Thanks to Bahama Bert for the links! These two sites gave the Five-0 finale a big thumbs up. The finale did what it should do…raise excitement, make you care for the characters, leave you wanting more, and last, start a summer long speculation of what happens next…
From Television Without Pity:
Best: Hawaii Five-0
We were initially going to write this show off as a just another cop procedural, but its freshman season was a pleasant surprise, particularly its exciting finale. McGarrett has been trying to take down gangster Wo Fat all season, while also investigating his mother’s murder (he and Kate from Castle should really get together), when he finds out that the Governor, who was supposedly his friend, has really been stabbing him in the back. And worse? Wo Fat has her killed and frames McGarrett for it. So he’s arrested, Danny’s ex-wife/girlfriend is pissed at him for not catching the flight back to New Jersey and Chin Ho seems to be back on the regular cop beat. It’s all a big (albeit enjoyable) mess that we can’t wait to see untangled.
From TV Blend:
Hawaii Five-0 Watch: Season Finale
Tonight, Hawaii Five-0 showed how great it could be. With an emotional, character driven plot, plenty of action, a cliffhanger ending, and better than average directing, Five-0 was a cut above the rest in the finale of the first season – and it left the audience wanting more. Because the show tries to make every episode its’ own entity, the story arc of the entire show is thrown under the bus; therefore, many of the plot twists and emotional gotchas had to be explained in length in this episode.
A canon of the Five-0 rhetoric states the government can’t be trusted, so naturally the governor ended up being a super-villain after only one season. Okay, so perhaps the writers kept it slightly more subtle than that, but yeah, the governor took her place alongside Wo-Fat just long enough for her to get a couple of rounds through her chest to frame McGarrett near the end of the episode. It all started with the murder of the governor’s top aid, who Five-0 discovered was the informant sending McGarrett pieces of information from his father’s toolbox, the one someone stole earlier in the season.
Meanwhile, Danno kicked off the episode by banging his wife; which is scummier than the bottom of a tug boat, even if her new husband is an a-hole. Over the course of the episode his ex-wife persuaded him to come back to Jersey for god-only-knows what reason to start a new life with her and his daughter; then she really nailed him by revealing her pregnancy, which exists solely as a trump card to be used by manipulative women. Okay, okay, that was a stretch; but that’s totally the card she used. After agreeing to meet Rachel (his ex-wife) at the airport with Grace (daughter), Danno got caught trying to figure out what the hell was going on as Five-0 fell apart around him.
So McGarrett is framed for murder by the governor, and then framed for murder of the governor which leads to his arrest. With the governor’s death, Five-0 effectively ceases to exist thereby giving Chin a perfect excuse to bail on the team to take his old job with HPD at the last moment; just in time to arrest a framed, dazed, and confused Steve McGarrett at the governor’s mansion.
Kono did not escape the governor’s wrath, though. Busted for stealing the money needed to ransom Chin earlier in the season, both she and McGarrett are now behind bars with Chin effectively abandoning them in the aftermath. The only stable piece left in the puzzle is Danno, which is less surprising than a guy from Jersey successfully wooing an English woman. He’ll be left to pick up the pieces in the premiere of season two, which will air sometime next Fall. Join Cinema Blend again next fall as we cover season two of Hawaii Five-0!
Hawaii Five-0 UNDERCOVER 
TV Blend and I are totally on the same page, literally and figuratively. Only thing I disagree with is Chin. Chin is loyal to the end and only went back to the police force, so that he would have a vantage point to help Steve (and now Kono). Chin will save the day! 🙂
Of course Chin will save the day!!
Hope Danny understand that soon, so they can work together…
well I thought the tv blend was a bit over the top on the whole Danny and Rachel part- which we agree to disagree 🙂
just intresting to see how Peter and the gang will bring the team back together.
I reread the article…yeah, that has pretty heavy handed.
I also agree. I’m tired of haters out there that don’t want to see Danny & Rachel back together calling it a soapie storyline. i thought it was cute and it has made Danny happy again so there’s nothing wrong with that.
wow- “haters” is such a strong word. indeed, many of the people who don’t want the D/R storyline feel that way because they love and are concerned about Danny. perhaps, because the writers did such a good job of showing and convincing us how devastated he was after the breakup, there is apprehension that this will not work out and he will be crushed again. many anti- D/R storyliners wanted to see Danny move on and be happy in a fresh, new relationship. there are no ‘haters’ here in H50 land. we are all lovers- we love the show, we love the characters, and we love each other. 🙂 so, please accept this virtual lei in the ahola spirit and hug it out. *hugsies*
I have to say I’m more than a bit perplexed by the assumption that Chin’s just blithely up and kicked his 5-0 family — Steve especially — to the curb at the first sign of HPD wanting him back, when we were given so many signals to tell us what Chin was doing.
