Episode Report Card M. Giant: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Mayer, Mayer Not
By M. Giant | Season 7 | Episode 14 | Aired on 03.16.2009
Just then there's a knock on the front door of the house, and a loud voice calling for Senator Mayer and identifying himself as Metro PD. Kiefer tells Mayer not to move and goes to the study door, drawing his knife. But Mayer stops Kiefer. "You're obviously onto something," Mayer says, and suggests Kiefer get help from the police instead of running from them. Kiefer reminds him that he's wanted for Burnett's murder, but Mayer offers to protect Kiefer and order the cops to help. "We'll keep the circle small," he promises. "It's time for you to start trusting the institutions that you sacrificed so much to protect." "Trust isn't my greatest asset," Kiefer understates. "Son, you have to start somewhere," Mayer tells him. You know, it's funny: I thought Kiefer could always tell whether someone's lying to him, as long as he's torturing them. I've got it: Mayer can offer to let Kiefer torture him, and then Kiefer will know if he's lying or not. But nobody on this show ever listens to my suggestions. After a long pause, during which there's more knocking and shouting at the door, Kiefer tells Mayer to let the officer in. It's all going to be okay now, right? But when Mayer goes to the door, while Kiefer watches from the end of the hallway, he opens it to find Quinn on his doorstep, gun at the ready, with which he shoots Mayer three times. Oh, yeah, Quinn has a police scanner. Dude, this is the kind of security a United States Senator gets? Some guy with a BFG can stand on his doorstep for like two minutes and nobody notices? Especially today? Apparently so. "No!" Kiefer roars, all echoey like Luke Skywalker. Quinn steps into the house and opens fire on Kiefer, who dives through the handy French doors behind him and into the dark yard. Quinn pursues, as Kiefer scrambles over a garden wall. But Quinn has to drop back and duck behind a tree when he sees the real cops come screaming up the nearby road. He ducks behind a tree to wait for them to pass, then continues the pursuit, trying to make up the head start that Kiefer got. It's 9:48:36. But why is Quinn trying to kill Kiefer, anyway? I thought the plan was to frame him, and you can't frame a dead dude. At least not without rigging up some way of making it looked like he committed suicide with an entire clip from an automatic weapon.
At 9:53:02, Olivia enters the Oval Office to see her mother behind her desk, and Ethan standing next to her, both looking pretty severe. "You wanted to see me?" she chirps. Taylor calls her "Livvie" again and says that Ethan kind of just tattled on her about the leak to the media. Olivia calmly denies it, but Taylor says Ethan isn't convinced. "I need to hear what you have to say," Taylor tells her daughter. Ethan says, "There's nothing she can say, Madam President. She was one of the few people who knew all the details." Oh, stop acting like the sanctimonious older brother, Ethan. It doesn't suit you. "More people knew than you think," Olivia tells him. She adds that she's been on the phone to CNB, who says the leak came from the federal marshal's office. Oh, yeah, those guys. Ethan asks if this can be verified. Olivia offers up a slip of paper that she says has the name and phone number of the CNB producer. She adds that she offered the producer some exclusive time with Taylor in exchange for killing the story, and he accepted. A juicy story like that? Man, Taylor's going to have to sleep over at his house to pay that off. "So as long as we get Bauer in custody, we should be able to keep the fallout contained," says Olivia. So she not only denied creating the problem, she solved it. Which is more than Ethan even tried to do. Shrewd. Taylor is now smiling proudly up at her daughter, and tells Ethan that it looks like he was wrong. Ethan can only apologize. "I'm sorry, Olivia, if I misjudged the situation. And you." His second apology of the hour goes unacknowledged, and Taylor dismisses him from the room at 9:55:02. She apologizes to Olivia, who says, "I just hope they find Bauer before this gets any worse." I just hope someone actually calls that producer to verify Olivia's story.