Birthright is the 7th episode of the fifth season for the 2018 remake of Magnum P.I., and the eighty-third episode overall, which was aired on March 26, 2023.
Summary[]
Magnum and Higgins investigate the robbery of an elderly man suffering from Alzheimer's. The ohana tries to help TC overcome a past trauma.
Recap[]
Two masked men broke into the home of an old army veteran. They probably thought the guy wouldn’t be trouble because of his age. They therefore got a surprise when he pulled a gun on them. Mr. Urima killed one of them. The other guy got away.
He got away with some valuables including something that belonged to the elderly man’s late wife and so Urima wanted justice. He was hoping to get that from the police, but they couldn’t find the other thief on their own and the dead guy was no use in locating his friends. Urima's daughter was also worried about this other man coming back for retaliation for his friend. And that’s when they turned to Juliette.
Juliette agreed to look into the thieves. Only Magnum wasn’t working the case with her. She and Magnum decided to take separate cases. She was talking with the Urima's and he was actually meeting with a woman that wanted to find her son or at least that’s what he was told when he took the meeting, but this woman was actually TC’s mother. She wanted to locate TC because they haven’t seen each other in thirty-six years. She essentially abandoned him because she was struggling with mental illness.
She’s been sick for years. She couldn’t quite handle her sickness on top of being a mother. It also didn’t help that mental illnesses weren’t really discussed in those days. It would be really hard to get help because family members would often make excuses for what was happening, and no one was encouraging treatment.
The worst thing they would tell people in a spiral was that they could pray it away. Which was why it's taken her thirty-six years to finally get right. She was better now, and she wanted to see TC and yet she knew she couldn’t go barging into his life. She lost the right to that.
She instead contacted Magnum. She saw him on the news when they had gotten rescued. She knew that he was a friend of TC’s, and she wanted to reach out back then only she still wasn’t steady on her feet. She wanted to give herself more and she was hoping Magnum would now pass on a message for her. She wanted TC to know that she was on the island. She wanted to see him and its okay if he doesn’t want to see her. Magnum later passed on that message. He also added what he thought of the situation.
He didn’t think that TC’s mom wanted anything from him. He thought she was genuinely interested in TC’s life. Magnum said as much to his friend and his friend decided not to see her. TC said he didn’t need her in his life. He was going to pass. He wanted to forget the whole thing and it was his friends that kept telling him to see her. They thought it would be good for him. He could finally get things off his chest. And so they talked him into eventually meeting with her, only it didn’t go as they hoped.
TC got to process his feelings in his own way. He told his mother how much it hurt when she abandoned him. He told her that his dad had never been the same after she left and that he’s been pushing away people his whole life because he was afraid of being abandoned again by someone he truly loves. TC told her what he was feeling. Then he walked away. He told himself that he doesn’t want a relationship with her. He felt she lost that right when she chose to walk out rather than get the help she needed to stay.
It took him talking to Cade for him to realize the chance he’s been given. Cade lost his own mother because of her addiction. He reminded TC that he can finally get to know his mom. He had heard stories of her wild days from family members, and he used to tell himself that he was lucky not to have her around. Only the woman he met recently was nothing like what he heard in the stories. She was calm. She knew she couldn’t be forgiven right away. She was very aware of his feelings as well as his boundaries. And so, Cade made him see that the woman was very much worth knowing.
Magnum meanwhile started helping Juliette with her case. They found out that the necklace that got stolen was a fake thanks to Detective Childs being an expert on engagement rings. Urima’s daughter sold the real thing years ago to pay for her father’s cancer treatment. The guy that stole the necklace hadn’t known it was fake until he tried to fence it. The fence called it fake. The thief shot him and the whole thing made him angry. It turns out their thief was Nixon Hoa. He served time for a while. He was also pen pals with Urima’s daughter. And she had asked her brother to give him a job off the books when he got out of prison.
Fast-forward a couple of years. Urima’s son went broke. He needed money and so he enlisted Nixon to rob his dad because he wanted money from the sale of the necklace. He didn’t know it was fake until Nixon got mad at him. Nixon came over to their dad’s house with a gun. He demanded what was left of the sale of the original necklace. So, the brother had to call his sister to find out where her stash was. And he gave it all to Nixon because Nixon had a gun in his face.
That phone call helped HPD figure out what was going on. They went to Urima’s home. They were closing in when Nixon came up with an idea. He knocked out the son and he made the father drive away in his car. He was creating a diversion so that no one would see him sneak away on foot. And it was Magnum who spotted him.
The cops later took down Nixon and the money was recovered. But Urima knew that the necklace was fake. He’s known for years. He figured out that his daughter helped him cover his medical bills. He then went along with the lie because he hadn’t wanted her to feel bad.
Notes[]
Deaths
Trivia[]
Quotes[]
Cast[]
Main[]
- Jay Hernandez as Thomas Magnum
- Perdita Weeks as Juliet Higgins
- Zachary Knighton as Orville "Rick" Wright
- Stephen Hill as Theodore "T.C." Calvin
- Tim Kang as Detective Gordon Katsumoto
- Amy Hill as Teuila Tuileta
Recurring[]
- Michael Rady as Det. Chris Childs
- Martin Martinez as Cade Jensen
- Michael De Lara as M.E. Gabriel Santos
Guest[]
- Ryan Dorsey as Nixon Haoa
- Lawrence Pressman as Gus Urima
- Judith Scott as Verna Calvin
- Jordan Belfi as Brent Urima
- Bethany Anne Lind as Kerry Urima
- Kristy Dawn Dinsmore as Dawn Makali
- Sarah Haruko as CSU Tech Cynthia
- Jay Tapaoan as CSU Tech Neil