24 Recap: Tarin Up My Heart

If we had any emotional attachment to the characters in this season of 24, last night’s episode would have been gut-wrenching. Unfortunately, it’s hard to feel that bad for characters that we just met. ‘Tis the problem with the eighth iteration of a show that was considered “revolutionary” for killing off main characters with just a flick of the writer’s wrist. That being said, we had three scenes that were supposed to be emotional this episode (an episode that looked like it was filler for what comes next)—let’s take a look at those three scenarios:

In a chamber of Marcos' heart (or, at least, the hospital)

The planning of the terrorists on 24 is so meticulous. They not only bring the bomb and the detonator with them, but they also bring a cellphone and a magic marker in case they have to trap themselves in a hyperbaric chamber and get instructions to manually detonate the bomb and kill themselves to escape capture. And Marcos was no different. Apparently an amazing sketch artist, Marcos had drawn up a schematic of the wiring of the bomb in the few minutes between last episode and this episode on the walls of the chamber.

Nothing Jack could say would sway the young man from wanting to rig this device to blow himself up and when Jack found out it would take the entire episode to drill through the chamber*, he knew he needed to find another way in—the kid’s mom. It ends up that Marcos father was from the Fake Islamic Republic and he committed suicide after being imprisoned and losing his ability to find jobs. Marcos decided to become a spy for the country after his father died so he too could be imprisoned er, so he could become a terrorist for his country.

*Side Note: They tell Jack that it would take 40 minutes to drill through and instead of telling them to get started ASAP, they wait about 40 minutes to start drilling. So with 10 minutes left to go in the episode, they send out the drill team. Genius. Maybe if they would have started sooner…oh well, sorry Marcos.

But it ends up little Marcos was not only born in the United States and has a mother who is American, but he also is a huge momma’s boy. Kid never left the teat. It ends up Marcos, a terrorist ideologue with ideas about “making America pay”, has a soft spot in that hardened heart and Jack wants to try to exploit it.

First Jack sends in Marcos’ mother to try to reason with him. In a very touching speech (or it would have been touching had we had even a few more episodes of emotional attachment with these characters) his mom and him talk about their lives and what he’s doing and why he’s doing it and…well it doesn’t work, because Marcos tells her it’s too late to stop him and he needs to do this. Sorry mom.

Also “sorry mom” because Jack Bauer is not OK with this result. He goes in to speak to Marcos one last time and lays down this bomb for the kid with the bomb vest: “You detonate that vest, your mother dies too.” In a way that Jack has done before (Season 3 where he threatens to throw Stephen Saunders daughter in the infected hotel), Jack makes the chemical threat very real and very familiar for the terrorist by threatening to kill his family. Instead of faceless/nameless Americans, this is one that hits quite close to home for those hell-bent on hurting us.

“But”, Marcos says, “you wouldn’t do that because you’re a federal agent!” Nuh-Uh! “The truth is I’m not really,” snaps back Jack and then tells him with all the things that have happened in his life, he’s not bluffing. Jack is threatening Marcos in a way that only Jack seems to be able to. I still think he was bluffing, but Marcos didn’t know that, and despite the fact that he had the vest all rigged up, he decided to come out of the chamber. But, unfortunately for Marcos, his terrorist friends had used “the failsafe” and remotely detonated the bomb. But luckily for Jack, the terrorists wanted to give everyone a warning before the bomb went off and installed a one-minute timer. Jack tried to disarm the bomb, but realizing he couldn’t, he threw Marcos back into the chamber where the bomb exploded and Marcos’ guts and blood were spread all over the place. But right before he did, he gave Jack one great lead...

Tarin up my heart when I’m with you

The big reveal is that Tarin—the erstwhile head of Hassan’s security who Hassan suspected of plotting against him—is the mastermind of this new plot against New York (I called that one). But before he can “seek asylum”, he has very hot, very sweaty sex with Hassan’s daughter (just one more time for good measure). In the middle of their talk (where, by the way, she magically stop sweating as profusely within seconds), the Hassans, reunited at the United Nations, call but Tarin stops his woman from answering. Alarm bells or lovers peace?

Well, it should have been alarm bells. Also alarm bells? How Hassan was so right about Tarin, despite the fact that his wife (ex-wife?) is berating him “for losing his way.” Um, lady, you don’t talk that way to a paranoid dictator who just arrested a ton of people. Omar will have you arrested too. Or maybe not. He agrees with her and decides to contact the police. But amazingly, no one can find her*.


