24: A Fan’s Retrospective

Something I have talked about very often on this blog is my love of 24. Well, it outlived LOST by 24 hours. What more could you ask for?

Honestly, I could have asked for a stronger Season 8. I watched the first four episodes and felt I could predict the whole rest of the season. Jack kills people, there’s a mole in CTU, someone tries to kill the/a president, nuclear threats (this was an even-numbered season after all), and an over-reliance on the dangling plot threads of Season 5, now not even arguably the greatest season of 24, as the writers could NEVER get over it.

Season 6 all linked back to Season 5. Season 7 was doing great on its own, and then all linked back to Season 5. Season 8? Well, I’ll give you three guesses. Even the final ending is like a mix of Season 4’s and Season 5’s. Jack leaves the country, he’s not under arrest, but every nation on the planet is after him for his ridiculous killing spree this season. Where does one such as Jack Bauer go from here?

Well, to the big screen no less! I am looking forward to the 24 movie, but the creators need to do a few things to refresh the formula:

1. Keep it real time, but raise the stakes. Give us Jack Bauer’s final mission, to take down the organization that’s been funding all these terrorist attacks since at LEAST Nina Meyers.
2. Make it darker than the show. I mean this both in terms of content and chroma. Make this a movie about Jack on a stealth operation, and keep us on the edge of our seat.
3. Cut the political mumbo jumbo. You have two hours, and two sides: Jack and the Bad Guys. You don’t have time to be messing with the President having to make a choice between letting Jack Bauer do what he does best and stopping him for some really stupid reason.
4. Don’t put it in America. Honestly, America only lives to keep Jack Bauer from doing what he does best. We only want the bad guys to do that. When America does that, America is the bad guy. Have the movie take place in some fictional, Ex-Soviet, Eastern European Nation on the verge of collapse or something, and put Jack right in the middle of it attempting to take down these masonic psychos who even had the balls to recruit his own brother, his father, one or two of his lovers, President Charles Logan, and even almost Tony Almeida.
5. Speaking of which, finally, bring back Tony. We know he’s alive. We know he’s in jail, for now, but if Tony can escape death he can escape jail. While you’re at it, make sure all the surviving, core cast returns, mainly Tony, Chloe, and Kim (it wouldn’t be a complete 24 movie if Kim wasn’t kidnapped at some point and someone said “We have your daughter!”).

I have enjoyed watching 24 these past four years and will continue to look back on it fondly. The writing may not have always been the strongest, and the reliance on per-episode plot twists definitely fizzled after the triumphant Season 5, but overall it was good, smart, violent fun. Plus, Jack Bauer survived to fight another day, which means I think I may owe someone $5.