"You ever pull your weapon on me again, you better intend to use it."-- Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland)
Spoilers. I'm really enjoying Day 7 now; it will never be as fresh and envigorating as earlier years, but it feels damn solid -- and there aren't many seasons of 24 that are in this good shape by mid-season. Usually, the show has exhausted its pre-season planning by episode 6 and becomes a juggling act, but the writers' strike has given them the time to plot a stronger course through the story...
Hour 10 is the finale to the threat posed by Colonel Dubaku (Hakeem Kae-Kazim), beginning with Jack (Kiefer Sutherland) and Renee (Annie Wersching) being stopped by city cops, after they received a federal arrest warrant -- sent by FBI mole Sean (Rhys Coiro). With Jack and Renee wrongly arrested, and Larry (Jefrey Nordling) trying to cut throught the misunderstanding from his office, Marika (Enuka Okuma) has no back-up support as she's driven to meet terrorist boyfriend Dubaku, who now knows she's in league with the Feds. Interestingly, with Marika delivered to him, Dubaku doesn't just shoot her dead (as many cold-blooded villains of yesteryear would have), but genuinely professes his love and tries to make her understand his side of the argument. It actually felt refreshing to have a villain who isn't a callous cipher, but a real person who believes his atrocities are a necessary evil.It's also revealed that Sean's colleague Erika (Ever Carradine) is part of the government conspiracy, which was a neat development -- as I never really considered there could be two FBI moles, particularly after Sean was unmasked last week. It's also quite humorous that the two prime suspects (literally from the moment they appeared on-screen) proved our first suspicions were correct, but were still a mild surprise. Hiding in plain sight was a good tactic.
Anyway, it's not long before Jack and Renee are released and get back on the trail of Dubaku, who is now in a car with Marika bound for an airport. A high-speed chase ensues (nicely handled by the production team), during which Marika bravely causes Dubaku's car to flip, trapping her inside the wreckage. Typically, Jack is only really concerned with getting Dubaku free to interrogate him, and actually needs a bit of persuasion from Renee to risk his life to save Marika, with the overturned car threatening to explode. Sadly, Marika doesn't survive her ordeal after being pulled free, and Dubaku's survival is doubtful at the scene -- although Jack discovers Dubaku's data-file listing the government traitors implanted beneath skin on his abdomen. The file is sent by chopper to Larry and Chloe (Mary Lynn Rajskub) to decode, meaning Sean and Erika must work together to destroy the FBI's servers once the data is retrieved, to protect their cover. For storytelling purposes, the data-file auto-erases when downloaded. How convenient.
As usual for this season, there's a lot of angst and arguing about Jack's methods, particularly from Renee -- who, in one excellent scene at a hospital waiting on Dubaku to regain consciousness, lays into Jack for his apparent lack of emotion and humanity over Marika (coldly referring to her as an "asset" earlier, etc.) What's good about these scenes is how 24 seems to be painting Jack as a tough bastard we should pity, and less the action hero to idolize. It's not that we don't understand Jack's attitude and viewpoint (especially after years of saving the world with tough measures), but Renee's character helps remind us how hollow he's become as a result. The only downside is that the show doesn't quite go all the way in crucifying Jack, and scenes usually end with Renee or Larry on the receiving end of a pithy Jack one-liner or steely look that communicates he's right. I'd love to see him proven wrong for once, though, and for Renee to achieve a better result by-the-book.
We also had arguably our first shock moment, with Sean shooting Erika dead in the FBI's mainframe (after she's reformatted the servers), before shooting his own arm and staging the scene to look like Erika was the mole and he killed her in a struggle. Even nicer was seeing dopey Larry apparently fall for Sean's story, but after Chloe miraculously retrieves the contents of Dubaku's data-file (thanks to a convenient mirroring procedure she has), Sean beats a hasty retreat and Larry proves his worth by catching him in the guilty act. About time Larry was seen being competent and not a jobsworth.
The only tedious element of the story were scenes with Persident Taylor (Cherry Jones) waiting outside her husband's operating theatre with Ethan (Bob Gunton), and later with her estranged daughter Olivia (Sprague Grayden), but these were mercifully brief in an hour that generally provided a lot of incident and a surprising amount of closure.
Indeed, with Dubaku incapacitated in hospital, the First Gentleman likewise, and the vital data-file successful retrieved (and incriminating 100 government workers in the conspiracy), this episode could possibly have been the 24th hour. But it's never that simple. As Jack rests on steps outside, Tony (Carlos Bernard) makes a reappearance -- warning Jack that the threat isn’t over, as he has intel that General Juma himself is planning to attack a high-profile target over the Sangala situation -- and that a man called Bryan Burnett (Eyal Podell), who we know as Dubaku's contact, is heavily involved. Burnett also turns out to be the aide to Senator Mayer (Kurtwood Smith), the man who shut down CTU and has Jack facing the Senate for his crimes.Overall, this felt like we reached a narrative crossroads, a few episodes prior to the chronological halfway point. I've been impressed by Manny Coto and Brannon Braga's scripts this year -- operating within the parameters of standard 24, but giving us a few twists and the kind of character moments that can sometimes get lost in the rush to shock audiences every 15-20 minutes. It's particularly surprising that Braga (a Star Trek veteran who specialized in divisive, knotty scripts) has slipped so easily into the world of 24. As we head into another new phase of Day 7, I'm now comfortable and keen to see where we go from here -- particularly as Tony Todd and Jon Voight have yet to show their faces...
2 March 2009
Sky1, 9pm
Writers: Manny Coto & Brannon Braga
Director: Milan Cheylov
Cast: Kiefer Sutherland (Jack), Mary Lynn Rajskub (Chloe), Cherry Jones (President Taylor), James Morrison (Bill), Annie Wersching (Renee), Bob Gunton (Ethan), Jeffrey Nordling (Larry), Rhys Coiro (Sean), Janeane Garofalo (Janis), Carlos Bernard (Tony), Eyal Podell (Ryan Burnett), Andi Chapman (Rosa), Karim Prince (EMT Theener), Emerson Brooks (EMT #4), Matt Nolan (Police Officer #1), Joe Wandell (Police Officer #2), Jeronimo Spinx (Dubaku's Driver), Marci Michelle (FBI Agent), Hector Atreyu Ruiz (Chopper Pilot), Enuka Okuma (Marika), Hakeem Kae-Kazim (Dubaku), Sprague Grayden (Olivia Taylor), Kurtwood Smith (Senator Blaine Mayer) & Ever Carradine (Erika)
