Hawaii Five-0 Finale: If It Doesn’t Kill Us, It Will Make Us Stronger

May 14, 2012 By 3 Comments

If you were already apprehensive about watching tonight’s finale, then reading this post may discourage you from viewing it altogether! It’s one thing when the executive producers tell us the epi will blow our minds (after all, they’re supposed to), but when a reviewer warns you that you’ll be on tenterhooks the entire way and that the action never lets up, then you’d better believe it!

Here’s what Peter Lenkov and Elwood Reid, who co-wrote the season closer together with Paul Zbyszewski, shared with Rick Porter:

So where does that leave us for the season finale next week? Well, the thing McGarrett didn’t get in Japan was Shelburne, but Lenkov says the identity of the mysterious figure is “absolutely resolved” in the final moments of the finale. That doesn’t, however, mean that McGarrett will have all the answers about his father’s death, because Lenkov and writer/co-executive producer Elwood Reid also promise a cliffhanger ending.

“You’re going to be pissed it ends where it ends,” Reid says, noting that next season will most likely pick up immediately after the finale.

The finale is titled “Ua Hala,” which translates to “Death in the Family,” and Lenkov and Reid say the episode will deliver on that ominous promise.

“We thought we did a good job on the [Season 1] finale. We wrote this big episode with a lot stakes; every character had something they could lose,” Lenkov says. “So we sat down and said, how do we top that? … It ends, I think, with bigger stakes this time.” The cliffhanger story will resolve fairly quickly next season, he adds, but “character-wise, it will carry on” for a while into Season 3.

“We think of it as building fires,” Reid says. “There’s a lot of wood on the fire now, and it’s going to give us a lot of stuff to play next season. … The hardest thing as writers is to set stuff up so we have somewhere to go in the next season. This finale — we’re not manufacturing a finale here. Everyone is sort of thrown.”

Lenkov’s one-word description of the finale is “jaw-dropping.”

Taking it a step further in the striking-fear-in-the-hearts-of-fans stakes is Michelle Carlbert, who watched the screener last night (minus the final two minutes, which were deliberately left out):

Last week Hawaii Five-0 Executive Producer Peter Lenkov and Co-Executive Producer Elwood Reid sat down to talk about this year’s season finale. Though they were understandably reluctant to give too much away, they still gave us a good idea of what you can expect tonight.

  • Joe is back and will play an integral part in the finale. He brings Steve the information that he has been seeking and fans will finally find out the identity of the mysterious Shelburne.
  • Tonight’s episode will have very emotional repercussions for a couple of the team members, including Chin. With these incidents, they will be breaking Chin down so that they can explore building him back up again next season.
  • Fans should be ready to say goodbye to somebody on the show and the finale will end in a huge cliffhanger. The stakes at the end of this season are even bigger for the team than they were last season.
  • Asked to describe the finale, they both said it was “jaw-dropping,” that the episode has a “compelling case,” and that there will be a “lot of action.”


Now that you’ve heard from the creators, here are a few of my own thoughts about the finale.

The hits start right from the beginning and they don’t stop.

There’s a moment that happens less than five minutes in to the show that has such ramifications that I could easily see a scene like that happening at the end and yet it basically starts the episode. After that, things go from bad to worse for the team. The amount of near-misses, injuries and life-threatening incidents is off the charts. If you are looking for a nice relaxing episode, you will not find it here.

A lot of familiar faces return

As the EP’s said above, Joe is back in this episode. But what you may not know is that he’s not the only character to return. I think it’s more fun seeing these people come up in the storyline without knowing so I’m not going to mention any names but I will say that ever familiar face that returns is vital to the overall story.

Never let your guard down

Just when you think things are quiet, or that the case is resolved, or that all the bad stuff is over – it’s not. Like never. I’m not going to say how many times new surprises come up to bite our favorite characters in the ass, but I will say it’s more than once and less than ten. My advice: don’t leave your couch during this entire episode. If you need a snack or a potty break, go during a commercial. If you go any other time, even if you think all is well, you’ll be sorry. Consider yourself warned.

