FAQ Bauer (aka Thread Rules) 1) What can be discussed in plain text, unboxed?
A: Any events in episodes, once aired on the east coast – as well as any speculation based on these already-aired events.
2) What should I confine to spoiler boxes?
A: Any discussion of upcoming shows that contains information from sources outside the aired material, or any speculation based on such things. This includes the “Next week on 24” previews, which some people choose not to watch.
3) What will Morris O’Brien’s fate be today?
A: With any luck, Chloe will just taser him, then dump him into the Potomac…
Previously on 24…
People continually fail to learn not to be within a 1-mile radius of Jack’s current location, as they usually end up dead. Latest evidence? Senator Mayer. I guess Jack doesn’t have to go in for his congressional hearing tomorrow morning now, does he?
Agent Rowrrr helps Jack get info while she cleans out her desk. They discover the identity of the real Hospital Ceiling Assassin, but of course they choose not to let anybody know.
Jack ambushes the assassin with the old “I Bulldozing Your Shack” trick. Kick-ass fight ensues. Jack finishes him off with the Screwdriver-Of-Death Maneuver.
Meanwhile, the First Daughter is being snotty. News at 11:00.
Had a feeling Olivia would turn out to be the leak after all – especially when Ethan was making that last apology to her for assuming that she was. The First Snot gets snottier.
So Commander Tripp runs off, and Tony Almeida gets captured instead. Jack should have shot the next guy with his silenced-gun – the one who went to check on the first guy. Pick them off one by one for the first few rounds…
At the end, it looked like Jack was taking aim at the rope attaching the chopper to the cargo. If the bio-weapon leaked during the initial fracas, imagine what falling to the ground from mid-air would do to it…!
Okay, I was wrong, I admit it, the First Hottie turned out to be the First Bitch.
For a minute when the gunfight started, I was thinking it might be a good idea to shoot the guy running the crane. But because of the later results, that probably would have been a bad idea. Drop container from 50 ft up, see what happens to bio containers.
I still don’t buy the “We can’t call the FBI, the won’t believe us.” How about, “Hey, you want to arrest me, come to the shipping container facility at XXX. Come prepared. I expect a small army of mercenaries trying to pick up a bioweapon. Hey, don’t believe me, fine, but show up and we’ll see who’s laughing.”
At least Special Agent Moss stopped being an idiot long enough to read the evidence that someone else was involved.
I think they did try calling from the office in the shipyard, but the phone lines had already been cut at that point. And cell service was magically jammed.
I keep expecting Tony to double cross Jack. There’s got to be more to his role than the voice of reason evil whispering in Jack’s ear.
I’m still waiting for the reveal that Agent Moss is one of the bad guys. It wouldn’t make any sense, but in the 24 Universe, it seems inevitable.
As far as the overall plot goes, let’s see if I have this right. The evil corporation with the private army wants to prove that only they can prevent forest fires, so they stage manage a couple of terrorist attacks on US soil, including an attack on the White House. Once they set off the bioweapon, this will conclusively prove that the conventional anti-terrorist forces aren’t up to the job, leading to large lucrative contracts for them. OK, it’s evil and cynical, but at least it’s a plan. However once Jack has discovered their identity (and it wasn’t particularly hard now, was it?), doesn’t this plan pretty much fall apart? It’s kind of hard to be hiring out your private army when the US government is hunting you down like rabid dogs for initiating a bioweapons attack on US citizens. So what’s the point? Isn’t it time for some hard core bargaining? Like, “You let us quietly slip out of the country and we’ll show you where the canisters are?”
I don’t think so. This season has been completely devoid of any surprises, especially when it comes to people’s true identities and/or allegiances. The writers tried half-heartedly to make us think that Chloe-lite was the traitor, but it was obvious that it was snarky guy from the beginning. They seemed to be trying about an eighth-heartedly to make us think the chief of staff was a bad guy, but it seemed clear that he wasn’t. As soon as the first daughter denied being the leak, it was obvious that she was. And Moss has been so clearly not in on the conspiracy from the beginning that I’d bet the writers never even thought of that possibility. Oh, and starting out making Tony look bad, while it was clear it would be revealed that he was under cover.
For me, this has been the most excruciatingly boring season of 24 yet. Up through last season, even with all the outrageous unbelievabilities, the show still had a healthy dose of edge-of-your-seat suspense. They’d shown in past seasons that they could kill off major characters, and set off nuclear bombs on US soil, so the safety net that’s usually present in all other shows made the suspense in 24 all the more intense.
But this season, it’s either action in small doses of fits and starts, or the watching paint dry excitement of the white house intrigue.
Take last night. Ok, the fire fight at the docks was cool, but had no suspense; we pretty much knew that Jack would get the truck. Ok, now Jack has the truck, we’re in for some good chase scenes, semi vs. SUVs! Nope, before it can even start, Jack pulls over and the bad guys helicopter away the bio-weapon. Yawn. And even in 24, they’re not going to kill Jack, so no real suspense about his exposure.
And then back to the white house. They could have drawn out the is-the-first-daughter-the-leak story, they could have at least tried to make us think that maybe it was someone else. But no, we get that handed to us on a platter right away. Snore.
I was wondering if it maybe turns out that the scary bio-weapon is actually a placebo of sugar-gas or something, and that this whole situation was a ploy to get the feds to attack [del]Blackwater[/del] Starkwood and look like incompetent fools. It’s suitably nonsensical, but it doesn’t explain why the terrorist dudes were wearing gas masks when they reacquired the shipment from Bauer. Unless that was part of their cover.