24

Alright, let's move on to the next threat! …right after we find out what it is.
In the meantime, Kanin tries to get Senator Blaine Mayer to call off the prosecution against Jack. The political tug-of-war here actually isn't that boring, and it comes to a rather hilarious end when they catch Jack torturing Ryan Burnett just several rooms away.
The Sangala invasion goes well, except Benjamin Juma's not there. Where could he be, you ask? Actually, you don't ask, because you already know he's in DC and ready to light up the night. But first he sends someone to kill Dubaku, which leads to Renee finding Juma's hideout and learning what he's planning. Too bad she's too busy swimming for her life to warn anyone at hour's end. And no, Renee getting wet is NOT the Hourly Highlight. Technically.
We spend most of the episode in the dark on Juma's target. That's the theory, anyway; the season promos did kinda ruin the surprise. But that doesn't take away from Jack returning to his torturous ways, especially since—with S7's deconstructive focus—some horror is meant to come across along with the awesomeness of watching Jack do his thing inside the WHITE HOUSE (even if he does fail to learn the target).

Hourly Highlight:
Watch the scene where Jack gets arrested… Watch the first soldier who runs in… Watch him go practically out of his way to kick a chair…and try not to wonder why.

As with the 6 previous episodes of 24, the first terrorist attack or wave of attacks are just a smoke screen for the big one that is being planned. We now learn that General Juma is planning a larger scale attack.



When Dubaku is in the hospital after the car wreck, one of General Juma's operatives injects him with something that causes cardiac arrest. The operative gets away but Renee tracks him from footage of surveillance cameras and gets his license plate number.



Cloe gets on the bad side of Janis Gold, causing Janis to dig into the what she is doing. She finds that Cloe had erased Ryan Burnett's name from the list that Dubaku had on the data device that was cut out of his side. She also unscrambles a phone call between Cloe and Jack where they discuss Burnett being removed from the list. Cloe is immediately detained by the FBI.



It is found out Senator Blaine Mayer's assistant, Ryan Burnett is one of the traitor's to his country. Jack tries to interrogate him but is stopped short of getting the needed info on the pending attack. Jack uses "his" interrogation techniques to try and get the information from Burnett, but the President,Ethan Kanin,and Senator Blaine Mayer assisted by some Marines blow down the door and stop Jack from torturing Burnett. Burnett is offered full immunity by the President and turns it down asking for his attorney.



In the end, Renee tracks down the car that the operative that killed Dubaku was driving. She finds that they are at the marina and Juma and his soldiers go out on a boat and Renee jumps on board at the last minute but gets caught by the soldier left on the boat as a guard. But not before she finds that the next target may be the White House. She jumps off the boat and swims ashore.



Juma and his band of merry me are all under water and start drilling on something.



This was a great episode with the focus of being removed from Dubaku (he's dead) onto General Juma.



No one in the government suspected that Juma was in the US, but assumed that he was in Sangala fighting back the US troops.

Jack meets Burnet in White House(who is with Juma and his soldiers)and tortures him in order to find out a valuable information: where the next target is.

Meanwhile, Renee finds Juma and his men and discover what they are planning.



This is the incredible plot of the present installment from the seventh season of 24.

This episode is really perfect and with nice points of tension that will make you scream and putting in the edge of your seat!.



The acting is perfect and the places are so great and really cool and interesting: The White House itself!.



And the ending makes you to look forward to the next installment!.

Maybe the target is a bit predictable... but it stills being perfect!.

Presentation Phase - » (8/10). The presentation ends when Jack had another crazy idea that only him can do. Juma is prepared to attack and Dubaku is killed, nice presentation.



Complication Phase - » (7/10)*2. Jack had another crazy idea that can only put him in Jail, he wants to interrogates Ryan (chief staff of Senator Myer) in the White House. Another attack will happen and this time it seems serious.



Climax Phase - » Wasn´t the time for that, the next episode will reach the climax of this plot.



Ending - » (8/10). Nice ending, a new threat that is totally new and unique in 24.



Time and Scene Management - » (6/10). This episode utilized Ryan to make the fillers and some discussion, since he is irrelevant for the attack that will happen.



Plot Details/Holes- » (10/10). Nothing that I could notice, the discussion in the White House was very good and well explored.



Surprises/Shocks/Twists - » (9/10). Here the surprises had big impact, Juma appearance is not something very surprising, but the plans for the White House is.



