Culture: 24 - midnight to 1 AM

The show is limping towards the season finale. I guess it is inevitable that a show will begin to run out of ideas. The complaints from fans and critics is rising as previous plot devices have been recycles and the implausibility meter has topped the charts. It is an agreement you have with fans to "suspend reality" but that rubber band is not an infinite one.

This particular hour was going off the rails.

Implausibilities ...

They can't track Jack with the satellite due to the fallout? Huh, I don't think the fallout should interfere with the eye in the sky? Fall out might mess up equipment on the ground but not in the sky?

In White House intrigue, Karen is forced to fire Bill. Huh? Karen is the National Security Advisor and the staff she has authority over is at the White House. Those are the only people she is allowed to fire. Bill working for CTU probably works under the Department of Homeland Security. I suppose Karen could call the head of DHS and demand that Bill be fired but she can't fire him directly.

Meanwhile, Jack arranges the meeting to hand over the chip for Audrey. I dunno if he would allow himself to be in a situation where they could have killed him and took the chip and kept Audrey. But as they were making the deal, the minute the Chinese spy master knew Jack had the chip on his personal possession, he could have had his henchmen kill Jack on the spot.

Jack tells Audrey to walk to the bridge so she would be out of the range of the sniper. Huh? I think snipers can shoot people from quite a great distance so she was hardly out of range just walking a mere 30 seconds down the road.

And the final insult was how easily the Chinese bad guys got away. 3 Hummer into the country side and they are gone? Huh? I though they mobilized "ancillary agency" resources to help CTU? And since the military is on high alert in the LA area after the bombing, it should be pretty easy to send over some more aerial assets to track down those vehicles.