TivoBlogging: The Following Takes Place Between 8:00 pm and 9:00 pm

8:00:00 to 8:13:14

I was promised "hardcore."

The very first sight we, the viewer, are treated to, is Tony having a sheet drawn over his head, which should end the "Is Tony Dead?" speculation, unless the Tex-Mex gas revives him and he stumbles around CTU muttering "Brains, Brains..." Anyway, Chloe has already picked up on the terrorist’s communications with Heidi Fleiss somehow, and an assault team is being formed up. Knowing the target is a high-ranking Hollywood hooker; volunteers are easy to come by.

Meanwhile, Weasel is preparing to involve Martian Law, and being pretty much out of SeaLab 2021 references, we'll leave it at that. Mary Todd makes a last ditch attempt to talk him Weasel out of it, arguing that Vice President Murphy is just setting him up for a fall. "Why would he do a weaselly thing like that?" Weasel asks. "After all, he is a politician."

During Weasel's speech announcing Martian Law, Frau Blucher arrives at CTU. Meanwhile, her weenie, Creepy HLS Jerk, kicks Edgar's corpse out of the way and demands Chloe's CTU Shopper's Club Card. Chloe is reluctant to give it up, being just one punch away from either a free small sub or an unauthorized intrusion, but Creepy HLS Jerk prevails.

Then, David Palmer's brother, Shaft Palmer, calls Red Foreman. He has something from his brother he needs to give him personally. "You're not hitting on me again," Foreman asks. "No, this is important," Shaft assures him. "All right, Dumbass, I'll make sure you can pass through the roadblocks.

Martian Law is having some trouble getting under way as most of the California National Guard is caught in traffic on the 405, and the Crips and Bloods have the 82nd Airborne pinned down in South Central. But VP Murphy is reassuring. "Don't worry, Mr. President. I'm in control of this situation. Meanwhile, have some nice fresh chicken entrails."

Meanwhile, Heidi Fleiss and her stud, who kind of looks like a scruffy cross between Baltar from BSG and Desmond from Lost. Anyway, Heidi and Baltar are parting company. Heidi is headed for the airport, but she intends to stop off on the way to sell Comrade HATO the schematics to the "Distribution Center," where the Tex-Mex gas will kill 200K people. And I am really, really starting to wonder... since the terrorists originally supposedly were planning to take the gas to Russia, how did they put together such a thorough back-up plan... hitting CTU, hitting the distribution center, setting up an appointment with Heidi Fleiss (which is usually a three-week wait unless you're Charlie Sheen)... in less than 8 hours?

8:17:36 to 8:24:13

Back at Frau Blucher tells Chiggy Killer that CTU is now under the control of Homeland Security. "Sorry, Chiggy, but CTU is just too incompetent to be trusted with a National Emergency. But don't worry, we're bringing in the entire Hurricane Katrina Emergency Response Team to take over CTU operations." She then explains why it would be a bad idea to use school buses to evacuated people who are in danger of being toxically gassed.

Elsewhere, Bacardi and Cola are moving in on Heidi Fleiss's apartment or hotel room or whatever it is. The find a rumpled bed, and a Dateline NBC production crew scanning the sheets for semen stains. Sensing that they may be too late, the teams move into the stairwells and strike dramatic poses with their guns. Suddenly Cola gets jumped by Scruffy Baltar who manages to get Cola's gun. Then, Jack appears pulls a gun on Baltar, and encourages him to surrender. Baltar identifies himself as an agent with German Intelligence. Chloe soon confirms his identity.

Jack demands to know where Heidi Fleiss is. Desmond Baltar refuses to tell him. "I will not help you. Your American lives are far less valuable than our pure, Aryan, German lives." "I get to hurt you, now," Jack says.

8: 28:35 to 8:36:39

Heidi Fleiss arrives in Comrade HATO's Evil Lair. She is patted down repeatedly by one of his minions. Soon, she meets with Comrade HATO. The files are on a memory stick, but they are encrypted. Ah, so she saw what happened to Badger a few episodes back. She's one smart whore. Anyway, she says she'll only give him the decoder ring to decrypt the files after funds are transferred to her accounts in Zurich. Comrade HATO obliges, and she gives him the decoder ring. She leaves, and he decrypts the files. They read B-E S-U-R-E T-O D-R-I-N-K Y-O-U-R O-V-A-L-T-I-N-E. Comrade HATO is furious, "Ovaltine? A crummy commercial? Son of a bitch!"

