24 5.10: "Day 5: 4PM - 5PM"

Written by Joel Surnow and Michael Loceff
Directed by Tim Iacofano

In which Logan struggles with the knowledge that Martha may die with the Suvarovs, while Lynn grows ever more unstable at CTU and Jack runs into an old acquaintance following a lead…


Status Report

The previous episode was filled with serious flaws in characterization, designed to mask the fact that the writers, as usual, started working out the plot on the fly once the initial story arc wound down with episode 5.8. It left Lynn on a paranoid power trip in the middle of a national crisis, Logan giving up the Russian president to terrorists, and Jack going dark again for reasons even more inexplicable than usual.

As with past seasons, the trick to reviewing the episodes is understand that each episode will inevitably include plot and character elements from the episode that came before it, and sins of the prior episode should not carry over to those that come after. Still, it makes it difficult to review an episode like this one, where the elements that didn’t work are amplified.

Logan, for instance, is even more willing to sell out every speck of the nation’s political integrity on the chance that the terrorists might release the Sentox gas against American citizens. Even having identified the most likely position for the ambush, he can’t make the call to CTU that would set in motion an effort to find or contain the terrorists.

Part of that is to ensure that Logan agonizes over the choice between Martha and the public, which is all well and good. But it’s drawn out specifically to allow the drama at CTU to unfold and resolve itself. Once again, it’s less a matter of choices having consequences as the need for a big plot point forcing decisions by the characters. Unfortunately, that means that most of the scenes with Logan were beyond repetitive and, over time, more than a little annoying.

Lynn’s paranoia continues to get the best of him, but at the same time, while people are fired for taking phone calls that are related to their job, he completely misses Audrey’s ongoing circumvention of his authority. Sure, he notices that Chloe is away from her desk, but only after Audrey has a long time to get Jack what he needs to infiltrate Omicron. Considering how Lynn was hovering over Audrey and questioning her motives, it seems odd for Audrey to have such latitude.

“Buffy” reference aside, Audrey’s continued ability to work in some dark corner of the CTU building, out of Lynn’s sight and control, really doesn’t make sense once he “catches” her working with Chloe on something he didn’t explicitly authorize. It’s true that Lynn is losing control and getting in the way, but one would expect him to be exerting that level of control more personally and more frequently.

But the point, of course, is to give Jack support just long enough to service that part of the plot, so Audrey gets all the time in the world. Thankfully, Henderson turns out to be smarter than one would expect, given the contrivances of the script. Henderson knows Jack is coming, which is something that Jack conveniently forgets later in the episode. In fact, this is one of those situation where Jack is suddenly struck by the Really Damn Stupid virus. Henderson made such a point to grab that metal file box on the way to a bunker that he supposedly hadn’t been to before. Suspicious, much?

Lynn, however, is not just a member of the Really Damn Stupid club, but also its president. He assumes, with very little information, that the chatter regarding Suvarov is unrelated to the nerve gas. This, despite the fact that the terrorists connected to the nerve gas originally demanded that the anti-terrorism accord with Suvarov be disavowed and despite the fact that they all know the terrorists were stealing the gas intending to strike Moscow. So why does Lynn aggressively dispute such a possibility?

Well, the reason is fairly clear; the writers needed an excuse for Audrey to defy Lynn directly and question his mental stability. The writers don’t completely drop the ball on this one, since Curtis gives Audrey a bit of an argument regarding the legality of the move. But it’s quite clear that Curtis is going to follow through with Audrey’s plan, and while it’s fun watching Lynn completely lose his control.

Not willing to let anyone of true conviction to remain unaffected by his cowardice, Logan resigns himself to sacrificing his wife and then asks Novick to pray with him. Frankly, Novick is equally disappointing in this episode, since his past decisions have never indicated this level of equivocation. But Novick certainly knows that this is not the right thing, even if he’s willing to support it for political reasons.

In a scene that is more satisfying than it has any right to be, Lynn is removed from power and Buchanan quickly undoes as much of the damage as possible. This only serves to underscore the fact that Lynn’s power trip was designed to serve the needs of the plot. Once the story no longer needed Jack to be on his own or the motorcade to be an irrevocable target, all the results of the paranoia are reversed and everything’s back to status quo. It’s more than a little annoying, because it’s something that seems to happen even season.

Pierce was looking like an obvious red-shirt when he joined the motorcade, so it’s slightly surprising to see him survive the assault. That said, the dynamics of the attack are designed to ensure that certain people survive. That RPG should have taken out the armored car with relative ease, for instance. Never mind that the terrorists line themselves up rather conveniently for Pierce to counterattack!

Meanwhile, Jack steps into such an obvious trap that one wonders if he was knocked senseless by that stun gun. Far more questionable, however, is the idea that Jack could use the explosion to open the bunker door while hiding from the explosion under a floor panel. He’s trapped inside a bunker! It’s designed to contain explosives!

Worse is Henderson’s assumption that CTU doesn’t have enough evidence to pin anything on Omicron. Perhaps they didn’t, but killing Jack on their premises using an explosive that is clearly a bomb will all but implicate Omicron in the terrorist plot. And Henderson seems to forget that if Jack was investigating based on some evidence, which CTU still has. However one chooses to interpret it, Henderson should know better than to think he’s in the clear.

By the end of the episode, the situation is essentially the same as it was two episodes earlier, which brings up an interesting question: just what was the point of the past two episodes? Now it’s not Erwich threatening to release the gas on Americans, but is it really any different for Bierko to be making the threat? The one obvious lead has evolved into another obvious lead, and all that’s happened in the meantime is a moral collapse for a questionable president and a mental collapse by a questionable bureaucrat. Since both collapses required the characters to make extreme and illogical choices to service the plot, it all seems like a waste.

But how much of the problem was the status quo delivered by the previous episode, and how much can be attributed to this specific installment? If one takes the situation with Lynn and Logan at face value, then they act more or less consistent with that situation. It’s a question of extremes. More damning, however, is Jack’s inexplicable trust of Henderson and the manner in which he survives. It’s a better episode than the previous installment, but there’s still quite a bit of room for improvement.


Final Analysis

Overall, this episode is an incremental improvement on the previous installment, but many of the same annoying and questionable plot elements remain at the forefront. Some events come full circle, which makes some choices seem pointless in the process, and Jack in particular seems to be out of character. Once again, the lack of planning by the writing staff leads to sloppy storytelling.

Writing: 1/2
Acting: 2/2
Direction: 2/2
Style: 1/4

Final Rating: 6/10

Season Average (as of 5.10): 6.9