Suspense/Tension - » (6/10)*3. Scenes like Chloe helping Chloe with the danger of being caught or Jack torturing someone is nothing new that can deliver great tension. The tension when Jack was extracting information was good, but nothing very good or great. Renee investigation had some tension.



What I liked -» Hard to say, at least the discussions was entertaining.



What I Didn´t Liked -» Ryan as a filler.



Ryan was utilized as a filler to delay the real relevant material that will play in the next episode.

As usual, a certain amount of disbelief-suspension is required if one is to get the most out of '6pm - 7pm', but it's worth it in the end as there is a great deal of good here. While the notion that Juma has managed to hot foot it to the United States within a few hours and remain completely undetected is farcical at best, and the fact that his team's plans of their target include a gigantic image of the outside of the building itself (it might as well have a neon sign next to it reading 'this is the White House') is a bit silly, the strength of Kiefer Sutherland's more-amped-than-usual performance in the interrogation scenes and a great deal of the dialogue between he, the President and the smarmy Senator thrusts these niggles to the back of the mind. There's a delicious current of foreboding running through this episode, as the juxtaposed dramatic irony of our knowledge of Juma's presence with the refusal of the loons at the Oval Office to believe what's in front of their eyes greatly amplifies the tension and sets things up rather nicely for what is sure to be a kick ass instalment next week. It is a little frustrating that the authorities are so quick to reign on Jack's parade, forcing him to end an interrogation that is so obviously going to produce results when he has proven over and over again that he is always right, and Chloe's covert antics and subsequent arrest are eye-rolling in the extreme, but, on the whole, this is a solid effort and a major improvement on last week.

The threat is not over yet as Tony revealed to Jack at The end of the Last Hour. Jack went a little out of the way to clear Bill of the situation when stepping into the White House to try Interrogate Ryan Burnett; it didn't go according to plan as he was interrupted by the Senator and The President. Dubuku died but something wasn't right, Renee got luscious and followed a lead when viewing pictures of a man leaving the premises. Renee tracked him down and discovered General Juma was in D.C and preparing another attack. When Juma and his crew headed to the boat, she snuck around in back of them, in full light, when any of the men could have just turned around and saw her. She discovers they are planning to invade the White House, Dubaku Jr. See's this and frantically chases her in his speed boat after going overboard.

"24" remains on track with another well written and very exciting episode. Annie Wershing gives her best performance of the season as she conducts her own investigation. For the majority of time this season she has played second fiddle to Jack so it was a welcome relief to see her take the spotlight and show some guts. The scenes of Jack interrogating the Senator's aide are very well done. The dialouge between Cherry Jones and Kurtwood Smith is another reason why that particular scene works so well. I hope good things keep coming as "24" enters the second half of the season.

It's been quite a while since I've been so gripped by an episode of television, and that includes the other heavyweights such as Lost. At the end of the last episode, when Tony warns Jack of yet another impending attack, I can hardly believe how brilliantly executed the twist was. I had high hopes for day 7, and I'll be honest, I was starting to get slightly tired and concerned around hour 7/8, but as promised, and like a good film or book, the writers are proving they know what they're doing with this day. They really seem to have learnt from their mistakes and used the extra time to their advantage, and aren't we all thankful. The writing has entered a different league; the characters are vivid and excellently acted, the plot is believable while being constantly interesting and relevant, the parallels between Jack/Renee, the antithesis of Jack/Mayer, the pressures on the President and understanding that doing the wrong thing for the right reasons can be both right and wrong, but can also breed destruction. I paticularly enjoy watching Renee, such an expressive face, relatable character and a brilliant actress. who can imagine 24 without her? I do hope she survives the day.

One of the great examples of how television can be done correctly. This is why we watch TV. The episode had it all: character development (the awkward placement of Jack next to the Prez), action (speaks for itself), and brutal, thought-provoking plot. Who could not help but wonder how he or she would have handled the situation that played out at the end of the episode. Who could not help but hope and prey that character after character would end up safe, or would succeed in being able to thwart the enemy? All sins from season six are nor forgiven in by book.

(Note: This review covers the first half of the Monday night mid-season event. The second half will be covered under a subsequent review.)



This episode is essentially the culmination of all the discussion on the use of torture and other unusual interrogation tactics since the season premiere, and for some, that is something to be celebrated. Others will grind their teeth at the very thought that the debate is even taking place. Reactions fall along general political lines, which only seems to heighten the tension.



Setting aside the simplicities of the "24" universe, where every tortured individual is the right person with the right answers at the right time, pragmatism dictates that the ideals of reasonable coercion will sometimes fail. The choice, then, is to have a select few ready to take matters further behind closed doors, or accept the consequences of the moral high ground.