(Actually, I think we’re given much clearer signals regarding Chin’s motivation for his behavior and which way his choice will go that we are with Danny, who is currently in a very, very conflicted (dare we say, screwed) position — caught between two families he loves and faced with having to hurt one or both of them by the time the dust settles. (Which makes it a bit “pot, kettle” when Danny’s railing at Chin about just up and going back to HPD after all they’d done to hurt him — in a sense, two cases of two men being given the option of returning to the arms of their first loves and doing so, even though those loves patched hell and heartbreak on them for several years)). 😉
The morning of Laura’s death, we see him turning down the Chief’s offer as he’s happy where he is — 5-0’s doing good work, they’re family. If we’ve seen one thing about Chin throughout the season, it’s that he’s loyal and dedicated to family, and that includes 5-0.
Chin’s the first to see the start of the frame-up and demolition of 5-0 when Duke walks past with that bag of singed moolah, and if I’m remembering correctly, he’s the first to call it what it is when the forensics results come back on Laura’s house and claim Steve’s fingerprints were found all over the place — Steve being set up.
When he gets the call from Duke re: the warrant for Steve’s arrest, he doesn’t hesitate — he tells Steve and the team what’s going down, and then shortly thereafter, when they’re all standing around in the office, watching HPD ransack their HQ and Steve’s office especially, he says “well, I’m not going to stand around and do *nothing,*” (which everyone else was doing at that point — standing around, stuck in neutral) and takes off. He’s put two and two together and realizes the best place for him to be is inside HPD and this murder investigation. (Bummer that he never told anyone else about the job offer he’d turned down only a day ago..)
Steve going off the rails and acting out of desperation, breaking into the mansion to confront Jameson… that can’t have been anything Chin was anticipating that quickly — or if he was, he was assuming Danny would find Steve and corral him before he could do anything that foolish.
Given the state Steve was in when Chin and SWAT burst into the room — clearly disoriented, flushed, staggering, holding a gun, with Jameson’s blood-stained body across the room — Chin being there probably saved Steve’s life, as seeing Chin, he didn’t try to Rambo his way out of a no-win situation.
If Chin’s a lead investigator on the case, he’ll also have access to Steve and be able to examine him, talk to him, pass the info along to Danny, Kono, and Jenna — and odds are it’s Chin who’s going to point out the tazer burns and retrieve the all-important iPhone recording.
Nowhere in this scenario do I see a Chin who’s turned his back on Steve or 5-0 — quite the opposite. Chin’s acted swiftly and surely to get himself positioned to be able to help and maybe protect Steve when he’s most vulnerable, and to be able to make sure “innocent until proven guilty” is never forgotten by the rest of the HPD investigators.
Thanks, Bert. Absolutely spot on.
I’m with ya here.
Bert – agree on all points, I think Chin is there to make sure that Steve and the 5-0’s get the investigation they deserve.
But I still think the HPD chief is not a good guy.
Totally agree.
I’m with you on the HPD chief, Kimmer. He’s probably the reason that the mini-me Yakuza gang at Pipeline Cafe were “invisible”.
Yeah, that weekly lunch-date with Jameson at the Turtle Bay Club is either a case of cronies cahooting, or “keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”
I mean, the job offer and promotion to Chin seems mighty convenient from a timing standpoint, what with the conspiracy to frame Steve and destroy H5-0 gathering speed, but then again — if the offer *hadn’t* been put forward, Chin wouldn’t have been able to position himself *within* the investigation where he can help protect Steve from further malfeasance while working to prove the accusations false.
It’s definitely going to be interesting to see how things play out!
Bert your comments are great- but I loved how you “compared Chin and Danny- brillant!
It’s just such an interesting parallel, you know? Especially when we see how shocked, angry and betrayed Danny apparently feels over Chin’s seeming defection.
Well written Bert. I couldn’t agree more.
With ya here too. Good point about if Chin hadn’t been there when they found Steve in the Gov’s office it could have gone badly for Steve. They have really built Chin up about ohana loyalty, how far he would go etc. He has said 5-0 is his family now.
It would appear we are all in agreement on this point. I still think Chin will be the one that saves both McG and Kono, as he will be able to do more on the inside than Danny and Jenna can do from outside the force.
did wo fat get to rachel? is the newark departure her attempt to protect danny?
I have thought all along. Either Wo Fat got to Rachel or Rachel overheard something Step Stan said that led her to believe that he is in like flynn with Wo Fat and that Danny and the 5-0 were in danger. I think this is why she was so upset when she called him to meet her and came up with the baby story. But, I could be totally off.