Meanwhile back at CTU, S4GF is trying to reason with German Intelligence, with about the level of success one would expect. "They refuse to cooperate and some sicko named Dieter keeps asking me to touch his monkey." Bacardi asks Cola to leave him alone with Baltar. Cola gives him a "Please, Hammer, don't hurt him," look, and then obliges. Since torture seldom works on Germans, Jack offers Scruffy Baltar a deal. In exchange for Heidi Fleiss's whereabouts, he'll give him the "wet-list" --- the list of every operative CTU knows about in the world. Scruffy Baltar gets weird for a moment... as though consulting with some sort of hallucinatory underwear model... then agrees. Jack asks Chloe for the list. "I can't get that for you, Jack. The Katrina team is in place, and they're having us round up all the blacks." But, Chloe promises to figure out something. She dumps a hot steaming cup of coffee onto HLS Jerk's lap --- which all of us enjoy. While he's distracted, she accesses NSA servers and gets the wet list, which she quickly shoots to Jack.

Baltar is satisfied with the authenticity of the list. "All right, then. Let's meet Heidi at airport."

Meanwhile, Comrade HATO is preparing to move out of his hide-out to begin the attack on the Ovaltine Distribution Center. "Let the cleansing flame of the Ori torch this place," he pronounces.

8:40:54 to 8:49:54

Shaft Palmer is stopped at a roadblock by the National Guard, who've been told he's a bad mother ... shut yo' mouth... but I'm talking about Shaft. After dicking with him, VP Murphy agrees to let him through, since he can dig it. Meanwhile, Jack and Baltar have folded space-time to arrive at the Van Nuys airport approximately two minutes after leaving their previous location.

At CTU, Chiggy calls Chloe into the Situation Room. Turns out HLS Jerk has ratted her out. Frau Blucher is furious. Horses are whinnying wildly. They call Jack. And say, "Jack, whatever you do, don't give the wet-list to the Kraut." This makes Scruffy Baltar jumpy, o, Jack pulls a gun on him. He tells Frau Blucher to stuff herself, because Heidi Fleiss is the only lead they got and the wet-list is the only way to get to her. "But that list will screw every counter-terrorism operation in the world," Frau Blucher fumes. "Only the New York Times and Senator Jay Rockefeller are allowed to do that."

At this horribly awkward moment, Heidi Fleiss pulls into the airport in a tacky red Lexus. Jack and his team move in to arrest her. A dozen CTU agents line up for the chance to pat down Heidi Fleiss. Baltar gets into his car and drives off. As he prepares to pass the list to German Intelligence, Unfortunately, Jack used his joke memory stick, and it blows up his PDA.

Jack calls Baltar on his cell phone. "Ha-Ha," he says using his Nelson Muntz voice.

8:54:15 to 8:59:59

Hey, not to go off topic or anything, but does that Unanimous show look really dumb or what?

Anyway, Jack prepares to interrogate Heidi Fleiss. She asks to be alone with him. She asks him how much it will cost to make this situation go away. "Do I look like the Mexican Police to you?" Jack tells her. Heidi demures, "All right, I'll help you out, but I want the same immunity deal that one guy got in Season 3... except, I want to live." Jack calls Frau Blucher to set up the immunity deal.

"See," Chiggy tells her. "We got Heidi Fleiss, and we're hot on the trail of the terrorists. Even at half strength, we're still doing a better job than you dweebs at Homeland Security."

"Shut up and help me load the torpedo tubes," Blucher says. "We have to take out those levees."

"There are no levees in Los Angeles, ma'am." Chiggy informs her.

"Well, then we'll build some levees and then torpedo them. Now, where do I find Compton?"

Meanwhile, on a long lonesome highway outside the presidential retreat, Shaft Palmer gets into a drag race with some heavily armed dudes in a Ford Econoline Van. They shoot out his tires, run him off the road, and set up an excellent cliffhanger to draw us back in next week.

But wait... there's more... once Heidi Fleiss finds out she's immune, she reveals the source of her data is in the DOD ... and she fingers S4GF.

OK, pretty cool. Not really what I'd call "hardcore," but not too bad.