Episode Report Card M. Giant: A- | 1 USERS: A YOU GRADE IT Heads of State
By M. Giant | Season 8 | Episode 16 | Aired on 04.05.2010
Jack," Hastings orders.A convoy of CTUmobiles is pulling into a narrow alley behind the building at 7:46:32. As he gets out of the lead vehicle, Kiefer answers Hastings' call and takes in the new information that Hastings relays. Hastings also adds that Kiefer needs to hurry; "The terrorist is running a live internet feed. He's reading a list of Hassan's so-called crimes. As soon as he's done, he's going to execute him." Kiefer says they're in the staging area. If he doesn't exactly seem freaked out, it's probably because he's been here, done this. He turns to face Walker, Cole, and the sad little army of a dozen or so other CTU agents assembled in the alley. Kiefer tasks Cole and his team with taking down the lookout, and recruits "Charters" and "Bank" (when did he have time for a meet-and-greet with everyone, anyway?) to join him in the building and locate the right apartment using audio surveillance. He tells them all to silence their weapons, to preserve the element of surprise. "If they get a sense that we're moving in on them, President Hassan is dead. I don't have to tell you what we're up against, and the significance of this operation. Trust your training and let's get this done." He tells them to meet at the rally points in two minutes, because first he wants to talk to Walker alone. And it's not like those two minutes are going to count or anything. He says he wants her along with him on the assault, but since this goes against all his instincts, he needs her to promise to stay behind him and do what he says. He sure knows how to talk to a girl, doesn't he? "Get ready," he says. It's 7:48:03, and let's hope that Samir keeps talking through the commercial.
At 7:52:22, the good news is that the snipers are already in position, apparently invisible to the lookouts despite being skylined. With some skillful coordination, Cole takes out one from the ground while the rooftop guy takes out the other almost simultaneously. "Lookouts are down, you're clear," Cole radios to Kiefer. They start moving in, while the drones can transmit their images live back to CTU. A couple of agents use bolt-cutters to remove a section of iron fencing leading into the lot, and the entry teams climb on through, silenced weapons at the ready. Samir is still yapping at the camera about what a dick Hassan is, fortunately. Soon Kiefer and his team are inside the building. Samir is starting to get pretty worked up, while Hassan just stares into the camera all, "Can you believe this asshole? I mean, honestly." Suddenly, as the team reaches the fourth floor, a guy comes into view, smoking a cigarette. Sentry, or not? Kiefer tells him to get down, first in English and then Arabic. When the guy doesn't, and just slowly backs away, Kiefer shoots him in the chest. Lucky for Kiefer, he turns out to have had a gun on him, not that he ever drew it. That still might be against the rules of engagement, though. Without holstering his own weapon, Kiefer ejects the clip, racks the slide one-handed on a railing, and sets it up on a wall box out of the way, just to keep everyone safe when the shooting starts. Kiefer whispers over his comm to Hastings that there's one less hostile and confirms that they're still good to go. "Yes, Jack, you are still good," Hastings clearly states. Well, there was some doubt there for a minute when Kiefer shot a guy who hadn't made a threatening move.
While Samir continues ranting, Kiefer leads his team into the fourth-floor hallway at 7:54:37. The guy with a handheld listening device starts pointing it at doors, looking for a match to what the video is saying. It takes a little while, but they find the right one. Kiefer carefully picks the lock, as quietly as he can, and goes in low, his gun leveled. Nobody in the front room but a young girl in a hijab, sitting on the sofa and coloring. Not sure how she failed to hear the lock opening four feet from her head, unless that hijab is really thick over her ears. Kiefer shushes her and says they're not there to hurt her. "Where's your mommy and daddy?" Just then the similarly-headscarved mom comes in from the kitchen, and the two residents suddenly start talking loudly at each other in Arabic. Walker snatches up the girl, a hand over her mouth, and dumps her with the agents waiting in the hallway. Come for the raid, stay for the babysitting! Meanwhile, Kiefer grabs the woman, hissing, "One word, and I will kill you." After he flings her to a seat on the couch, Hastings warns into his earpiece, "Jack, looks like Samir's wrapping it up, you need to get in there right now." Kiefer's still taking his time, looking for the right room. All he finds is a closet, but when he pulls the light on, he finds a false panel in the back wall at 7:56:37. And Samir's voice is coming from the other side of it. Probably a sign that he's on the right track.
Meanwhile, in the front room, Walker's still holding her gun on the woman as Kiefer opens the false panel and sneaks through. Just then, Walker happens to look down and sees a blonde pageboy wig on the floor. Hey, I just figured out who that woman is! And while she reaches under the cushions for a gun, Walker figures it out too. Walker shoots first, but just barely. With the non-blonde driver of the Hassan-da now dead, Walker's free to follow Kiefer through the secret passage. In a closet-door mirror, Kiefer can see the back of the chair Hassan is sitting in. "I have a visual on Hassan," he whispers. "Ready to engage." So do it already! He darts around the door frame and starts shooting. The tech and the other henchman, who were hunched over the computer screen displaying the webcast, go down right away. But Samir, out of his initial line of fire, opens up with a machine gun, still wearing his mask. Kiefer takes him down too. But then why does it sound like Samir is still speaking without interruption? Is he so committed to getting his message out that even being dead doesn't shut him up? No, it's worse than that; Kiefer spots the open laptop, running the internet feed and showing Samir still talking on the screen. "No. No!" Kiefer says, realizing what it means. Kiefer goes to it, and then turns around, which is when he sees Hassan, still in the chair, gazing up at the ceiling, his throat cut ear to ear, totally dead. Well, that sucks.
Kiefer and Walker fall to their knees in defeat. Kiefer gently tips Hassan's head forward and closes his eyes in respect. "Sorry," he whispers. I think a more respectful gesture would be to shut down the damn internet feed, now that recorded Samir is saying, "The time has come for this criminal to pay for his treason." In other splitscreen windows, Taylor and Tim watch the continuing feed, as do Chloe and Dana at CTU. "Omar Hassan shall pay with his own blood," Samir, and puts his giant knife to Hassan's throat. We cut away as Taylor moans in horror. "Jack! Jack! Talk to me!" Hastings blares in Kiefer's ear. Instead of waiting for the feed to show him busting in and shooting everyone, Kiefer thickly says, "The, uh, statement was prerecorded. He was dead before we got here." Everyone at CTU looks sad, and Taylor sobs as presidentially as she can while Tim leans defeatedly against the conference table. Finally Taylor pulls it together and says, "Call CTU. I want to know what the hell went wrong. And clear the screens." No shit.
But I think I can answer her question. We know the webcast couldn't have started much earlier than we saw, because Samir gave the order, and that scene ended, and thirty seconds later, Tim got the call that the webcast was already happening. Yet it continued playing a minimum of ninety seconds after Samir killed Hassan, because that's how long it took from Kiefer to enter the room until Hassan's murder was shown on the screen. In other words, the webcast lasted longer than the speech, while CTU was assuming it was happening in real time. This is awful; we all knew that buffering delays in streaming video were annoying, but now they've cost a brave man his life.
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