Episode Report Card M. Giant: A- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Friday the 13th, Part XXIV
By M. Giant | Season 8 | Episode 22 | Aired on 05.17.2010
Taylor, Dalia Hassan, and Jamot get up from the U.N. conference table at 1:06:25, their work on the treaty apparently done. Now there's nothing left but to have some poor admin type it up in Word, get all the headings and margins and page breaks right, and print it off. Let's hope there's still enough time. They all exchange compliments (and apparently Jamot has been promoted to minister of something during his time off-screen), until Logan sticks his stupid face in to interrupt. Taylor introduces him to Dalia, and he's so predictably unctuous that he's practically hitting on her. Not that we expect anything less. Then he asks for a minute with Taylor, who knows this can't be good. As soon as Dalia and Jamot walk on, the smile Dalia's been wearing this whole scene vanishes and she quietly asks Jamot whether he's found out what Logan did to keep the Russians on board. Jamot says he's polled the delegates and found nothing, but offers to bring their intelligence services in. Dalia politely declines. "I trust President Taylor. We have to assume that if she involved Logan it was for a good reason." I don't know how the two of them manage to fit into that elevator with so much dramatic irony.
Alone in the Conference chamber with Taylor -- and again, is there a way to make sure none of those microphones is on? -- Logan blurts that Kiefer escaped with the evidence. When Taylor angrily says he told her that wouldn't happen, he admits, "Clearly I was overly optimistic." What else is new? He adds that Kiefer's in contact with Meredith Reed, and the stunned president is still absorbing that body blow of an update when Logan tells her to call Reed's publisher. "Deny any foreknowledge of whatever evidence she has and demand that they do not run the story." That'll be convincing: "Hello, this is the President of the United States, and I just wanted to tell you that whatever evidence you're about to get, I have no idea what it's going to be. Also, don't print it." Taylor understandably hates that idea, but Logan tells her to invoke national security, which is so important it allows any president to get away with anything, ever. "New lies to cover old ones," Taylor moans. Yeah, that's usually how that ends up going. Logan warns that it's her only choice now: "You don't need me to tell you the damage that your criminal prosecution will do to this country." "This country survived your presidency," Taylor reminds him rather than simply saying, "Look who's talking," but he says it won't survive hers. "Me, I inherited my presidency. I was never nearly as popular as you are. And most of my alleged misdeeds never made the press." Right, alleged. "But if you were to bare your sins to the people who put you in office? You are a beacon of righteousness." In fact, as he points out, she even had her own daughter prosecuted for murder. Which is true, but that had to be easier than it sounds on account of how Olivia was an asshole. "You're a poison!" Taylor hisses. "I never should have let you do this." Logan slimes that all he did was "give recommendations" and "make arrangements," but the final decisions were all hers. Of course neither of them is going to point out that it was the plans Logan made and the people he brought in who have fucked up every stage of this, because Taylor's still got too much integrity and Logan still has none. "I've studied you for a number of years, Allison," he adds, calling her by her first name now that he knows he's got her by the short and curlies. "You've always known what needed to be done and were willing to do it." Which in this case means calling Reed's editor. "I suggest you do it now. You have a signing ceremony to prepare for. And I need to go meet President Suvarov." He leaves her standing there looking miserable, but he looks pretty confident that she's going to do what he says. It's almost like being president all over again.
At CTU, Arlo and Chloe are working on their secret project in a conference room when Arlo shows her a live feed from the CTU team going through Kiefer's slaughterhouse. Which, in addition to the sweetmeats on the floor, includes a view of the gun that killed Walker. "That's gotta be the shooter," Chloe says matter-of-factly. "Jack did this and you still think you're going to be able to talk him down?" Arlo asks. Chloe says she has to try. "Pillar and his people are just going to kill him and I can't let that happen." So where's she going to talk him down to? Meanwhile, she's found a record on Jim. His file says he's James Ricker, a former Green Beret who served with Kiefer in the Gulf. Arlo points out that Jim's dead, having been killed in a Basra chemical plant explosion seven years ago. That would explain the nasty burns on the side of Jim's neck, though not why he's still walking around. "Then he must have a twin," Chloe says sarcastically, because the store surveillance from the scene of the shootout with the Russian agents clearly shows him walking around. Noticing the suspicious looks Eden is giving them from out in the hallway, Chloe decides it's time to break this up. She sends Arlo back to his desk with instructions to cross-reference Jim's photo with the DMV database so they can find him, presumably under an alias. Start with the last name "Blonde" and they might get lucky.