Tall on the Wave

The summary on IMDb says "Danno enters a surfing competition..." but this is simply not true. Danny is a judge at a surfing competition and he never surfs--though this would be awfully funny if he had! As you'd expect on "Hawaii Five-O", something bad will happen because it's a day off! The girlfriend of the competition's leader, Ben Hanakea, is killed. To make things worse for Ben, the killer plants evidence to make it appear as if Ben did it! But, since Ben is one of Danny's friends, you know things will work out fine.

If this sort of plot seems a bit familiar, it is. However, Ben turns out to be perhaps the dumbest guy I've ever seen on the show--as again and again and again he runs away when Danny gives him a break. And yet, inexplicably, Ben wants to be a cop one day and both Steve and Danny promise to help this become a reality even though EVERY THING BEN DID during the course of the show showed he was 100% stupid and would not cooperate with the police investigation! If this makes for a good candidate for the academy, I'd sure hate to live on the islands!! The bottom line is that this is a very weak episode made even weaker by a profoundly annoying and stupid character that you are supposed to care about in spite of this!! This and "A Short Walk on a Long Shore" seem to indicate that after almost 10 years, the show is slipping.