24: Chloe to the Rescue

I’d love to tell you how great it was to see Chloe take center stage for the first time in a long time, but we all know she’s not good with praise.

Instead, I’ll save my kudos for an hour of “24” that had our hero in the middle of an intense gunfight for the better part of an hour, yet managed to make a darkened, powerless CTU seem like THE exciting place to be.

And I suppose I’ll also talk about that stupid twist in the end.

The hour picked up with CTU hurting from the detonation of the electromagnetic pulse bomb. Since CTU offices are already pretty dark to begin with, having the lights out didn’t make much of an aesthetic difference. (Maybe they’re intentionally dark so that, in the event of an EMP, CTU employees will be able to continue working because they’re accustomed to having no light.)

Still, CTU needed to get its power back so they could track the nuclear rods. Jack called the national NSA office, which sent over Frank Haynam from NSA’s New York office and possibly the biggest dickhead in the history of this show. Honestly, this guy made Brian Hastings from earlier this season look like Mr. Congeniality. (Unlike Chloe, I don’t believe Haynam is “probably an ok guy when he’s not at work” — he’s probably a prick to his family too.)

Chloe had an (admittedly riskier) idea to get CTU’s power back quicker (the buzz term of the episode was “trunk line”) so they could assist Jack, but Haynam bristled and eventually had her removed. That led Chloe to force Haynam out of the room at gunpoint so she could try her own method. Haynam got Hastings (who Haynam had rubbed the wrong way earlier) and demanded to have her arrested. Chloe begged for 10 minutes to complete her work, leading to a genuine applause moment when Hastings backed her up.

Sure, Hastings’ about-face may seem a little unbelievable to some. We have to keep reminding ourselves that, even though we’ve been watching these people for months, it’s only been a few hours in the characters’ lives. So having Hastings do this 180 and support Chloe may ring false to some. However, I’m perfectly happy to accept this turn of events because, over the last few hours/episodes, Hastings has proven himself to be thick, but not so thick that he won’t listen to a good suggestion. More specifically, the Hastings character seems to have learned what we at home already know — you should always listen to Jack and Chloe. (Or maybe I was just happy to see Haynam taken down a few notches.)

Then there’s Chloe, who was completely at her best last night. She brought the sour face and the biting quips (telling Dana she’d be a lot further along if she stopped talking to her), but she also demonstrated that undying, almost puppy-like loyalty to Jack.

It turned out that Jack needed all the help he could get.

Jack, Cole, Young Agt. Owen, and Anonymous CTU Agent Who was Destined to Do Something Stupid and Get Himself Killed got pinned down by Samir’s men as Samir and Tarin attempted to get the rods across the East River.

Samir had jammed the field team’s cell phones, so Jack’s only hope was to reach a semi conveniently-placed hard line phone. They seemed well on their way there in a Jack-designed barrier until Anonymous Guy freaked out, got himself shot and basically led to a recreation of the Vin Diesel sniper scene from “Saving Private Ryan.” Agt. Owen, God bless his poopypants little heart, tried to save Anonymous Guy, but ended up getting mortally-wounded himself. (It sucks to not be as famous as Kiefer Sutherland and Freddie Prinze Jr. when there’s a firefight going down!) Oh well, at least Agt. Owen died under the belief that he’d saved Anonymous Guy. And at least Anonymous Guy died being an idiot.

Eventually, Jack himself drew fire from the bad guys (Kiefer’s the star of the show, so none of the bullets pierced his armor) and was about to get shot in the head until Renee re-entered this season’s storyline. (Chloe had actually called her and asked her to help before.) Mostly, I was just glad Jack and Renee didn’t take that opportunity to talk about their “relationship.” Unfortunately, Samir, Tarin and the rods made it across the river and into the city, setting the stage for the nuclear threat that will likely dominate the next few hours.

Samir and Co. will likely have help from the latest (though certainly not greatest) CTU mole — Dana Walsh!

Remember a few weeks ago when I said the two components of a great twist are 1.) that it’s surprising and 2.) that it makes perfect sense in hindsight? Well, the Dana-is-a-mole development sadly only fills one of these requirements. I was certainly surprised, but the reason I didn’t see it coming is because it doesn’t make any damn sense!

We learned of Dana’s betrayal after she strangled parole officer Bill Prady and stored him in an incredibly convenient corpse-sized grate in the room where Prady was waiting to speak to Hastings. (I mean, seriously, is that space specifically there to hide dead bodies? Why else would that be there?!)

Dana whipped out her phone (to call Cole, we presumed), but instead she phoned Samir to tell him her problem had been taken care of. If Dana was the IRK’s mole in CTU all along, why wouldn’t THEY deal with the Kevin Wade/Bill Prady saga, instead of having Dana risk her cover by going on all these dangerous side missions? Also, I know CTU’s HR department is a joke, but are we really meant to believe they hired someone who had a hidden criminal past AND ties to a terrorist organization?!

I hate to be cynical, but it seems to me like the writers realized the Dana Walsh saga was bombing in a big way and desperately came up with way to tie her to the season’s main storyline. I hope I’m wrong.

So what’d you think of this episode? Are you ok with the Dana Walsh twist? Are Chloe and Hastings besties now? Finally, is it possible for Samir to have less of a personality?