Magnum P.I. has had a wild ride over the past year after its spring cancellation on CBS, only to be rescued by NBC in time for Season 5 early in the 2023 TV premiere schedule. The show didn’t go for a big time jump after Season 4 ended in the wake of Magnum (Jay Hernandez) and Higgins (Perdita Weeks) sharing a kiss. In the weeks since, they’ve tried to keep their relationship under wraps, but had some close calls with none other than Kumu (Amy Hill). So, how would Kumu react if she’d caught the good ship Miggy setting sail? The actress shared her thoughts!
Amy Hill previously shared that Kumu can be the “voice of reason” for Magnum and “the boys,” and she certainly noticed in the latest episode that Higgins’ dogs – once more than willing to terrorize Magnum all across Robin Masters’ estate – were mysteriously fine with him. Magnum lied about as well as he did in the premiere when trying to keep Kumu from finding Higgins in his kitchen, and it seemed like she might have been the one to connect the dots first.
When the actress spoke with CinemaBlend about the return of Magnum P.I., she shared her vision of how Kumu would have reacted if she’d caught them in the act early on:
I feel like she would have been like, ‘You know, I’m not sure this is a good idea, personally.’ [laughs] I love them. They’ve had this kind of sexual chemistry, but I also know that Magnum isn’t really a guy that commits and she has had her heart broken several times. Part of me, because I love them both so much, I wouldn’t want them to get hurt. So there’s a part of me as Kumu that would not have been that excited about it. And I still don’t know how much I love the idea, but that’s just Kumu. Because Kumu also is not so sure she believes in love. She’s had her heart broken several times.
Kumu, Rick (Zachary Knighton), and T.C. (Stephen Hill) haven’t witnessed all of the heartfelt moments between Magnum and Higgins over the years, so it tracks that the cultural curator might not be sure that they should do something that could result in both of them being hurt. Plus, Kumu finding out because Magnum was hiding Higgins in his kitchen or because the lads no longer wanted to terrorize him might not have been ideal!
It should be interesting to see how exactly she finds out and reacts under those circumstances. She wasn’t privy to Rick and T.C.’s theory that Magnum was secretly seeing whoever’s necklace they’d found under his bed, so it may come down to them dropping the news about Higgins or Kumu figuring it out. Either way, it’s bound to be a game-changer! When I noted that complications for the group (like the changes that Stephen Hill previewed) were probably inevitable, Amy Hill responded:
It’s gonna be complicated, and I don’t think the other boys or anybody else on the show is that complicated.
Of course, the characters tend to wind up in life-or-death situations on a weekly basis, so there may be larger complications to deal with than Magnum and Higgins going from will-they-won’t-they territory firmly into “they will.” Fortunately, the show got plenty of promotion from its new network ahead of the premiere, with the potential to draw in new viewers on top of the existing fans.
And those fans came to the show’s defense during the time between the CBS cancellation and official news that Magnum and Co. would be coming to NBC! In fact, Amy Hill shared that she feels more connected to fans ever since their campaign to save Magnum P.I., and Stephen Hill reflected on their support during the “darkest hour” after the cancellation.
For now, you can look forward to new episodes of Magnum P.I. on Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on NBC. If you’ve missed any of Season 5 so far or just want to revisit the Ohana’s earliest cases on the network, you can find the newest episodes streaming with a Peacock Premium subscription!