24: LEGACY 3:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. Quick Review

What if THE GODFATHER took place in the present-day? Would you swap out organized crime for jihadists? Would you make Vito Corleone some sort of Usama bin Laden-type terrorist? And would you make that person's son (Michael Corleone's character) a man who straddles the worlds of educated elites and reactionary fundamentalists? Hidden within this season of 24 is a really interesting story, and it's so far been given the least amount of attention from among the many subplots being spun simultaneously. The "bin Laden's son" character, Jadalla bin-Khalid, has potential to be a fascinating antagonist. I hope the writers pay this off because as of now, this season is running a very standard "terrorist sleeper cells" plot. Anyway, Jadalla bin-Khalid has the thumb drive, and as expected it's damaged- files are corrupt! Unreadable! But one of the terrorist IT support guys will start to fix it, I'm sure, just not within these 60 minutes.

Hugs occur in real-time.

Eric Carter and the field team arrive at CTU where Ingram is waiting to greet her old pal. It was great seeing Carter's reaction to the CTU "nerve center" and it served as a reminder that Carter isn't a special agent and he's never had a "seat at the big table." Carter is very much swimming in a bigger pond now. Grimes, fresh off his failure from scoring $2 million, is in custody at CTU, getting his scrapes and (what happened to his gunshot injuries) bruises mended while under armed guard. Mullins takes charge of some conference rooms, Edgar Stiles weirdo cousin is giving Andy (formerly known as MacBoy here) odd looks as per usual. Hey, does CTU have a Starbucks? I think I'll go wander around while you all talk about nothing in particular...

Trevor is safe at the hospital, and according to the attending physician, should make a full recovery! Praise be to Alla-oh, the Chechen Murderess is unhappy about this because Trevor is going to tell everyone that his ex girlfriend is an ax-murder/jihadist, and also that she's sleeping with the Chem Teacher who's helping her do terrorist things because... she's sleeping with him, and because he's been in some trouble for sleeping with other students... just somebody shoot that guy already. Anyway, Chechen Murderess calls her terrorist tutor for help with her terrorist homework- "How do I get Trevor dead?" Easy, just inject him with air. "But I thought air was good for people!" Not when it's put directly into the circulatory system, your organs go boom. "Cool!" As the show skips around to some nonsense with Jimmy Smits being upset over Nilaa's arrest, we eventually get to the moment where the Chechen Murderess does the deed. It was a pretty rough moment, you could see she didn't want to do it, but Trev wakes up suddenly, they have an awkward mutual choking moment and she pushes the air-filled syringe into this IV. Trev dies (again). If he's resuscitated next week, I will look up his character's actual name and start referring to him by it. Ha, no, I won't.

What's a Twitter?

Oh yea, I mentioned Jimmy Smits! For a candidate, he has hardly anyone around him- are we sure he's running for president of the United States and not a local bowling league? Well, Senator Smits sees a video that proves Nilaa told him the truth about the run-in she had with a militant imam at a local mosque several years ago. This emboldens Smits to believe his beleaguered campaign manager even though Ingram has some video, which Major Dad and Uncle Luis doctored, that puts Nilaa in a building when CTU's files on Carter's team were compromised. Within a record amount of time, 24 turns this subplot into a confrontation- between Smits and Major Dad. And Major Dad confesses that he was the one who sold out Carter's squad. Why did you do it, Major Dad, and don't say it was to get your son elected! It turns out that Jadalla bin-Khalid pulled a Michael Corleone and blackmailed Major Dad into giving him the intel on the Army Rangers in exchange for not telling the press that Major Dad's company bought oil from terrorists.

Okay, let's stop here for a moment.

A few minutes have gone by since I typed the last sentence because I don't know what to write next about this subplot-- it's just stupid. I hope there's another layer to this that we haven't seen that makes this suddenly plausible. If this is all there is to Major Dad's betrayal, then let's agree to not dwell any further on what the writers have cooked up.

A delightful and ridiculous series of events happens back in the projects when Carter's wife, Nicole, gets the drop on Aisha and one of her goons. Nicole gets the upper hand by running, jumping, hitting people in the head and picking up their guns. Nicole finally gets to call Isaac and tell him that Aisha betrayed him to Royo and that bad stuff is going to happen to Isaac at their meeting. Isaac does a great thing next- he gets off the phone, steps up to Royo and bluffs his way out of certain death by saying "So, before we do this drug deal, I want you to know that I know that you're going to try to kill me, but I have people with guns on you right now, so if I die, you die too." Royo backs down, and the fellas complete their original transaction.  The drug trade in the Virginia area goes on uninterrupted, so let's all celebrate that outcome!

Oh, Aisha and her goon escape as the police arrive to arrest Nicole for self-defense- and for murdering a broken down car's window with a gunshot too. Isaac will later grease the two officers who detained her, which leads to a semi-intimate moment between Nicole and Isaac that ends with Nicole giving him the cold shoulder. Ah, what the heck is this going to end up being about anyway? I vote for Nicole and Isaac getting matching "I'm with stupid" t-shirts next week, maybe hit up a photo booth at the mall, share a Cold Stone sundae. COME ON WHY IS THIS EVEN A SUBPLOT?!

Back at CTU, emotionally intelligent Eric Carter gets Grimes to open up about stuff, and it turns out there's a local arms dealer named "Gabriel" who might have a lead on the Corleo- err, bin-Khalid family's whereabouts. Cool! So let's get Grimes in the field and have Carter go along with him to make contact with Gabriel. All they need is something to give Gabriel, to make their meeting worthwhile- how about the schematics to some highly classified weapons system? Sure, great plan! Mullins kills it, as well he should, the second it's proposed to him by Carter. My question though is this: why not give Gabriel fake plans so that even if it falls into the wrong hands, they end up never working? I'd be so great in CTU meetings! "Hey, yeah, in the back! Why don't you give Gabriel the plans to that Samsung phone that kept blowing up last year? Yeah! No, I don't have any security clearance, but did you all know there's a Starbucks in the North wing of the building?"

Is that kid watching me? Hey, where did you get that Iced Macchiato?!

Carter talks with Ingram after everyone conveniently leaves the room and they agree to break the rules AGAIN and steal real plans from the CTU server so he and Grimes (who's under arrest still) can go on the lam and find Gabriel. Dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb and dumb. So, Andy sends the plans to Carter's phone, Carter starts punching CTU people and he takes Grimes to the basement to hotwire a CTU vehicle and off they go into the early-afternoon Virginia traffic to find themselves an arms dealer. I still like Carter, but he's been suckered by the writers into yet another ridiculous scenario. Oh yeah, he's still got that CarterClutch™ too, he loves that bag! I haven't identified the brand yet, but when I do, I'll share it here.

CarterClutch™: The Mystery Bag of 2017

Did I miss anything else of note? Sorry, this wasn't a tremendously interesting episode.