Hawaii Five-0

About the series

Contains story spoilers.

Hawaii Five-0 is a 2010 reboot of the police drama that first ran from 1968 to 1980, returning to CBS’s island setting and special-task-force premise. Steve McGarrett, a decorated Navy officer, comes home after his father is killed following an attack on Steve’s convoy in South Korea. Hawaii’s governor offers him authority to lead an elite unit, and he accepts while pursuing those behind the murder. The team begins with Danny Williams, a New Jersey detective who moved to Oahu to stay near his daughter; Chin Ho Kelly, a former Honolulu officer and friend of Steve’s father; and Kono Kalakaua, Chin’s cousin and a police-academy graduate.

The team structure is tested by cases that spill into family life. At a football game, Danny spots armed men and hides his daughter before calling Steve; a gang shootout then leaves several people dead. Tattoos and a player’s account lead Five-0 to a pipeline moving guns inside pizza boxes. New Jersey mobsters have armed a Samoan gang to expand gambling on the islands. Chin and Kono learn their cousin Sid is an undercover officer working against one of the gangs. His information helps Steve, Danny and Kono go undercover and gather evidence against the mob boss, turning the public attack into a case about family trust and organized crime.

The early episode “Lanakila” turns a prison escape into a case about stolen money. Inmate Wendell Dawkins kills guards during his breakout, and the team discovers an inside accomplice helped him escape. Steve works out that Dawkins’s trigger was seeing a former partner, Craig, on a game show: Craig survived their earlier crime, took the money and built a new identity. Dawkins reaches Craig and his wife, then pursues the hidden cash. Steve follows Craig to a bank where he retrieves it, leading to a helicopter chase through a valley. Meanwhile, Steve’s sister Mary arrives in trouble, exposing unresolved hurt between them over their father. A contained manhunt thus connects to the McGarrett family history established in the pilot.

In “Huaka'i Kula,” Steve and Danny volunteer with Grace’s Girl Scout troop at a jungle camp. They help a wounded stranger, who draws a gun and locks Danny and the others in a supply shed. He is Ron Alberts, a robber searching for diamonds stolen from a crashed cargo flight. Ron takes Steve and Lucy into the jungle as leverage, while Danny escapes and reaches Five-0 using a repaired cellphone. The team links the diamonds to the plane wreck. Danny searches with an ER nurse, then continues alone when she stays to help a wounded passerby. He reaches Steve in time to stop Ron’s accomplice, while Chin finds Lucy safe. The crisis grows from an attempt to help an injured man into a rescue operation, with the aircraft wreck explaining what the robber is after.

In “Kapu,” a college freshman finds a chemistry professor’s decomposing body. Investigators consider the professor’s reputation, suspected misconduct and a computer that could expose exam theft. A teaching assistant did sell exams, but laboratory analyst Charlie Fong discovers the professor was also studying species believed extinct. That research points Five-0 toward a private-island wildlife reserve and botanist Brian Stevens, who hopes to find treatment for his son’s rare disease. The killer remains active as the team follows the research trail. Danny’s cousin Eric, visiting from New Jersey, helps through his interest in forensic science and sharp observations. The case moves from campus suspicion toward research with a potential medical use.

“Olelo Ho'Opa'i Make” strands Chin inside the prison system. His teammates believe he is marking the anniversary of his first date with his late wife, but he has been drugged and abducted, and wakes in a maximum-security prison. Bribed guards refuse to identify or release him and deliver him to a hostile group led by rogue former officer Kaleo. Sang Min, a prisoner and failed crown witness, becomes Chin’s only ally. Outside, Five-0 notices Chin is missing and traces the abduction to Paul Delano, who seeks revenge for his criminal brother’s death. Steve and the others reach the prison as a riot is under way, turning the rescue into a race through the same breakdown that enabled the kidnapping. Inside, Chin’s badge and identity offer no protection. Five-0 rescues Chin and other people caught in the prison chaos.

The serial story carries the team beyond Hawaii. When Chin learns his niece Sara has been abducted from her grandparents’ home in Guadalajara, he travels there and tells only Danny, believing Five-0 has no Mexican jurisdiction. Steve organizes an informal rescue effort. The team examines a dead abductor and recognizes that the ransom demand hides a personal trap; Chin is then kidnapped by a cartel, forcing Five-0 to race to save him. In a season-seven finale, the team tracks a moving truck used by a child-trafficking network. Steve climbs onto the trailer and separates it from the cab to stop it safely, but Kono questions whether one rescue changes the broader operation. Her response carries the story beyond its immediate result.