Previouslies. Nina is back, and there's this bomb about to go off unless Jack can stop it. And some other stuff has happened too.
Okay, so I just got back from Vegas -- where I autographed posters for Agent0042 and Mrs. Dalgliesh; thanks guys! -- and discovered that my tape is missing a few minutes from the top of the show. Apparently my technophobic ex-boyfriend, who was taking care of my dogs and doesn't have cable, taped an episode of South Park over it. Thanks for taking care of my dogs and otherwise being a very agreeable ex, Mario, but that rule about not touching the VCR from while we were going out? It still applies. So anyway, according to the official recap on the Fox site, the show opens thusly: "As Nina waits in a secured CTU room, Jack is handed her case file. Yet he knows all about her and doesn't need it to interrogate her." I didn't see it myself, but I'm sure it was fraught with sexual tension.
So then I still don't have the beginning of this scene at NSA but from what I can gather from the Fox site, reporters are bombarding Palmer with questions about the helicopter crash and if it has any connection to the CTU bombing. Palmer remains silent about the B-O-M-B and promises a "full investigation." Asian Patty is left holding the bag and assures the reporters that a statement will be released once they know more. As Palmer and Rolaide walk away from the press conference, Palmer reminds Rolaide to curtail any further statements to the press and keep leaks to a minimum.
Oh, man. Someone as gay as I am is doing the cinematography for this episode, because the opening shot of this scene is a total shout-out to one of those Vogue photographs from the sixties taken by someone like Avedon or Bert Stern. A woman is sitting in Palmer's office, but all we can see of her is the back of her head and one of her perfectly made-up eyes in the mirror of her compact. Palmer enters; the mystery lady turns around and reveals herself. It's Lady Mac! Rock out! Oh sure, there's no way on earth that the Secret Service would just let Palmer's ex-wife into his office to hang out unsupervised, but she's bringing the Heather Locklear on Melrose Place vibe, so I'm not complaining too hard. Palmer asks her how she got in his office. Lady Mac elliptically replies that "many people" respect the fact that she was married to Palmer for "many years." That's kind of like saying that many people respected the fact that Ike was married to Tina for many years and then giving Ike the keys to Tina's dressing room, but, again, I'm not going to complain. We've missed Lady Mac, and we're not going to ask too many questions. At the mention of "marriage," Rolaide looks down guiltily at her shoes, giving us something to ruminate on. Lady Mac says that she needs to talk to Palmer alone for five minutes, and looks pointedly at Rolaide. Palmer tells her that even if he was interested in what she has to say, today is not the day. Lady Mac assures him that it's not about their marriage. "Did you order an evacuation of military personnel out of Los Angeles?" she asks. Palmer and Rolaide are both stunned to hear this, since Palmer ordered no such evacuation. "Who told you this?" asks Palmer calmly after one of his trademark slow burns. "Five minutes," purrs Lady Mac, holding up five of her manicured fingers. Palmer tells her to wait, pulls Rolaide aside, and asks her to find out more about the evacuation.
Chez Crew. Soul Patch continues to question FarsiBoy about his ties to Syed Ali. FarsiBoy refuses to answer, instead accusing Soul Patch of engaging in racial profiling. He also points out that he's from England and is about to marry a white Protestant American girl, so Soul Patch doesn't even have his facts straight. Soul Patch points out that educated Muslims with passports and the ability to assimilate into Western society are precisely the sorts of people that are recruited by terrorist cells. In fact, one of the places that recruits a large number of these terrorists is a mosque located…near Reza's home in London. "So tell me, Reza," says Soul Patch, his moist mouth opening provocatively. "How's my racial profiling going now?" Reza asks for a lawyer. Soul Patch flatly refuses his request.
Back at NSA, Palmer, Rolaide, and Yulin have an impromptu meeting while traversing the halls of NSA in a series of golf carts and elevators. Palmer doesn't think the helicopter crash was an accident. Yulin and Rolaide agree with that theory. Yulin feels that the Fauxraqi government is behind the crash, since they might have been upset that the ambassador was trading intelligence with the U.S. Palmer and Rolaide feel that someone in the U.S. government might be behind it, upset that they were trading intelligence with Fauxraqistan. After all, if Rolaide and Yulin were against Palmer's decision to trade, someone else could be as well. Palmer tells Rolaide to set up an independent investigation to get to the bottom of everything. Yulin looks semi-busted.
