Country: United States
Genre: Action
Director: Various
Year: 2004-2005
Rating: 
TRASH CINEMA HIGHLY RECOMMENDED MOVIE
It’s starting to become obvious that 24 has some built-in obsolescence. In order for 24 to maintain it’s urgency, someone close to Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland) has to be threatened. Eventually, Jack is going to run out of friends and lovers to save, and then what are the writers gong to do?
One of the things every fan of 24 looks forward to are those typical Jack moments, when he pulls some completely outrageous stunt, like killing some innocent person in cold blood, or getting addicting to heroin, or taking the director of CTU hostage. I pity the writers who have to come up with new outrages for Jack to commit.
As the fourth season starts, Jack has been fired from CTU for his stint as a heroin addict. He’s now working for Secretary of Defense James Heller (William Devane) in a non-operational capacity. He’s also romancing the Secretary’s daughter without Heller’s knowledge.
This year’s terrorists snatch a mysterious briefcase off of a train in their usual hamhanded fashion. They’ve also placed a virus on several high-profile portals on the Internet. Something big is brewing, as always.
The creators of 24 have come up with an original set of threats for this season, but due to the bombardment of wacky events from past seasons, I felt a little desensitized. I couldn’t really get all that excited about the impending holocaust.
Also, to an extent that I was never so aware of before, the creators of 24 have jam-packed their series with the personal problems of the characters, so that 24 plays like a Fox news soap opera.
The good news is that some of these conflicts are fairly compelling.
Take the Araz family, for example. They’re all neck deep in the terrorist conspiracy (the family that prays together, slays together, I guess). The teenage son Behrooz (Jonathan Ahdout) has an American girlfriend, much to the consternation of his father Navi (Nestor Serrano). Do you think the girl might be in danger? Fortunately, Behrooz’s mother Dina (the remarkable Shohreh Aghdashloo) dotes on her son. Maybe her compassion for the boy will overcome her fundamentalist tendencies.
On the other side of the ideological divide, Secretary of Defense James Heller’s son Richard (Logan Marshall-Green) is planning to speak at a Lockheed rally to denounce administration policy, much to the embarrassment of his father. When it turns out that Richard may be protecting someone connected to the terrorist conspiracy, will James Heller use his influence to protect his son from being tortured to extract the information?
The answers to these questions are amusing and entertaining.
Even though the gears show to an unprecedented extent on 24, the writing and direction are skillful enough that a great deal of tension and suspense are generated on almost purely a mechanical basis. And the writers come up with at least two major Jack moments during the first half of the season, the sort that make you laugh out loud.
For me, that’s reason enough to keep watching 24 for now. The series isn’t quite working at the nosebleed level of quality it was, but it’s still a whole lot of fun.
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Related posts:
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- 24: Redemption - Child Soldiers Reduced To A Plot Point
- 24 - Sixth Season DVDs 4-6 - What Makes Jack Run
- 24 - Sixth Season DVDs 1-3 - Business As Usual
- 24 - Fifth Season DVDs 4-6 - Down To The Razor Wire
- 24 - Fifth Season DVDs 1-3 - Ugly Surprises
- 24 - Fourth Season DVDs 4-7 - No Patriotic Deed Goes Unpunished
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- 24 - Second Season DVDs 4-6 - Sheer Heart Attack
