24: D7: 6:00AM - 8:00AM. Discussion and Spoilers. SEASON FINALE!
- Thread starter Trekker4747
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RobertScorpio
Pariah
But then his spirit will float up into the sky and go inside the body of a jumper..who will jump just as jack goes into their body..and then the new person will go SPLAT..right next to jack's body
Rob
See, I don't feel this way at all. I don't think Tony was overly evil or insane. He was just doing what it took to infiltrate the bad guys organization and bring them down, while keeping the loss of life to the minimum. Sure he had a personal investment in it (revenge) but he was still working for the greater good and to protect the USA.
As he said, he was the one that helped get the CIP device back, he warned Jack about the attack on White House allowing Jack to save the President (and the sovereignty of the USA), he single-handedlly destroyed the Bioweapons and all the missiles before they could be launched and he did all of that, while still maintaining his cover inside the badguys operation. In fact he used all of that to further himself inside the badguys organization. He is one of the best undercover agents ever.
Sure some innocent people got killed by the CiP device before they could recover it. That sucks and more people would have been killed if the gas attack had succeeded in the subway, but that is still a small price to pay to bring down the whole evil organization that was behind thousands of more deaths and planning thousands of more. With out Tony the bad guys would have used the CiP device to destroy America, they would have taken over the White House & probably killed the President, and then the East Coast would have been destroyed in a bioweapon attack. All of that was going to happen, with or without Tony working for the bad guys, he prevented it all from happening and relieved the head of the bad guys to boot. Nice work by Tony. He pretty much single handedlly brought down the biggest threat to the USA and world-wide security. These were the guys behind Logan and his plan to start a war between Russia to China (which would have gone nucluar and started WWIII), these guys were evil they were willing to kill millions to further their plans for power and wealth. Tony stopped them.
And before people point out the loss of innocent lives to keep his cover, well that has always been a gray area on 24. jack fucking shot and killed a guy then cut off his head with a hacksaw to get undercover with some badguys. He let innocent prison guards get shot and killed to keep his cover with a fucking drug dealer. There have been many times in the series where the needs of the many have been placed before the safety/lives of a few.
Tony was just doing all of this on his own, without government assistance or backing. If he had been a sanctioned undercover CTU or CIA agent doing this then he would be a hero. Heck, if it had been Jack Bauer doing all of this and we got to see the pain it was causing him to sacrifice those innocent lives then we would be saying, "Damn! Jack's bad-ass. He does what he has to for the greater good." The fact is that this time it was Tony doing all of that.
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Sure, he might have, but then again up to this season we haven't ever seen a line Jack wouldn't cross to protect the USA. Heck, how many times has Jack risked lots of lives (many more then what Tony threatened) in some crazy gambit that just luckily pays off.
I can't remember the season, but didn't Jack give back the very item (that season version of the CiP) to the bad guys after spending half a season to get it, in order to track it back to the main bad guys? Didn't he have to get permission of the President and vow that nothing would go wrong with his plan, because if it did thousands upon thousands of people could die? And, if I remember correctly, it did get loose and it was only by getting lucky he was able to recover the item and prevent lots of deaths (and catch the big bad). All that risk to thousands of people just to catch the bad guys.
That's basically what Tony was doing. Risking a lot to catch the bad guys.
Up until this season Jack would have been right there along side him doing it. The only difference is that this is Jack's show, so if Jack had been helping Tony all along then things would have gone smoother for the innocent civilians and a lot worse for Tony and Jack and their friends and family.
Only two things bug me, really. First, the killing of Harvey. Maybe there was another way forward for Tony there, maybe not....but it grates.
Second, the fact that he didn't let FBI in on the gas attack on the station. They stopped it and he got his endgame anyway; so why not give them a slight edge to do so (apparently independently) as Jack always would try to do?
Second, the fact that he didn't let FBI in on the gas attack on the station. They stopped it and he got his endgame anyway; so why not give them a slight edge to do so (apparently independently) as Jack always would try to do?
The difference is Jack did it to save the country. Tony did it for revenge over the death of his wife.
I can't recall ever seeing Jack deliberately kill innocent bystanders or law enforcement personnel to his ends. The only event that comes close is Ryan Chappelle, and he only did that when all other options were exhausted. Plus, he showed more remorse for that one death than Tony did for the hundreds he killed or endangered to get to the point of putting a gun against Wilson's head.
