Category: 24 (Page 21 of 25)

They never stick the landing.

Oh, sure, they come up with some great last minute hook to lure you in to next season – killing Teri Bauer, poisoning David Palmer, faking Jack’s death – but the events leading up to that moment leave little to the imagination. Of course Jack’s going to stop the virus from spreading (though chopping off Chase’s arm was pretty cool). Of course CTU is going to stop the missile headed for L.A. And, this year, of course Jack is going to find a way to bug President I.M. Weasel and get that confession.

And yet, while it was imperative that Logan be taken down, I can’t help but think that they ignored nearly every other detail in the last two hours in the process. How did no one else from Logan’s security detail find Old Yeller and the First Lady of Crazy? Were we really supposed to believe Robocop wouldn’t have been able to tell that the pistol Jack gave him was empty? Heck, they taught us that in “In the Line of Fire” 13 years ago. Lastly, can you really break someone’s neck with your calves? Holy Xenia Onatopp.

The best line in the show came from a guest star who damn well better be a regular next year, Chloe’s ex-husband Morris. Chloe taps him to do some hi-tech gadgetry for Jack, and Chloe, in her typical personality disorder-driven style, says, “Can you do this without talking?” “I could do that, but it would be a terrible waste of my charm,” he counters. Oh, man, are they going to be fun to watch next year.

And speaking of next year: I am dying to know how the Chinese were able to abduct Jack right out from under the noses of government forces and have him on a Chinese tanker, seemingly miles offshore, in a matter of 10 minutes. Unless they moved like Hammy the squirrel at the end of “Over the Hedge,” that’s just not physically possible. Also, will the Overseers be returning? If not, they were an incredible waste of time. But most importantly, we never found out who it was that leaked Jack’s status and fingered the people responsible for it. Who knows, maybe that was the Overseers’ work, and maybe they were the ones that tipped off the Chinese on Bauer’s whereabouts. They damn well better be, since they dangled that ‘who sold us out’ subplot in front of us for half the day, and then swept it under the rug when it was no longer necessary. But I still want to know the answer to the question, dammit! (Take a drink)

I’d still like to see one of these seasons end with the bad guy winning. Maybe Logan has Big Dick Heller implicated for everything while Martha suffers an “accident” on her way to the funny farm. That would be a lot more interesting than an angry Russian President, discarded, followed by an angry English spy, discarded, then the former President’s brother, discarded. Worst of all was Kim Bauer, needlessly brought in, and just as quickly, discarded. I’m sure it’s incredibly difficult to graph these story lines out, and for the most part, they do an incredible job. But they have to start spending more time on resolving these temporary plot threads, rather than leaving them dangling like that. One of these days, the whole thing will just fall apart.

I’m sure I am forgetting something else. But after watching this and the series finale of “Alias” back to back, I’m all spyed out. Plus, I’ll have my hands full tonight trying to keep Buffybot from drowning those kittens during the “American Idol” finale. See you in January.

(“24” drink gamers out there, salut!)

Does anyone else feel like the entire show just became…something else entirely? The recording, that Goddamn recording that held the entire plot hostage for about a month and a half, is indeed fried, just like they suggested at the end of last week. All that time spent obtaining the precious recording, all of the people killed in the process, only to lose it within a matter of minutes after obtaining it. Fuckers.

And that’s not the only thing that’s changed. The Warlock commandeers a nuclear sub using what we are to assume is their last canister of nerve gas. Whoa, where did that come from? That canister wiped out the entire sub in what seemed like 15 seconds, and while I’m sure that the gas only needed 20 more seconds than that to make them all stop twitching, the scene still felt a bit rushed. And I don’t know about the rest of you, but those guys were awfully cavalier walking through a sub filled with deadly nerve gas in face masks. Are you sure those things are completely airtight? Wouldn’t your hair create some hole for the gas to seep in and wipe you out? Any military personnel out there who would like to correct me on this one? And never mind the safety-of-the-masks angle: wouldn’t the place stink with all of those crew members dying…and subsequently soiling themselves? Come on, you were all thinking it.

But here’s the part that’s really bugging me: Jack is letting Robocop lead him around by his nose. First Jack has to agree to help Robocop disappear, since Robocop knows that he’s toast the second he’s out in the open. (That was a nice touch though, when Robocop said, “Just give me your word, Jack. That’s all I need.”) Then Robocop (wisely) refuses the wire when going to contact an associate of the Warlock, again showing that Robocop is outmaneuvering Jack at every step. But perhaps the most frustrating stunt was when Jack overhears Robocop selling CTU out (who are outside the mole’s apartment and ready to strike) and orders an attack…and Robocop tells him afterwards that he was in the process of getting the mole to move all of his sensitive files out in the open so Chloe could download them. But darn it, Jack, you ruined everything! Therefore, Chloe has even less time to find the nuclear sub, now that she has to decrypt everything!

