A Christmas present for all my readers

24

This week's show and last week's show moved uncharacteristically slowly for 24. I guess the producers were letting the fact that terrorists had blown up a nuke in a US city sink in. I expect that they have milked it for all that they intend to try and we will get back to the patented Bauer bloodletting next week.

However slow moving does not mean nothing happened at all. The highlights are these:

Jack and Zefrem Cochran (his father) were captured by Jack's brother who ordered their executions. Jack and Zefrem managed to kill their guards and get away. Back at Jack's brother's house the CTU strike team managed to actually do what they were supposed to do and capture Graham alive. Jack tortured him until he admitted that he ordered Pres. Palmer's murder along with the murders of Jack's CTU coworkers. This wasn't the information that Jack was fishing for, but he took it nonetheless.

The amoral arms merchant located an engineer who could arm the Evil Terrorist Mastermind's remaining bombs, but the caveat was that he wouldn't do it willingly. CTU's surveillance satellites intercepted the cell phone conversation between the ETM and the amoral arms merchant and captured the data stream containing the photo and entire life story of the technician. Al Bundy knew a Borg algorithm that would recover the corrupted data (apparently data is hopelessly mangled when it is intercepted - they might want to fix that as it seems to rise above "undocumented feature" and make it into the territory of being a true bug), but found out that his kid brother had been taken to the hospital with severe radiation exposure. Al can't figure out how that could have happened, its not like a nuclear bomb went off a few miles north of the city a couple of hours ago or anything.

Bundy leaves CTU just seconds before the picture of the technician resolves itself and it turns out to be [drum roll] AL BUNDY!

They find this out just in time to narrowly miss stopping Al from being kidnapped by the amoral arms merchant and his skanky gold digger girlfriend.

The peaceful and tolerant Muslims who were being unjustly held in a concentration camp by the evil FBI director found out that the Chairman of CAIR was attempting to help the US government prevent the detonation of four more atomic bombs in US cities. The Muslims who were being unjustly confined in Gitmo North demonstrated how loyal to the United States they were and how they hate terrorism with every fiber of their beings by attempting to beat the Chairman to death. This was only after they let the Chairman into their confidence only after he told them that he had been attempting to contact the Evil Terrorist Mastermind because running an organization like CAIR wasn't doing enough to destroy the USA.

When Anita Hill found out that the peace-loving and tolerant Muslims who had just tried to beat her boyfriend to death for trying to stop the nuclear bombs from murdering hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Americans were not directly part of the terrorist plot she was giddy with glee. Her conscience was clear. She had NOT done anything after all to prevent a terrorist attack.

At the White House Major Mat Mason had blackmailed Julie Myers into handing in her resignation to the president. It seems that CTU had the ETM in custody some months back and had let him go. M3 was going to use this to destroy Col. McQueen's career so she took one for hubby. Freed from her influence M3 prepared his Enabling Act for President Chappell's signature.

He then called his true master and we got to see who is behind the entire thing. The Vice President! We know that the VP is the spider in the center of the web pulling the strings on the whole evil conspiracy, even the nuclear terrorism, because he is played by Powers Booth!

President Chappell surprises everyone (except those of us who know the formula by which the show is written, black politicians are good, white politicians are evil, especially when they are the Vice President) by rejecting the Enabling Act. The VP and M3 try to reason with him by pointing to the still smoldering rubble of the Reichstag, sorry - I mean the nuclear bomb, but he isn't having any of it. As far as he is concerned the Constitution IS a suicide pact and if we must go into that good night we will go quietly!

We can see by the look on Vice President Jim Jones' face that he isn't happy and is already planning another presidential assassination.

Meanwhile back at stately Bauer manor Zefrem asks for a few minutes alone with his boy and the CTU Strike Team allows this. What follows is a bit of dialogue which reveals that Zefrem is really the family mastermind and Graham was just taking the fall to protect daddy. Zef is afraid that sonny-boy can't stand up to what he will face in the real CTU torture chamber so he gives his kid a lethal injection. He calls the CTU guys in and starts threatening to sue.

My predictions for next week are that Jack will have to cap Al Bundy to keep him from arming a nuclear bomb. Chloe will forgive him.

Jack killed one person tonight.

24

Tonight's episode was fairly slow moving and mainly set up things for the upcoming episodes. We got revelations about Jack's family, however.

The episode begins where the last one left off with the mushroom cloud rising north of LA. The president's people estimate that 12000 people have died as one square mile of Valencia has been destroyed. The good news is that the fallout cloud is moving away from the city.