Senator Mayer is portrayed as a bit more arrogant and holier-than-thou than is necessary, because it undermines the strength of his argument. He's also making this a personal vendetta for some reason, based on his desire to turn Jack into the poster boy for excessive force. Holding that kind of moral stance does not have to be a sign of weakness or the result of a personal agenda. Lawmakers and citizens object to actions on religious moral grounds all the time, and they are often equally unwilling to entertain exceptions to the rules.



It doesn't help that Jack has chosen a rather extreme measure in this case, and that he's doing it right in the White House. It's fairly ridiculous, actually, though it does manage to place Jack right in the middle of the impending action. But under the circumstances, his tactics completely undermined his message. It's almost as if the writers felt that Jack had to do something really off the wall to balance out the stridency of Senator Mayer's anti-torture rhetoric.



Jack is stopped on the brink of success, and Senator Mayer is convinced that Jack has proven his point. Worse, President Taylor has just been told that she's in for a major fight if she continues to champion Jack. Jack is sure that his methods were about to yield results, and for a moment, it appears that Taylor is going to make the difficult but pragmatic call. This being the mid-point of the season, of course, it's not that easy.



The problem is that it completely undermines the character of President Taylor. No one would mistake her for David Palmer or, as referenced in a previous review, President Roslin of "Battlestar Galactica", but she began the day with a strict "no tolerance" policy with terrorists. It's not much of a leap from there to "by any means necessary". In fact, given the knowledge that Senator Mayer would rip her to shreds for it, backing Jack would have been the more courageous option.



Instead, for reasons that are purely plot-driven, Taylor chooses to place Jack under arrest and attempt an immunity deal in exchange for information from the suspect (Burnett). This is necessary to allow Juma's attack to take place, of course, and for Jack to be proven right over the course of the rest of the season. After everything that has happened, it shouldn't be that hard for Taylor to err on the side of anti-terrorist caution.



But it all adds up to this: the terrorist attack must take place so that Jack's instincts can be proven right in the long run. The endgame still feels like the restoration of CTU as a necessary evil and Jack as a heroic (if damaged) figure.

Really good start to this two hour event which was warned by Tony in the hour before. Jack gets O'Brian to purge a name from the database, which results in Jack and O'Brian being taken down. Once O'Brian was able to purge the record, the FBI storyline became kind of boring. I didn't particularly care for O'Brian getting owned by Janice in such short of a time, but that is the nature of 24 - to do things faster then normal. Jack had the best part of this episode - trying to figure out where the next terrorist attack would be taking place. He went to the levels that he usually goes to, but right before he was able to get the answers he was looking for he was cut off by the President of the United States. The fact that all of this was going down in the white house was something I was unsure of before the episode, but for the msot part they executed it very well. 24 is a show built around a corrupted government and every administration has had someone bad in it in some way or form. Overall, really good start to the episode. Other then Renee pulling a Michael Phelps and being able to outswim a boat I thought the episode was very well done.

The cool thing about the show with the obviously Conservative bent is I felt they addressed the issue of torture very well in this episode.



And the sad truth of the matter that most people can't really face is that the answer to torture is never really as simple as yes, or even no. The answer might be maybe, and of course the maybe might be a maybe too. But of course we know Jacks's answer. And once again he was right to torture (maybe?), but I actually thought something else about it too in this one.



He was wrong. He was right to torture, but was the chokehold on his friend really that necessary? Of course it was to keep him blameless of Jack's actions. And then a few minutes later Jacks's asking Bill to join him and be a co-conspirator.



But you know what. I don't really care. That is the Jack Bauer character in a nut shell. He does all of the dirty work. Get's none of the glory and when the lawyers look at the list of things and bodies left in his wake he's asked to fall on his sword. And he just keeps missing that sword and lives to torture another day.



And I have to say the little Jack Bauer cadet named Renee Walker kind of had some cool things to do in this one too. This was a very solid episode and it is good to see the show returning to it's glory days.

I really most say this episode was really good.. the whole action, tension, development going on - it was superb. I am not sure where even start.



Jack seems to come out with even crazier plans every time and this time it is a torture in White House but he does not get the information.. but viewers does understand what is coming and it is scary - the tension the are building - everyone is removed from good position - Chloe arrested, Jack arrested.. Tony is fugitive, Bill cannot do much.. they are out of options and attack is happening..



I also liked the storyline with Renee - she really has the courage to go solo and I loved her face when she saw those schematics.