Villainess Review: Brooke Mason (Magnum P.I.)

After four seasons, CBS suddenly axed the Magnum P.I. reboot, and I was livid! I loved that show; it was originally part of my Monday nights until the show was moved to Fridays, where it aired in-between the MacGyver reboot and Blue Bloods. The series stars Jay Hernandez as Thomas Magnum; filling the shoes (and the Detroit Tigers cap) of Tom Selleck--who currently stars on Blue Bloods. Perdita Weeks portrays Juliett Higgins, who ended the fourth season revealing her romantic feelings for Magnum, hence was I was upset at the cancellation. Zachary Knighton and Stephen Hill portrays Magnum's co-horts, Orville "Rick" Wright and Theodore "T.C." Calvin, respectively, and Tim Kang portrays detective Gordon Katsumoto.

So again, CBS (the network that aired the original for eight seasons) axed the reboot, but NBC revived it, and that news was music to my ears. Even better, it's a two-season pickup, and Season Five began on February 19, 2023. This show had some amazing villainesses, some of whom I've written about here, but in honor of the show's return, this story centers on one of the reboot's earliest female baddies, who appeared in the episode, "Sudden Death."

The central character in the episode was Hani Iona, whose young son, Makoa, was part of a little league football team coached by T.C. and Magnum. Hani ends up arrested in the episode, with Makoa informing the duo of the occurrence before the pair went to Katsumoto, who revealed that Hani was charged with murder. The victim is Dr. Ellis Mason, who Hani had a connection to, though it was revealed that Ellis was selling PEDs, and that led to a belief that Hani was not only buying them, he was administering them to Makoa.

The investigation revealed another customer, Wade Steuben, who is shown to be quite the hothead (it may not be only the juice causing this). Magnum briefly encounters Ellis' widow, Brooke Mason, as well as her mother, who were both mourning the loss and were hopeful that Ellis' killer would be found. Also, Magnun and T.C. were at huge odds regarding Hani, who was caught disposing of the gun. The former was becoming convinced of Hani's guilt, until he was informed that scratches on Ellis' body, as well as the culprit's lack of height, unveiled that a woman had to have been Ellis' killer. It was already discovered that Ellis had an associate, Daisy Chase, who was also believed to be Ellis' mistress. However, after saving Daisy from an enraged Wade, Magnum informed Daisy about his investigation, with Daisy revealing that he was Ellis' partner in his business. She stated that Ellis' motivation for his side business was to keep Brooke living in a lifestyle that she was accustomed to, as Brooke came from money,

As for the "affair" assumptions, Daisy denied them, and stated that she couldn't figure out why everyone thought that she and Ellis were together. That statement activated the light bulb in Magnum's head, and afterwards, Magnum contacted Brooke Mason regarding stunning information about Ellis, and asked her to hop a plane to Oahu. The true plan, was to search Brooke's house, with Magnum obtaining her laundry and asking Katsumoto to run it for GSR (gun shot residue). In addition, there were inconsistencies in Brooke's story, the main one being her claim that her earlier flight to Oahu was after being notified of her husband's death. In actuality, Brooke was at the island two hours before Ellis was killed.

As Brooke was interrogated, Magnum knew that just getting the evidence of GSR wouldn't be enough. He needed a confession. After sending T.C. to talk to Katsumoto, Magnum entered and got to work on Brooke. As revealed during the scene, Brooke firmly believed that Ellis was cheating on her, and on that day in question, Brooke angrily confronted Ellis, causing the scratches before taking the gun and shooting her husband to death. Magnum informed Brooke about her husband's partnership with Daisy in their side business, which was done to keep her in luxury, and just as Katsumoto returned to the interrogation room, Brooke broke down and made her confession, claiming that all she wanted to do was talk to Ellis and that she didn't mean to kill him. Luckily, Katsumoto heard it all in time, and Brooke was arrested, resulting in Hani being completely exonerated.

"Sudden Death," was the fifth episode of Magnum P.I.'s first season, and aired on CBS on October 22, 2018. Elisabeth Röhm, best known to Law & Order fans as Serena Southerlyn, appeared as the episode's main villainess, Brooke Mason. Though Brooke isn't the first villainess to appear on the reboot, she is the first murderess of the series, and she was quite an amazing one. When we first see Brooke in that brief introduction, we see her mourning her husband; now, usually in the case of murderous wives, the mourning is staged and feigned, but when it came to Brooke, it actually wasn't. Even so, Brooke was quite scorned when she assumed that Ellis was cheating on her, and that scorn and the misconception led her to kill her husband in an absolute crime of passion. In addition, Brooke was cold-blooded enough to attempt to cover up her role and allow an innocent man to be accused of the crime, though her interrogation with Magnum saw Brooke unleash a lot of emotion during her confession.

You know, it now surprises me that Brooke wasn't one of those evil wives who forced her husband to skirt the law to keep her in her lifestyle. Brooke truly had no clue about what Ellis was doing--not a single clue. The only things that Brooke was evil enough to commit were murder and covering up her role, and regarding Röhm, she acted out her previous brief scenes very well, but the interrogation was her best work, as we see her act out Brooke's emotion in such a stellar fashion.

Elisabeth Röhm has done a lot in her amazing career, which includes a number of Lifetime films. She has also played her share of villainesses, but her most notable one is an interesting one. Röhm recurred on Hawaii Five-0 as Dr. Madison Gray, a psychiatrist who is also a serial killer, and the interesting thing (other than that deliciously evil role): both reboots are actually connected. This means that Röhm appeared in two shows from the shared universe, and played different characters--villainesses in each case.

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Check out Brooke Mason's profile on Villainous Beauties Wiki!