"A Shallow Grave" is just one of many examples of episodes from the last couple seasons that weren't bad BUT used stupid gimmicks which cheapened the show. This is the second time in season 12 that parapsychology was the theme--the other was a crappy episode involving a kooky astrologer. Ditto for season 11--other episodes that really showed that the writers were running out of ideas and were resorting to cheap episodes about this mumbo-jumbo. It's a shame, as the series had been very solid and very entertaining for quite a few years. It just goes to show you that it truly had run its course. Heck, had the show been renewed for the 13th season, I could imagine with the lack of script ideas and the supernatural that they would have been battling Satan himself or the ghost of Hitler!!
A young man comes to Hawaii just when a notorious robber (John Ireland) has been released from a 20 year prison term. Now that the young guy is there, he starts having visions--as if he was there when the robbers were hiding out in a shack two decades earlier. Oddly, he also knows lots of details he couldn't have known unless he'd been there--and Detective Wilson thinks the young man could be a reincarnation and that his spirit is that of one of the dead robbers!!! And, she's able to find a professor who lends credence to this very professional observation. Is the young guy reincarnated? Or, does he somehow have inside information from some other source?
Fortunately, the show ended well...or at least reasonably well. I did have a laugh when the police dug up a skeleton and if you look closely, you can clearly see it's a skull from a biological supply catalog-- complete with a cleanly sawed off top of the skull!! And the guy was not to have been killed this way! Mildly interesting and also a bit silly.
By the way, this was the last episode filmed with Detective Wilson and I could see why she wanted off the show. Her role, as usual, is the gofer for the office and she never gets directly involved in doing anything. McGarrett sends her off to make phone calls and pick people up from the airport and drop people off to appointments. And, she plays the gullible one. All in all, a thankless role for a female actress! Also thankless was the way the excellent actor John Ireland was used...or hardly used in the episode at all!
A young man comes to Hawaii just when a notorious robber (John Ireland) has been released from a 20 year prison term. Now that the young guy is there, he starts having visions--as if he was there when the robbers were hiding out in a shack two decades earlier. Oddly, he also knows lots of details he couldn't have known unless he'd been there--and Detective Wilson thinks the young man could be a reincarnation and that his spirit is that of one of the dead robbers!!! And, she's able to find a professor who lends credence to this very professional observation. Is the young guy reincarnated? Or, does he somehow have inside information from some other source?
Fortunately, the show ended well...or at least reasonably well. I did have a laugh when the police dug up a skeleton and if you look closely, you can clearly see it's a skull from a biological supply catalog-- complete with a cleanly sawed off top of the skull!! And the guy was not to have been killed this way! Mildly interesting and also a bit silly.
By the way, this was the last episode filmed with Detective Wilson and I could see why she wanted off the show. Her role, as usual, is the gofer for the office and she never gets directly involved in doing anything. McGarrett sends her off to make phone calls and pick people up from the airport and drop people off to appointments. And, she plays the gullible one. All in all, a thankless role for a female actress! Also thankless was the way the excellent actor John Ireland was used...or hardly used in the episode at all!