CTU. Everything is in place for the Kiefer-on-Nina interrogation to begin. I'll bet you they at least considered showing the uncut version in Pay-Per-View format. Kiefer assures Mason that he'll get all of the important information out of Nina. Mason reminds Kiefer that the last time he let Kiefer interrogate someone, he "shot him in the chest." Kiefer promises to be a good boy. Mason wishes him luck and glances down at Kiefer's package. Kiefer enters the interrogation room and puts the presidential pardon down on the Modotti table in front of Nina. They exchange looks fraught with tension -- the kind of meaningful glances that could really only be shared between two people who once worked together, had some hot sex, then worked together some more until one of them killed the other one's wife while betraying her country. You know how that happens. Finally, Nina speaks. She explains that she needs to be "on a plane to Visalia." Um, what is Visalia? Is it a new fictional country? Is it a skanky neighborhood in Manhattan that realtors are trying to class up by renaming it "Visalia"? Is it an Eastern Bloc-themed hotel and casino in Vegas? A search through the Fox site turns up nothing. Kiefer asks her why she needs to be in Visalia. Nina says she has a contact there who's the only person who can tell her where the bomb is. She refuses to disclose her contact's name to Kiefer. Kiefer doesn't want to play along. He threatens to hold onto her until the bomb goes off in L.A. Nina tries to reason with him, saying that she's not trying to play Kiefer, since she only gets the pardon if she stops the bomb. Kiefer goes krazy. He throws the Modotti table against the wall and screams at her to stop wasting his time and give him the name. With the table no longer separating them, their faces are inches apart. Nina threatens to have Kiefer removed from the case if he "touches her."
Meanwhile, Mason and Bitchelle are watching the interrogation on the closed circuit video monitor outside. Bitchelle looks really embarrassed by having seen all that. Mason is probably masturbating. Kiefer is momentarily subdued by Nina's threat. "You're just going to have to follow my lead," says Nina smugly. Kiefer attacks her again, but this time he grabs her by the neck and forces her up against the wall. He whips out the patented Sutherland bedroom whisper and threatens to kill her painfully unless she tells him everything. "No one will stop me!" he says. It's true. No one would stop him. They'd all be watching, or trying to find a video camera and tissues. Then Mason, who sees this on the monitor, rushes to the interrogation room to break it up, but he can't enter the room itself. He tells Kiefer to kut it out. Kiefer releases Nina and leaves the room. She doesn't look so smug now. Mason tells Kiefer that he's off the kase. Kiefer kounters that he's got her right where he wants her. If Nina thinks she's in kontrol, she won't kooperate. She needs to believe that Kiefer will break the rules to get what he wants. Mason reluctantly agrees to this strategy and lets him back into the room. "All I need is five minutes," says Kiefer. So that's why Julia Roberts ran off with Jason Patric to Ireland on the day of your wedding. He also gets Mason to raise the thermostat by ten degrees. The time is 01:14:28 PM.
The time is 01:17:52 PM. Klockwise from the top left, Palmer consults with governmental-looking people, caterers and movers enter Chez Crew to set up for the wedding, and Nina waits for Kiefer's explosion. At Chez Crew, PoorMan'sCateBlanchett enters PoorMan'sReneeZellweger's bedroom. Renee has changed from her wedding dress into a crisp white men's oxford cloth shirt that brings out the, um, whiteness in her skin. "We need to talk," says Cate. Renee is all, "I told you to leave." Cate sits down on Renee's Ethan Allen sleigh bed to the teddy bears and damask throw pillows and tells Renee that she can still be as mad at Cate as she wants. But they still need to do something about the wedding, since it probably won't happen as scheduled what with Reza being detained by CTU and all. Renee accuses Cate of enjoying the wedding cancellation. Cate insists that she's just trying to help…the way she always has since their mom died and Cate had to drop out of school to help take care of Renee. Renee accuses Cate of putting her own life on hold for Renee and then resenting Renee when she no longer needed her. "Mom died a long time ago," says Renee. "So get your own life and stay out of mine! I'm not canceling this wedding!" She then locks herself in her bathroom…presumably to purge that Junior Mint she ate ten minutes ago or to apply some more 89 SPF sunscreen.
