24 Review:
"11:00 p.m. - 12:00 a.m." (Episode 7.16)

We kept waiting for the "gotcha" moment in last night's 24. It never came.

Moments after Jack receives the results of his blood test to see if he is infected, from the looks of his stoic face, you wouldn't have been faulted for thinking he was playing with your mind. Kiefer Sutherland has that hardened, Jack-Bauer look down pat. Even as we went to commercial without technically knowing whether the test came back positive or negative, we knew. We knew it was just Jack being Jack, right? But no, Jack Bauer is infected. To what extent, we don't know, but if a (supposedly) cureless disease is in his blood, that can't be good.

How absurd, we thought, to even entertain such a notion that Jack could be "patient zero" as the result of a biological weapon, but we played along last week, half-heartedly asking, "What if?" Other reviews didn't even do that. Well, as the clock strikes 12 a.m., we're given no indication on the state of Jack's being except that he and everyone else have known the bad news for the better part of the hour. Perhaps it's an early April Fool's joke, and the punchline is coming next Monday. Perhaps an antidote is in waiting. But even as he's allowed himself to be removed from the action, barely putting up a fight with Larry Moss, we retain important knowledge in the back of our heads. Day 8 begins shooting in May, with Sutherland on board. There's no way your favorite fictional patriot is going to die today (save for the creators throwing the remainder of the franchise into prequel mode), not with another day and a possible movie on the way. In other words, we're not ready to throw in the towel and be had, though we remain cautiously optimistic knowing, again, this is 24.

The rest of the episode can be summed up pretty quickly. While Jack hangs back with a saddened Renee (who seems genuinely impressed with Jack's saving the security man's life in the last hour) at FBI Headquarters, Larry and three choppers head to the Starkwood compound, using what they believe to be good intel from Greg Seaton, Jonas Hodges' (Jon Voight) right-hand man, as to where the biological weapons are located. He seems to be the only one with a conscience, and Tony vouches for him, as he appears to have saved his life. So the guy gets immunity from the president herself in exchange for information. Only problem is, it's all a diversion in an attempt to buy time. The weapons aren't in the specified building, as that smug Seaton fools all/most of us. (Come on, Larry. Let Tony have just five minutes with this traitor.) At the very end of the episode, the FBI is in a standoff with the Starkwood army, vastly more intimidating with its humvees and mounted machine guns.

Confused about the plotline thus far? Here's what we understand from this informative hour. Starkwood, a private army essentially, is unhappy with the government for supporting them less and less. In exchange for safe haven to develop biological weapons in Sengala, Starkwood provides the rebel General Juma with solid, real-time intelligence on how to wreak havoc in the States when the president goes forward with her plan to remove his cruel regime. Unrealistic that all this could go on under the government's nose? Sure, but perhaps even more unbelievable is that so many powerful Americans (Starkwood) can be united against said government without at least one credible source singing like a canary. But what fun is that train of thought? Just sit back, and enjoy what is turning out to be a hugely entertaining season of 24. The ultimate payoff looks better and better by the hour.