*Side Note: OK, 24, this is getting insane. You can’t trace her cell phone? Seriously? If it was on the whole time, they should have been able to track exactly where she was. CTU is seriously lacking on the technological obviousness this season. I can just see the headlines now: “next week on 24, a computer in CTU is frozen…but Chloe saves them by pushing Ctrl+Alt+Delete at the last second!” or “in two weeks on 24, the Nintendo is not working…but Jack saves the day by blowing on the cartridge.” Seriously, people, get with the program.

That is, until Tarin decides to go take a shower (you have to be clean for terrorist activities). Hassan’s daughter finally contacts them and finds out who Tarin really is. But after initial suspicion that it’s just her father’s crazy paranoia, Hassan’s daughter realizes that this man is, in the words of former NFL head coach Dennis Green, “not who we thought he was.” But she quickly alerts them that she is at the Theodore Hotel: Suite 514. Jack and FP jr. (more on the latter in a bit) are en route, but 20 minutes out. Methinks that will be just enough time for Tarin to get out of there.

Quickly reaching Worst.Sideplot.Ever. status

That of course is FP jr. and Denny who not only are killing us with their accents but with their logic as well. At this point, we rather be Kevin Wade and be slowly sinking to the bottom of the lake. Well, instead of watching this drivel at least. They start the episode (in new clothes) by talking about their relationship. FP jr. seems to be the only one with half a brain in his head when he says “we’re in the middle of a radiological threat—we have jobs to do.” I mean he does it with an accent that makes you think he’s a retard like Rainman (Hangover reference right there), but at least someone said it. I was upset this logic wasn’t flushed out a few episodes ago when he chased Denny into the woods, but at least he’s coming around now.

Denny, on the other hand, is still a mess. And not even a hot mess like Freckles (who was upsettingly absent from this episode). Denny was demoted and now works for Chloe and is in charge of monitoring the radiation censors (oh, lovely idea). Everyone is being nice to Denny including Chloe who wishes her the best and Arlo The Horndog, who also wishes her the best…in bed. The other person giving her some praise was Bubba who says that he saw her as a leader and good under pressure…unless he misread her. Well, Bubba, hate to break it to you, but you are a terrible judge of character. I think Chief Wiggum from The Simpsons is more qualified at this point to be running CTU. Especially your idea to let the terrorists into Manhattan so that you can get back the nuclear material. Just let them detonate it in Queens; it’s not like the Mets were healthy anyways!

I kid, I kid. But while the radiation censors are not disabled yet (and that was a very ominous “yet” from the terrorists), I’m pretty sure Denny’s incompetence will be enough for the terrorists. Especially when the Ex’s probation officer, played by Milton from Office Space, calls her looking for his red Swingline stapler er, Kevin. And she freaks out, even reverting back to the Jenny accent. You had come so far, Denny! She agrees to meet with Probation Officer Milton (I mean if she doesn't, he's going to burn down the building), which of course will take her away from the office yet again and prolong a sideplot that should die with Denny's Ex. But before she meets with him, she calls FP jr. who in so many words tells her to shut the fuck up and do her job--oh and that she should be pretty good at lying at this point. ZING!

Conclusion

Although we had a big reveal and a bomb blow up, this was an episode where not much happened. It was a filler episode for what looks to be a pretty epic 24 episode next week. In fact, we had an amazing preview which told as at exactly what time things will happen next week--the first in a long history of great 24 previews (part of the success of the show is to really suck you in by the "next week on 24" part, but time cues for the audience is something totally new and totally awesome). That alone will sustain me for a week that was full of emotion-filled scenes that really failed to capture anyone's emotion. Next week, though, we look like we'll really be Tarin up someone's heart.

Season grade so far: B. I'll keep it where it was last week. It's an average season at best (so far) and I'm not willing to upgrade it any more on promise of next week. I agree with my co-worker Paul who commented to me this morning that the show has shifted for the better (it certainly has), but I'm worried that they don't have the juice to sustain this for the rest of the season. I hope I'm proven wrong.

Best line of the week: “We’re in the middle of a radiological threat—we have jobs to do”—FP jr. Perfectly delivered and perfectly relevant. I think the entire audience was sick of them not doing their jobs and it was about time they finally changed that. Jack and FP jr. out in the field with The Rookie (and hopefully Freckles) would be an amazing foursome.

Best moment of the week: Jack vs. Marcos. Talk about a showdown. Last week we had Marcos vs. the Rookie with the treat of blowing him up but this episode we had Jack and his threat against a very scared momma's boy. It was pretty awesome and scary and totally old-school-Jack. He did this in Season 2 when he fake executed a terrorists family and, as I said, he did this in Season 3 with Saunders. Just awesome to see old-school, "I do what I want" Jack back in action.

Ari's body count: 37 total. One more this week as Marcos was blown into a million little fibers er, pieces

Thoughts? Comments? Feel differently about this season? Excited for next week?

Picture from The A.V. Club