Certain "Magnum P.I." episode

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Um, have any CAF members been bothered by the ending of the Magnum, P.I. episode “Did You See the Sunrise?”
 
I was a huge Magnum, PI fan back in the day, but I am afraid that 35 years after the show aired, I am a little rusty on the content of that specific episode. 😛 If you have something in particular that you want to discuss, you may have to give some details.
 
I never really watched the show, but this page says:

1 This episode has the most shocking, unexpected and controversial ending of the entire series, with Magnum killing Ivan in cold blood! In most airings in the UK, the gunshot is omitted.
 
Magnum shoots the KGB agent who tortured him when he was a POW in Vietnam.
 
Magnum figures that Ivan will go on to assassinate a prominent leader. “Whose next on you hit list? Begin? Thatcher? Reagan?” To prevent that, he shoots Ivan.

An interesting moral proposition, whether it is morally allowable to kill an assassin prior to his crime. I can see why this might be controversial here at CAF.
 
I loved that show…don’t remember that episode, though. For a moment I thought this was about that episode where Higgins had a half-brother(?) who was an Irish priest.
 
I enjoyed Magnum as entertainment, but I never thought of it as a serious show about moral reasoning. Am I supposed to be bothered each time James Bond kills off a villain? I’m not bothered when he does it, or when Magnum does it, either. They’re fictional spy/ private eye shows.
 
We can come up with all kinds of scenarios of bad things if we really study a television show .
As a Kid , I Dream of Jeannie had me going to Confession every second day ,🙂
 
If the episode were a standalone feature film, would it be branded with an “O” rating by Catholic News Service all because of the ending?
 
Beryllos said:
Magnum figures that Ivan will go on to assassinate a prominent leader. “Whose next on you hit list? Begin? Thatcher? Reagan?” To prevent that, he shoots Ivan.

An interesting moral proposition, whether it is morally allowable to kill an assassin prior to his crime. I can see why this might be controversial here at CAF.
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Given that the OP is not providing many details here, I researched the show myself, including watching the ending and listening to an interview with the man who wrote the show.

“Ivan” on the show is a total baddie who
  • tortured Magnum in Vietnam
  • killed a fellow prisoner in Vietnam in front of Magnum, after which Magnum and his buddy TC and another guy escape
  • comes to the island expressly to kill Magnum
  • ends up killing a friend of Magnum’s, Jeff (who was secretly trying to find Ivan and stop him before he killed Magnum) with a car bomb that was intended for Magnum
  • hypnotizes TC in order to compel him to kill a visiting Japanese dignitary (Magnum manages to stop TC in time) but escapes punishment for this due to diplomatic immunity
  • in the final scene, taunts Magnum and tells him that he knows Magnum could shoot him but won’t do it because he is unarmed and he knows Magnum’s psychology from torturing him in the prison camp
At this point Magnum shoots him (the shooting is not shown on camera and all you see is the camera on Magnum as the gun fires and then the show ends).

So by the time this guy Ivan gets killed he has tortured people in a prison camp, killed two of Magnum’s friends, tried to kill Magnum, and nearly implicated TC in an assassination plot, plus probable other assassinations and killings and torture in the past and also going forward in the future. The guy is a walking murder disaster who can’t be prosecuted (has already walked away from it).

According to the show’s writer, 95 percent of the people who wrote in about the episode approved of the ending. I can understand why.
 
I was a big Magnum PI fan, and that episode (iirc, it is a two hour episode) is one that I still remember, and the ending is perhaps why.
Ivan was going back to Russia, Magnum was seeking justice, as he saw it.
Doesn’t disturb me. Not justifying the killing, but it’s a TV show.
 
tafan said:
Doesn’t disturb me. Not justifying the killing, but it’s a TV show.
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Exactly. These shows (and James Bond, etc. ) are often written with the goal of letting the audience blow off some internal emotions/ pressure about subjects currently in their minds. At the time that show ran, a lot of people were confronting their Vietnam-era experiences, and there was also a lot of feeling against Russians. The show reflected that.

In real life, most people don’t get to be Magnum and kill off a guy who is pretty much 100 percent evil with no shades of gray. In real life, Magnum would have been prosecuted for murder and not just gone happily on with his PI career. TV shows (and video games, and movies, etc.) are not real life.
 
Well…I should probably be ashamed of myself, but when Mel Gibson offed those cruel bikers in “Mad Max” and Charles Bronson went after all the creeps in those “Death Wish” movies…I wasn’t exactly shedding tears. Vengeance belongs to God, but it’s hard *not *to feel some satisfaction when the bad guys get it on a show. Especially if they’re going to keep on hurting people.

When I saw *The Green Mile * I was sorry for a lot of the characters in it (especially poor John Coffey and Delacroix!). But the guard Percy was such a jerk, and “Willy” turned out to be such a monster, that I couldn’t feel bad for what happened to either of them.

When it happens to “baddies” in real life, I have to feel some sadness for them, at least about the fate of their souls. I didn’t always feel this way, though… 😊
 
In the world of entertainment, I always enjoyed Clint Eastwood blasting creeps both as a cowboy and as Dirty Harry (feel lucky, punk?) and in whatever other role he happened to take.

In real life I did anti-death penalty work and Innocence Project work. I could not bring myself to watch The Green Mile. Reading the plot summary was bad enough. I got exposed to enough of that sort of thing in the real world without watching dramatizations of it.
 
Mike_from_NJ said:
I never really watched the show, but this page says:

1 This episode has the most shocking, unexpected and controversial ending of the entire series, with Magnum killing Ivan in cold blood! In most airings in the UK, the gunshot is omitted.
Click to expand...
Thats it? I was expecting something extremely disturbing like finding out he shaved off that epic moustache. 😉
 
Tis_Bearself said:
In real life I did anti-death penalty work and Innocence Project work. I could not bring myself to watch The Green Mile. Reading the plot summary was bad enough. I got exposed to enough of that sort of thing in the real world without watching dramatizations of it.
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I don’t blame you. In fact, just watching The Green Mile began to change my mind about the death penalty. Thanks to the Social Justice network at my parish, I’m now completely against it.
 
Ivan was an expert in hand to hand combat and would close his eyes for a second before exploding into an attack. That’s why Thomas shot him. Self preservation.
 
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