Episode Report Card M. Giant: B- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Together Again
By M. Giant | Season 4 | Episode 8 | Aired on 02.06.2005
It's 2:20:27 as Scott crashes Driscoll's ninetieth briefing of the day. AIIIEEEE!sha's in on this one, of course, because even though she wasn't invited to the earlier ones, she has to be here to advance the plot. Special Agent Breck doesn't understand why Kiefer is at the old CTU substation. Driscoll isn't entirely clear on the reasons either, and she admits she didn't talk to Kiefer directly. "Who did?" Special Agent Breck asks. "I did," says Scott. "He also asked that his whereabouts be kept strictly internal until he contacts us." He's about as subtle as Mr. Subliminal. And that's the end of the briefing. They held a whole briefing about where Kiefer is right now? How do these people catch a single terrorist, ever? The camera follows a sneaky-looking AIIIEEEE!sha back to her desk, where she pulls a little Dictaphone from her purse. "Old CTU substation in Torrance," she mumbles into it, and then puts it on a Dictaphone cradle that's apparently standard issue at CTU's desks, just in case an employee wants to frame another employee some time.
Back at Casa Patch, Kiefer and DoDder are running through the surveillance footage. Even though the tech last week clearly said that there was only one camera covering the entrance at the party where DoDder saw TerrorGringo, there's a second angle now. Good thing, too, because that's the angle where she recognizes him. Kiefer zooms in and enhances the image. That's some sweet "software" Soul Patch has. Kiefer says he's going to "run this through the D.C. office" and picks up Soul Patch's phone. SoSP is yammering away on the extension. Kiefer tattles to Soul Patch and hisses, "We can't have her making calls." Soul Patch's eyes roll so hard that they physically carry him into the bedroom at 2:22:05, where our heroes overhear something of a contretemps. The closed captioning includes the words "[thud]" and "[screams]." Soul Patch comes back out with the cordless phone in hand, which he sets down on the desk in front of Kiefer and cheerily says, "Go ahead." Yes, domestic abuse is funny when Soul Patch does it. Kiefer picks up the wired phone to make a long-distance call. Make yourself at home, dude.
The subtitles say "Department of Defense, Washington D.C." as a woman named Marcy answers. I inaccurately identified this person as a CTU employee last week, but at least I know that the DoD is housed at the Pentagon, which 24's caption crew doesn't seem to. I can't help noticing that Marcy is at one busy government office, considering it's 5:23 in D.C. Kiefer tells her he's sending the images over. You think the DoD has gMail?
Scott's reporting to DaD that they've found something on somebody's system. It was digitized and scrambled, but they were able to make out the words "CTU substation." The Redshirts are on their way. DaD thanks Scott and heads up to the DrisCube to report that there's a leak at CTU. Driscoll acts surprised, because she's relatively new here. Dad explains that the info Scott passed her is false, and tells her about the leak that led to the attack at Felsted Security. As DaD predicted, Driscoll isn't happy to hear she was kept out of the loop. "I assume you're telling me now because your sting operation yielded a result," she says pissily. "Yes, it did," he snaps. "Read that." And he throws the report down on her desk. Driscoll reads. "Where is she?" she says. "She's about to be taken into custody," says DaD. "Join me." I never noticed before that the door to the DrisCube sounds like an airlock. It's 2:23:52. At the bottom of the stairs, DaD and Driscoll meet up with Scott, who's leading a small army of Redshirts onto the floor. The camera pans over to AIIIEEEE!sha, who's just sitting on someone's desk rather than, you know, even pretending to deal with the nuclear threat. The suspense for everyone who didn't see last week's preview builds as the group approaches AIIIEEEE!sha -- and blows right past her. Special Agent Breck looks up at the group converged around her and asks Driscoll what's going on. "You're under arrest, Breck," DaD says. "For passing classified information," Driscoll adds. Breck is gobsmacked. I want her to look at them like Kevin Pollak in The Usual Suspects and sneer, "You think you brought enough guys?" Alas, she simply protests her innocence. But it does her no good; she's led bodily to a holding room as everyone stares. "Get back to work," Driscoll tells them. AIIIEEEE!sha returns to her desk with a "so there" head toss. It's 2:25:12.