So there you have it, vital information about tonight’s Hawaii Five-0 finale from the Executive Producer and Co-Executive Producer themselves, as well as my personal thoughts. Still thinking about skipping this one or leaving it on your DVR for another night?…..Yeah, I didn’t think so.

:drama:

Filed Under: Alex O'Loughlin, Hawaii Five-0, Interviews & Articles, Latest Headlines, TV Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

AOLR Weekly Wrap-up #141

May 14, 2012 By 5 Comments

Hawaii Five-0 and Alex Updates
  • TV Tonight reported on May 9 that due to disappointing ratings, Australia’s Channel Ten has taken Hawaii Five-0 off its schedule. After fans protested via Twitter and Facebook, Ten tweeted “Hawaii Five-O will be returning soon. We’ll make an announcement when we hear more.” The last episode to air last Monday was the crossover with NCIS: LA. It looks like they will at least broadcast the remaining Season 2 episodes. Note that it’s not just Hawaii Five-0 that’s suffering; ratings have dropped considerably across the board for Channel Ten, causing advertising revenue to shrink and the network is struggling to keep its head above water. Also, Five-0 has been shuffled around on the broadcast schedule several times, with little promotion to support it, which certainly hasn’t helped it build an audience.
  • Thanks to John McMahon (@jmx1aus) for the heads-up about GQ Australia’s efforts to find out who their readers want to see on the cover of upcoming issues! The poll was up for only a short while and has now ended. Mahalo to all who voted for Alex — hopefully we made a difference!
  • In the light of CBS’s recent cancellations (among others, CSI: Miami, Unforgettable and A Gifted Man), it will be interesting to see what the network’s schedule will look like next season and if Five-0 keeps its 10 PM slot on Mondays. We should know more on Wednesday, when the upfront takes place!
Hawaii Five-0 Articles
  • Interviews with Grace Park are rare, so it’s great to see Canadian health magazine Vista feature her on the cover of their March/April issue! Check out what the Vancouver beauty has to say about Five-0:

    A Not-so-Leisurely Life in Hawaii

    “A lot of people think that a little sunshine makes your entire life better, but it’s not as easy as people might think — the entire industry is about creating an illusion. It’s story telling. There are long hours and it’s a tough job. However, there are a lot of things that I feel very fortunate for; it’s a great job and you meet a lot of amazing people. There is a different culture here that I really appreciate. A lot of people here aren’t originally from Hawaii, so there’s a feeling of expanded family. People are really kind — in Vancouver we’re very polite, but in Hawaii people are warm. It’s a very different default and I’m still getting used to it. I’m sure people wonder what’s up with that Canadian girl!

    “Having the show set in Hawaii definitely gives it its own flavour. We have a Hawaiian cultural advisor who gives us pronunciation advice for every episode. The chemistry between the actors is amazing. The action is incredible and the special effects are spectacular — we take our cues from action films. In the pilot, we had exploding helicopters and army trucks, and it wasn’t CGI — we were really blowing them up! The amount of talent that goes into car chases blows my mind the margin for error is tiny, and they go so fast.”

    You can read the full article in their digital issue or sign up to download the magazine in PDF format.

  • A thought-provoking article from Zap2it’s Rick Porter about the possible direction Michelle Borth’s character Catherine Rollins is taking in Season 3:

    The good news for “Hawaii Five-0″ fans is that Michelle Borth will be a full-time part of the show next season. The bad news is that her character, Catherine Rollins, and McGarrett (Alex O’Loughlin) may be headed for some rough sailing in their relationship.

    Showrunner Peter Lenkov says Catherine will join the Five-0 team next season, which means that her active duty in the Navy is likely at an end. Lenkov declined in an interview to say how she joins the squad, only that her addition “is very organic” to the show.

    On the downside, though, McGarrett and Catherine may not handle that much togetherness all that well. In the five episodes Borth has appeared in previously, Catherine and McGarrett seemed pretty content together — but that could be partly because they don’t see one another very often, since she’s usually at sea.

    Continuing their relationship is “going to prove to be difficult,” Lenkov says. “When she originally joins [the team], they are still dating, but it’s going to be difficult — just like any relationship is with [a co-worker].”

