This season of “24” has really been “The Renee Show.”Of course, you can debate whether or not this is a good thing, seeing as how Renee didn’t show up until hour #4. The fact that we’re more interested in her than the season’s main terrorist plot is probably not great. Need more evidence that Renee is driving the action right now? Jack spent 85 % of his screen time last night sitting in a car by himself. (Think about it – it’s true.) Thankfully, we got to hear the classic/hoarse Bauer yell a few times when he let out a few “Damnits” and a surprisingly funny “Are you kidding me?!”
Fortunately, Annie Wersching is knocking it out of the park right now. I was getting worried that her performance had become too reliant on heavy eye makeup and vacant stares, but the episode’s final scene was both pulse-poundingly tense and heartbreaking.
We’ll get to that in a bit, but first a bit of housecleaning. I erroneously reported last week that Renee had sliced off Ziya’s hand and part of his wrist to remove his parole bracelet. It turns out that she’d only sliced off a thumb so that she could easily slide the bracelet off. See, she’s not THAT crazy!
Jack tried to pull the plug on the mission, but Renee sorta convinced him that she was STILL in control and the good guys didn’t really have a better option. Renee and Ziya met up with Renee’s old flame Vladimir and Vladimir’s infinitely-more perceptive sidekick, who is distrustful of Renee. In a terrific scene, (good use of the split screen!) Jack fed Renee some CTU-gathered information to convince Vladimir that she was a legitimate crook. Despite getting all the right answers, Vlad tossed her in a trunk with Ziya and drove off to execute them.
In a very un-Jack move (are his feelings for Renee clouding his judgment), Jack followed a decoy car, (“ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!” which meant there was no way for him and CTU to reach and rescue Renee on time.
This is about the time Wersching took over. Vladimir killed Ziya (Renee didn’t even flinch) before dumping him in what looked like Mystic River and pointing his gun at Renee. That prompted Renee to give a great speech about how she had nothing to live for and practically begging Vlad to shoot her and put her out of her spooky misery. Vlad spared her life and Renee maintained her cover. Except that we’re not really supposed to believe that everything Renee said was meant to maintain her cover. Jack expressed concern earlier on that Renee was purposely putting herself in harm’s way (it was revealed that Vladimir had beat her up in the past, among other things). Wersching made me believe that Renee honestly didn’t care whether she lived or died.
Unfortunately, none of the season’s other storylines were nearly as compelling.
I was encouraged to see Cherry Jones finally getting a bit to do when she went toe-to-toe with President Omar Hassan. After being betrayed by someone close to him, President Hassan had effectively declared martial law in his own country, which sort of put a damper on his peace-keeping mission in the U.S. Both presidents stood their grounds, and I’m curious to see how this gets resolved.
I also hope we haven’t seen the last of Hassan’s wife and daughter. The estranged married couple had a brief, but VERY effective scene in which President Hassan asked for his wife’s forgiveness and council. She couldn’t bring herself to do it, and I’m really interested in finding out what happened between them. (This, of course, is assuming that his affair with Meredith Reed is NOT the reason she hates him – I sort of just assumed that Hassan didn’t start that relationship until after his marriage was on the rocks.)
Hassan’s brother Farhad is cooling his heels with a pair of Russian prostitutes until his payment reaches the Russian buyer Sergei Bazhaev. Meanwhile, in a development designed to give CTU a lead when Renee’s mission inevitably goes downhill, Bazhaev’s oldest son (David Anders of “Alias” and “Heroes”) took his younger, dying brother to a doctor against his father’s wishes to treat baby bro’s radiation poisoning. How long until the doctor tries to contact the authorities? One episode? Two, tops!
Finally, I’m tired of complaining about the Dana/Jenny storyline and I’m sure that you’re tired of hearing me complain about it. My main gripe isn’t that an ex-con who was apparently an accessory to murder when she was a minor was able to get a job at CTU. What annoys me is that (so far) none of this has anything to do with anything else (so far). Oh well, since this is here and we have to deal with it, I suppose I have to give Clayne Clawford kudos for doing a terrific job of playing the scumbaggy Kevin. It’s going to be pretty sweet when he gets killed. I might even cheer.
So what’d you think of this episode? How come the bad guys on “24” never check for earpieces? (I mean, how small can they be?) Did anyone else laugh out loud when they saw Kiefer Sutherland wearing those ridiculous glasses in next week’s preview? Finally, who’s going to end up killing Kevin? Dana, Cole (or Arlo?!)
2 comments:
First, I take offense to the jab at heavy eye makeup and vacant stares... lol... and second, do you think it's possible that most of Jack's scenes are of him sitting in his car because... you don't suppose he's PREGNANT, do you?
To be fair, Laura, I said that Annie Wersching was relying too much on heavy eye makeup and vacant stares to convey craziness - on the other hand, I don't really think you need either of those things for us to know you're a little crazy.
Also, that's a great theory about Jack being pregnant. I saw where Kiefer Sutherland lost a bet recently and wore a dress on Letterman recently, so maybe he's also pregnant in real life and they wrote it into the show. That would actually be a twist NO ONE saw coming.
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