#h50 5x24

[trickster-archangel]

Random thoughts about Hawaii Five-0 rewatch: part 1/?

So, as someone of my mutuals already knows, I'm currently undergoing the exhausting task of checking all the fucking 61 DVDs from the H50 box set before the 30-days guarantee expires, because it's physically impossible to watch them all completely in that time, even if I took 1 month leave. So I'm simply skipping back and forth and leaving the regular rewatch for when my life will be less of a living hell...so, supposedly around 2038...

I have one complaint, which is the subtitles are not completely matching all dialogues, but since my brain only needs them until it's switched to English-mode and I can start understanding it again, I guess it's alright. Second complaint: they're fucking HUGE and OVERLAPPING THE SCENES SO RANDOMLY IT HURTS.

Anyway, I've by now processed only s1-s5, and dude....some things I caught in the deleted scenes (which I've watched entirely) AND in some parts of the commentaries I specifically sought because curiosity won, and which I've never seen giffed or captioned....man, I was so angry and disappointed at times. So I thought I'd be randomly processing them here, no pics sorry, only thoughts.

~~~~~~more under the cut~~~~~~

Thought #1: Alex and Scott goofing around.

Trust me. The gag reels are so much better than you'd expect. At times I was genuinely laughing to tears and god knows how rare it is.

What I loved most was to watch that scene where Alex and Scott start cussing in Italian, and I bet no one who's not Italian could understand a fuck about what they're yelling. Best part, though, were the subtitles, captioning ALEX AND SCOTT: SWEARING IN ITALIAN 😂 Just to make sure what language exactly they were using.

Thought #2: missed chance to make Amber's character less of a plastic doll, or: Why did you fucking cut those 57 seconds?!?!

While watching s5 deleted scenes, I stumbled upon two real jewels from the 24th episode. I'm still trying to understand why they couldn't include them in the canon episode, since both of them combined are less than a minute and surely there were other moments that could've been cut. My only explanation, sadly, is that it would've painted Amber in quite a different light, making her a stronger, rounder character, and giving her an agency we rarely saw in her, except when confronting her ex husband. They could've followed that route, but we cannot have a beautiful woman who's also her own person, a self-confident person, and not just a plastic Barbie doll, right?! God forbid a woman can have agency and call out men on their bullshit, it would threat masculine privilege too much....

So, what exactly happened that bothered me so deeply? (Be aware I'm quoting by heart and not literally, as I didn't take screenshots and anyway I can't make gifs. Also, the following meta is just my interpretation of the implications running through subtext).

The first scene is very short, just six or seven seconds long, but it's a jewel in subtext and non-verbal communication. It takes place presumably after or around the moment Rachel tells Danny about Charlie: we see them from afar, clearly in a street-taken point of view, from an external observer. They are agitated and distressed, Rachel more than Danny, who's tensely spread on the bench with his arms looped behind the backrest, angling far from Rachel's compact and almost self-hugging frame.

They're distressed, not happy, not even remotely connecting to each other, so it's clear it's not a scene which could be envisioned as romantic. It's only a couple of seconds long, and then we see whose this external point of view belongs to: Amber. Amber who's not an idiotic, mellow, shallow doll. Amber who's been so clearly upset by Danny's lie about the texts, that she decided to follow him to the place Rachel had indicated. Amber who's been manipulated and controlled and abused long enough to become suspicious and self-preserving when someone she loves, and who knows her vulnerability, tries to play her around. Amber who looks at them, and clearly isn't angry nor jealous, because those few moments the actress uses to convey all of Amber's inner distress, are some of her best ones (giving that the actress, alas, is not very expressive to begin with), and we understand that she doesn't see any romance in the air. She's disappointed. She's hurt. Betrayed. Again.

Amber's face, in a handful of seconds, perfectly displays the devastating feeling of someone who finally felt safe and respected and secure, only to discover that it's yet another kind of control and manipulation, less cruel, less brutal, but not less humiliating and even worrying.

This is something she's learnt at her expense, and now that she knows the red flags, she cannot trust a man who can't be honest with her, not with this kind of problems, not with something which is clearly affecting his life to a deep level. He wants Amber to be a part of his life, but only if he can control the terms, limits, boundaries and times of their relationship. And Amber has been through it all before, and can't trust that history won’t repeat itself.

She then drives away, hurt and disappointment written all over her face.

The second deleted scene is even more important plotwise, because it explains Amber's absence as Danny’s plus one at Kono's wedding, after all the talk he did in the car about bringing some Amber's friend as Steve's date, and it casts a new light over Danny's reaction to Steve's resolve to ask Cath to marry him, or his tension about Lynn, or Amber's condistent absence for the whole first part of s6, or even Danny's and Amber's fight during their Valentine's dinner.

The scene is longer, about fifty seconds, and it supposedly takes place right at the end of the episode, after Danny pulls up at the hospital's parking lot, after Steve's affectionate text. He takes his phone out of his pocket again because he's received a voice-mail message.

A message from Amber (sorry, I noticed just now I'm still going with Amber instead of Melissa).

