Episode Report Card M. Giant: B | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Poison
By M. Giant | Season 7 | Episode 15 | Aired on 03.23.2009
10:29:44. A whole commercial break later, Carl finally reaches the front gate, where Stokes gives him a hard time about how long it took him to get there. Stokes seems pretty angry about it, too. But what we're going to learn about Stokes this hour is that he's angry about everything, all the time. Carl nervously asks Stokes for the routing documents as he opens the gate. Stokes can tell he's nervous, and asks in a not-so-friendly way, "How's your wife?" Carl says she's fine, and he didn't tell her or anyone else about this. "Why would I?" he asks rhetorically. Stokes angrily wonders why Carl seems so nervous. Carl stammers that he was expecting a simple pickup, and here's Stokes with a small army. He claims he just doesn't want to get caught, is all. Stokes tells him it's cool, then orders everyone into the vehicles -- including Carl. Carl weakly protests that he should finish his rounds, but Stokes insists. Angrily.
Watching from the window, Kiefer mutters, "Dammit." "Forget about him, Jack," Tony advises. "He was dead the minute he stepped out that door. You and I both know that." Even if it did take him a full five minutes to amble from the shack to the front gate that's less than a hundred yards away. At 10:31:47, the three trucks rumble onto the lot: two SUVs sandwiching a semi tractor without a trailer. I guess they're going to just drag the container out of there. The hail of sparks that results from that shouldn't attract too much attention.
Ethan is cleaning out his office. From a frame, he removes a picture of Taylor and himself in happier times. Apparently the frame is government property. Olivia comes in to express her condolences. "I appreciate the courtesy, if not the sincerity," Ethan says, a bit snippily. Olivia insists that she's sorry for him, "and for some of the harsher things I said to you in anger." In turn, Ethan apologizes to her for accusing her earlier. "Considering the impression I gave you I'm not surprised," she admits. Ethan decides to offer Olivia some advice, and gives her a little lecture about ambition. He wants her to remember that running the country is different than running a campaign. "It's not about doing whatever it takes to win. It's about doing what's right for the American people." "Sometimes those things aren't mutually exclusive," Olivia says smoothly. Ethan takes off. And the second Olivia's alone in his office, she takes out her cell phone and calls the reporter from last hour, the one who pulled Ethan aside during Taylor's address. "You can go with that story now, Ken," Olivia says, revealing to nobody's surprise that she was the leak after all. "And it just got better," she adds. "Ethan Kanin's resigning...It seems Jack Bauer just murdered Senator Mayer." Ken is shocked, not least of all because she's giving him an exclusive on this, and in time for the eleven o'clock news, no less. "You just hold up your end," she warns, by which she means he needs to make sure that Ethan gets the blame and her mom gets away clean, and more importantly, ignorant of Olivia's role as the leak. Well, that certainly sounds feasible. He asks her to dinner, because this isn't all incestuous and creepy enough yet. "Maybe next week," she dodges, clearly not for the first time, and hangs up. It's 10:34:57. Ken, even though she just used you to get rid of a political rival in under two hours, it would seem that she's just not that into you.