Season 3, Episode 7 "Flashback"

It's official, Magnum has the gift of "sight"! No, not that sight, we knew his eyes worked, but in Episode 7 of Season 3, "Flashback", Magnum confirms what we suspected in Season 2's "Memories are Forever" when Magnum dreams of a scenario, it plays out in real life. I never realized this when I was a kid watching this for the first time, but this show is getting spooky. 


In any case, what am I talking about? Well, the episode starts, like many, with Magnum sleeping off a hangover in bed. But when the phone rings to wake him up, we see that it is an old timey phone and Rick is talking funny. Magnum gets up to find that the guest house is decorated in depression-era furniture and artwork. Also, Magnum's Hawaiian shirts and short-shorts have been replaced with boxer shorts and fancy white suits. After greeting Higgins and heading off to the club in an old car to meet a client(per Rick's phone call), Magnum realizes that he is not the subject of a practical joke, but must actually be dreaming. Okay, a dream episode, that's fine. I guess the writers/cast wanted an opportunity to have some fun with wardrobe and fancy old cars. I won't have to sweat out plot holes in this episode.


As for the case in Magnum's dream, he must exonerate a union organizer who has been accused of murdering a businessman. Of course, he's innocent and the killer is really the businessman's son who was working in cahoots with his mother to kill the father, as the father was getting ready to leave the family to start a new life with his pregnant mistress(portrayed by the actress who played Mitsu in last season's "The Taking of Dick McWilliams").


During Magnum's lengthy, unusually linear dream, he finds documents showing the murdered man's intentions to leave his wife. They were hidden in the wall of a secret country home. As Magnum discovers this, he is confronted by the businessman's son who shoots Magnum to death. Luckily, it was all a dream. 

Magnum shakes off the cobwebs and realizes that he had this dream because he had been hired by the union organizer's granddaughter(years after he had been executed for the businessman's murder) to clear his name. As an aside, I find it hard to imagine a world where a woman spends her hard earned money on a private investigator to research the murder that her grandfather was convicted of. If I were her, I would probably assume he was guilty and let sleeping dogs lie. 

In any case, Magnum calls the deceased businessman's son and accuses him of murdering his father back in the 30's, based on the evidence gathered in his dream. Okay, maybe he's bluffing. But then Magnum finds this old secret country home(again with info from only the dream) and when he gets there he finds the damning documents hidden in the same spot in the wall that he discovered the night before while in slumberland. The only difference in waking time is that TC is able to save Magnum before the murderer can shoot Thomas. Very mystical episode...



Side Note: Dream Magnum takes dream TC to a fancy 1930's bar and is super confused as to why they can't be seated together. How naive, Magnum! Oh wait, it was all a dream so Magnum did know about segregation, I guess. I'm confused. 

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