Hour 5: Magic Dummy Gets Acting Lessons!

Well, late again. Sorry about that, folks. I'll try to get these in sooner. Don't count on it.

Overall, I'd give the ep a "so-so" or a "fair to middlin.'" Some observations.

1. Is it me or did Annie Wersching, who plays Renee Walker, take Drama 101 over the summer? WHOA! I was actually pretty riveted during her faceoff with Vladimir. That final scene was quite thrilling.

Of course, it wasn't like we haven't been here before. That scene was reminiscent of just about every season when someone sits there with a gun either to the forehead or... (not sure what the back of your head is called; let's call it "asshead") ...the asshead and dares the gunman to pull the trigger. Usually, the tense standoff culminates with Jack (even in the midst of giving himself CPR) miraculously saving the day.

Unless, of course, you're Ryan Chapelle from Season 3. Then your day is screwed. Big time.

Still, kudos to Wersching for getting it done. Can't imagine her being able to pull it off last season.

2. I'm convinced that Oleg (Bazhaev's son, Josef's brother, which doesn't really clarify anything) doesn't have radiation poisoning. It made the scene a LOT funnier for me to imagine that Oleg, in between breaking kneecaps, dancing the bottle dance from Fiddler on the Roof, and transporting weapons-grade uranium, ate at the same cheap Mexican hole-in-the-wall I did last time I visited the Big Apple.

 

Montezuma reached his long arm of revenge all the way up to NYC and into Oleg's colon!

Once again, the 24 writers rehashed another threadbare plot device. For decades I've been seeing bad guys strong-arm doctors into giving them free medical care and then off the doctors when service is rendered. Hmm. Now THERE'S your healthcare reform!

  

3. In the meantime, the country of Schadenfreude goes to hell in a handbasket.

I did like Hassan's comment to the Prez that power is the only thing his people understand. We'll see how the whole power struggle plays out, especially with Jason Schwartzman trying to snag the uranium, seen here doing some fancy pointy hand moves.

4. Best comic moment of the evening: Renee offering to drive Ziya and herself to Vladimir's.

For God's sake, you just chopped off the man's thumb with a circular saw! How thoughtful of you.

All is not lost. Ziya's thumb can, in fact, be repurposed...

...into a very personalized swizzlestick. Sadly Mr. Swizzlestick ended up in a bigger drink than he wanted.

5. Ex-squeeze me?! Did I just hear Jack calling Renee unstable? 

6. Why is no one at CTU worried about Dana Walsh's productivity?! Oh, I forgot, it's CTU (Clueless, Thoroughly Unprofessional), voted the worst government agency EVER. I mean, I suppose if you get the chance to get into a "discussion" with Leonardo DiCaprio from Gangs of New York, your supervisor really ought to look the other way.

Come to think of it, Dana's supervisor Hastings has other things on his mind anyway.

7. Does it bother anyone that if Evil Ex-Boyfriend Kevin is such a despicable lowlife ex-con who gets his jollies beating up women, why then does he have such good diction and enunciation? It's probably just me, but I really found his overly clear, succinct accent off-putting. It's either a case of bad directing or bad casting. I keep expecting him to break into a Shakespearean sonnet!

Next episode: Magic Dummy gets her FREAK ON!

Oh, dear. What an unfortunate picture. Does Anthony Hopkins have any idea it's floating around?

Hours 1-4: CTU Voted By Congress as THE Most High-Tech, Yet Sadly Inept Government Agency EVER

Well, here we go again, friends of 24. As you know, I sucked last season at maintaining this blog. As I'm already despondent, this may be the first AND last post.

To make it easier on myself, I've decided to streamline and post shorter posts with fewer pictures. That took a ton of time! But as you can see, I didn't keep to my guidelines very well. Sometimes inspiration just hits and suddenly the need to post a photo becomes irresistible. Say, of RuPaul...

...or a meerkat.

Anyhoo, here are some observations about the season opener, not in any particular order.

1. Does Jack's adorable little granddaughter really know what she's getting into? It won't be long before Grandpa sits little Terri down and says, "Terri, next time little Bobby Tucker pulls your hair in the playground, I want you to take this innocuous ballpoint pen and thrust it viciously into his neck like I'm doing now with your favorite dolly. If he doesn't immediately lose consciousness, you're doing it wrong. If you don't have a pen, you can either rip his esophagus out with your own teeth or break his neck with a car door. Uh-oh, here comes Mommy! If she asks, we were having a tea party."

2. No one told me Jason Schwartzman was guest-starring this season. His hair's too long.

 

3. Apparently, the regime change in the Hassans' country (insert "Iran"; to be safe, let's just call it from this point forward "Schadenfreude") is fostering radical new hairstyles, edgily harkening back to 1973.

4. Throughout the two-day, four-hour premier, I kept feeling the Ghost of 24s Plots Past tapping on my shoulder. He kept saying, in his best presidential voice, "I was the best one, you know, and now I'm selling Allstate. CAN YOU BELIEVE they used the Bomb the Presidential Motorcade trick from Season 5?!"

5. Is it me or are Dana Walsh's shoulders the size of Terry Bradshaw's? WHOA!

6. Then the Ghost of 24s Plots Past poked me in the ribs and asked, in his best presidential voice, "Does anyone really care about the convoluted, serpentine backstories of any of the characters?" By the way, Dana Shoulderpads has a past...as the character named "Starbuck" in the most recent iteration of Battlestar Galactica. 

(Yes, I realize that having not seen one episode of BG, I'm the pariah of geeks everywhere. To be a geek is bad enough, but to be a geek PARIAH...O, the humanity!)

If you're bored, look it up. TONS of 24 actors have a past with sci-fi TV, including our beloved Curtis, Charles Logan, and current President Taylor's ex-husband.

7. Will somone PLEASE tell me why Hastings hasn't once said, "Shrimp is the fruit of the sea. You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, saute it. Dey's uh, shrimp-kabobs, shrimp creole, shrimp gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried. There's pineapple shrimp, lemon shrimp, coconut shrimp, pepper shrimp, shrimp soup, shrimp stew, shrimp salad, shrimp and potatoes, shrimp burger, shrimp sandwich"!
 
 

8. So, apparently, Horace spent some of his time-traveling in Lost to end up as a Russian gangster/Queens meter maid. Once again, the writers turned to their secondhand bag of plot devices with the Shoot the Lady in the Leg trick.

9. Are you serious? A showdown on a basketball court? Three hours later, the thugs realized Mr. "Smith" had some basketball moves, unable to get him past "H" in a game of Horse.

10. Well, Freddie certainly has come a long way. 

 

11. Highlight for me from the entire four hours: Chloe's smirk. This, after telling Hastings: "No, you should thank Jack first, then Cole, then me."

12. And what about Jason Schwartzman stabbin' that dude in the neck? I didn't think he had it in him!

13. Finally, Renee Walker returns in a VERY BAD MOOD! Must've gotten a splinter putting her makeup on. After exfoliating with some 80-grit sandpaper, Renee returns to her government job only to use a circular saw to remove a guy's parole bracelet. Here we see the typically unequivocal Jack Bauer shocked at Renee's brazen jewelry removal skills. "Renee, what's gotten into you?! And why are we dressed exactly alike?"

Damn, that girl's got some BAGGAGE!