Meanwhile, at St. Virgil's Hospital, Spawn and Rick 2.0 are heading towards JonBenet's room in order to take her to Aunt Carol's. When they get to her floor, though, Spawn sees DaddyStopTouchingMe stationed outside of her room and retreats back into the stairwell. The smug Asian female doctor enters, approaches DaddyStopTouchingMe, and informs him that they suspect that JonBenet's injuries are a result of abuse; they can't release JonBenet until the police question him. Wait, weren't the police just there? Oh, never mind. DaddyStopTouchingMe pretends to be patient and cooperative. SmugAsianPhysician pretends to be sympathetic, but forbids DSTM from using his cell phone in the hospital because it "interferes with the equipment." Too bad they're not at St. Mahk's, where they don't care about cell phone use or whether or not you snuff out your alleged child with a pillow before she can talk to the authorities. Nevertheless, DaddyStopTouchingYourCellPhone makes a call from the privacy of JonBenet's room. As he dials, JonBenet regains consciousness and asks DSTM if he's "still mad" at her. DSTM assures her that he's not mad at her; they just need to get her dressed and out of there. He gets his assistant on the line and has her book two one-way tickets to Mexico City and cancel his meetings for the rest of the day. He begins to dress JonBenet.
CTU. The interrogation room. Kiefer enters for his promised "five minutes" and asks Nina once more for the name of her kontact in Visalia. When Nina doesn't answer, he takes out a gun -- why not? -- and shoots a few rounds at her head. The bullets don't hit her, of course, but it freaks her out enough to make her tell Kiefer that her kontact's name is "Mamud Faheen." Kiefer already knows about Mamud Faheen, but Nina claims that she's the only one who knows where he is. She goes on to explain breathlessly that Faheen introduced her to Wald, and that's how he got the schematics for the bombing of CTU, which she never realized had anything to do with a nuclear strike on Los Angeles. She refuses to give Kiefer Faheen's location until they get to Visalia because -- as she explains amid a sniffle or two -- she won't be needed once they find him, and her pardon won't mean anything if Kiefer kan still kill her. Mason, watching on the KieferKam, orders Bitchelle to alert the authorities in Visalia. Oh, and according to its official site, "Visalia is a city located in California's San Joaquin Valley, a large and agriculturally rich basin that runs through the center of the state. Equidistant between San Francisco and Los Angeles, Visalia can be found just east of Highway 99 on Highway 198, the pathway to the Sequoia National Park." I should have known that Visalia existed when it didn't show up on spell-check.
NSA. Rolaide confirms for Palmer that there is indeed a military evacuation taking place in Los Angeles. Are there extras in uniforms shown pulling out of L.A.? Of course not. They didn't have any funds left over in the budget after they got that bed set-up for PoorMan'sReneeZellweger, so we're just going to have to take Rolaide's word for it. Palmer asks her who gave the order for this evacuation. Rolaide tells him that it was Yulin. Then we get this pan over to Yulin, who is sitting at a desk looking really guilty. He's also wearing a ring on his middle finger that is way too big to be worn by a male heterosexual with a government job. Palmer orders Rolaide to countermand the evacuation order, and calls Yulin into his office to bust him. When confronted, Yulin claims -- unconvincingly, mind you -- that he was just following the procedure Raygun had already put into place. He apologizes profusely for not double-checking everything with Palmer, and takes full responsibility. Yulin leaves, and Palmer tells some unseen secretary that he'll be meeting with Lady Mac in twenty minutes.
St. Virgil's. Hush little baby, don't say a word. Papa's gonna sing creepy Mother Goose songs to you while he prepares to evade the police. JonBenet is dressed and ready to go. DaddyStopTouchingMe whips out a pen knife, cuts off her hospital wrist tag, and stresses the importance of not talking to anyone who tries to stop them from leaving the hospital. A sassy black nurse with closely cropped natural hair enters, looks suspiciously past DaddyStopTouchingMe at JonBenet in her street clothes, and informs DSTM that he has a phone call. DSTM is all, "Why can't I take it in here?" SassyBlackNurse is all, "Because we don't have phones in the room unless you specifically order one." Oh, you do not want to piss off SassyBlackNurse. She is not a just cultural stereotype, or the source of witty one-liners or relationship advice. She is a cultural reality. There is one of these ladies working the floor of every single hospital of every single major city in the U.S. and she does not miss a trick. She will take your shit past a certain point because she is a professional, but once you cross the line you will feel her wrath. If you piss her off enough, she will calmly type your name into a database, and every single Sassy Black Working Woman from here to Elko, Nevada will be up your ass: Sassy Black Waitresses, Sassy Black Hotel Maids, Sassy Black Receptionists will unite to make your life a living hell, and you will never get a second cup of coffee, fresh towels, or a phone message again as long as you live. And don't even get me started on what the gay Mafia will do to you.