Jack helps save the pilot of a chopper which crashed onto a rooftop when it was hit by the shockwave. He calls Col. McQueen and tells him to send a car, he takes back the business about quitting. BTY, it seems that the power grid and every cell phone in LA has been hardened against EMP since none of them are affected.

Evil Terrorist Mastermind (tm) has escaped with his other nuclear bombs and calls up his amoral international arms merchant to get a new nuclear arms engineer to arm his other bombs, the one that President Chapell let go having been vaporized. The arms merchant agrees to find someone who can do the job in between arguing with his skanky gold-digger girlfriend.

Dr. Bashier tells the boys at CTU that they had been trying to get some nukes from a former general in the Red Army, but nothing had come of it. Al Bundy figures out that Jack's father's company had done business with the general and that their contact had been Jack's old man.

Jack calls his brother to find out where the old man is and we get the first major revelation. Jack's brother Graham is the head of the Bluetooth Mafia from last season. He was the one pulling the strings on President Weasel.

Meanwhile at Gitmo, sorry, Palmdale the head of CAIR has agreed to be wired up. Anita Hill hates this. The idea of helping stop terrorists rather than helping put them on the streets to kill and kill and kill is revolting to her. The FBI roughs up the CAIR guy to give him street cred with the club jihad guys. It works and they let him into their circle.

Jack is able to get his SUV across town to his brother's house despite the most massive traffic jam in the history of the universe as everyone with two brain cells attempts to flee the fallout.

At brother's house we learn that Jack and his sister-in-law were an item before Jack met his wife and that sister-in-law may still be carrying a torch for Jack. We meet Jack's nephew and a seed is planted which may bloom into the boy being Jack's son.

Jack asks to speak to his brother in private so they go into his office. There Jack punches him out and starts to torture him for information. I think this family has issues.

In the previews we see the next major revelation. Jack Bauer's father is Zefram Cochrane, the inventor of warp drive. This explains how Jack is able to move from any place in the vicinity of LA to any other place in the vicinity of LA in the space of a commercial break.

Will Jack be able to beat the information out of his brother or will his brother's evil minions turn the tables on Jack and leave him twisting in the breeze?

Tune in next week. Same Bauer time, same Bauer channel.

24

The Evil Terrorist Mastermind (ETM) demands that all of the terrorist detainees at "Palmdale" (I guess that Gitmo was out of the budget) be released and put on a plane or else the terrorist incidents will continue.

M3 and Julie Myers are against this, but President Chapell feels that it is the only chance they have to buy a break from the constant attacks.

Meanwhile Jack Bauer (having recovered his super powers after draining the life force of one of the terrorists - the life is the blood!) and Dr. Bashier have faked a traffic accident in which the terrorist handler's car was totaled. Bashier offers the terrorist a ride while Jack tails them in a Jeep which he carjacked. Bashier sets his Sprint cell phone on covert surveillance mode so that Jack and CTU can listen in.

The terrorist has Bashier drop him off at a self storage place where he opens a unit which is stacked floor to ceiling with boxes of Eastern Block weapons, ammunition and explosives. The terrorist suspects nothing because he failed to notice the white Jeep and the two enormous black Ford Expeditions following his car.

At this point we see that Curtis is going to be a problem. He gets up in Bashier's face and has his men take him into custody. Jack tries to tell him that Bashier is a part of the operation, but Curtis isn't having any of it.

The terrorist spots one of the snipers on a rooftop and starts shooting. The CTU assault squad starts pouring weapon's fire into a small room full of explosives, but the terrorist denies the infidels the opportunity to blow him up by setting off a hand grenade. In the wreckage they find a laptop which conviniently has one recoverable file which lists the components for a Soviet era suitcase nuke. Along with the name of an engineer trained by the Russians who has terrorist ties.

Of course Curtis's first thought on hearing this is that if he is going to get blown up in a nuclear fireball he will at least give Bashier an ass-whippin before he goes, but Jack won't let him.

Meanwhile Joe Middle Class (JMC) and family are being held hostage by their teenage Arab neighbor (proving that in this post 9/11 world making friends with Arabs is stupid and will get you blown up in a nuclear fireball). The Jihad Kid tells Joe Middle Class that he is going to have to deliver a package for him since his leg as a boo-boo from his fight with the neighborhood redneck.

