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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)

August 4, 2026

A pair of extremely short 1980s khaki athletic shorts standing trial in a Hawaiian courtroom made entirely of wicker and hibiscus, the shorts are on the witness stand looking dignified and slightly smug, a very proper British butler in a full three-piece suit is prosecuting them while sweating visibly in the tropical heat, the jury box is filled with twelve identical mustaches, a red Ferrari is parked illegally inside the courtroom with a parking ticket on the windshield that reads “BILL IT TO THE MANSION,” a courtroom banner overhead reads “THE PEOPLE VS. INSEAM,” dramatic sunset light coming through slatted blinds, one Dobermann in the gallery is quietly weeping

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. Magnum is a private investigator (thus the PI, they were not being subtle). TC runs a helicopter tour business. Rick manages a club for rich people. Magnum is perpetually, catastrophically broke and takes absolutely horrific advantage of both of his friends in a way that would end most real friendships within a fiscal quarter.

He also lives on the estate of a wealthy writer friend who — and this is my favorite structural choice in the entire show — we have yet to actually see. The man is a rumor. He’s a landlord made of vibes.

The estate is managed by Higgins, who is the greatest character ever committed to film. I will not be elaborating. Watch it.

Okay, But The Shorts

Right. The shorts.

Magnum spends a meaningful percentage of this show in a pair of shorts that would get him sent home from a modern middle school, and I want to argue that this is not a costume failure but rather the single most efficient piece of character work in the show. You do not need a monologue explaining that this man has no money, no shame, no plan, and no intention of dressing for the job he wants. You just need the shorts. Thirty seconds of Thomas Magnum walking across a lawn tells you everything a modern show would spend a six-episode arc on.

Costume design used to say things. Now everybody’s in a gray henley.

The Part I Didn’t Expect

Here’s what actually got me. On the surface this is a silly little mystery show — Hawaii, boat chases, a mustache, hijinks. Murder She Wrote is cozy. Cozy is the whole point of Murder She Wrote; people die constantly in Cabot Cove and it never once stops being a warm bath.

Magnum is not always that. Magnum gets genuinely hard to watch sometimes.

The show touches on a lot of rough territory, and the part that surprised me most was how directly it deals with PTSD — years before that was something people were talking about in a public, named way. The creators didn’t shy away from the horrors of war. They just put it in there, in the middle of the sunshine and the Ferrari, and let it sit next to the fun.

I don’t think a network would greenlight that balance today. It would get focus-grouped into either a Serious Prestige Drama About Trauma or a completely weightless procedural. The idea that it could be both, in the same forty-four minutes, seems to have been lost.

And Then, Sometimes, It’s Just Nonsense

Lest I oversell this as some kind of somber meditation: there is an episode about a gang of adolescent girls who are also art thieves.

So, you know. They aren’t serious all the time.

The other thing I love is that everyone in Magnum’s life picks on him constantly. Relentlessly. Higgins in particular treats him with a contempt so refined it’s basically a love language. It is genuinely good to watch a protagonist get absolutely no respect from anyone he knows.

The Verdict

It’s not quite at Murder She Wrote levels for me — Jessica Fletcher remains undefeated, she’s a serial killer and I’ll die on that hill another day — but it’s a very good addition to the watch list if you need something completely removed from the world as it currently exists. Hawaii. Hijinks. A helicopter. A butler who hates you. A man who has never once picked up a check.

Stay hydrated, respect a good pair of shorts, and be nicer to Higgins than Magnum is.