IN DEFENSE OF MAGNUM'S SLUTTY LITTLE SHORTS (A Show About Vietnam That's Pretending To Be A Show About A Man Who Won't Pay For Anything)

Sarah and I have been watching a genuinely unreasonable amount of Magnum PI. This is entirely the fault of Murder She Wrote. See, forty years ago — and I need you to sit with this for a second — there was a crossover episode between Jessica Fletcher and Thomas Magnum. Two separate shows, on the same network, acknowledging that they existed in the same universe, so that an elderly mystery novelist from Maine could go do a bit in Hawaii. That happened. In the eighties. Casually. Which just goes to show what absolute cowards television shows are now. We live in an era where every streaming service is desperate for a “shared universe” and they all cost four hundred million dollars and require a viewing order chart, and meanwhile CBS in 1986 just went “sure, put the old lady in the Ferrari” and moved on with their day. So obviously we had to watch the whole thing. The Setup, For The Uninitiated Thomas Magnum and his friends TC and Rick all live in Hawaii, and they’re all Vietnam vets.…