Now this is what I’ve been waiting for. Although the return of ’24’ has been pretty entertaining so far, we hadn’t yet seen Jack Bauer truly kick ass and take names… until now. This week, President Heller throws his disavowed agent back into the field and all hell breaks loose. And this time, he’s got a partner who looks to be just as tough as he is.
With only a few hours to go before Margot’s deadline that he turn himself over to the terrorist, President Heller relents and decides to let Jack find an arms dealer named Rask, whom Jack thinks can point the way to Margot’s hideout. Jack’s plan: To get the dealer to log into his overseas bank account and then have Chloe upload a virus into his system, which will reveal a contact list with the names of people he’s dealt with. They’re hoping to find Margot on that list and find an address for her. Yep, not the greatest of plans, but this is ’24’, so just go with it.
Jack has one caveat for the President, however. He wants Kate Morgan to join him. Jack says that she seems to have the skill-set he needs for this type of mission. Oh, she has a skill-set all right, but there’s no time for love, Jack Bauer.
Remember that huge explosion that rocked Navarro’s team at the end of Episode 5? Well, the team sustained a few casualties, but Navarro and Ritter are both fine. Jordan tells Navarro that he’s detected that someone has either removed or added information (I didn’t quite get the gist of it) for a “Phoenix” file that has something to do with the evidence that was used against Kate’s husband, who was accused of selling secrets to the Chinese. Jordan wants permission to dive into the program, but Navarro wants him to focus on the current crisis. More about this later.
With Jack now teamed up with Kate, he tells her his plan. Rask thinks that Jack has betrayed him, so he wants to knock Kate out (by drugging her) and turn her over to Rask as proof that Jack is still on his side. He hopes that by the time Kate recovers from the drug, he’ll have what he needs from Rask’s computer (with help from Chloe) and can rescue Kate before Rask’s henchmen torture her for information. Naturally, this all goes horribly wrong.
The British Prime Minister (Stephen Fry) hears innuendo that Heller may be suffering from Alzheimer’s, and is then informed that Heller sent Jack Bauer on a mission. Using MI-5 to track him, the PM sees Jack put Kate’s drugged body into the trunk of his car. Assuming that Jack has betrayed the President, he sends a team to Rask’s location to take him out. Leave it to the Brits to muck things up.
Chief of Staff Mark Boudreau is in a bad spot as well. He gets a call from a Russian diplomat wondering why Jack Bauer hasn’t been turned over yet. Mark, of course, forged the President’s signature on the rendition order. He tells the Russian that the President has rescinded the order. The Russian isn’t happy, and Mark asks him to meet and talk things over. However, it looks like we’ll have to wait a week to see how things develop, as nothing else happens between Mark and the Russian in this episode.
Meanwhile, back at the terrorists’ location, Margot learns from the now-deceased Naveed’s cell phone that he had talked to his sister about escaping from London together. Margot orders Simone to find the sister and see what she knows. Once Simone tracks the sister (and her young daughter) down, Margot commands Simone to kill them both.
Simone can’t bring herself to do it, and begs the sister to leave the city. When the sister attempts to call the police instead (big mistake), Simone tries to stop her and stabs her with a switchblade in the process. The daughter sees this happen, and runs out into the streets of London with Simone in pursuit. As a viewer, I thought for sure that the little girl was going to get hit and killed by a car, but instead Simone gets hit by a big double-decker bus. I didn’t see that coming!
Rask reveals to Jack that he has an antidote for the drug Jack gave to Kate and can revive her quickly. Suddenly, it’s a race against the clock for Jack to get Rask to log into his bank account before Rask’s henchmen torture Kate (now in another room of a large warehouse facility) to death. Poor Kate gets hung up by her wrists, cut, and electro-shocked. Just as she’s about to have her head drilled into, Rask finally gets ready to hit the Enter button on his computer, which will log him in and give Chloe (still at her station at Open Cell) a chance to upload a virus that will give her access to all his info. Of course, right at this point the Brits launch their raid on the facility.
Kate uses the distraction of the Brits’ gunfire to go all Xenia Onatopp on the henchman, crushing his neck with her thighs. Knocked to the ground, Kate manages (with her hands still tied behind her back) to grab a knife and plunge it into the henchman, killing him. At Jack’s side of the warehouse, a gunfight is underway. Jack presses the Enter button and Chloe is able to upload the virus. Jack tries to question Rask, but he blows himself (and a couple of Brits) up with a grenade. However, Chloe finds Margot’s name in Rask’s bank files. It has no address, but does have a cell phone number, which (although Jack and Chloe don’t know this yet) will lead to Simone.
Back at CIA headquarters, Navarro places a call to a mysterious man (cue evil-sounding voice on the other end of the line) and tells him that one of his employees has been digging into the file on Kate’s husband. He expresses worry that the file will reveal that Kate’s husband was set up. Those of you who pegged Navarro as a mole can now take a well-deserved drink!
I really liked this episode. It reminded me of how good this show can be when it doesn’t worry too much about the logistics of things and just bombards viewers with a lot of intense fun. I’m sure if I go back and watch it a second time, I’ll be able to nitpick a dozen different flaws and leaps of logic, but boy this was one entertaining episode.