That's true. And, in keeping with the theme of the season, that is why Tony was able to do what Jack was never able to do catch the guy behind all of the bad shit that had been going on.
Just like Jack was able to get info and results from doing things the FBI wasn't able to do or stomach doing to get the results, Tony got results by going even further then Jack would be able to stomach.
It's a slippery slope which is what I think the writers wanted to show this year. Should we cheer when Jack tortures people to get info? How about when he breaks every law and regulation to get results? And if we cheers him on to do this, why wouldn't we cheer on Tony for going even further to get even bigger results?
There is an obvious line to cross between breaking and obeying the law, but what about after you cross that line? Are there other lines beyond that one? Do any lines beyond that one even matter? Once you are breaking the law, torturing, killing, etc... does it matter how much further you go?
Jack only killed Chappelle because of some contrived plot point where the bad guys somehow found out he was digging up information about him, and somehow by having him killed, there would be no one else who could possibly continue his work of digging up dirt on them.
Great scene, awful logic.
RobertScorpio
Pariah
Great scene, awful logic.
When he killed CHappelle it was so...hard to watch, because Jack doesn't do that kind of cold-blooded killing....great scene!!!
Rob
RobertScorpio
Pariah
But as I recall, he had no choice. He didn't just kill Ryan. They were threatening to do something bad if Jack didn't, and as I recall, Chappell told him to do it...
But yes..jack is an interesting character.
Rob
Tony's endgame was to berate the apparent mastermind behind his pregnant wife's death ... then shoot him in the head. Wilson's operation was an octopus. I have no doubt it could continue without him. Certainly, he wasn't micromanaging every single evil event in the 24verse, such that his death would destroy all those plans. Tony didn't care about stopping the evil conspiracy, he attached a name to his pain and set out to end it with a bullet. All those lives he risked, or outright ended, were simply a means to an end.
Even the impending attack on the White House he revealed to Jack was a means to get what he wanted: Tony still looks useful to the good guys, while giving the bad guys enough rope to hang themselves with; Hodges gets revealed as a nutjob when he typically overreacts to Juma's failure and is swept aside, unlimbering the Cisco Conference Call Conspiracy of a liability and allowing Tony to step up and save the day, as it were, all to get Alan Wilson to notice him and agree to meet. If letting Juma's plan succeed, the White House be decimated and Hodges remain anonymous would have somehow gotten him a face-to-face with Wilson, Tony wouldn't have said jack to Jack.
The one time it seemed like Jack actually risked world disaster for his own benefit (to get back Audrey Raines from the Chinese in exchange for war-triggering Soviet intel), nothing was actually at risk until CTU, not trusting him, bust in on the deal before he could suicide bomb the Chinese and the intel. Left alone, Chang, the intel and tortured Jack would have been incinerated, with Audrey wandering the coast, brainwashed, but alive.
Tony was and remains a piece of shit. I don't care about his pain. I hope he enjoys his stay in a federal supermax, or more likely, CIA blacksite.
Even the impending attack on the White House he revealed to Jack was a means to get what he wanted: Tony still looks useful to the good guys, while giving the bad guys enough rope to hang themselves with; Hodges gets revealed as a nutjob when he typically overreacts to Juma's failure and is swept aside, unlimbering the Cisco Conference Call Conspiracy of a liability and allowing Tony to step up and save the day, as it were, all to get Alan Wilson to notice him and agree to meet. If letting Juma's plan succeed, the White House be decimated and Hodges remain anonymous would have somehow gotten him a face-to-face with Wilson, Tony wouldn't have said jack to Jack.
The one time it seemed like Jack actually risked world disaster for his own benefit (to get back Audrey Raines from the Chinese in exchange for war-triggering Soviet intel), nothing was actually at risk until CTU, not trusting him, bust in on the deal before he could suicide bomb the Chinese and the intel. Left alone, Chang, the intel and tortured Jack would have been incinerated, with Audrey wandering the coast, brainwashed, but alive.
Tony was and remains a piece of shit. I don't care about his pain. I hope he enjoys his stay in a federal supermax, or more likely, CIA blacksite.