Actor Ed Asner arrives at the Kennedy Center for the...

Actor Ed Asner arrives at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts for the 14th Annual Mark Twain Prize awards ceremony in Washington. (Oct. 23, 2011) Credit: AP

Now, now ... don't get too excited -- it's only a "recurring" role -- but CBS just announced that Ed Asner will join "Hawaii Five-O" in the spring. He will actually reprise the original role he had on the original ""Five-O" a few decades or so ago, which means this is a highly unusual  tie-in with the remake. 

Check out details in the release: 

Asner will reprise his role of August March, a character he played in an episode of the original “Hawaii Five-0” in 1975, called “Wooden Model of a Rat.” In a first for the series, footage from the 1975 episode featuring Asner and his character’s backstory will be used, showing him as an up-and-coming world class smuggler. Now a reformed man after serving 30 years in prison for murder, March lives on O’ahu and is approached by the Five-0 to assist on a smuggling case. “It is thrilling to, for the first time, merge the original ‘Hawaii Five-0’ and our new show by having the classic, versatile and award-winning actor Ed Asner reprise his role of August March, a character Mr. Asner first played 36 years ago. There is no better way to form a bridge between our reboot and the original series,” said Executive Producer Peter Lenkov.

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