mr. Gaylord puts his foot on a piece of paper, squashing out some unpleasant looking goo, in the surrounding shots, the piece of paper on the ground can be seen to be much smaller than in the close-up.

* I’m not certain about this one either, but on Magnum’s license (which reverts to stating his birthday as 5th January, which I love, as this is also my birthdate!), the photo of him to me looks like it was taken from the common early promotional shot of him kneeling down by one of the Ferrari’s wheels. I’ll have to try and find a scan of this shot and compare them.

* The DVD version of this episode has all of the act breaks abridged.
JAY FIRESTORM

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N1095A
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#21 Post by N1095A »

Carmen wrote:Hey I found a flub (my first one)
While looking thru`the garbage Magnum is wearing a white shirt and a light blue jeans. Next scene he is sitting on his sofa, dirty dark blue jeans and some different dirty shirt and Higgins is telling him to take a shower and put on new clothes. 8)
TM isn't dirty from the garbage when he's sitting on the couch. This scene takes place some time later, after his class had been canceled. TM is dirty in this scene because he's just spread the ton of manure that Higgins "negotiated" with him earlier. He talks about this in his voice-over at the beginning of the scene.
"But Higgins, I can explain."

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lutherhgillis
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#22 Post by lutherhgillis »

N1095A is correct. Remember that TM agrees to spread the recycled vegetation for Higgns in order to borrow the recording deck for his lesson plan or 'idea vocabulary'. The gardener was called away for some reason that I cannot remember. TM comes home from the cancelled class and spreads manure is the implication.

I always liked this episode. It reminds me a little of the movie Summer School (1987) starring Mark Harmon as a beachbum PE coach who tries to teach a summer class. That's about where the similarities end, however.
Who's Dot Matrix, and what has she got to do with this?

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N1095A
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#23 Post by N1095A »

That reminds me of the other time he dealt with "recycled vegetation". Although I don't remember the episode, I do remember him asking Higgins 'Recycled how?"
to which Higgins replied "Through a cow". At the end TM leads Higgins to think he's going to do it, but instead goes swimming because Higgins didn't come through with his part of the deal. I'm not positive, but I think this was "Billy Joe Bob", and higgins' part of the deal was keeping Billy Joe in the guest house "all day if necessary". Of course, Billy Joe escaped.
"But Higgins, I can explain."

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#24 Post by Doc Ibold »

N1095A wrote:That reminds me of the other time he dealt with "recycled vegetation". Although I don't remember the episode, I do remember him asking Higgins 'Recycled how?"
to which Higgins replied "Through a cow". At the end TM leads Higgins to think he's going to do it, but instead goes swimming because Higgins didn't come through with his part of the deal. I'm not positive, but I think this was "Billy Joe Bob", and higgins' part of the deal was keeping Billy Joe in the guest house "all day if necessary". Of course, Billy Joe escaped.
Kee-rect. It was Billy Joe Bob. Also, I think the reason Kenji was called away in M101 was a death in the family or something like that.

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N1095A
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#25 Post by N1095A »

Yes, I remember now, TM in his voice-over said there was something in the air, and it wasn't jasmine. Classic!
"But Higgins, I can explain."

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lutherhgillis
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#26 Post by lutherhgillis »

I like this campy episode even though it is gnarly in places. It was good to see TC and Rick actually get paid by Magnum for a change. Did that ever happen again in a episode? It seems like I remember TC helping himself to Magnum's paycheck in another episode to recoup some of the gas money and glass damage owed him. Anyone know if that is a correct memory?
Who's Dot Matrix, and what has she got to do with this?

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J.J. Walters
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#27 Post by J.J. Walters »

At the 3:31 mark, a Boeing 747-121 commercial airliner is briefly seen leaving a gate at Honolulu International Airport. It's hard to identify, but the airliner is the Clipper Maid of the Seas (you can just barely make out the lettering on the front of the plane), which was tragically destroyed in the "Lockerbie Bombing" of Pan Am Flight 103 in southern Scotland on December 21st, 1988. :shock:

From the episode:

Image

Non-episode picture of the plane:

Image
Higgins: It's not a scratch! It's a bloody gouge!

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miltontheripper
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#28 Post by miltontheripper »

I think this is an underrated episode. A bit ridiculous for sure, but definitely still entertaining!

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nha trang
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#29 Post by nha trang »

I thought this was an average episode, to be generous. I think this is another episode where the plot had potential to be good (Magnum teaches a class on private investigating) but as JJ notes, with the canned actor students and the overall weakly written scenes, it nosedives.

I hope this doesn't become a habit after Bellisario stopped writing...

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J.J. Walters
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#30 Post by J.J. Walters »

Season Five is probably the weakest season IMHO, but you do have several good episodes coming up (Luther Gillis: File #001, All For One). I'm guessing you're probably not going to like the Tran Quoc, Cassie Yates, and Ms. Jones episodes. Just a guess. If you don't like Willie and Waldo, how can you like Tran Quoc? ;)
Higgins: It's not a scratch! It's a bloody gouge!

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