`24:’ Jack Bauer goes Martin Riggs and then John McClane on the Russians while Omar Hassan goes Tony Montana
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One has to suspend a lot of belief when watching ‘24,’ but Monday’s episode really pushed it to the hilt. Our hero, Jack Bauer, apparently not hurting from the wound in his side when Renee went crazy last week and accidentally stabbed him, has been taken captive by Sergei, the Ukrainian uranium dealer who even killed one of his two sons. Sergei, who when he isn’t trying to sell uranium is busy chopping carrots in the kitchen of the restaurant he uses as a front for his arms dealing, isn’t buying Bauer’s story that he’s Ernst Meier, a German arms dealer. Heck, Bauer’s not even really trying to sell that one anymore. But Bauer won’t give up his identity, so Sergei gets Dimitri, his vice president in charge of torture, to find ways to make him spill the beans.
Seems that Dimitri is a big ‘Lethal Weapon’ fan because before you can say ‘ripoff’ Jack is hanging from a pipe and being severely electrocuted until he manages to break free and kill Dimitri. Done with channeling Mel Gibson, the writers then move on to ‘Die Hard.’ Bauer roams barefoot through the restaurant picking off all the bad guys until capturing the ringleader without showing any signs of being tortured for a good half-hour or so.
Sergei agrees to talk but only after the president gives him immunity. Alas, his surviving son, Josef, has already gone on the run and grabbed the uranium for himself, so that was a wasted deal. He’s looking to close the deal with Farhad Hassan, who has resurfaced none worse for wear after a few hours with some of Sergei’s best girls. Josef not only manages to flee the restaurant, but he makes it out to whatever outer borough the truck with the uranium is and kills everyone guarding the truck in, oh, 20 minutes or so. I long stopped paying attention to the clock on ‘24,’ but every now and then I can’t help but say out loud, ‘really?’
Most of my eye-rolling was done -- as usual -- when the show focused on the plot involving CTU agent Dana Walsh and Kevin, the idiot ex-boyfriend trying to blackmail her. Kevin and his Silent Bob-like sidekick, Nick, have fled the police evidence storage facility they just ripped off and headed to -- where else? -- a strip club to celebrate. Kevin also informs Dana that he didn’t really mean it when he told her it would one and done for their reunion. Yes, another deal gone wrong.
Tired of being pushed around, Dana is on the verge of telling her fiance, Cole, what’s going on when she suddenly decides instead to take matters into her own hands. In the middle of a global crisis, she walks out of CTU packing heat and starts following Kevin and Nick as they leave the strip club and head off to do some more partying with a few babes in tow. Uh huh.
Meanwhile, Kamistan President Omar Hassan is really losing his grip. He’s convinced that everyone around him is a traitor. He locks up Tarin, one of his top aides who is also having a fling with his daughter Kayla. When informed of this relationship by his daughter, Hassan is more convinced that Tarin is out to hurt him and thinks he’s only faking loving his daughter. In short, Hassan has gone from Ghandi to Tony Montana.
Back at CTU, chief Brian Hastings has become a non-entity. He makes decisions based on who spoke to him last (maybe he’s modeled off of a television executive) and has no backbone of his own. Chole hasn’t had anything worthwhile to do in weeks, and Milo needs to be smacked. Late in the episode, a new CTU agent shows up, and something tells me he’s not to be trusted.
If it seems I’m being a little harsh on this particular episode, it’s because I fear we’re at that point in every ‘24’ season where the plots get bogged down in the absurd for a few weeks before a furious race to a finale that -- hopefully -- makes us forget all this nonsense. There was one nice touch: When Bauer is negotiating a deal with Sergei, their dialogue is not one of two enemies but rather two rogue warriors coming to terms with each other.
Another problem: Over the last few seasons ‘24’ has gone with the revolving villain approach. While it worked for awhile and kept the story moving, it also makes it harder to get emotionally involved in the story if each week brings a new bad guy. We need one true evil mastermind (preferably not the usual American gone wrong) to root against.
On the plus side, Bauer got new clothes. When CTU comes to get him and Sergei, they bring him a leather jacket and a nice clean black shirt. Do you think they always travel with a wardrobe?
-- Joe Flint
