Episode Report Card M. Giant: B | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT One-Term Wonder
By M. Giant | Season 5 | Episode 23 | Aired on 05.21.2006
Kiefer makes his way back to the sub's control room, saying into his own earpiece, "Bierko's dead. The sub is secure." Buchanan asks if he's okay, and he says he's fine. Even though he's just reached the control room, and it's empty. "I'm getting a lot of feedback," he lies. "Take me off of comm." Chloe acknowledges, and Kiefer heads for the nearest hatch, gun leveled. Looks like he's going dark in more ways than one. It's 5:20:06 as he climbs the ladder to exit the ship. Up top, he redraws his weapon and starts making his way along the hull to the gangplank. But Henderson pops out behind him, holding Malina's weapon on him and telling him to slowly lower his arms and turn around. Don't ask me why he doesn't tell Kiefer to put down his gun, or better yet throw it in the harbor, but he doesn't. Kiefer complies, looking even more pissed than usual with the blood dripping from his scalp. "You were never really gonna let me go, were you?" Henderson accuses. "No," Kiefer readily admits. And Henderson pulls the trigger.
Of course, there's nothing but a dry click. Henderson ejects the gun's empty clip, and realizes that Kiefer's finally beaten him. His defeated expression is quickly replaced by the grin of the graceful loser, if not a proud papa. "Good for you, Jack," he winks. Kiefer starts walking towards him along the length of the sub's hull. He's got some things to say: "You were responsible for the deaths of David Palmer, Tony Almeida, and Michelle Dessler. They were friends of mine." And it's not like I have a lot of those, he doesn't add. Kiefer and Henderson face each other across the distance between them. It's like a Western, but one where the hero is a sneaky fuck who's secretly disarmed the villain. "That's the way it works," Henderson says, and Kiefer blows him away. Henderson falls flat on his back, failing to topple into the water. And an uncharacteristically smooth (for this show) crane shot rises above Kiefer as he stands over the body of his mentor and enemy. Behind him, Rooney has just popped out of the hatch and is looking at Kiefer in gape-mouthed horror. Kiefer just looks back at him like, you want some? It's 5:21:57, and at this rate, this two-hour finale is going to kill me, too. That whole sequence was so tense, exciting, and well-done that I would have been satisfied to stop watching right there. I'd gotten what I needed. In fact, if you want to stop reading right now, I wouldn't blame you.
We're not back from commercial until 5:27:44 show time. Kiefer's fifty-foot walk down the gangplank from the sub back to the dock must have been quite a leisurely stroll, because he's not stepping back on dry land until just now. At the same time, a whole convoy of official-looking SUVs screams onto the grounds, sirens and flashers blazing. Quite an impressive show of force, boys, but where were you before the sub got hijacked? Kiefer raises his arms high and waits for them to pull in. He identifies himself to the officer in charge and adds, "All the hostiles are dead." "Holster your weapons!" the naval officer says, taking Kiefer's word for it. Hard to believe a submarine got jacked right out from under this crack squad, isn't it? Without even asking to see Kiefer's ID or the contents of his man-purse, the officer tells Kiefer to contact Buchanan at CTU ASAP. Kiefer asks for a vehicle, and the officer bellows an order at an underling to produce one. For some reason, Kiefer doesn't also ask for a harrier jump jet. Kiefer steps aside to call CTU on his cell phone, and they discuss how the Navy has just arrived. Kiefer adds that Henderson is dead. "He fired on me," Kiefer says, way too smoothly. "I didn't have a choice." Obviously no one at CTU -- Hayes, Buchanan, Chloe, or Audrey -- believes this for a second, but none of them seem to be in the mood to call him on it, even over the phone. Kiefer promises Buchanan that he's on his way back to CTU, and tells Chloe to pick up a handset so he can get access codes to CTU logs to help out the Navy. Chloe complies and asks what codes they need. Without even waiting for her to finish, let alone making sure he's not on speaker any more, Kiefer snaps, "They don't. Get somewhere where you won't be overheard." Chloe plays along and crosses the floor to her desk, then picks up that extension and asks what's going on. What's going on is this: "I'm not coming back to CTU. I'm going after Logan." What he needs from Chloe is help "modifying some field communications equipment." Chloe says that's not exactly her wheelhouse, so Kiefer tells her to get some help. Just make sure they can't overhear, right, Kiefer? Just wait until you see how ironic that aside of mine ends up being. As his Navy-provided car pulls up, he asks Chloe, "Are you with me on this?" I love how he frames it as a yes-or-no question, because he knows she can't say no to him. Kiefer and the man-purse drive off as he prepares to give her a list.