    The McGarrett-dating-a-colleague scenario wasn’t a favorite of mine the last time it came up, but we’ll just have to wait and see. Given the recent past, the less advance information we’re given about this topic, the better. Especially with an entire summer ahead to angst over it…  :rolleyes:

  • Guess which show came out on top in Hawai’i magazine’s poll of Top 5 Favorite Filmed-in-Hawaii TV Series Ever?   :yesss:

    New or old? Many Facebook ohana voters simply could not decide. Consequently, they voted for both the original series and the currently airing re-imagined police procedural drama. Another batch of voters, however, decisively opted for the new version, which is our Facebook ohana’s top pick among filmed-in-Hawaii TV shows.

    Now booked for a third season, we’ll surely be seeing more Hawaii Five-0 filming around Oahu in months ahead featuring the rule-bending Steve McGarrett (Alex O’Loughlin) and the rest of the Five-0 team — Danny “Danno” Williams (Scott Caan), Kona “Kono” Kalakaua (Grace Park) and Chin Ho Kelly (Daniel Dae Kim). In addition to the show’s primary cast (pictured, above) and regulars, such as Dr. Max Bergman (Masi Oka), the sophomore season has featured cameo roles for some well known actors, such as Ed Asner, who reprised a role he played more than 30 years ago on the original series, and James Caan, whose son plays “Danno” in the new series.

  • Modern Luxury Hawaii featured Five-0′s costume supervisors in their Spring Best of the Islands’ issue (page 86; a scan is also available in the gallery):

    Everyone from Alex O’Loughlin to the hobby store clerk with just two lines gets styled by Hawaii Five-0 costume supervisors Michelle Moder and Anthony Scarano.

    “Anyone with a speaking role, even it it’s just, ‘Aloha,’ gets fitted, photographed and approved by the executive producer,” Moder says. And it’s not as glamorous as it may seem. Since Hawaii Five-0 is an hour-long, episodic drma — known throughout the biz as the most challenging type of show to work on, according to Moder — it’s a continuous revolving door of new characters and situations that call for new bodies to be dressed.

    But these pros — Moder started 22 years ago on In Living Color; Scarano’s first gig was 27 years ago on The New Leave It to Beaver — pull it off week after week. “A lot of times we start before the sun is up and end long after it is down,” Moder says. “We lug around tons of clothes and wipe dirty shoes. Far, far from glamorous!” OK, maybe just a tad glam…

  • Nike recently launched their new Free Trainer 5.0 and created an exclusive version of the shoe for the cast; you can read about it at SoleCollector.com!
Gallery, Picture and Video Updates
  • There have been a few more recent sightings of Alex, who is now mohawk-less, in Hawaii and pics have been added to the 2012 album in the gallery. A photo taken with a fan in Sydney last November has also been added. Thanks to Allyson, Allyssa Marie, Kayla, Julie and Danielle for posting their photos! 
  • There’s also a photo shared by @AlohaSD of Peter Lenkov trying out Chin Ho’s Harley — thanks, Julie!
  • Screencaps of 2.22 are now up — God bless Peter Lenkov, Larry Teng and the DOP for giving us so many McGarrett closeups!
  • Five-0 Undercover has posted some behind-the-scenes photos from 2.22!
  • More Moonlight screencaps have been completed; you can feast your eyes on our stylish vampire here.  :heart2:
  • Grace got to meet President Obama at a dinner organized by the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies on May 8; you can view the article scan here.
  • CBS posted assorted behind-the-scenes photos from the season finale, courtesy of E-PR, on various sites; you can view them all here. There’s a great one of Alex and Scott as well as a group shot of our Fab Four!
  • Daniel appeared on The Talk on Thursday; you can watch the interview — his best yet, in my opinion — on YouTube: part 1 – part 2. Thanks to Skylar for the videos! He was also with Extra at The Grove, but as far as I can tell, that hasn’t aired (yet). Some photos shared by CBS can be viewed here.
  • On May 7, DDK was at Citizens Bank Park to throw the symbolic first pitch for the Phillies vs. the Mets game. Enjoy the photos in the gallery and a video posted by KTLA!
  • Joint season finale interviews were given last week for Hawaii Five-0, Criminal Minds and NCIS, and CBS posted some BTS photos on Tumblr!

