Recap / Designated Survivor S 1 E 1 Pilot

Pilot

Directed by Paul Mc Guigan
Written by David Guggenheim

It is the day of the 2017 State of the Union Address and, in a non-descript conference room somewhere in Washington, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development and designated survivor Tom Kirkman is watching the speech on television with his wife Alex. The broadcast of the speech abruptly cuts to a Snowy Screen of Death and Kirkman's Secret Service immediately prepare to evacuate him. Kirkman opens the security shutters just in time to see a massive fireball rising above where the Capitol Building stood a few moments ago.

15 hours earlier: Kirkman is informed that President Richmond has cut any mentions of Kirkman's proposed new housing programs from the speech. In fact, after the State of the Union the President intends to appoint a new HUD Secretary and will be kicking Kirkman upstairs by naming him Ambassador to the International Civil Aviation Organization in Montreal. Kirkman will also be the designated survivor for the speech to keep him away from the public and the media. The flashback ends with Kirkman asking what a designated survivor is.

Back in the present, the Kirkmans and their Secret Service detail are escorted to the White House. They are informed that President Richmond, the rest of the cabinet, and most members of Congress were killed in the explosion. As the only surviving member of the line of succession Tom Kirkman is now the President of the United States. Kirkman is immediately advised of different responses he should take, including a general demanding swift military action against Iran.

Meanwhile, FBI Agent Hannah Wells rushes to the scene of the bombing and examines a recovered bomb that apparently malfunctioned. She begins to suspect that all is not as it seems and that the perpetrators may have more plans.

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Tropes in this episode:

• Answer Cut: When Tom is told what his role is on the phone, he asks: "What's a designated survivor?" Cut to the Capitol building being blown up and Tom being the only surviving member of the government.
• Asshole Victim: President Richmond removes mention of all of Tom's programs from his speech, and then has him fired while his Chief of Staff (who also qualifies) tries to pass it off to Tom like it's a promotion. Still, their deaths are treated sympathetically and Kirkman doesn't hold a grudge.
• Bait-and-Switch: When we first see Alex, she seems to be talking to a business associate or another lawyer on the phone. Turns out she's talking to her eight-year-old daughter and trying to convince her to go to bed.
• Big, Bulky Bomb: The Capitol is half-demolished by a series of them.
• Brutal Honesty: Kirman informs the Iranian ambassador that he's the straightest shooter he will find in Washington.
• Casting Gag: Tom Kirkman is told he'll get reassigned to Montreal as the American ambassador to ICAO. Kiefer Sutherland is himself a Canadian.
• The Conspiracy: The start of their overt actions in-universe, although clearly their plots were in motion for a significant amount of time leading up to the Capitol bombing.
• Fish out of Water: Tom Kirkman is initially this, before he starts to adjust to suddenly being President.
• Gilligan Cut: A dark example. Leo tells his sister that their father is not scared of anything. Cut to the Capitol ruins where Agent Wells keeps trying to reach her boyfriend by phone and a bomb dog is whining.
• Heroic BSoD: A collective one at the sight of the exploding Capitol.
• Incredibly Obvious Bomb: Agent Wells begins to suspect that the perpetrators left one or more of these to divert attention onto Al-Sakar.
• Irony: At the start of the day of the State of the Union, Tom tells his assistant that "at the end of the day, I'm not the President of the United States". At the end of the day, he is the President of the United States.
• The Lost Lenore: Agent Wells was in a relationship with one of the victims of the Capitol bombing.
• Monumental Damage: The House of Representatives wing of the U.S. Capitol is reduced to a pile of smouldering rubble.
• Reassigned to Antarctica: Kirkman was informed on the day of the attack that he was going to be appointed the new ambassador to the ICAO in Montreal, Canada and replaced as HUD Secretary. As the Capitol attack took place that very evening, the appointment never took effect.
• Snowy Screen of Death: Alex and Tom Kirkman are watching President Richmond's address on television when the feed from the Capitol abruptly cuts into static. Kirkman immediately looks out the window, only to be greeted by the rising fireball from the bombs exploding.
• Stress Vomit: Kirkman ducks into a washroom to take one of these, where he ends up meeting Seth Wright.
• 25th Amendment: Invoked in the wake of the Capitol attack.
• 20 Minutes into the Future: The episode was aired in the fall of 2016, but is set in January 2017, at the start of what would have been President Richmond's second term.
• Unexpected Successor: Kirkman becomes this when a seemingly routine address to Congress ends up in the deaths of almost everyone present.
• Wham Line: See below.
• Wham Shot: Kirkman opening the window to see a Mushroom Cloud where the Capitol used to be.
• You Are in Command Now:
  • Towards Kirkman, from Mike Ritter, the leader of his security team.
    Ritter: It's confirmed, "Eagle" is gone. Congress, the Cabinet, none of them made it. ... Mr. Secretary, we're enacting continuity-of-government. A D.C. appellate judge will meet us at the White House. Sir, you are now the President of the United States.
  • By extension, this also applies to much of Kirkman's staff and the surviving officials who were not at the Capitol when the bombing took place. Ritter is now the chief of security for the President; Alex Kirkman is now the First Lady of the United States; Aaron Shore is the new White House Chief of Staff; and Jason Atwood becomes the new Deputy Director (or acting Director) of the FBI.

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