Underpants On The Outside

Some of you may have noticed on Monday around 10 PM EST that the universe had not imploded.  If anything, it seemed to be functioning perfectly.  Perhaps you were happy; perhaps your next thought was “Fuck!  Now I gotta go to work.”

Turns out, the world was saved by Passover.  I went to a friend’s house and didn’t get home until late, preventing me from watching Jack Bauer in real time, the resulting paradox of which would have torn the universe in half, if I’m understanding “Back to the Future” correctly.  Still I’m thinking about waiting until 10 PM to watch tonight’s episode on DVR.  I’m crazy like that.  I live on the edge.

But never mind what I was doing last week.  Sometime between Cups of Wine #2 and #3 (of four, I’ll explain), Jack was getting ready for the next of his one-hour adventures.   Remember, when we last saw our hero, he had just made his first successful apprehension of the day, though he needed the help of a heavily (and poorly acted) autistic character to do it.   Still, a win is a win, and here at the Underpants we’re all about positive reinforcement.

Jack’s Day, 9-10 PM:  As to be expected in these matters, the Russian is ready to give up the terrorist, in exchange for immunity and not to be extradited.  Unfortunately Jack doesn’t have bullets that can accomplish either of those things, which means he’s forced to call Buchanan.   Then Buchanan shows why he’s the boss, saying, “It’s your call, Jack”.  I get the feeling that if Buchanan were a real person, there would be a lot of self-help books on his bedside table.   Buchanan also tells Jack that the Vice President is challenging the President’s ability to perform his duties, since the President was blown up, placed in a coma, and now doesn’t want to nuke a made-up Middle Eastern Country.  Then Jack notes that if there is a challenge to the Presidency, it would invalidate the immunity agreement.  That makes no logical sense.  I call shenanigans, and this is precisely why I get my legal advice from Law and Order, not 24.  Jack also adds, “Bill, I need you to understand that I have no intention of honoring this agreement.”  

Personally, I’m not okay with this.  Jack just endangered a mentally disabled guy, now he’s relying on a chintzy legal loophole (that doesn’t even exist).  Furthermore, he just explicitly indicated that his honor isn’t important.  I think this is a big mistake.  We like characters like Dirty Harry and Batman because while they’re willing to break the law in the pursuit of justice, it’s only because the law doesn’t align with they know to be right and wrong.  But this is just wrong.  The writers keep beating us over the head with the theme of ends justifying means, and they seem pretty determined to see how far that can take them.  Since the terrorists no longer can use the unmanned drones, I suggest they strap the nukes to baby seals trained to swim to Catalina.  I want to see Jack racing around on a Jet Ski with a baseball bat in his hand, desperately trying to club the seals before it’s too late.  Or maybe he’d just cause an oil spill.  Whatever it takes.

Back from my rant, I want to point out that I like how Jack finishes his conversation with Buchanan: “Bill, draw up the papers.”  Okay, so maybe Buchanan is a glorified secretary now, but give him a break; he’s only halfway through the Six Secrets of Successful Supervisors.

9:28:  The paperwork finally comes through.   I think Bill took an extra long time to passive-aggressively get back at Jack for ordering him around.  I also suspect Jack passed the time by wandering down the block, kicking down random doors and torturing everyone over the age of six to make sure they don’t know anything about the nukes.  The ends justify the means, after all.

With his immunity agreement in hand, the General calls the Terrorist, who wants to meet at the Santa Monica Pier.  Finally, they pick some Los Angeles location that I’m familiar with and can therefore be considered important in this space.  But it’s not a happy place: my dad once appeared in an episode of Knight Rider where his character was shot and killed at the Pier, and in high school I’d take girls there so I could fail to make out with them (actually, the Pier was just one of several locations like this.)  I have to believe this is a bad omen.  But whatever goes wrong for Jack here, he should at least go grab a corn dog from Hot Dog on a Stick; their deliciousness will help calm his anxiety about his virginity.  So I’ve heard.

Jack calls into CTU to find out how long Ricky Schroeder would take to get there, but Buchanan says it’ll be at least 30 minutes, leading me to believe that Schroeder snuck off to Vegas.  Jack says “We’ll take Ryan’s team.”  Hey, way to go Ryan!  Not only have we seen how successfully your team has worked with Jack, but by calling you by your first name, Jack has officially given you “Curtis” status, with all the privileges that implies.  One suggestion: find out if CTU offers a bullet-proof turtleneck.  Trust me. 

To monitor the general, Ryan hooks him up with a wire and injects a radioactive isotope into his arm that CTU can track from a satellite.   Then they send him down the pier, which is deserted even though it’s 9:30 and that place has a merry-go-round* and an arcade.  Terrorism, shmerrorism; half the population of my high school (SAMO – Go Vikings!) would still be there, including me, trying to convince Samantha N. that tonight could be our last night on Earth.

