Rescue HI-Surf Season 1 Episode 2 Review: Mauka to Makai

Critic’s Rating: 4.2 / 5.0

4.2

Power struggles. Grief. Intense rescues. Old feelings. Kainalu making a mistake.

If this is what Rescue HI-Surf has to offer every week, I will be seated.

As part of the two-night premiere, this second hour flows nicely from the first, continuing to introduce the characters and their dynamics and setting up many future storylines as the series finds its footing.

Spotlighting the rescues may seem like a given for an action drama about lifeguarding, but a show like this could have easily leaned more toward drama and less toward action. That’s not the case thus far.

Focusing this hour mainly on rescuing a young girl stranded at sea after a hike gone wrong was an excellent showcase for the action and character dynamics, especially between Sonny and Em and Em and Will.

We still need to learn about these characters, and they’ve chosen to slowly reveal their backstories rather than dumping all the exposition on us right away.

Sonny is a well-respected man, both as a person and captain. The fact that he’s just known as Uncle Sonny tells me so.

But Zion’s death has rattled him to the core. But it’s not clear whether he’s always flown by the seat of his pants and done whatever or if his nephew’s death is pushing him to a place where he’s willing to do whatever it takes to make sure people are saved and he’s putting his people in a position to save them.

There’s this fascinating power struggle emerging between Sonny and Em, and it’s only a matter of time before things boil over.

In the case of the missing teenager, Sonny defied protocol, but it’s hard to find fault in his decision-making when it was ultimately the correct call.

They would have been behind the eight ball if they’d waited around for fire and rescue.

But from Em’s perspective, she’s already named on a lawsuit for a situation for which she was not at fault, and now she’s being put in yet another situation that could reflect poorly upon her.

I’d be frustrated, too!

I can only imagine what she had to do to ascend to her position as a lieutenant in a male-dominated field. She doesn’t have the same luxuries as the men regarding what she can and can’t get away with.

In working through Em’s worries, there was a lovely scene between her and Will, which was the first time I looked at them and thought I could see them as ex-lovers.

It’s not that there’s no chemistry, but the vibe between them and Laka gives siblings more than anything illicit.

But there’s a past there, and again, the series chooses to dole out little pockets of information, so we don’t know where things went wrong with them or what sacrifices had to be made.

I wonder if they simply weren’t going to be able to work together and be in a relationship. Or if it’s something more complex than that.

Once the team got out into the open sea, they had zero luck, and the scenes of them out on the jet skis with nothing but the ocean in front of them didn’t make the rescue look promising. But considering this is only episode two, it should be expected that they’d find a way to make an impossible rescue possible.

Em’s decision to wade out in the water with only a rescue tube and her radio felt like the worst idea in the world, and her skirting orders felt like it was as much about saving Amber as it was about showing Sonny that she, too, could break the rules when it suited her.

The way this could have gone so wrong and almost did should be studied. Not only did Em lose her radio, but she’s lucky she somehow managed to find Amber and keep them conscious and afloat until Laka happened to spot them through his binoculars.

This rescue was truly a mess from beginning to end, but in these early hours, Rescue HI-Surf shows the complexities of lifeguarding and that they don’t always get it right.

They may cover the most dangerous waters in the world, but they’re also human. And the series is making a point to drive that point home.

Case in point: Kainalu.

I want to think we’re misunderstanding Kainalu. Maybe he’s just a sheltered young man who grew up being handed things because of his father, and he doesn’t know better than that, but he’s not content as an adult to continue his life in that kind of ignorance.

Has he shown anything that would make me think that’s true? Absolutely not, but he still has time to get there!

If we’re comparing early season 1 ships and, why not? Then I’m way more invested in whatever rivalry/flirtation has begun between Hina and Kainalu than whatever Em and Will have going on.

Hina has every right to be frustrated with Kainalu, and he’s done nothing to endear him to her yet. His apology may not have been forced out of his mouth, but it was overdue, and it felt like he just thought he was supposed to say it.

Maybe I’m being too hard on him because I want to like him, but he makes it so hard when he’s such a basic lifeguard.

As if screwing up the location and triggering a lawsuit wasn’t enough, he spent this hour complaining about children and then forgetting a basic necessity when rescuing someone.

And don’t even get me started on him trying to shoo off a considered citizen who happened to be a doctor. What would have happened to that surfer if Hina hadn’t been with him?

Hina is clearly a capable and compassionate lifeguard. That’s not to say Kainalu is not, but we have yet to see what he enjoys about lifeguarding.

He’s defying what his father wanted for him, but for what? The glory of racing out into the ocean and being praised for saving the day? Or is he truly in it to help people?

We learn a bit more about Hina’s life here, and it’s obvious she’s led a life that couldn’t be further from Kainalu’s. She’s not looking for pity but just telling it like it is. Again, she’s compassionate and empathetic, and when she gets her time to shine, I know she will have an incredible story worth telling.

Having things wrap up with the team being interviewed and recognized for their heroics helped ground Sonny in a way.

He made the save. He ensured two parents didn’t sleep that night without their child safely in bed.

We may not know much about Ohsha, but she’s surely in pain following Zion’s death. But it doesn’t seem like she and her father are discussing it. There’s a divide there, and there’s just so much else we don’t know about their relationship and their family dynamics as a whole.

Again, they’ve decided to roll out information about these characters slowly, and it has piqued my interest. Still, I worry that people will become frustrated and lose interest if you drag certain things on for too long.

This is especially true when viewers feel as if they have to piece together their own backstories to make sense of what they’re watching.

We’re not there yet, and we hopefully never will be, but let’s start filling in some of these gaps! I already like these characters, and I want more!

Extra Rescue Notes

• So, are we ever going to meet the elusive Julia? She gets named dropped in the past two episodes, and yet we can’t get her to stop by the headquarters to shoot daggers at Em?

• As Laka’s number one fan, I did not get enough Laka this hour.

• I screamed with delight when Sonny called to get information about grief counseling, but I understand why he’s not quite ready to make the leap. He will get there, but I sincerely hope things don’t worsen for him.

So, how are you guys feeling about the start of this season?

What characters have you most intrigued?

What are you looking to see next?

Drop all your thoughts in the comment section below!

You can watch Rescue HI-Surf on FOX on Mondays at 9/8c.