“Hawaii Five-O” fans have celebrated a happy week. There was confirmed news from CBS that Season 9 was solid for the police drama. Many viewers are still smiling from the recent episodes, one of which put leading man, Alex O'Loughlin, in the role of director. Then there was last week's outing, which brought McGarrett and Catherine Rollins together again, able to settle the past in peace.

Even with the welcome news, “Hawaii Five-O” has been filled with high emotion and high crimes all through Season 8, and this week's April 20 21st episode, “Ahuwale ka nane huna (The Answer to the Riddle Is Seen),” offers a little comic relief and some eye candy for viewers charmed by Chris Vance as Harry Langford.

The old friend, Langford, welcomes Danny (Scott Caan) and Steve to the King Suite of his resort hotel, where he is keeping watch over Lady Sophie (Alana Boden) a royal princess who is a little further down the line of succession, but still royal. After introducing his mates to all the family, Langford takes them along for what should be a lark of an assignment, keeping an eye on Sophie for a day out, until she has a mind to make an escape.

Meanwhile, the newest recruits to “Hawaii Five-O” have a real case to crack on their own, and it starts 25 years ago. An old Betamax tape is forwarded for investigation, and Junior (Beulah Koale) and Tani (Meaghan Rath) become enthralled with a murderer who has his gruesome history recorded for posterity.

Starving and seeing the unthinkable

After not hearing the Steve and Danny banter for a few weeks, it was welcome music to the ears to have the partners arguing over animal crackers while their charge was trying on endless wardrobe additions. In a switch, it was Steve who had the most complaints about not having a full stomach, and who was jealous of Danny eating Charlie's snack.

Just when Harry and company are about to have the afternoon free, Harry discovers that Lady Sophie is gone from the dressing area. So much for cold beer and pizza.

After trading some banter of their own over streaming video from the bathroom, it doesn't take long for Tani and Junior to know that they're watching a murder, not just sexual interplay.

Dealing with very old evidence and suspects is daunting, but Lou Grover (Chi McBride) pushes the newbies to do a “deep dive” and start with tracing to the hotel room, which happens to be 13. The number 13 is generally absent from all hospitality locations today, but Junior and Tani track down the place where they used to be. Captain Grover directs them to go up to the ceiling area, and it's obvious that the person looking down from a decoy vent basically made himself very much at home in the darkness.

Oh, where can she be?

Lady Sophie loved Danny's fashion savvy, but that didn't stop her from giving her watchers the slip. She arranged a pickup from a handsome boy (Adam Scott Miller) on a dating app and was whisked away to a beach party, where she behaved like a pro-Hawaiian socialite.

Sophie didn't stay with the boy who brought her, and her bad manners get her in deep with consorts who want to “sell her to the highest bidder.” She is ordered onto a boat for safekeeping, no longer such a contented escapee

Danny is skilled in putting social media to use to get to Sophie's location, but it takes the swashbuckling of Harry and Steve to swim out to the boat and take care of business. The dialogue has the feel of Daniel Craig's lines in his James Bond movies, with bodies being tossed here and there in the fray, but the scenes are fluffy enjoyment. When Lady Sophie is safely returned, Danny's wry Jersey detective skills sense something deeper in Harry's face.

Tani discovers that the murdered girl is Lara Levy, young, unmarried and alone.

At the time of her death, no one “cared enough about her,” as Tani relates, to even try to find her killer. Lou and Tani have an emotional talk, and Lou tells her that sometimes justice for the victim has to be enough. Tani knows that she could be a victim like this and takes the mission of seeking justice for the victim even more to heart.

When it comes to light through evidence that a man named Arthur Dubbins is the videographer from up above, the case is still far from solved, since he has suffered a stroke, and remains on a ventilator in the hospital. His wife (Mariko Van Kampen) is brought in for questioning, and she is also promised protection for her cooperation. Her husband had beaten and threatened her for years if she divulged any hint of his dark habits, and she was living in fear even as he was lying in a hospital bed.

The tapes don’t lie. A lapel pin reveals a pilot, Paul, as the killer. She takes “Hawaii Five-O” to a closet, which holds hundreds of other Betamax tapes, leading Duke (Dennis Chun) and his officers to buried bodies.

There is another of those famous “Hawaii Five-O” slow-motion scenes near the close of the episode, depicting the arrest of the killer. As Steve McGarrett found out for himself in Episode 19, justice delayed can still feel satisfying.

Danny offers another observation to Harry after the safe homecoming of Lady Sophie, noting that the grimace on Harry's face when he saw the daughter in the arms of Lord Mortimer could only be that of a father. Harry admits to an affair while Lady Helen, Sophie's mother, was separated from her husband, which indeed conceived a daughter. The MI6 agent has to be satisfied with keeping his child safe from afar and when called upon. Steve suggests that Sophie has a right to the truth. “If she ever asks, I won’t lie,” Langford replies.
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