I read today that Fox cancelled '24' (which may be picked up by NBC who desperately needs prime time programming to fill the gap created by the failed Jay Leno Show) and my initial reaction is that I don't really care.
For the past week, the 13th episode has sat in my download file because I had little or no interest in seeing it. At one time this show was the top of my 'watch' stack. What is the reason for that? I have several theories.
1. It's all been done before.
How many plots to blow up a city by Muslim terrorists can we see before it all blends together? The initial twist of having the show take place over the course of a day is no longer fresh. It just feels hurried and chaotic where before it was organic and elegant. I am sick of Jack's hyperbolic dialogue. It's not entertaining me anymore, it's just stressing me out. Also I wonder is there are any actors that can sound or look Muslim even around anymore.
2. The too smart and too invincible Jack is not realistic.
Sure this show always walked a fine line between what was realistic and credible but this season Jack seems to have a script on his lap the whole time and is able to ALMOST out think the terrorists. Too many last minute escapes and Jack's nearly invulnerability has stretch believability for me. Everything seems scripted and so much more less organic than in previous years. He gets stabbed and tortured several times in the earlier episodes but goes on like nothing ever happened. After all he has gone through in the past 8 seasons (gassed, shot, stabbed, tortured with electricity, held in a Chinese prison camp, poisoned with experimental viruses, blown up) he would be too damaged to ever come back that fast again. I am not buying it. They should have replaced him with another super agent years ago. May I blaspheme and suggest Ricky Shroeder who did a good job years ago when he worked with Jack. Keifer deserves a break.
3. Too many uninteresting or silly side stories
How Katie Sokoloff could get away with providing intel to her skeevy ex boyfriend so he could rob a police evidence facility is laughable. She is borderline psychotic and the fact that no one noticed what she was doing doesn't pass the sniff test. At her level of expertise and access she would have shut down this blackmail attempt right quick and approached her superiors regardless of the threat of losing her job. Also how her superiors never discovered she even HAD a false identity is not realistic. No one just POPS out of thin air without records of their former life without getting caught. You show us countless scenes where CTU can call up the most obscure piece of data on a person's life but THIS slipped past you. BAH!
4. CTU - most vulnerable and insecure complex EVER!
For a counter terrorist hub you would think that CTU would have learned from past years and upped their security and employee vetting methods. Spies who are working for the enemy seem to have limitless access to CTU systems. Just now I watched the entire operation shut down by an EMP (electro magnetic pulse) bomb that rendered all of their systems inert...ONCE AGAIN. Might as well just set up in a McDonalds and get some fries with your policing.
5. You can pretty much assume that anyone leading CTU will either die or go crazy.
That job is a worse killer than a Russian submarine. The stress of one bad day causes highly functioning individuals to lose their minds. They make critically bad command decisions right when the plot needs them to be ignorant the most JUST to advance the story. This year the CTU chief gives an agent unknown to him with a shaky history (one Jack Bauer) virtually control over a critically dangerous operation and pays for it as they all do. Jack may be good but he is a widow maker. It may take several seasons but once you meet Jack, my advice to anyone is to start the clock because your time is running out.
6. ONE GOOD THING - at least Elisha Cuthbert is not around to be kidnapped five more times this season. I am thankful for that. The second I saw her little daughter I feared the worse. However, this season is only half over so it is probably coming soon.