DSTM follows SassyBlackNurse to the phone, but warns JonBenet not to move until he comes back. He takes the call, and it turns out to be En-Rick-Ay, pretending to be an accounts payable administrator with a problem with DSTM's bill. While DaddyStopPissingOffSassyBlackNurse is distracted sufficiently, Spawn enters JonBenet's room and convinces her to leave with Spawn. Meanwhile, DSTM gets frustrated by the "ineptitude" of the accounts receivable department and hangs up on them, promising to drop by their offices "later." He goes back to fetch Jon Benet, and she's gone. He takes it up with SassyBlackNurse, who tells him to try looking for her in the bathroom. She's not in the bathroom, so SBN suggests that they might have taken her to radiology. "Find out where she is," barks DaddyStopTouchingMe. SBN stomps off to do just that…as soon as she enters DaddyStopTouchingMe into the aforementioned database. He punches the wall. The time is 01:28:26 PM.
The time is 01:32:40 PM. Klockwise from the top left, PoorMan'sCateBlanchett paces the floors of Chez Crew, hospital workers wheel stuff around St. Virgil's, and Kiefer prepares to question Nina some more. At St. Virgil's, Spawn and JonBenet run into En-Rick-Ay in a stairwell and they make their way out of there. JonBenet starts to freak out about the fact that she's broken a promise to her daddy by leaving with Spawn and her boyfriend. Spawn begs JonBenet to trust them. "Your daddy is going to keep hurting you unless you leave with us right now." Um, actually, Spawn, DaddyStopTouchingMe will most likely have to stop hurting his daughter once they are both vaporized in the nuclear blast. I'm just bringing some reality into it, 'kay? Meanwhile, DaddyStopTouchingMe is going off some more on SassyBlackNurse. He tells her to call security and freaks out some more. Back in the stairwell, Spawn has finally convinced JonBenet to stop crying and come with them. They are just about to find their way out when they encounter a security guard who seems to be looking for them. They hide in an examination room.
Meanwhile, at CTU, Mason has authorized the trip to Visalia. Agents have been stationed there, and an additional agent has been commandeered to escort Nina and Kiefer on their journey. Kiefer assures Mason that he can handle Nina himself. Mason tells Kiefer that the escort is there to protect Nina from Kiefer, not vice versa. "George, do you really think I'd sentence millions of people to death just for the satisfaction of killing her?" says Kiefer. Mason shrugs. Hee! Nina is led to the plane in her leg irons, looking just slightly less smug. Mason starts coughing. Kiefer tells Mason to go be with his family. Mason ignores this advice and tells Kiefer to get on the plane.
Palmer enters his office, where Lady Mac is waiting for him with her feet propped up, sipping a cup of coffee. Oh, and it's official: the set dressers must read my recaps and the boards, because Lady Mac is sitting on an Eames Lounge Chair with a Matching Ottoman. Palmer demands to know where she got the information about the evacuation. Lady Mac won't reveal her sources, but alleges that there are people in his administration conspiring against him, and she can help him bring them down. Palmer tells her that he has no time for her "power plays" since he's dealing with the B-O-M-B. Lady Mac is stunned by this news and admits that she got her intel from someone at the Defense Department who owed her a favor. She elaborates further on the conspirators who want to control Palmer's presidency. "There were deals made under the table," she says. She offers to help him find out who these people are if Palmer will let her. Reluctantly, he agrees, but under the condition that it's for the good of the country and not their estranged marriage. "You can call it anything you want, David," says Lady Mac. Aw, we missed you Lady Mac! He sets her up with an office and a secure phone line. "This better not be one of your manipulations," says Palmer. "The stakes are too high." "This better be one of Lady Mac's manipulations," says Gustave. "The ratings are too low." The time is 01:39:10 PM.
