4x00: The Middle

4.00 "The Middle"
Found on the Season 3 DVD Set: Disk 7

This Season 4 Teaser can be found on the Region 1 DVD of Season 3, disk 7. It picks up where Season 3 left off and was designed to be transition ‘episode’ between Seasons 3 and 4.

(From the end of Season 3), Jack gets in his SUV after leaving the hospital. He shuts the door and begins to cry. The scene fades out.

3 months later

We pick back up at CTU and the new boss Erin Driscoll is in her office at the desk flipping through some papers. Jack semi-nervously enters the room and asks Erin if she wants to see him. Erin seems almost bored with the entire process as she tells Jack to sit and then tosses the papers on her desk. Jack looks around the office as Driscoll comes towards him. Jack tries to look interested and enquires as to how Erin is settling in at CTU. She admits that it’s taking some time but change always does. Jack offers his services if there is anything he can do. After a few seconds Driscoll comes out with the news to Jack admitting that she’s removing him as the head of Field Ops. Jack doesn’t understand, where does he want her to go? This is up to Jack. She tells him that he’s a liability that she just doesn’t want to carry. Jack is puzzled and asks for an explanation. Driscoll can look past all of the off the book behaviour documented over the past 5 years but she just can not look past the fact that he was addicted to heroin. Jack contends that he incurred that in the line of duty, he has come clean about it and he hasn’t touched it since he went into the program. Erin commends Jack for this but she passes judgment that this will hurt his performance and she does not allow any weaknesses, it’s not how she works. Jack understands and Driscoll has made some calls on Jack’s behalf. Now at the door letting himself out, Jack responds “I can find my own fucking job, Erin.” With a half-smile he leaves down the stairs out of her office.

1 Year Later – US/Mexico Border

A flashlight signal signals someone across a fence waiting on the other side. 3 men slide down a dirt hill and one on the bottom gives the man with the shaved head a boost over the wall. The top half is mesh-style fencing and barbed wire but it has already been cut. The other two men go back away from the fence and when they get to their large purple van they open the briefcase that has been given with them, it is full of money. The two men get in the van.

The bald man lands on the ground on the other side of the fence and a 4 th man that is waiting meets the bald man and they go to a waiting car. The other man opens the trunk and hands the keys over and quickly the bald man pulls out a gun and shoots the man that brought the car. He gets in the front seat and puts a sat phone up to his ear. The only words he says are “I’m in the US.” And he hangs up the phone and drives away.

6 hours before Day 4

Audrey Raines opens her hotel room door. There are flowers on the table and the room is dark. She calls hello a few times as if she isn’t sure someone will answer. Out of the darkness Jack appears and puts his arm around her midsection. She jumps from the scare but then realizes who it is. She turns around and the two kiss and begin to remove clothing. Jack backs her over to the bed and they continue. Jack rolls over and in the light we can clearly see the two of them, happy.

Place cards appearing on the screen:

He lost his job, but found a woman who loves him.

It took a long time for Jack Bauer to feel good again.

Then day 4 began

Miscellaneous Thoughts:

This was interesting and I couldn’t resist doing a little summary of this.

What we can learn from this to keep in mind for Day 4:

-Jack did in fact go into rehab after Day 3. He faced at least some of his demons

-It looks like they are setting it up for Jack to become unhappy again, as I read those cards, he DID feel good, but won’t any more.

-Driscoll is kind of a heartless hard-ass that is not necessarily by the book, since she was willing to overlook Jack’s pervious decisions, but wants a lot out of her teams with no compromise. It will be interesting to see if she herself has any weaknesses that will become exposed during the season

-I wonder if she canned the rest of Jack’s squad, too? Since we know that Kim and Chase aren’t coming back I’m curious to know if she had anything to do with their separation from CTU.

-The guy coming in from Mexico is a real criminal. Why else would he kill everyone that he came in with? He’s going to be one of our main target baddies this season.

-I’ll be damned if that isn’t the same purple van that Dan drove in Season 1 that the terrorists on the Mexico side were driving. I wonder if it’s gone for good this time since we saw it as Eddie’s van in Season 2? It got blown up good this time so that should be the end of that.

-Pretty flowers in Audrey’s hotel room. I wonder if Jack sent them.

-If the two of them rendezvoused 6 hours before Season 4, is it safe to say that Jack will be running on 5 to 5 ½ hours of sleep for this day? Not a good start!

-I think it’s safe to say that Jack would come across as a very different person if 24 was aired on a network that allowed excessive swearing (i.e. HBO) because there have been many times where I thought that Jack would have been using more forceful words than “dammit!”.