Photos
Video
RSSFinaleWatch: "24" wraps with plenty o' melodrama
Believe it or not, "24" manages to wrap-up Jack Bauer's seventh day to a most fitting conclusion... the day is saved, yet we've only just begun. Also, the character development knob is turned to 11 for the final two hours.
The Spoilers hope we can spend Day Eight together.
Thanks to the Cisco TelePresenceâ„¢, Olivia can be interviewed by the Justice department without having to leave the White House. That's a good thing, because she's already attracted enough unwanted attention to warrant Aaron calling Ethan. He initially doesn't believe the Greatest Secret Service Agent EVER, but the power of Aaron's guilt is too much to deny. Ethan initially succeeds in retrieving the flash drive containing the audio and nearly makes it off White House property, but Olivia puts the kibosh on that. Knowing that card is the only thing keeping her in the position of power, she negotiates with Ethan to give it up. The agent eventually finds the card, which Olivia promptly destroys... except Ethan handed off the real card to Aaron all along! Thanks to automobile technology, he listens to the incriminating evidence in the car while Olivia hyperventilates to Martin. Should have thought about that before you put a bounty on Jonas Hodges head.
Meanwhile, the Tony Almeida convoy is truckin' down the highway when Cara forces Jack to free the beast. He even shoots the random FBI guy riding along for dramatic effect. Once Tony is free, he and Cara take a very-weakened Jack as hostage, whisking him away to the dreaded undisclosed warehouse. Renee makes an effort to locate Jack, using the combined, yet bitchy forces of Chloe and Janis to locate him. As it turns out, Jack is only being held because once he's dead, the pathogen can be extracted from his organs to reconstitute more weapons of mass destruction. Who knew Tony could be so resourceful. He recognizes this, which is why he begs Cara to have Alan Wilson formally allow him to join the Coalition Gang.
Back in the Connecticut Avenue tunnel, Renee tries to hail Kim without causing too much of a ruckus. She has Kim paged to the white courtesy phone at the gate, only to keep her long enough to raise Bob and Sarah's (yes, that's their names) suspicion levels. Bob takes it upon himself to secure Kim... so he begins shooting up the terminal; particularly the agents headed his way. Sarah takes Kim hostage, yet the spunky blonde Bauer stabs her to not only get away, but to have the bad girl go down in a barrage of bullets. Bob is shot as well, yet he breaks free. Kim gives chase (allowing her to awesomely utter Daddy's favorite phrase!), but manages to make the smart move by alerting the police. Bob nearly breaks free, but multiple shots through the windshield lead to his car flipping over and catching fire. This gives Kim the chance to put on her common sense hat by reaching into the engulfed car to retrieve the laptop.
And that's just the first hour... the final 60 minutes blow that out of the water.
It took Olivia just over half a day to knock Ethan from his position of power... but he returned the favor in a fraction of that time. When she realizes she didn't destroy the actual flash drive; well, the look on her face is priceless. All he wants is for her to come clean to Mama President. It's a touching family gathering when Olivia reveals Jonas is dead (mostly) because of her actions. While she doesn't directly appeal for Mom to sweep the matter under the rug, she does bring to light that Roger is dead because of Jonas. A weakened Henry takes his daughter's side by encouraging his wife to cover the whole mess up... for the good of the family. Lucky for us, Allison Taylor comes from the School of David Palmer and does the right thing by having Olivia remanded into federal custody. She may have just lost what family she had left, but she's earned my respect.
The Jack and Tony chase sequence leads to a taxi garage, which Jack tries to blow up using leaking fuel and a flare. Tony finds a forklift to force open the garage door and take Jack back into custody. Before when I said Jack was a hostage only because of the pathogen inside him? Yeah, no. He's just using his former friend to gain ultimate access to Alan Wilson, who as it turns out was Tony's target all along. Alan was the man pulling the Charles Logan strings: the Sentox gas attacks, David Palmer's assassination, the guy who had Michelle Dessler (and, as it turns out, his unborn son) killed AND colluded with Jonas to help General Juma unleash the terror in DC. The man has been busy, that's for sure. Tony is ready to end his reign by strapping a bomb to Jack.
Surprisingly, Alan decides to meet Tony in person to determine whether he's worthy to join the gang. The comprehensive security sweep looks efficient, but when you fail to account for FBI helicopters, you might as well have sat on your hands. Renee and company sweep in to take out most of the redshirt bad guys. Meanwhile, Cara safely moves Alan into the warehouse, only to have Tony kill her in front of her boss. Dude, that's just harsh. He launches into his monologue against Alan... it appears he's taking many years of frustration out on Alan's kidneys. Just before the two reach their most awesome moment, Renee and Jack bust in to wound him. The last we hear of Tony is his telling of the dynamic duo that they'll be sorry!
So much for honoring Michelle.
Since Tony spared his life, Renee won't be extracting much info from Alan. She even goes as far as to ask Jack (on a gurney) what he would do. Not surprisingly, he can only really suggest "whatever it takes," so long as it a choice "you can live with." You can almost see Renee transform into Jack before your very eyes.
What is somewhat surprising is that Chloe and Janis make up in a way you'd expect those two characters to do so. After that, Janis takes a series of forms for Renee to sign, who has just arrived with Alan to the interrogation room. When Janis refuses Renee's order to leave, Agent Walker goes ballistic; she busts the door keypad and has Janis handcuff herself at gunpoint. Alan is calm and cool in the room... that is, until he catches a glance at Renee's crazy eyes!
