Number One With a Bullet
Episode 3 of Magnum P.I. Season 5 begins with a flashback to 2 years ago when Magnum met with Captain Buck. Captain Buck wanted to apologize personally for betraying and endangering Magnum and his friends’ lives. Magnum was understanding of his situation; Captain Buck was between a rock and a hard place. He forgives Captain Buck and asks him to stop torturing himself.
Back in the present, Magnum and T.C. identify Captain Buck’s body for the M.E and pick up his personal belongings. He asks the M.E. to do a full autopsy and T.C. agrees it is necessary. Magnum and T.C. believe something is off about Captain Buck’s death.
Elsewhere, Katsumoto finds himself a job as part of the security details for a popular K-pop singer, Rae. Rae’s manager, Ji Yoo asks him to avoid interacting with Rae as she is quite particular. Rae insists Katsumoto rides along with her so that she can get a sense of who he is. During the ride, Katsumoto and Rae bond and she starts liking him. To her, Katsumoto’s honesty is a breath of fresh air and she shares that she finds it hard to trust people.
Rae tells Katsumoto about her journey and her new reality as a singer. She is frustrated that even though she works hard, her label owns her fully. She is thinking of walking away but she is scared because music is all she knows. Katsumoto advises her to fight for her dream. They soon arrive at the venue and Rae alights from the car and greets the hundreds of fans waiting.
Rae has her rehearsal and as they leave, a man tries to stab her. Thankfully, Katsumoto stops him but gets stabbed in the abdomen. He is rushed to the hospital and his son, Dennis stops by to check on him. Rae also pays him a visit. Dennis tries to hide that he is a fan but his ringtone betrays him.
Rae apologizes to Katsumoto and explains that she is postponing the concert. She also thanks him for saving her life. She offers him a full-time job in Seoul but Katsumoto turns down the offer.
Later, Katsumoto heads to the police station to give his statement and meets Detective Childs. He is surprised to learn that Rae’s attacker managed to flee the scene. According to Childs, Rae’s security team were clear that they failed to subdue the guy. Katsumoto leaves to meet with Kwan, Rae’s head of security.
Katsumoto is not pleased to hear that the security team decided to handle the matter themselves. Kwan offers him money to keep his mouth shut about the matter. Katsumoto also notices Kwan’s tattoos which are linked to a Korean Mafia group. He heads back to the police station and tells Childs his suspicion and shows him the money Kwan gave him. Childs is hesitant to believe him so Katsumoto asks him to run the assailant’s blood. As they wait, the two detectives bond and we learn Childs ended up in Hawaii for outing corrupt cops.
The blood analysis report comes back and they identify the assailant as Dae-hyun who is affiliated with the seven-star Mafia group. It turns out that Rae’s label ordered the hit on her. Katsumoto worries that they need to save Rae before she returns to Korea and meets her death at the hands of her label.
They rush to the airport and confront Kwan. Rae realizes that they have been plotting to kill her and that her manager was the one who betrayed her. Ji-yoo knew of her plans to re-record her masters and take control of her life. Katsumoto cautions Rae not to return to Korea or trust her team. Rae decides to stay in the USA and spends the night at Katsumoto’s house.
Meanwhile, Higgins and Rick team up to help Rick’s friend. Rick confides in Higgins that he thinks Magnum is in a relationship but he doesn’t know who Magnum is seeing. He asks Higgins and she acts like she has no idea. Rick believes Magnum might be in love with the lady in question and worries that Magnum might soon be disappointed. They arrive at Rick’s friend’s house and find him dead, bleeding on the floor. There are also two armed men.
While Rick and Higgins find themselves in a dangerous situation, Magnum thinks that Captain Buck was trying to send them a message using his watch. He shares his theory with T.C. and starts wondering why Rick and Higgins are late and unreachable.
It turns out Rick and Higgins are being driven to a secret location along with the dead body. Rick thinks that his friend was into shady business and he might have been looking for a stolen item. They realize they need to escape before they end up dead too. The car stops somewhere in the forest and they are asked to dig a big hole to bury three dead bodies. Higgins tries to negotiate their freedom by telling the armed men that they can be able to recover whatever they were looking for.
At first, their plans backfire as the men already checked out their identities. However, Higgins insists they have a solution. In the meantime, Magnum and T.C. trace Higgins and Rick’s movements and they realize something is off about Rick’s friend’s house. There is too much bleach and it looks like someone bled out. While they investigate the house, Higgins calls Magnum and explains the situation.
The armed men ask Magnum to find a rare, premium whisky bottle in exchange for his friends’ lives. Magnum assures them that he is on the case and will find them their whisky. The armed men give him five hours and warn him not to talk to the police. Magnum immediately checks online and finds the whisky. They trace the man who posted the picture.
They interrogate the man about the stolen liquor and learn that he was just chasing clout. The whisky belonged to one of his clients and he directs Magnum and T.C. to the actual culprit. As Magnum and T.C. work on finding the alcohol, Higgins and Rick plot their escape. They fight back in an effort to escape but are subdued by the two armed men. The men threaten to kill them in the next hour if Magnum fails to come through.
Speaking of Magnum and T.C., they try to strike a deal with the new whisky owner but he plays hard to get. This forces them to move to plan B and they tie him up in his own home and take the whisky. They check his phone and go through his messages to find out who sold him the whisky.
They take the whisky to the armed men and find Higgins and Rick trying to create distrust between the two armed men. One of the armed men actually betrayed his partner and they start shooting each other. The armed men kill each other and no one else is harmed.
Later that evening, the friends enjoy the whisky and Magnum gets a call from the M.E. According to the autopsy report, Captain Buck was not drunk and he didn’t drown but was waterboarded. His official cause of death was a heart attack and it seemed someone tried to resuscitate him.
Higgins believed he was tortured and he died before revealing whatever his killers were after. Magnum has an epiphany about what message Captain Buck wanted to send through his watch. It is related to a covert mission they carried out on April 5th 2016, where they took out a target named Hadid.
They realize that Captain Buck might have been killed as retaliation to that mission and they are the next targets. However, they still have time as Captain Buck died before identifying them.
The Episode Review
Katsumoto and Childs are so alike and they should become friends. Hopefully, they can become partners when Katsumoto gets his job back. I think they would make a great team.
Meanwhile, Magnum and his friends need to brace themselves for the attack coming their way. I reckon it is better to get ahead of their enemy and they should try to quickly get Captain Buck’s killers before their identity is discovered.
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