I was always a big defender of the Christmas Gap commercial. Every year, I've disagreed with the countless throngs of people who hated those clever Gap ads and their attempts to modernize Christmas. No more. Not even Will Kemp and Angela Lindvall, the two most gorgeous people on earth can save this ad. Nor can the inclusion of my favorite disco song, "Love Train," by the O'Jays. This ad sucks. Oh, and I'm not going to see Gangs of New York.
The time is 01:43:36 PM. Klockwise from the top left, DaddyStopTouchingMe searches St. Virgil's, Spawn hides from DaddyStopTouchingMe, and Cate paces the floors of Chez Crew some more. Reza's parents arrive at Chez Crew. His mother is wearing one of those big-ass Chanel scarves over her head because she loves shopping and Allah. Reza's father looks like Armand Assante, but with shorter hair. Cate gets the door and steers them quickly past the handsome black agent posted in front of the dining room. FarsiMom wants to see Reza right away, so Cate just blurts out everything right then and there about how the government is questioning Reza and the wedding is probably going to be cancelled. FarsiPop rails against the U.S. for its prejudicial treatment of Middle Easterners. FarsiMom gets so worked up that she even removes the scarf from her head. Oooh! Scalp!
Back at St. Virgil's, En-Rick-Ay decides to create a distraction so that JonBenet and Spawn can leave the hospital. "If I'm not out in ten minutes, it means they caught me," he says. Spawn insists that they will all leave St. Virgil's together. She kisses him. Hard. En-Rick-Ay leaves the exam room, grabs a flat screen computer monitor from a desk, and runs. The distracted security guard chases after the "male Hispanic," allowing Spawn and JonBenet to escape. Unfortunately, DaddyStopTouchingMe just happens to be looking out the window at that moment. He sees the girls crossing the parking lot, and heads outside.
In the van to Visalia, sweaty Nina tries to fuck with Kiefer by making small talk with Agent Miller, the guy who Mason sent to escort them. Yet Miller ignores her, and takes a bottle of water from Jack. Nina continues to ruminate on the fact that Kiefer will probably try to kill her once she stops the bomb in retaliation for killing Bride. Miller begs Kiefer to shut her up. Nina keeps talking and reminds Kiefer subtly that Spawn will lose her only parent if Kiefer has to go to jail for killing Nina. Miller keeps sipping his water. It's hot in that van. Isn't it? Isn't it? The time is 01:49:49 PM.
The time is 01:54:19 PM. Soul Patch presses Reza about a money transfer to Syed Ali under his name, but Reza fights back and claims ignorance. Soul Patch sees the FarsiParents outside and gets a brilliant idea. He hints that he'll have to bring Reza in for questioning and walk him out in handcuffs past his parents. Reza finally relents, and admits to only confirming the transfers to cover for someone else…and that someone else is none other than Papa Crew! Dun dun dun!
Back at St. Virgil's, Spawn and JonBenet duck behind cars in the hospital parking lot while waiting for En-Rick-Ay. JonBenet is tired again, so Spawn has to carry her. DaddyStopTouchingMe finds them. He threatens to have Spawn thrown in jail unless she turns over JonBenet. Spawn refuses. DSTM grabs Spawn's hair and is about to strike her when En-Rick-Ay appears and body-slams DSTM. The men fight, and En-Rick-Ay knocks DSTM out cold with a roundhouse martial-arts kick to the face. Who knew that Rick 2.0 knew how to kickbox? They grab DSTM's keys and head for his blue Lexus.
Reza comforts both Marie and his parents with news of his exoneration. Yet when Soul Patch asks to speak to Papa Crew, Cate turns to Reza. Reza explains that he only told the truth to Soul Patch. Cate feels like a turd as she watches her attempts to protect her little bitch of a sister backfire on her and put her own father in jail.
Back in the VisaliaVan, Miller and Kiefer go over the details of the team assembled in Visalia, but Miller starts getting delirious and passes out. Kiefer eases Miller's body down on the seat. Nina notices the water bottle that Kiefer gave to him, and she realizes that Miller has been drugged. Jack cocks his gun and smiles at Nina. A look of fear spreads over her face. Oh yeah! The time is 01:59:58…01:59:59…02:00:00 PM.