By this point, Jack is clinging to life by the thinnest of threads. He calls for Muthadi, the imam of Jibraan's mosque, to sit and pray with him. Behind all the tangled webs that is Jack Bauer, he is simply a man. Dr. Sunny confirms nothing more can be done for Jack, aside from morphine that will put him in a coma. It's at this point Kim arrives, desperately begging the good doctor to go ahead with the radical stem cell treatment. We end with Kim sitting on her father's hospital bed... taking his hand, not ready to let him go.
07:59:57... 07:59:58... 07:59:59... 08:00:00
So what are your thoughts on Day Seven? Is "24" back and better than ever? Are you pumped and ready for next season?
Post a comment
Zap2it Twitter Talk 
meh, i know a lot of people said 24 was reborn this year, but for me, it was more a commentary on how bad previous seasons were. I still watch it, as I can't stand the other shows on, and I do like myself a serial storyline. That said, I thought the storytelling was uneven this year, I thought the rationalizations for certain actions weren't developed quick enough (still can't get over how the henchman Tony eventually killed TACKLED him outside of the compound first ...). I thought this season, moreso than in year's past, was trying to preach a political ideology (I mean, everyone knows 24's leadership leans one way ... but no need to smack us on the face with it, during the season and in that TV movie), along with trying to preach a "there's nothing wrong with our show" mentality - a "it's our show meme".
I disliked the lack of effort they took in trying to portray DC. Having lived in the area, I know it's easy for TV and movies to snap a few keyshots and call it a day, but since 24 was supposed to cover the ground on a more specific level, I thought they should've taken more effort, and I hope they do so with "New York" next year.
You know, everything boils down to the storyline, and I'd like to, for once, see them plan out the story ahead of time. I think the winging it philosophy they had worked early on, bringing twists, but at a certain point, you go to the well too much, the taste starts weakening.
There's other things I find annoyance with (such as the "everyone chooses the dumbest action so Jack's actions look sane in comparison" map ... where was the FBI Director the WHOLE day ... it's DC after all) but that would take much longer.
_____________
As for this episode (well these 2 episodes), they were alright. It seems like they were teasing a 24 reinvention, hinting at Annie Wersching perhaps taking a bigger role. I'm not the biggest fan of the Renee character. I think Wersching is a bit too limited for the depth they were trying to take her. Or they tried to do too much in one day. The reinvention finished with us not knowing Jack's fate clearly ... although does anyone really think that Jack won't be back in some way?
I have to admit, they made Tony much more sympathetic than they probably realized. This might be a way to keep Carlos Bernard around ... but I honestly thought to myself, what was wrong with what Tony was saying? I mean ... he did save a ton of lives today, he got the big boss to show up, and he's avenging his family. Of course, they probably knew the line they were walking on, so they decided to slap us with a "evil" tag by having Tony hitch that bomb.
The Kim storyline was better than the jaguar storyline (or was it lion, I forget), but it felt sort of made up at the last second.
The whole White House plotline was ridiculous this year ... including the attack on it. But the "daughter couping the Chief of Staff, then getting caught in something" was clear as day a mile away. They wasted what's his name ... the First Man ... the actor's alright (he made do with a fairly idiotic storyline early on).
I appreciated the efforts at character development, and I like the fact that, barring a surprise, next year should tie in to this year. That said, a lot of people had long speculated that they would try to slowly tie in past storylines to a larger conspiracy. So ... Alan Wilson is the head of the shadow government (or is he ... Patton was a good pick to play the guy and I can see a lot of ways to spin things on that front, and he tried to say he didn't have anything to do with Michelle's death)? It might've been nice to, well, actually develop that story a bit this year, rather than just having Tony cover that ground in his angry man speech.
They'll need Elisha back again next year to really do some character development for Jack. I can see them try a "spin it forward a few months" and have Jack be retired, with Renee calling him in. They under utilized Chloe this year, and Janeane wasn't given the best stuff to do (hey, let's have her show shifty eyes and whine ... ).
For a finale, not bad. For the season? Eh.
Wow, a president with some ethics! I wasn't sure what Allison was going to do, but I give her a helluva lot of credit for doing the right thing.
I figured Tony was doing of all this to avenge Michelle's death, but he really went off the deep end. I thought for sure Jack was going to kill him, but he didn't.
I really liked the scene between Jack and Muthadi and between Jack and Renee. She really wanted Jack to tell her what to do, but he couldn't. I think he gave her very good advice and it is going to be interesting to see what the next season brings.
I thoroughly enjoyed this season.
Great season finale. While the ending was predictable, it was the right thing to do. The rumors of season eight being a prequel had me worried.
I also love the fact that the door seems wide open for the return of Charles Logan next season.
Greg Itzin, I think, has a contract with the Mentalist. I wouldn't count on Logan being back other than for an episode or two.
The action will continue, expect another difficult day for Jack Bauer. But I've heard that they changes location again for Season 8.
Yes, season 8 is supposed to be "New York" (I put that in quotes, largely because they'll shoot a couple "cover scenes", then head back to California probably).
What a piece of trash to be dumped on its viewers who spent the last 22 hours waiting for something exciting. Last year I said it was my last but this ending sealed the deal for me.
24 is starting to feel like a 24 hour infomercial on the benefits of torture. I like the show but wish they would leave their pro torture arguments out and just show Jack kicking ***.
Not overly impressed with this season. And if they don't come back (are they?), it'll be one of the worst finales on the record books.
I'll just say: UGH! Enough with the bad Tony already. I had hopes that he'd wake up.
Guilt is such a cheap character trait. Bad writing.
I want to know how "Bob" and "Sarah" got a gun and a knife past airport security! I was glad to see Kim manage to save herself instead of needing Jack to swoop in and rescue her.