Finale night tonight — bring it on, Five-0!   :popcorn:

Filed Under: Latest Headlines, Weekly Wrap-Up Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

“Toothpick” Causes #Mayhem on Hawaii Five-0 Finale

May 13, 2012 By 1 Comment

Mike Gordon puts the spotlight on actor Karl Herlinger in his Outtakes column this week. Karl plays the role of “Toothpick” in the season finale of Hawaii Five-0 — a guy with a lot of character, and all of it bad!

Mr. Herlinger’s favorite hashtag is #mayhem and you can follow his antics on Twitter. Mike’s Twitter handle is @crankydad.

A scan of the article has been added to the gallery.

Kailua actor relishes role as ‘Hawaii Five-0′ bad guy

By Mike Gordon | Honolulu Star-Advertiser

Even with a latte in hand, Karl Herlinger looks like a villain or, at the very least, someone capable of extreme road rage.

His eyes are set close together, his brow quick to furrow. The television actor from Kailua can wither with a glance.

“I get cast a lot as a bad guy,” he said recently at a Kaimuki coffee shop. “I think it’s the way I look. But I’ve also gravitated toward those roles because they are fun. And it’s interesting to find the humanity in the badness.”

Of course, that makes him perfect for a menacing role in Monday’s season finale of “Hawaii Five-0″ (9 p.m., KGMB). Herlinger is the second Hawaii-born actor in as many weeks to wear the bad-guy mantle on the CBS hit. (Last week it was Mark Dacascos, aka Wo Fat.)

Herlinger plays a character named “Toothpick.” He won’t elaborate on the part except to say he creates mayhem for the “Five-0″ team — and he hopes to stress out the show’s fans.

“If I have done my job right, they will either love hating me or there will be some kind of level of disgust,” Herlinger said.

Having a guest spot on a series shot in his hometown is a dream come true, said the 40-year-old Herlinger, who was born at Castle Hospital, grew up in Enchanted Lake and graduated from Kalaheo High School.

The actor, who now lives in Los Angeles, said the final episode will leave fans hungry for the season three premiere.

“This episode has a lot of action,” he said. “It has a great start and it doesn’t let up. It’s what you want a finale to be.”

Herlinger has been a working actor, on stage and television, since graduating with a degree in theater arts from the University of California at Los Angeles in 1994. His first TV role was on “Law & Order,” but his first appearance on a series was in 1979 as a background extra in the final season of the original “Five-0.”

He had never seen the old “Five-0″ episode until he found it on Netflix last week. His parents wouldn’t let him watch it — Herlinger was only 7 — because the plot involves a child who gets lured into a car by strangers.

“They were protective of certain types of influences at a young age,” he said. “I later watched the show, but I think at the time they just wanted to preserve as much innocence as possible.”

Herlinger and his wife, Malia Musick, have a 5-year-old daughter they protect just as much. (They’re expecting a baby boy in August.)

“She has never seen anything that I have done because everything I have done has pretty much been some kind of violence,” he said.

HIS acting roots are decidedly innocent, though. As a boy he tagged along with his older sister when she took dance and acting lessons, and wound up onstage. His résumé through high school included “The King and I,” “Music Man” and “Fiddler on the Roof.” But he also appeared in a stage drama for Hono­lulu Theatre for Youth and said the experience was powerful.

“It added a level of depth to the art that I had not thought was there before,” he said.

While he was in Hawaii shooting “Five-0,” Herlinger began sending Twitter messages from the set. He kept the plot secret but aroused fans by saying he was going to turn the Steve McGarrett character into mochiko chicken — and including a photo from lunch.

“I made a conscious decision to do that for this show,” Herlinger said. “Prior to this I didn’t tweet a lot. I thought it would be fun to tweet as the character and really engage the public.”

Herlinger got tremendous response and exchanged numerous messages. But he kept the plot secret, in part because the final scene of the finale wasn’t even printed on his version of the script; the ending consisted of blank pages with asterisks on them.

But the fans didn’t know that. He kept them hanging as only a villain could.

“It’s fun to have a secret and toy with people,” he said. “All of it feeds into this character.”

