Try To Die On Time for 50 years

Tonight 50 years ago, CBS aired S06E13 "Try To Die On Time".

This very convoluted episode made me skip it when I was writing out the full plots. :p

Mr. Mike does a great job in his review. It's here: https://www.fiveohomepage.com/5-0log6.htm#133

Harry Foxton (Jack Carter) is dying (aren't we all?) of cancer. He has come up with an ingenious, if not insane, way to go out with a bang. He's created a lottery for his friends and family with 24 total tickets. Each ticket represents an hour of the day. The winning ticket, worth $240,000, is the hour in which Foxton dies.

Based on the best Doc (Al Eben) could figure, three people could be potential 'winners'. Suyam (Yankee Chang), who helped Foxton orchestrate the whole debacle, is the first suspect. Diane Foxton (Louise Sorel), Harry's daughter, is the second and her ex Scotty McBain (Fred Beir) is the third.

Suyam winds up dead in his wine cellar because he knew of Harry's meddling that broke up McBain and his daughter. Not to mention it hit McBain financially to the point of bankruptcy.

In the end, McBain is the guilty party for murder on multiple counts, including Harry's doctor, Bromley (John Stalker). It's Bromley's death that pulls Five-O into this big mess to begin with.

There isn't much that is redeeming about this episode. Even the apprehension of McBain at the end is cringe-worthy.

The only up side is watching Louise Sorel in action. She went on to several parts including one on the soap opera "Santa Barbara". This was the same soap that launched A Martinez's career.

Regardless, Happy 50th, "Try To Die On Time"!! :cool:

Here is my 2019 review of it:

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Definitely an interesting episode, and one of the "mystery" variety, where we don't learn the killer's identity until the final few minutes.

Mike's review (scroll down to episode 133) described the plot as "complicated", and that's an understatement! There's no way such a plot would see the light of day 2019, as editors would have had a field day with this one.

They crammed a ton of plot into these 48 minutes, thus leaving some unexplained points.

Scotty McBain was attempting to set up Diane Foxton for her father Harry's murder, but it seems the entire plan was far too complicated to work.

The "gimmick" of this episode involved the terminally ill Harry Foxton setting up a lottery, where 24 people bought $10,000 tickets, and each was assigned an hour of the day. The winner would be the one who had the hour Harry died. The prize would be $240,000, equating to about $1.3 million today.

Harry had ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease), but claimed he had cancer. It's unclear why he lied about his illness, given that both would be terminal.

Harry intended to kill himself and win his own lottery (bought through a proxy), believing he would die between midnight and 1am. However, McBain shot Harry's doctor (who gave Harry the suicide pill) dead, then took McBain and hid his body in a hot room, thus attempting to throw off the coroner, allowing Diane to win and become prime suspect.

McBain hired wiretapper/hitman Doug Listie to do his dirty work, but it's never made clear how Listie managed to break into McGarrett's office to bug it. It seemed all of Listie's break-ins had the same recognizable M/O, yet somehow the same wasn't noticed for McGarrett's office? (This was never explained.)

They also didn't explicity explain why Harry's doctor was murdered, but presumably it was so he wouldn't talk about the suicide pill, and give away that the time of death couldn't have been 10:30am.

All of the serial numbers on all the equipment used in the crimes (including guns) were stamped multiple times, but this particular detail was also never explained.

McBain was eventually tricked into showing up to retrieve tapes from Listie's hidden van, after McGarrett realized his office was bugged, and they set him up.

These "office bug" episodes actually annoy me, because they assume the bug has a spectacular range. Unless McBain/Listie were camped out very close to the Iolani Palace (unlikely), they couldn't have heard every word McGarrett was saying.

Doc was especially grumpy in the episode, for no apparent reason. At one point he complains, "This isn't a paradise, it's a shooting gallery!" He seems annoyed that McGarrett wants an exact time of death for Harry.

Despite the flaws, I still enjoyed the episode, and give it 3 stars.

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Bobbi wrote:

“There isn't much that is redeeming about this episode. Even the apprehension of McBain at the end is cringe-worthy.”

Not sure what in particular was cringe-worthy about the ending. They apprehend McBain outside the van and I particularly love McBain getting pissed that McG didn’t figure things out the way he planned for it to work out. McG’s response? “I guess I’m a sloppy cop”. Love it!!! :D So actually the ending is probably my favorite part of the episode :)

I think the part that got me on the ending was that McBain easily escaped at first. They did catch him, but it was all "sloppy". Glad someone enjoyed it! :)

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Originally Posted by Bobbi

I think the part that got me on the ending was that McBain easily escaped at first. They did catch him, but it was all "sloppy". Glad someone enjoyed it! :)

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I guess I’m a bit foggy how they caught him. I don’t remember him getting away. I think they opened the van door and wasn’t he inside?

He was but I think he got away from Danno. Wasn't Danno trying to cuff him and they had to recapture McBain? Granted the escape only lasted a few seconds, but it made Danno look really stupid. Makes me mad.

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Originally Posted by Bobbi

He was but I think he got away from Danno. Wasn't Danno trying to cuff him and they had to recapture McBain? Granted the escape only lasted a few seconds, but it made Danno look really stupid. Makes me mad.

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Makes you mad? That’s funny.:D But that’s life. Sometimes a suspect slips away from an officer’s hands. Doesn’t happen all the time with Danno or anyone else on the Five-O team so all is forgiven. Doesn’t make me mad.;)