Okay, let’s get real here. I can understand Robocop keeping his cards close to the vest – after all, he would love nothing more than to screw Jack any which way but loose at this point – but in any other situation, Jack would have prepped his subject on what the shot was. “How are you going to get him to open up his network?” That’s all he has to say for Jack to know not to go in guns a-blazin’ the second he hears Robocop betraying his trust (which resulted in Curtis getting a nice scar on his right arm). But no, Jack doesn’t ask, Robocop doesn’t tell, and all hell breaks loose. Heaven help us if our real life CTU/HTU is that poorly trained.

Which brings us to a beaten but not yet rabid Old Yeller, who disses President I.M. Weasel in the greatest way imaginable when he calls him “Charles” after I.M. Weasel tries to buy Old Yeller’s silence, like he did with the First Lady of Crazy. Little does Weasel Boy know later that Crazy Lady saved Old Yeller’s life by intercepting the exchange from Old Yeller’s holding pen to the trunk of the car that was going to drive him to the Shotgun in the Sky (though I’m not exactly sure how she happened to be there, other than incredible convenience). Yeller tells Martha to have Mike Novick meet him where he lay, and that, for whatever reason, sets off my spider sense in a big, big way. Maybe that request gets relayed through untrustworthy channels, maybe Martha gets whacked before she can relay the message. Or maybe the message goes through as intended, and Mike shows up to pop Old Yeller himself. The bottom line is I don’t like seeing Old Yeller prostate like that. It screams “dead dog” to me.

So we have two hours left in this whole thing. Who haven’t we heard from in a while?

– Principal Wood (Wayne Palmer)
– Leland Palmer
– Big Dick Heller

VP Leland Palmer looks like he’s been taken out of the loop, which is pretty ridiculous, given the circumstances – hello, hijacked nuclear sub – and they made a reference to Big Dick Heller recovering from his plunge into the Pacific. That’s why I can’t help but think that Principal Wood is not finished here. After all, his brother was killed less than 24 hours ago. Okay, maybe I just don’t want to give up my early dark horse baddie yet. But you don’t take him out of action like that, not the “Here, I’ll get you past this checkpoint, now run!” way. Hell, for all we know, he’s running the Overseers. Go ahead, you can laugh all you want (“I’ve got my philosophyyyyyyyyyy”), but that would be a pretty sweet ending. And I’m sure they can find a way to justify it. Lord knows, whatever cards they’re holding better be better than the pair of fours they just played with this whole digital recording nonsense. After a great setup, they’ve been rolling snake eyes the last few weeks. You owe us, guys. Justify my love.

For all the times the producers of “24” like to twist and turn the story into making villains out of the unlikeliest of people, sometimes a weasel is just a weasel. And I’m not talking about President I.M. Weasel, but Miles, Karen Hayes’ ever-faithful lapdog. He rolled on Hayes the second he knew the score, and if the scenes of next week’s episode are any indication, the recording, the one that should have been played over the phone to CTU, recorded and uploaded to Limewire, Kazaa, anywhere else (hence this week’s episode title), is about to get zapped by the “patriotic” Miles. Of course, you know that Jack has a backup plan. We just don’t know what it is yet.

The funniest thing I learned in the last week is that apparently a “24” drinking game has sprung up, where viewers drink every time Jack says, “Damn it.” Even funnier, Kiefer Sutherland knows about the game, and sometimes will string together three “damn its” in a row. You’ve been warned, “24” alkies.

Dr. Romano isn’t messing around, is he? When Jack snuck through the perimeter after having the pilot/FOR (Friend of Robocop) land the plane on a highway, Romano made it clear that Logan had failed him, and Logan knew what to do next, and Logan pulls out a GUN. Maybe I’m just being vain (and I am), but I think I’d choose the cyanide capsule. Still, what organization has the power to persuade the President of the United States to commit suicide? Anyone…? Bueller…?

Did anything else really happen this week? They landed the plane, Karen filled in Miles on the lowdown, Miles betrayed Karen…oh, right, the Warlock thing. They kept the Warlock at CTU until he came to, and then they basically let him go. I mean, this guy is a big time Russian terrorist, and they don’t even give him a police escort. They just throw him in the back of an ambulance. Gawd, why didn’t they just give him a gun while they were at it?

So yeah, the recording and the Warlock, those are pretty big flaws. They have three hours left to resolve them in a reasonable manner. On the bright side, we learned that Old Yeller will be back next week. Hopefully he gets to bite at least one bad guy before the day’s over.