I’m not going to beat around the bush. This was not one of 24’s finest hours. While the episode spent its time introducing some new characters to the 24 universe and laying the groundwork for some new plot points, it truly felt like not much of substance occurred. I realize that every serialized show experiences some downtime at some point in the season, it’s just it was a bit jarring to see this season suffer a dead hour so soon. Here’s hoping things pick up next week. With 24 and Heroes airing against each other, I currently watch 24 live and have Heroes on DVR duty. I’d hate to have to flip the two although perhaps that’s what I should have done this past week.

Anyway, onto my observations.

1. Jack’s torture of his scared, sweaty baby brother – Graem a.k.a. Blue Tooth Bauer (Paul McCrane) ended when Jack threatened to get the dry cleaning bag again. Although sarcastic to a fault, we haven’t seen a glimpse of the steely man behind the curtain that McCrane portrayed last season. Where’s the Machiavellian shadings? Where’s that sinister cabal of rich, important men. Here’s hoping that Blue Tooth is simply conning his big brother out of fear that his grand global conspiracy will be cracked.

2. Well, that Walid (Henry Lennix) infiltration of the terrorist detainees subplot went nowhere fast – other than serving up the smackdown on poor Walid when he was revealed as a traitor. Chloe runs a match on the cell phone Walid lifted off of one of the “suspects” and reveals that the group is nothing but a chatty little group of catastrophe fanboys who have no connections to the day’s events other than an interest in surfing the web for the latest information – essentially an Osama sewing circle. How Chloe makes this leap and brazenly declares that they are not terrorists simply because they visited a web site, I’ll never know, but you just know her announcement is going to send the President’s sis into a full-on hissy fit. Walid and I are going to need some serious Codeine, stat.

3. In the world of 24, Milo’s rule-bending misappropriation in allowing Nadia to use his security ID (in the wake of National Securities stringent security measures) is going to haunt. Nadia is this year’s mole and Milo just granted her the fast pass to CTU’s secrets. Mark my words. All because he wants to hit ‘that’. By the way – Milo is a poor man’s Tony Almeida. Just saying.

4. We spent an entire hour following Derek McCarthy continue to make feverish phone calls to locate an LA-based freelancer that can rewire Fayad’s nukes. That’s two full hours of drawn out suspense when we all know that the name which will pop up on Derek’s computer screen as a perfect match is – ‘Morris O’Brien.’ Oops, maybe that makes him the CTU mole. Anyway, Morris himself foreshadowed his part-time underhanded deeds in the premiere when he casually remarked that he did some under-the-table triangulation work on a rogue Soviet satellite. Seeing as how these nukes made their way to the US via a disgraced Russian general, I think someone is about to call in their mark and Morris is pegged to perform the duty. This dove tails nicely with Chloe’s anguished appeal to Morris to explain why people around her keep dying. Alas poor Morris, we hardly knew ya.

5. Chad Lowe joined the show this week as The Weasel’s Weasel – or more to the point, Peter MacNichol’s slimy aide. Watching Lowe swiftly amass enough evidence to give poor Karen Hayes pause and ultimately the boot, I have to believe that Rob’s baby brother is still nursing hard feelings over his recent real world break-up with The Next Karate Kid and is seeking revenge against all broads in power.

6. What was I saying last week about Tom Lennox (Peter MacNichol) being fairly decent? OK, fine. I was wrong. He’s a stone cold bastard. I hope Karen gets a chance to unearth those skeletons he has rattling. Maybe Assad will get to him first when he arrives at the President’s doorstep with a little mid-season surprise.

7. The preview for next week shows Powers Booth joining as the Vice President. I call it every year and am normally incorrect but I never learn from my mistakes. I’ll say it again. The VP is evil. You don’t cast nor elect someone like Powers Booth without making damn sure your true intent is to have an evil bastard with designs on the Oval Office. You want a kind and considerate VP, cast Al Gore.

8. The preview also shows Jack back at his brother’s house getting ready to torture Blue Tooth again. Wait a minute, wasn’t that last week’s plot? Given the results of this episode, where Jack’s Dad found him and BTB turned the tables on both bro and Big Daddy and had his hit squad lead them to their doom, either the Fox Marketing department messed up and inserted the wrong clip or Hour 6 was all one big fever dream as Graem wished he heeded those warnings and never kept that bag around as a play thing.

Maybe that’s it. Maybe this episode was all just a bad dream.