JMC takes the package and goes to an electronics warehouse where the slimy owner opens the box and finds it to be full of money. He tells JMC that it is going to cost him an extra $50,000. JMC calls Kid Jihad who tells him to use his initiative and get the damn component.

JMC thinks outside the box and tricks the slimy owner into showing him the component. Then he beats him to death for it. He calls Kid Jihad and tells him that he has his nuclear trigger, but he will smash it if he doesn't let his family go. Kid Jihad agrees to let one of them go, but not both. JMC has to make a Sophie's Choice of which loved one he wants to save and picks his son. Kid Jihad lets the wife go instead.

Wife calls husband to tell him she's safe then she calls 911 and asks to be connected to Col. McQueen. McQueen forwards her call to Jack who sets up an assault on the house.

JMC hands the nuclear trigger over to the Evil Terrorist Mastermind who has the Soviet trained engineer with him because the whole "free the terrorists" bit was a ruse. A corrupt guard set the engineer (who was being held at Gitmo, sorry Palmdale) free.

At the assault on JMC's suburban home the crack CTU assault force succeeds in killing Kid Jihad BEFORE he can tell them anything of use. Fortunately JMC, Jr. remembers the exact address of the nuclear device assembly building.

The crack CTU assault squad is sent in to take out the terrorists and prevent the atomic bomb from going off (the same crack CTU assault squad which has just spent the day doing the opposite of what they were supposed to do). By this time even Helen Keller could see a giant nuclear fireball on the horizon.

Back at JMC's suburban home Jack sends Bashier (clutching his bright spanky new Presidential Pardon) back to CTU just when Chloe calls and tells him what the history is between Curtis and Bashier. It seems that back in the day Bashier ambushed Curtis's unit killed some of his men and captured some others. He tortured them and forced them to beg for their lives, then beheaded them.

Jack runs out of the house to find Curtis with a gun to Bashier's head. Jack urges him to let bygones be bygones but Curtis just isn't a big enough man to rise above the hate. Before he can continue the cycle of violence Jack shoots him through the throat with what appears to be his Ruger semi-auto.

Jack then lurches off down the suburban sidewalk and pukes. He then calls Col. McQueen and tells him that he quits. He's done. From where the sun now stands he will torture and kill no more. Then the crack CTU assault squad's raid on the nuclear weapon assembly pint has its inevitable result and we get to see Jack reacting to the mushroom cloud. We also get to see the Oval Office where President Chapell, Julie Myers and Major Mat Mason put on their best horrified reaction faces (none of them could hold a candle to Capt. Kirk).

One more lose end. The Arab phrase which the chairman of CAIR overheard meant "five visitors". Bashier had informed them that visitor was a code word for weapon. This means that there are four more nukes floating around (cue the sinister music).

The major question raised by this night's episodes is this: What will Anita Hill do to cope with the shame when she realizes that she has assisted law enforcement in (hopefully) stopping four major terrorist attacks?

24

As the season opens we see that the United States is 11 weeks into a blitz of terrorists bombings. Over 900 have been killed and we see the live TV coverage of the latest bombing. The news reader tells us that it looks like Islamic militants, but no hard evidence exists.

This led me to think that we were going to get the first CAIR approved season of 24. My assumption was that we would see a series of terrorist incidents set up to look like they were Islamic in origin but in reality be the work of Christian fundamentalists. I should have had more faith.

We see a Middle Eastern man trying to get on an LA city bus and being refused entry. As the bus drives away we see the real suicide bomber, an Asian man, setting off his bomb.

Next in the White House Julie Myers (from last season, the head of Homeland Security) having an argument with the Director of the FBI (played by Peter McNichol the guy from Numbers whose character left the show to be a mission specialist on the International Space Station so we'll call him Major Mat Mason, or M3 for short) arguing about M3's plan to build concentration camps to inter the nation's Arab population. She is against it.

President Wayne Palmer (his brother is back in the US Army Special Forces) is trying to walk the tightrope between protecting the nation from terrorists while preserving as much of our civil liberties as possible.

It seems that a terrorist named Farouk will give up the location of the terrorist Assad who is supposed to be behind the current wave of terrorist attacks, but only for a buttload of cash and Jack Bauer, who he wants to torture to death for revenge. The president has paid a "high price" for Jack Bauer to be released from the Red Chinese, who have been holding him in a Gulag for the last 20 months.

Jack's plane lands in LA and Col. McQueen and Cola tell him that he has been brought back so that they can hand him over to the terrorists. Jack is OK with this because it means that he can die for something.

