Well, even for someone like me, a person who can't help but apologize for the flaws of Fox's hit action drama '24,' it's hard to ignore the very strange turn made in the main plotline last night, focusing on Jack and an autistic man named Brady. Read on, folks.
Before we get into the Rain Man part of the show, it's time to look at the CTU wheelings and dealings. Last week, Nadia was outed as a mole working for the bad guys, but during the debriefing at the house the CTU team raided, Mike Doyle is informed that Nadia, in fact, was as innocent as ever. Through some technical mumbo-jumbo, we find out that the CTU computer was being subverted, making it look like she was a spy. The man who informs Mike is a fellow co-worker from Denver, Johnson. Both of them obviously know whatever happened in Denver, just like Milo, but when do we get to find out? And, more importantly, is it worth the hype? Johnson is willing to keep things secret, it seems, since Mike would rather not look like a total idiot and get in big trouble with the Justice Department.
Back at CTU, Milo is still shocked that Nadia could be a mole. Once Mike gets back, he gets more and more suspcious of the way things are playing out. Then, inexplicably, Johnson comes up to Milo and tells him pretty much what he told Doyle, knowing exactly what the outcome will be. Milo immediately takes a swing at Mike and tells Bill Buchanan that Mike's got proof that Nadia's innocent. Apparently, though, Mike didn't hide the evidence; he gave it to Morris for further investigation. Milo apologizes for blowing up at Mike. Mike then goes back over to Johnson and warns him that he's crossed the wrong man. And...does any of that make sense? I was rather confused with it all. If Mike wasn't hiding the evidence, what does it matter if Johnson told Milo? Moreover, why tell Milo? And, also, who the hell is Johnson? Yeesh.
When Bill informs Nadia that they've found evidence proving her innocence, he begs her to stay. He knows she'd want to press charges, but her skills are still needed at CTU. Nadia decides to stay, but is very cold with Milo, who tries to apologize, but to no avail. Maybe now he'll try trusting her? Maybe.
In Washington, Vice President Daniels continues to prepare for the ordered strike on Iran. Meanwhile, Karen Hayes decides to force her hand with Sandra, so this week Regina King gets to do something more than look painfully at the comatose body of her character's brother. Sandra is worried that if she wakes Wayne out of his coma, he'll get worse, but Karen manages to convince her to do it. Once this happens, Vice President Daniels gets wind of the development and unsuccessfully tries to force the head doctor to not wake Wayne up. However, it takes a long time for Wayne to even show some signs of life, and that's after he crashes for a few seconds.
But before the end with Wayne is revealed, let's talk about Jack. While doing the debrief early in the episode, he's given a new lead, another techie working for Gredenko and Fayed to give up some security codes. As Jack goes to stake out the location with his team, we see the techie and his autistic brother. Granted, we find out that the techie really is the autistic brother; it look like the lead Jack has is merely the middleman between Gredenko and his autistic brother, Brady. After Brady gets the codes, Jack and his team swarm in, shoot Brady's bro, and Jack begins to use his best tone of voice to try and convince Brady to let him know what's going on.
Of course, Brady relents. Though he's worried about his brother, he helps out after Jack tells Brady's bro that they'll both be imprisoned for treason, so he should help as much as he can. When Brady's brother is taken to the hospital, Brady is enlisted for a mini-mission: he will meet Gredenko with the information, while Jack and his team plan to shoot a tranquilizer dart into Gredenko, so they can question him. Improbably (well...maybe it's just plain impossible), the plan goes off, just barely. Brady is successful and Gredenko is tranquilized. Once Gredenko's being interrogated in Brady's house, he tells Jack that he's the only person who can lead him to Fayed, who still has the suitcase nukes.
This would seem like good news, in terms of nuking Iran. As in, it won't happen. Right? Nope. Even though Tom Lennox tells Vice President Daniels about catching Gredenko, he still obviously wants to blow up the whole damn world, so he continues the strike, to Lennox's dismay. However, there's a call for Daniels: it's Wayne, who's very much awake and very angry. He orders Daniels to not make any more decisions; the buck stops with Wayne. Daniels agrees, but when he hangs up, he says to the rest of the people in the conference room that Wayne's still not fit to run, and wants him out of office. Great!
So, was the autistic brother helping Jack this season's mountain lion attack? I think it managed to salvage itself with the suspense in the last few scenes, but the other part was fairly strange, especially for '24.' So, will Iran still get nuked? Will Wayne stay in power? Tune in next week to find out.
