24 Review/Recap

Day Five, 4 - 5 p.m.
Anyone else catch the Buffy easter egg in the episode? The name of the woman in accounting that Peter Weller's secretary went to see so Jack could get in and threaten him--Jane Espenson. Jane Espenson was one of the writing staff over at both Buffy and Angel as well as the greatness that was Firefly.

OK, but before I turn this into a Joss Whedon fest, let's get back to 24.

Interesting to see that in a time of crisis when there are no good options that Logan completely shuts down. His pleading with Mike that there had to be a magical third option that would meet the conditions of the terrorist threat and save his wife showed that. I kept expecting Mike to go, "What did you think would happen when you cave to terrorist demands, sir?" or "Well, I guess you'd better hope Superman is real!" Logan had no good options, but he didn't really give himself any. And then for him to expect the terrorists to understand that it wasn't his fault...I had to roll my eyes. Charles, they're terrorists! They're not going to say--"Oh, well, it wasn't your fault our plan failed. Sorry to hear that, we'll just go use that nerve gas somewhere else. Have a nice day." They are terrorists on 24! They are evil and bad and will do whatever it takes. And I'm sure they've got some new plan now that will use the Centox gas in some new, lethal way.

Man, the amount of time and planning these terrorists put into these things...

Meanwhile, over at CTU, we have a scene taken right out of the classic Trek episode "The Doomsday Machine" In the episode, Kirk orders Spock to take command from Commodore Decker, who clearly is having some mental issues, on his own personal authority as captain of the Enterprise. This is after McCoy has tried to have Decker declare mentally unfit and Spock says he'll need the logs to prove it. Anyway, over at CTU, we see Curtis take command of things, relieving Lynn, who buckled under pressure. I wonder if we were seeing a bit of the bullied complex come out. We saw Lynn get bullied by his sister and her boyfriend. Was his overreaction and clamping down part of trying to feel like he had some power again? It seems that way becuase it's been all down hill for the hobbit turned CTU director since that attack. But now he's out of the way--or is he? I can't believe that Lynn is gone for good. I bet he'll find a way to redeem himself before day's end. Either that or we'll find out he's a bad guy and linked to the terrorists.

Because everyone is linked to those wacky terrorists! Even Peter Weller, who plays Jack's old mentor. I guess he was the one who taught Jack how to watch McGyver repeats to find ways to escape an exploding room when the bad guys lock you in and leave you for dead. (Good thing Weller watched Austin Powers and took the Dr Evil plans of eliminating your enemies as the best possible way to go).

While this episode did have some requisite tension, I had a feeling this was a transition episode--moving us between plotlines in the season. Yes, we had the terrorist threat and it's still very real, but I feel as if there are other plotlines moving into place now or that will be emerging in the next few hours that are being set-up here. It's not a bad episode, but just one that's a transition for the next segment of the suspense to come.