Jack is allowed to clean up and then handed over to the terrorists. He has no gun, no manbag and no cell phone.

While in the custody of the terrorist Farouk he is beaten and tortured with acid and something like a knitting needle which is jammed through his spine. Farouk tells him that Assad is not behind the terrorist attacks. That Farouk is attempting to end terrorism and that he, Farouk, is behind all the terrorist attacks. The whole thing is an evil plot to get CTU to kill Assad and end any hope of peace.

Jack escapes by chewing out the throat of one of his captors. Good scene, however we should have seen an arterial spray. Jack escapes with a gun and a cell phone.

Jack calls CTU and tells them to call off the attack. Assad wants everybody to join hands and sing Kumbaya and Farouk is the real bad guy. Julie Myers and M3 convince Palmer to go ahead with the attack. Palmer agrees.

Jack finds that the terrorist cell phone contains a small hyper space window generator which he is able to program to fold space allowing him to get to Assad's small house in Compton before the two Marine Cobra attack helicopters can get there and launch their Hellfire missiles.

Jack convinces Assad that one of his men is a traitor and they escape before the attack.

They get to a safe house and torture the traitor into telling them where the next suicide bombing will be. Well Assad tortures the guy, it seems that Jack has lost his taste for torture.

The next bombing is going to be on a subway train. Jack gets on the train and Assad follows the suicide bomber's handler.

Jack kicks the bomber out of the train so that the bomb blows up on the track and kills only the terrorist. CTU intercepts a cell phone call from the terrorist's handler to Farouk reporting on the failure. CTU tells the President and M3 and Julie Myers that Farouk is the real terrorist.

In a sub plot we see an Arab family living in a nice Middle Class neighborhood where the father is being arrested by the FBI. The White neighbors, whose son is a friend of the Arab family's teenage son, go and help the son when the redneck neighbor (who was on Tour of Duty) starts harassing him. Later it turns out that the Arab father was innocent, but the son was a terrorist. He winds up shooting the redneck neighbor and as the episode closes he is holding he is holding his white "friend" at gunpoint.

Another sub plot involves the President's sister who seems to be a civil rights lawyer (we'll call her Anita Hill) in the employ of CAIR. Well not really CAIR but an Islamic/American organization modeled on CAIR. Except this organization is headed by a patriot who loves America while the real CAIR is a terrorist front group with past leaders in jail for supporting terrorists.

In this case the FBI wants their personnel files. Anita Hill sends them packing because they don't have a warrant, but when they come back with one she erases the files. the FBI arrests her (for interfering with official business) and the head of the Islamic group.

This is all I can remember. First impression is that the producers are trying to walk a fine line between the realization that terrorism in the modern world is a product of the Islamic religion and the politically correct impulse in the entertainment industry to oppose what the left calls "racism". I don't think that the 24 producers are politically correct, but they live and work in a politically correct industry and for a TV network that wishes to minimise controversy.

Showing some "good Muslims" will help take the wind out of CAIR's sails (and give them more time to assist terrorists in murdering innocent people).

I'm giving this season my approval, for now. We'll see how the second half of the season premier goes at 8:00 PM tomorrow.

Jack killed 2 people tonight.

It all starts tonight

Tonight's the night! The Jack Bauer Kill counter starts climbing faster than the national debt. Go over to Blogs4Bauer and post your estimate of Jack's body count. Then take the phone off the hook, pop some corn and open a good red-blooded American beer and get ready to watch the mayhem! Enemies of America your free ride is over. Jack is back!

Jacks back and it looks like he's pissed

Today we stand on the eve of the return of 24, the event that most of us have been longing for, "as the deer pants after the water brook".

The Washington Post gives us a sneek peek:

Jack comes back to the United States after spending two years in a Chinese gulag to find:

America has become a hellish terrorist landscape -- bus bombings here, train attacks there, bodies stacking up (it's fantasy, yes, but it feels uncomfortably plausible).

And he sets to work dealing with the situation:

To escape from his captors in the first hour of the new season, a manacled Jack (Kiefer Sutherland, ever intense and husky of voice) kills an adversary by biting him on the neck. And not just any old Dracula, I-vant-to-suck-your-blood kind of bite on the neck. The death-by-molars scene is played in close-up, with gurgling, grunting, ripping and tearing noises filling the soundtrack. It's topped off by Jack spitting out a big ol' piece of his victim.

Just think what Jack could have done if he had his cell phone.

I know not what course others may take, but as for me and my house we will be watching Jack!