Kurtzman was a Show Runner, Executive Producer, and writer on Five-0. The show lasted as long as it did as it (10 years!) as it had beautiful scenes of Hawaii, beautiful people, stuff blew up, and Steve McGarrett kicked a lot of ass. That almost makes the show impervious to bad writing.
Almost. The writers certainly tried. Mercenaries, nuclear terrorists, global syndicates, bio-terrorists descended on Hawaii every episode. When Steve got really mad, he'd round up a few now civilian SEAL buddies, rent a Huey, and randomly mount special operations in multiple foreign countries around the world as a glorified State Trooper in a solo non government sponsored effort. Writing wasn't even in the realm of possible.
But the show's real doozy was the "Wheel-of-New-Characters" approach to story arcs (sound familiar?). At the Producer level, this supports the aforementioned success factors: Hot new people to keep that factor fresh. Then you can kill them off in a fire fight, or have them flip sides for wonky gotcha episodes. All these new people introduced new story arcs for 2-3 episodes that should have been 6-8 episodes long to be properly developed. It was like the writers were counting on you to have ADD.
All these new people also reduced the actual regulars (i.e. Daniel Dae Kim, Grace Park) into what CaptainCrunch called "Bridge Furniture". Eventually they got so PO'ed they cited racism in a pay equity dispute and left.
I'm going to steal this description from a blog that summarizes how this happened in the last few seasons nicely:
Quote:
A sister was introduced into the mix. After several episodes she didn’t work out and was gone.
Jean Smart was the governor. It’s hard to make Jean Smart not interesting but they somehow managed to do so. Bang! She was shot and gone the end of last season.
Larisa Oleynik was introduced late last year as a former CIA analyst who winds up doing the same stuff for the team that Grace does. Big surprise. That didn’t work. She’s mousey so she can’t be used during action scenes. My guess – they thought she could become a love interest for Alex. But there’s no chemistry. She’s now gone.
And in her place – a super hot blonde bombshell, Lauren German. If that doesn’t light a fire under Alex’s loins then it's time for Ricky Martin. Lauren's a former Homeland Security agent assigned to the team against his wishes. So expect three weeks of mandatory bickering before the beleaguered writers realize that doesn’t work either. Good luck writing those scenes where we see Alex’s “sensitive” side. That’ll be one more story arc for the “dear God, never again!” file.
And still the new characters keep on coming. Terry O’Quinn (also a LOST alum) as a… I can’t even keep track. Alex’s mentor, John Locke, I dunno. And Tom Sizemore (in between his own jail stints) as an Internal Affairs hard-ass.
But wait! There’s more!
I suppose the writers felt they needed some comic relief. That way the tone could be action-thriller-romance-relationship-comedy. So joining the crew is Masi Oka as a goofy nerd coroner, and Taylor Wiley as big fat Hawaiian street informant, baby sitter for Scott’s daughter, scam artist, and shave ice stand proprietor. By this point you should be screaming, “Jesus! This is just a cluster####!” And you would be right.
But wait! There’s still more!
Arch villain Wo Fat pops in and out. Scott Caan’s ex-wife pops in and out. There’s a story arc involving Grace being investigated for grand theft. Lirisa may be a mole, or she may be a double-agent. The new governor has it in for Alex’s team. Alex suspects his late father may be a bad guy. There’s still the toolbox with clues. The HPD still hates Daniel Dae. And just what’s in that mysterious “hatch”.
The bottom line is this: If you don’t know what you’re writing you’re in trouble. Maybe one of these mid-course corrections will work and the show will click. The ratings are still okay but the theme song and beauty shots can only take you so far. One of these weeks I’m going to keep my vow. Better introduce Charlie Sheen before it’s too late.
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Ultimately Kurtzman tried to follow a similar approach with Discovery, but has grossly misjudged what fans want from the show. Somewhere along the way, he figured an action packed, FX intensive, fast paced show, topical show would appeal to old/new Trek fans but given Discovery's ratings - it's clear he's mis-judged what *anyone* wants from this show.
(Yes, I watched Five-O despite all this. It was one show my wife and I could agree on. After a long day of headaches at work, it was nice to watch something that required zero thought.... and Hawaii is my happy place...)
Ah yess, the theme song and intro.... everyone one of the show's success factors that I mentioned above packed into a 31 second climax.... Let me link it here to give neatly how why it lasted 10 seasons: