Sunday 6 June 2010

24 [2001-2010]



-->24 has been ranked as one of the greatest television series ever made, and why not? The adrenaline-fuelled thrill-a-minute, err, thrill-a-second ride, where lone ranger and one-man-army Jack Bauer, for whom ends justify the means, works against the ethical and administrative purview of CTU (Counter-Terrorist Unit), and the American government at times, to bring people, corporations and even Heads of State to justice, had me glued to my chair from start to finish every single season. Even when the show veered towards ludicrosity and been-there-seen-that territory, it never slackened pace or went easy on violence for once, or for that matter, shied from throwing pointed jabs at everything from excess bureaucracy and corrupt corporations to political conspiracies and government cover-ups. Real politic has often been the dominant theme of the series, where each season showed the events of a single day in real-time. The show also gave us a host of memorable characters – the ever reliable and neurotic Chloe O’Brian, expert fellow agents Tony Almeida and Cole Ortiz who aren’t very different from Bauer, Jack’s attractive nemesis in the first few seasons – Nina Myers, Tony’s wife Michelle Dessler, the soft-spoken Bill Buchanan, Jack’s one-time fiancé Audrey Reines, his daughter Kim with whom he shares an on-off relationship, and of course the beautiful but fragile Renee Walker who triggers Jack into ultra revenge-mode going into the exceptional finale of Season 8, the last in the series. We’ve also had a number of memorable US Presidents, from the commanding David Palmer to the self-serving Charles Logan and the upright Alison Taylor. And in Kiefer Sutherland’s Jack Bauer we’ve had a flawed but imperious protagonist worthy of being included in the elite group of indestructible action-heroes populated by the likes of Sly Stallone’s Rambo, Bruce Willis’ John McClane, Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt, Schwarzenegger's John Matrix et al.







Creators: Joel Surnow & Robert Cochran
Genre: Thriller/Political Thriller/Action/TV Series
Language: English
Country: US

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