Jack and Audrey: A Look Back

Jack & Audrey’s Relationship:

Jack approaches middle-age and his daughter is all grown up. She’s in a relationship with Jack’s old partner and doesn’t need Jack as much anymore. Jack’s been fired from CTU, he’s gone to rehab, he’s got his pal Tony out of prison but doesn’t know how to help Tony through his issues, and he’s too young to retire. So he goes to D.C.. and gets a job working for Audrey’s dad. He’s lonely. He’s really lonely and he is working a desk job, no field work, and pretending like that makes him happy and is the kind of man he can be.

Audrey’s separated from her husband. They got married too young and he’s not exciting enough for her– or so she thinks. Jack’s a little dangerous– he’s got this past on paper that turns her on like it’s a sordid little romance novel. All that drugs and danger gets her going. She and Jack start a secret thing– discreet because let’s not forget that Jack is now de-evolving into following the Chase Edmunds Path To Romantic Bliss here. (That worked out really well for Chase.) Audrey’s dad is the kind of man that Jack always wished was his dad and Audrey’s relationship with him is (at least Jack thinks it is) the kind of relationship he wants with Kim. Like Kim, Audrey lost her mom young and worked with her father and they represent this like golden dream of what Jack could have had, if his daughter wasn’t following in the footsteps of her own mother (crushing her career dreams to raise a child while she’s barely an adult herself, committing to a man in Chase who is similar to Jack himself.)

Audrey pushes Jack into saying he loves her and Jack nervously mentions that he didn’t think he could do this until Audrey. Not since Teri had died. This is the first time Jack has really given himself permission since Teri to actively *try* to have a relationship with someone that lasts– his previous attempts were more about just getting beyond Teri’s murder. Only, Jack spends all of Day 4 realizing that Audrey Raines has no clue whatsoever as to who he really is. It takes a day in the field and some chats with Tony to clue Audrey into the fact that the reality of Jack is much different than the Jack on paper.

Then, Paul shows up even more and it turns out he is *awesome*. He’s so unbelievably awesome that everyone feels terrible for being such a dick to him all day. Audrey’s going to stick with him. It turns out, all she needed was a day of hell to show her that maybe she should have given Paul more of a chance. Then, Paul dies because of an impossible call Jack had to make and Audrey gets the true ramifications of just how dangerous life with Jack Bauer really is.

Jack has to fake his death. No one tells Audrey in order to protect her. With Paul and Jack dead, Audrey is lonely. She sleeps with a creeptastic traitor who is also the White House Chief of Staff (her favorite position, double entendre intended.) She is so eager to get back with Jack after he shows back up from the dead that she makes him nervous and he’s not so sure, initially. Audrey’s alone and if she doesn’t stick with Jack Bauer, then all of this will have been for nothing. Jack’s not so sure. He’s more into whether or not Tony’s going to make it, who killed David Palmer, and why his daughter hates him and is sleeping with her psychiatrist. Compared to these things, Audrey takes a bit of a backseat.

But, by the end of the day, Tony is (faux) dead, Kim has left, David Palmer is still very dead, the President is evil, and Jack has nothing left in the world. Nothing left… except Audrey. Instead of manning up and facing the consequences for what he’s done that day and during Day 4, Jack decides to be a coward and make a run for it. He and Audrey are going to run away together. But then, karma shows up and it’s the opportunity to reconnect with Kim that Jack thought he was going to have (but was faked) that has Jack get kidnapped by the Chinese. If you fail to man up on 24, your past comes back to haunt you even more.

Audrey is so alone that she tries to find Jack because now her husband is dead, she’s slept with a traitor, she was accused of being a traitor, she’s been kidnapped and shot and is one ovarian cyst away from out-Teri-ing Teri Bauer here. So, naturally, she gets kidnapped by the Chinese and tortured for info about Jack. She’s subjected to psychoactive drugs. She has over a hundred injection marks in her body, including her groin, when she returns on Day 6, and is catatonic. Because this is what happens when you ride Jack’s magical cock, people. This is the price you pay in the 24 world.

So, like any normal, reasonable person, she clearly is still in love with him. Her entire life destroyed? No big deal. Not when she’s “finding her voice” because he’s returned. Not when she’s hurting some other guy she married because he was nice to her and took care of her and *didn’t* try to destroy her world and she decided to reward him for that with a pretty much loveless marriage. Yes, folks, Jack/Audrey is the ship to beat! They could not possibly be more unhealthy if they tried. It’s by far Jack’s most entertaining romantic relationship because it is the biggest trainwreck of one that the show has ever created. I can’t wait for more of this crazy.