AND that’s a wrap …

Mike Gordon is the Star-Advertiser’s film and television writer. Read his Outtakes Online blog at honolulupulse.com. Reach him at 529-4803 or email mgordon@staradvertiser.com.

Filed Under: Hawaii Five-0, Interviews & Articles, Latest Headlines, TV Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Daniel Dae Kim Charms on The Talk

May 10, 2012 By 1 Comment


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Filed Under: Alex O'Loughlin videos, Hawaii Five-0, TV Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

AOLR Weekly Wrap-up #140

May 6, 2012 By 10 Comments

Hawaii Five-0 Updates
  • It’s almost upfront time again and CBS’s presentation takes place on Wednesday, May 16 at the network’s usual venue — Carnegie Hall in NYC — at 4 PM. The fun continues afterwards at the Tent at Lincoln Center. There’s no word though on whether there will be a Five-0 delegation present… keep your fingers crossed! Source: THR.
  • Daniel Dae Kim will appear on The Talk on Thursday, May 10, so if you live through Monday’s Five-0 episode, be sure to watch!
  • TV Guide is wrapping up the season with several games! Registered fans can pick McGarrett as their favorite TV crime fighter and Wo Fat as their favorite TV villain.
Hawaii Five-0 Articles
  • If you’ve watched CBS’s promo for this week’s episode closely, you’ll know that there’s an unexpected turn of events in Kono’s storyline. Last week, she got a text from her new boyfriend and this week, we find out who he is! And if you can’t wait that long, watch the promo again…   :wink2:   EW’s Spoiler Room prodded DDK for some details:

    Will us fans get to see Daniel Dae Kim grill Grace Park’s character’s love interest? #H50 — @lilsugirl22
    Direct quote from DDK, which came right before a big grin: “You mean barbecue grilling? I’m not sure because we don’t do much cooking on the show.” (Okay, sorry, had to share that!) Thankfully, I clarified for Kim, and he pretty much guaranteed we’d see some sort of interrogation because, as he explains, “Chin is very protective of his cousin. So I wouldn’t be surprised if there wasn’t a little questioning back and forth.” As for the mystery man’s ID, it will be revealed next week, and, he teases, “It’s probably not going to be as simple as it may seem, and I’m sure there’s going to be some conflict and drama that ensues.”

  • Daniel also answered a question from a fan at CBS.com:

    Fan Question – What was it like teaming up with the NCIS: LA team?

    Daniel Dae Kim is visiting and has answered your questions which we’ll be rolling out! Octavio S. asks: What was it like teaming up with the NCIS: LA Team? “It was a lot of fun! I felt like going on a field trip and was an elementary school kid. It was a new set and talented people, a great vibe. ” – Daniel

Gallery, Picture and Video Updates
  • A large collection of BTS photos from the crossover event was posted on Daniel’s Facebook; I’ve added the new ones to the CBS album and the crossover album. He also tweeted some photos recently; you can view them here.
  • Also added is a set of BTS photos taken at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam on March 26 of Scott Caan, Chris O’Donnell and LL Cool J filming a scene from the H50 crossover episode.
  • A new BTS photo from August Rush was shared on Facebook recently; I’ve posted it and other August Rush photos from Alex’s MySpace in the gallery.
  • I posted crops of some “new” candids of Alex from 2006 – will add the originals and a few more pics later this week.
  • The screencaps of the crossover episodes are now available: 2.21 – 3.21.
  • I’m having fun re-capping Moonlight and the first two episodes can be found here — 99.9% of the caps are of Mick, but I don’t think anyone here will mind… :blush:
  • If you missed Daniel on Live with Kelly on Tuesday, you can watch his interview on YouTube – thanks to Skylar for the upload!
  • Daniel also answers some interesting questions in TV Guide’s cubicle confessions – check out the great video on YouTube!
  • Daniel also appeared on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon and you can view the videos on Jimmy’s official site: part 1 – part 2.
  • You can watch Scott’s interview on The Ellen DeGeneres Show on YouTube; the funny game segment was posted here. Thanks again to Skylar for the videos!

Okay, get ready for an awesome week… McG’s baaaack and hopefully he survived the crash landing!

:banana:    :banana:    :banana:

Filed Under: Latest Headlines, Weekly Wrap-Up Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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