I started this episode and I've got to be honest, I ended up switching it off before the end. I've never done this with any Columbo story. Last Salute To The Commodore was so bad that it kept me intrigued to the end in a strange sort of way, and I still think that everybody involved with that episode was taking the **** and were perfectly aware that it was awful. Murder in Malibu was hilariously badly acted and kept me watching, just to see if it could possibly get any worse. But Death Hits The Jackpot - well? It was the most awful ever episode of this great show. It was a good premise to start off with but it all became so horribly drawn out that by half way through I'd forgotten who had been murdered and why and I had no option but to hit the stop button. This caused me immense pain as I love Columbo! Aaaarrrrgghhhh!

Clearly, you've never seen "No Time to Die" haha... I don't have a problem with "Last Salute..." because I feel like they were going the Agatha Christie, whodunit route versus the usual Columbo formula.

As for "Death Hits the Jackpot", I actually think this is one of the better ABC episodes. I mean, Rip Torn? Legend. Getting proof via a monkey's fingerprints? Very creative. People that have seen my posts on this one know the only issue I have is with why Freddie Brower's wife would ever agree to take part in this killing. She knew he hit the jackpot, and they weren't legally divorced, so she had $15M coming her way without committing 1st degree murder.

Death Hits The Jackpot is a great episode in my opinion. However, I think it takes the record for the longest time before Columbo appears. Once the Lieutenant is on the case the episode really picks up, obvious plot holes aside.

The long time it takes for Columbo to appear is a trademark of many 90s shows because it shows how the writers were not capable of coming up with many "little" clues to let Columbo unravel a case slowly that as a consequence we had to get increasingly more and more "backstory" time leading up to a killing where that problem of how does Columbo unravel things is less daunting.

While the payoff clue is better than other 90s Columbo tales the whole community property issue again is a great point, not to mention the fact that if Torn becomes the "winner" then his wife that he's cheating on is going to be entitled to half of it when Torn eventually dumps her. They should have established him as not married (like Jarvis Goodland in "Greenhouse Jungle")

I agree the writers should have have Leon be single. His wife never said anything about the winnings. Now he's got to split his winnings at least three ways, and there was a son too. For being "broke", he sure lived a pretty lavish lifestyle, in a Beverly Hills mansion, driving a Rolls.