06.23 | Episode seventeen, 12AM - 1AM
Huh. Is Jack Bauer thick, or what? He must be - surely even Kate Warner can work out that the country's going to war without Jack having to explain it to her? And if Jack's so thick, how did he get to be so effortlessly cool?
President Palmer disembarks from Air Force One, which means we get to see the Division offices. It's a great set, all gun-metal grey and widescreen plasma TVs. Essentially, it's the CTU corridor, painted different. He chats to the Chiefs of Staff, tries to avert a war, yada yada yada. He probably does this kind of thing every day.
But, hey, the exciting sub plot of the liquor store hold-up came to and end way too soon! I was really loving the whole Kim standing around looking scared whilst dull stereotype (and worst character on '24' ever) picks up phones, points guns around and shouts at people about his terrible wife. The only way that'd turn out to be of any point to the plot whatsoever is if it turns out that this Garcia chap is Palmer's Vice President, or something.
Which he ain't, because Jim fucking Robinson from 'Neighbours' is. I mean, huh?
Jack is so thick during this hour that he manages to get himself followed to some secret rendezvous point. That's hardly the way to go if you want to find the only man capable of stopping the war. Still, he was lucky - it was only this weak-assed Yusef Auda bloke. Yusef seemed at first to be the only baddie so suspicious that he must be a goodie, and now he's the only goodie so keen and alert that he must be a baddie. So which is it?
And if the security guy locked down the CTU parking lot after Jack escaped with Kate, how did Yusef manage to drive after them? Surely he would have been stopped from leaving the building?
Tony Almeida gets Carrie to do some of the worst computer hacking since Trinity blew up a power plant in 'The Matrix Reloaded' using a DOS screen. Looks like this special 'CTU-OS' has a built-in sneeky snooper's monitoring routine. I think you activate it by pressing shift-escape, or something.
The best bits of this week's show come at the end. Jack seemingly is selling out Kate Warner, by bundling her into the boot of a car so she can go catch a plane with an evil killer. If you're clever, you might have noticed the simultanous juxtaposition with Mike Novick and Lynne Kresge preparing to sell out the President. Shocking stuff, eh? And then came the unexpected 'oh no, we're under attack' sniper fire - which is a trick that the writers haven't used in, ooh, an episode and a half.
All in all, a good hour that takes us back to the '24' of the first season - dark, lots of shooting and agents double crossing themselves every which way. None of this weddings, presidential retreats or nuclear bombs nonsense. Strange that this change in tempo coincides with the start of a new day, coming as it does with the '12AM - 1AM' episode.
