News > TW RECAP: Twenty-Four, 4-23-07
April 24, 2007
SUMMARY
The show opens as Doyle commandeers a vehicle from an unlucky motorist and informs CTU that Jack Has Gone Rogue, as he is wont to do. Bill then randomly and stupidly reinstates Chloe so she can help the search for Jack, even though her undying allegiance to his cause was the reason Buchanan made her step down in the first place. Great logic, Bill.
Jack removes the tracker from the component chip, and the confusion arising from this gives Chloe and Morris some time to bitch at each other. Milo and Chloe then have one of the most useless dialogue exchanges in the entire season, where Milo restates pretty much everything Buchanan said two minutes ago.
Back at the White House, VP Daniels talks to Lenox in private, in an effort to get him to give up the blackmail tape. Lennox tells Daniels that, despite the fact that he hates how Daniels came to the presidency, he supports him and promises not to use the blackmail evidence against him (thus making it, uh, not blackmail evidence).
Jack calls Chang and insists on determining the exchange spot because he knows CTU will likely be able to watch any location Chang chooses. Chang reluctantly agrees.
At the White House, Daniels and his Blonde Secretary Lackey have really, really, really awkward sexual conversation. They actually kiss, too, which turns out to be way more horrifying than any Jack Bauer torture scene. "I would like you to spend what's left of the night," he whispers. BSL leaves, ostensibly to go home for a change of clothes.
Doyle arrives at the spot where Jack destroyed the tracker and determines that (A) Jack is using the phone of a dead terrorist and (B) he's probably traveling down the 305.
Chloe and Morris bitch at each other, again. Milo interrupts, and the two-way bitchfest turns into a bitch-a-trois. Chloe then crosses the line and blames Morris for arming a nuke for the terrorists, at which point Morris runs off with his British tail betwixt his legs.
At the White House, a dude named Peter Hawk from the DoJ visits Karen Hayes. He says that he has interrogated one of the lackeys who attempted to kill Wayne Palmer, and says that the lackey has uncovered evidence that Bill Buchanan intentionally let Fayed free earlier in the year, and that Karen Hayes intentionally covered it up. Karen admits the individual facts are true -- Fayed was arrested in a terrorist sweep years ago, but was released on a lack of evidence. The entire situation was never "buried." Peter warns Karen that either she or Buchanan will nonetheless have to take the fall for the terrorist attack.
Jack shows up at the rendezvous spot, an abandoned motel.
Karen meets with Lennox and describes the situation. Lennox tells her to cowboy up and let Buchanan take the fall.
Jack hides a few pounds of C4 behind a wooden panel and calls Buchanan's answering machine. he tells him the circumstances under which the C4 will incinerate both him and the chip. Before hanging up, he asks Bill to take care of Audrey.
Morris goes to Buchanan and requests a transfer to get away from Chloe, which Buchanan agrees to. After Morris leaves, Hayes calls Buchanan and tells him of the situation. She sadly informs him that in order to protect the White House, she has to distance herself from Bill by firing him. Bill isn't really happy to hear it, and he hangs up on her.
Meanwhile, Doyle closes in on the rendezvous location -- Jack evidently parked his car like an idiot, and Doyle notices it from the road.
Buchanan takes Nadia aside and tells her that he is stepping down as acting director of CTU, thus putting her in charge. When Nadia asks for an explanation, he sadly replies, "It's just politics." Buchanan is escorted out, Nadia informs the CTU team of the change in leadership, and the audience realizes that Nadia looks really hot when she's sad.
Doyle hides near the hotel where Jack is holed up. A limo arrives, and Chang exits it. He enters the hotel and Jack demands to see Audrey. Two Chinese soldiers walk her in, bound and gagged. Jack removes the gag from her mouth, strokes her hair, and apologizes. ten guys line up outside the hotel as Jack tells Audrey to walk out a few hundred feet past the nearby bridge, beyond the range of Chang's snipers. He tells her to go to a nearby gas station, where a cab will be waiting to take her back to CTU. Audrey walks outside and heads toward the bridge.
Doyle asks where the field teams are, and -- surprise -- they're "a few minutes away."
Inside, Jack hands over the circuit board. The moment he does, Doyle begins firing at the sniper who has targeted Audrey. Jack moves his hand to detonate the C4, but he is shot in the chest by one of Chang's guards. Chang and his men rush to their humveess, and a short gunfight ensues (at one point, a Chinese soldier blows up a CTU helicopter, thus making this episode's budget at least quadruple that of any other episode). As Chang's humvee speeds into the distance, he curls his hand around the component chip -- confident in his victory.
Back at the hotel, Jack groans a bit, gets back up, and shoots the only two remaining Chinese soldiers in the hotel. Doyle and his men, as per usual, run in about thirty seconds too late. Jack blames Doyle and the CTU team for botching the operation: had they not engaged Chang in a firefight, Jack would have blown the building and Chang would be dead. Two CTU agents bring Audrey to Jack, but something is wrong -- she's mumbling and twitching and talking to herself. After a few seconds of talking to her, Jack comes to the realization that Audrey has absolutely no idea who he is.
REACTION
I'm usually not one to notice plot holes, but maybe my recent viewing of The Godfather Part II has put me in a plot-hole-looking kind of mood. In this episode alone:
-Jack is shot once in the chest by Chinese guards, but instead of moving in for a headshot the guards just ignore him after knocking him down despite the fact that they know how tough and intelligent he is, and that he probably wore kevlar.
-The same Chinese guards inexplicably and randomly stay inside the hotel after the shooting starts and Chang and the rest of his men escape in nearby humvees. They only stick around so Jack has someone to shoot when he gets back on his feet. Since they don't move in on Jack and they don't engage in the gunfight, they must have literally stood in place for a full three minutes after shooting Jack, just waiting for him to get back up and kill them.
-Speaking of which, where the hell did those humvees come from? How could that many humvees show up with neither Jack nor CTU noticing them? And how did Chang know that CTU would stage an assault from the front, and not the back?
-President Daniels just takes Lennox's word that he won't use the blackmail evidence?
-Karen firing Buchanan wouldn't distance Buchanan from the White House, it'd strengthen the relationship: the press would wonder why Buchanan was fired for no real reason, and would subsequently look at Karen, assuming that she fired him to cover her own ass.
-Buchanan reinstates Chloe so she can turn on Jack, even though that's the one thing she's proven incapable of doing.
-Buchanan puts Nadia in charge, despite the fact that four hours ago she was the subject of a criminal investigation.
And others I can't think of at the moment. You get my drift, though.
