The central flaw of this series is that it panders too readily to the demands of an audience with a short attention span and advertisers with an eye on quick gains. Everything has to be resolved in double quick time. As a result, it falls between too many stools. This episode is a great example. President Kirkland is trying to broker a peace deal between North and South Korea - mystifyingly renamed East and West Hun Chiu - at Camp David. We learn that the leader of North Kor...sorry, East Hun Chiu, Chairman Kim, is an evil despot who has personally executed most of his own family using an anti-aircraft gun. Yet, when we meet him, he acts like a mildly disgruntled geography teacher!
To complicate matters, Kim's remaining son wants to defect. This he does with the aid of, yes, Hannah Wells who then conducts the debrief hoping to gain intel about Kim's nuclear programme. The son won't give up any information until his girlfriend is safe. She is being held at the East Hun Chiu consulate, which is described as 'a fortress'. Presumably, the consulate, Camp David, the FBI HQ and the unnamed spot where Kim's son defected, are all within a few metres of each other as Agent Hannah Wells (Maggie Q), apparently the FBI's only agent, manages get round them all in a matter of seconds.
Naturally it is the intrepid Agent Wells who decides, unilaterally, to rescue the girlfriend from the consulate, of course alone and with no back-up. How does she break in? Using the devilish deception of setting off her car alarm late at night and overpowering the two guards who come to investigate. She then walks in to the consulate unchallenged and, upon opening the first door she comes to, discovers the girlfriend in question. Who knew security work was so easy?
The whole episode suffers from deeply unconvincing writing and plotting with most of the performances phoned in. It must have been around here when ABC started to consider cancelling the series.
To complicate matters, Kim's remaining son wants to defect. This he does with the aid of, yes, Hannah Wells who then conducts the debrief hoping to gain intel about Kim's nuclear programme. The son won't give up any information until his girlfriend is safe. She is being held at the East Hun Chiu consulate, which is described as 'a fortress'. Presumably, the consulate, Camp David, the FBI HQ and the unnamed spot where Kim's son defected, are all within a few metres of each other as Agent Hannah Wells (Maggie Q), apparently the FBI's only agent, manages get round them all in a matter of seconds.
Naturally it is the intrepid Agent Wells who decides, unilaterally, to rescue the girlfriend from the consulate, of course alone and with no back-up. How does she break in? Using the devilish deception of setting off her car alarm late at night and overpowering the two guards who come to investigate. She then walks in to the consulate unchallenged and, upon opening the first door she comes to, discovers the girlfriend in question. Who knew security work was so easy?
The whole episode suffers from deeply unconvincing writing and plotting with most of the performances phoned in. It must have been around here when ABC started to consider cancelling the series.