The Russian meets the Boss Terrorist in a warehouse/workshop room that I’m pretty sure doesn’t exist on the pier.  I appreciate that they’re trying to use actual L.A. landmarks, I just wish they’d use them accurately – you can’t go to Santa’s Village and call it Disneyland.  When he walks in, the General shows the terrorists his wire, which he then disables.  Apparently he had no intention of honoring his agreement either.   

Jack knows something is up.  Given the way today has gone, things are going WAY too smoothly.  CTU says they’re getting no audio off of the wire, but they still place the Russian in the nonexistent warehouse.  Jack barges in, only to find…the Russian’s severed arm.  I’d say the bar of baddassery has just been raised significantly; so much so that it took me hours to wonder where these guys found the hatchet lying next to the arm.  Either one of the lumberjacks building the pier dropped it and no one noticed it for 98 years, or one of the terrorists was never told not to bring a hatchet to a nuclear bomb fight.   I just hope he turned to the other guys and said, “See??? I TOLD you my lucky hatchet would come in handy!  Someone owes me an apology.”

9:47: Jack follows the trail of blood, revealing one of probably many flaws of the, “Step one: cut off my arm.  Step two we’ll figure out later” plan.    Unfortunately Jack’s way is blocked by two henchmen with automatic rifles. 

Jack gets pinned down.  “Ryan, where are you?”  Ryan, it’s your first day; don’t make Jack regret giving you Curtis status already.  Jack gets tired of waiting and kills the two guys himself, one with a head shot and his first official Amazing Feat of Marksmanship.  Ryan is nowhere to be seen.

Interesting twist.  The Russian and the Boss Terrorist wander into a bar.  Everyone’s watching the news, when the Russian suddenly gives the terrorist up, escaping while the bar patrons kick the bejeezus out of him.  That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.   He just cut off his left arm to keep from giving up Fayed, now he’s just going to sell him down the river anyway?  I told you that plan wasn’t very well thought-out. 

Jack rushes in to put a stop to the beating, making that two apprehensions in as many hours (although he did technically lose the first one), not to mention a guaranteed torturing in the near future. 

For the hour:

• Kills: 2
• Amazing Feats of Marksmanship: 1
• Apprehensions (Gross): 1
• Apprehensions (Net): 0

Meanwhile the Russian stumbles down to the beach, where he dies beneath the pier.  To review; he was safe in custody, cut off his arm to avoid betraying Fayed, betrayed Fayed, then died from blood loss.  Over the same 2-3 hours, President Wayne’s life was endangered by his sister bringing him out of an induced coma prematurely so he could stop the Vice President from launching a nuclear strike.   Then he had to fend off a potential coup by his VP, and now that everything is fine again…he orders the nuclear strike.  I actually guffawed when his aid said, “This makes no sense, sir!”  Something tells me this scene played itself out in the writer’s room:

“What?  The President is launching the strike?  This makes no sense!” 

“Good line.  We’ll use it.” 

“No, I actually meant it makes no sense.” 

“Oh.  Then you’re fired.   I don’t need that kind of negative attitude; what I need is an episode where Jack saves Kim from drowning in the La Brea tar pits.  Make it happen, people.”

My Day, 9-10 PM:  As I said before, Monday was the start of Passover, the holiday where Jews celebrate being freed from slavery in Egypt as described by the book of Exodus and Charleton Heston.  The way we celebrate it is by having a Seder, the ceremonial dinner where the story of Exodus is told.  Seder is Hebrew for ‘order’, referring to the many different parts of the meal, with readings, and prayers and storytelling…and wine.  At least four cups of it, to be exact.  They’re mandatory.  And the thing is, two of those cups come before the meal, which doesn’t happen until pretty late in the night.  I’m sure a lot of you know the effects of combining alcohol, empty stomachs and sitting still, so it shouldn’t surprise you when I say that every single Seder I’ve ever been to has featured a point where the whole thing jumps the tracks and someone’s making jokes about how genital crabs really seems like it ought to have been one of the ten plagues, because really, what’s so bad about frogs falling from the sky. 

Ever since I moved to New York, I’ve spent Passovers with my friend Sarah and her family.  It’s an interesting change, because her family is more observant than I am accustomed to.  They also often substitute plum brandy for the wine, and consequently, Monday’s Seder jumped the tracks even sooner than most.  While Jack Bauer was hot on the trail of a bloody one-armed Russian, I was being made fun of by a dozen people because in my telling of the story of Moses’ speech impediment (he had one, really), I mispronounced the word “brazier” like the word “brassiere”.   I could only shout, “Give me a break, they both hold delicious things!”

For the hour:

• Beats me.  Did you not read about the plum brandy???

*In my experience it was really more of a platonically-go-round.