Tuesday 18 July 2006

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Look out, the world's behind you!

If I was into drinking games and took a swig every time a CTU agent asked to be "patched through" to someone in the TV series, 24, I'd be velly, velly dlunk.

Another good trigger would be the occurrence of dodgy logic arising out of a complete lack of understanding of what goes on beyond US borders.

Here's a great example from series 2, episode 6...
Tony: "You're doing business with a known terrorist [actually he wasn't, though his fiance was] and you're going to sit there and tell me with a straight face you don't know what's going on?"
Reza: "I grew up in London. I'm marrying an American girl, a protestant. So, if you're going to racially profile me, you should at least get it right."
Tony: "You ever hear of the Finsbury Park Mosque? It's considered one of the main recruitment centers for Islamic terrorists in the West [don't know about 'main', otherwise this is true]. Our main targets are European Muslims with Western educations, passports and the potential to blend into Western society. And do you know where that mosque is located? Your hometown, London. So tell me, Reza, how's my racial profiling going now?"
Reza: "I want a lawyer."
Tony: "No."
So to qualify as a terrorist these days you just have to live in a city where known terrorists gather to conspire? Of course London is so minuscule everyone lives under the same roof and is on first name terms with the Queen's Corgies. I wonder if this scene raised any eyebrows amongst US audiences. I hope so.

Actually London covers an area of 609 square miles and has a population in the region of 7.5 million. That's a hell of a lot of terrorists! Maybe we should be gearing up to nuke the place in the interests of public safety.

Incidentally, the Finsbury Park Mosque line was cut from the UK version of the episode - if the Imam had spotted it he would probably have threatened to set Allah (pox be upon him) on Tony.
Firefox, patch me through to my post button. Go, go, go!

1 comments:

Trias said...

Every time I see the Queen's corgies I'm terrorised.

Mr Kook ya really gotta watch less TV. It's bad for er something.