You know, five hours of television is a lot to get through in one evening. Particularly when you are working till midnight. Compounding the issue, my VCR seems to be on its last legs. I think it may soon be time to invest in a different device for recording things; it’s too bad we don’t have Tivo up here in the Canadas. Of course, you’re not here to read about me whining about my VCR problems, so let’s get on with the 24.
They did drag it out for almost another entire episode, but Morris was finally ‘revealed’ as the engineer with the ability to help Fayed reprogram the nukes. Considering the revelation wasn’t even remotely surprising, I’m not sure why the writers felt it was necessary to build it up the ‘surprise’ for three whole episodes.
The whole picture decoding right after Morris left thing seemed a bit contrived. I know they had to successfully get Morris to Fayed or it would have rendered all that searching pointless (though I was kind of expecting CTU to figure it out and then send Morris undercover instead) but it still seemed forced to me. They really should have shown the audience the photo when McCarthy sent it, then instead of leaving us with a predictable mystery you could build up a sense of dread throughout the episode. I did like that Morris was at least a little suspicious of the information McCarthy planted regarding his brother ending up in the hospital though, so at least it wasn’t all bad.
Over in bunker land, it seems that Tom’s efforts to get rid of Karen haven’t really improved his lot very much. As long as the President’s sister is still around to lay guilt trips on Wayne, it seems unlikely that Tom will be able to move ahead with many of his new ‘reforms’. Presumably, this setback won’t be enough to stop Tom, of course, and we will see Tom taking some additional steps in the near future, possibly ones that enlist the aid of the Vice President.
And, since I can’t really think of a reasonably segue between the two, how about Jack’s family? I never really gave up my suspicions about Jack’s father secretly working with Graem, and those suspicions were only heightened when Phillip shot one of Graem’s henchmen before Jack could interrogate the guy. But, even though I did suspect he was in cahoots with Graem, I was not expecting Graem’s death (Admittedly, as soon as Jack left, leaving a bunch of minor CTU characters in charge of the scene, I was expecting SOMETHING to go wrong but it wasn’t until Jack’s dad asked to speak to Graem alone that I thought that something may involve Phillip killing his son).
From what Graem said, it sounded like his plan was for Jack to be killed and the back-up plan for Jack’s escape was pretty much what happened. But given the actions of Jack’s dad, it seems that his plan, all along, must have been for Jack to escape so that Graem would take all the blame for any wrong-doing. Of course, Graem’s plan involved his only going to prison for a while (though I’m not sure how he figured his dad would be able to pull enough strings to get him released after Graem confessed involvement in the killing of (among others) President Palmer) while it seems Phillip always intended to kill Graem (though I’m not sure how he could have much confidence in his ability to kill Graem once he was in CTU custody). With Graem dead, it’s easier to pin blame on him (especially after his confession regarding the deaths of Palmer, Tony and Michelle) and there’s no worry about Graem slipping up and giving a clue as to Phillip’s involvement in the whole affair.
I think the biggest surprise wasn’t that Phillip killed Graem (but, wow, that was some intense and cold-blooded killing on his part), but that it implies that Graem, who until now was perceived to be the puppet master behind President Logan and everything that happened in season five, was himself just the puppet of his father. Which I guess explains why he was (presumably) killed off so quickly when it seemed like he was to be a major character for the rest of the day.
Once again I missed out on the preview but next week, it seems that we’re getting a two-hour episode of 24 so I’m guessing that one will be filled with lots of action and/or plot developments.