She says she's sorry to be doing this by voice-mail because she'd prefer to do it in person, but given their situation it's probably for the best if she spares them both the trouble to be forced to find shallow excuses. She says he's an amazing man, and that she likes what they have and that she thinks it might be real, and that she hopes he feels the same. She's understanding that his job comes first and it's terribly demanding, as she's also aware of how hard his life and his backstory is, with Grace and Rachel. This all considered, she thinks it's best if they stop and take a pause, so that he can reflect and decide if he wants to keep this thing going, but as for now, she can't keep seeing him on these terms.

Amber decided to stop seeing Danny until he decided what to do with their relationship and be honest with her, and started thinking seriously if he was just using her, as she probably felt.

Why?? Why did they cut this whole plotline? It's pivotal for Danny's arc, for his strained and angry attitude towards everyone, for his constant distress, for his even worsening negativity, for the way he's overcompensating with excessive euphoria to Steve's announcement about Cath, for how he meddles with them and confronts Cath about being honest, for how he's not thrilled about Lynn's insertion inside Steve's life.

Because he's alone, at that time. Call it temporary breakup or period of reflection or a break, but he was single and thinking, again, about everything he was doing wrong with his life and his relationships, and falling again into his old black hole of depression and self-sabotage, and seeing Steve going on with his life even at the cost of pretending he was happy with this woman he had supposedly no trouble cheating on, during their "couple retreat", making him wonder if either what he had with Lynn wasn't serious, or if his obvious charade about his threesome with Alyssa and her friend had a second meaning.

Also, they were probably both single again, or at least testing the waters, when they were at the retreat. And Danny definitely was when Cath left Steve once again abandoned, betrayed, and never-chosen in face of anything else.

Quite a lot of subtext to think about, for just 57 seconds which were, prudently, cut.

[teruel-a-witch]

danny: are you bringing anyone to kono's wedding?

steve: no, the only person I'd want to go with doesn't feel the same way.

danny: what??? who wouldn't want to go with you? do they have a pulse? are they an idiot?? wait, why are you grinning?

steve: you just called yourself an idiot. so...anybody with a pulse, huh?

danny: *groans* you are going to be insufferable about this, aren't you? ...but yes. i would love to go with you.

steve: *grins* i didn't technically ask.

danny: i'm going to kill you.

steve: love you too, danno.

[rex-o0]

A McDanno Guide to: Effective Forms of Communication

Talking and Walking

Provides plenty of room for hand gestures and displaying your Tol and Smol credentials

It also means you can get away with pulling faces your partner can’t see (but would definitely have names for)

Whilst still providing the opportunity for some lingering looks if required

(Bonus - your partner can’t always follow your eye line - what are you looking at Steve?)

Telephonic Communication

No point trying to keep this private - your partner will find out one way or another.

Even if it is just by the simple, unsubtle, means of reading over your shoulder

Heart to Heart

Looks the best as it allows for some soulful staring in to the middle distance

Non-verbal

Who needs words anyway when you can just look at your partner as though they hung the moon

[satashiiwrites]

H50-rewatch

So rewatching season five while doing laundry and got to the Danny finds out Episode—which coincidently is also the episode where Kono is getting ready to get married which happens in the next episode.  And i have feels about how this could have gone differently.  We’ll see if this gets legs (it probably is)

Title: Untitled 5x24 fix it

Fandom: Hawaii 5-0

Pairing: McDanno, Danny/Melissa past Danny/Rachel, mentioned Steve/Cassie, 

Other tags/warnings: canon infidelity leading to Charlie, breakups incoming, McDanno not established but we’re heading there…. First draft

Set roughly in season 5 episode 24, Luapo’i

He doesn’t know what to do after Rachel dropped her bombs on him, obliterating any sense of purpose he had in his life.  The anger and pain he thought he’d finally worked through and made peace with was relit like a bonfire within him, searing through his veins and making his heart race and hands shake even as his foot pressed down on the gas pedal. 

Danny was not a violent man but sometimes he scared himself.  

He loved Rachel once upon a time.  

Would have done anything she asked because he loved her, was her husband. 

Except now everything hurt. He needed to get away from her before he did something he’d regret. 

How… how could she have done this to him?  

There was no doubt in his mind that if she hadn’t been forced to he never would have known how she’d deceived him. She’d let him into the damned delivery room and denied him to his face the knowledge that Charlie was his. 

She’d taken years from him.  Years he’d never get back. 

How could she?  

[secretgardensmind]

It still makes me so angry that the only reason Rachel told Danny about Charlie is because Charlie was sick and Danny was the only one who could help him. Her reasoning for not telling Danny is ridiculous too. Plus poor Stan. All that time he thought Charlie was his. I can’t imagine how hard that must’ve been for him. I don’t know how him and Rachel even stayed together for as long as they did after that. If Charlie has never gotten sick, Rachel might never have told Danny he has a son.

[itsalycenotalice]

Hawaii Five-0, Season 5, Episode 24 - Luapo’i (Prey)

While Five-0 investigates the murder of a bounty hunter after he apprehended a fugitive hiding out in Hawaii, Rachel reveals a long-held secret to Danny that has serious ramifications.

[coolranch-chrisevans]

Steve and Danny have to drop the bomb 50 miles offshore to avoid radiation effects on the island. But that will leave them less than two minutes to get out of the blast radius. Luckily, they manage to save the day, and the boys do that crying/laughing thing they do when they almost die.

My EW Community recap of the H50 finale (x)

[trickster-archangel]

Again thank you to @stellagioia for providing the deleted scenes.