There is a hilarious moment in the first few minutes of this week’s episode where Samwise Gamgee has to admit to President Buck Buck Brawwwwwk that CTU lost their lead on the nerve gas, after convincing the president that allowing the terrorists to set off a canister in a shopping mall was the best way to find the rest of the canisters. President Logan then puts Samwise in his place, saying, “No more excuses. You need to take some responsibility.”
Buffybot burst out laughing. “Hello, pot? This is kettle,” she said.
And, of course, she’s right. In the entire time he’s been on the show, Charles Logan has not made one decision on his own. Taking a stand means doing whatever Martha/Novick/Walt/CTU/David Palmer suggests that he do. And now, he’s talking about revealing the path of the Russian president’s motorcade, while the guy is still visiting him after signing a historical treaty, all because he doesn’t have the balls to stand up to the Warlock (good to see Julian Sands working, though it doesn’t look like he’s eating), who is threatening to gas Americans if Chicken Little doesn’t comply. Turns out I gave Goodbye Yellow Brick Tie a fitting nickname after all, huh?
A couple interesting things were set in motion this week. Samwise Gamgee is losing it, sensing betrayal and insubordination under every rock. The intriguing part is that he’s right; Audrey was indeed hiding information from him, as was Buchanan, as is Chloe. Likewise, Logan is losing it as well, completely over his head and torn between two radically different schools of thought: forthright (Marty) and subversive (Novick), the latter of which is far more appealing to his inner weasel.
But that’s not all. Nathanson, the man responsible for arranging the sale of the gas to the Russians, admitted that there is someone else working in the White House that was complicit in the day’s events. This week, they went waaaaaaay out of their way to paint Novick as the mole, but I sincerely doubt that he’s the bad guy. He may not like Logan, but he’s not going to risk having hundreds of thousands of Americans killed just to show his boss how much he doesn’t like him. There are still 16 hours left; it’s too early to guess, though I still hold on to my Wayne Palmer wild card.
The better bit was when the chip that Nathanson gave Jack to track the canisters was formatted with DOD software. That points a bony finger in Audrey’s direction. Or who knows, maybe even her father, former Secretary of Defense James Heller. I find this amusing as well, since Audrey was my dark horse bad guy pick last year. I was wrong then, of course, but how funny would it be if I were right in the end? Yeah, I know. It’s not gonna happen.
Tune in next week, when Samwise Gamgee has to admit that he doesn’t have his CTU key card because he was mugged by his sister’s pimp.
