TV reviewers should use their mid-season down time to revisit series that are a few years old. In some cases they’d find shows that found their groove, like “Seinfeld.” And sometimes they’ll be forced to watch a show careening into absurdity, like this season’s “24.”

“24″ was once one of the most exciting shows on TV. With each hour program matching one real-time hour out of a day, it was a new standard for suspense.

The first season was focused on a plot to get revenge on a presidential candidate and our hero, Counter-Terrorist Unit agent Jack Bauer. The second year upped the ante with an attempted nuclear bombing of Los Angeles; although it had it moments of absurdity (Jack’s daughter Kim in trouble! Again!), it generally held together. Last year’s third season also followed the single thread of a biological attack, although in the end the principal villain’s motivation was weak.

This year has brought not one threat, but many, as if the writers have decided to unload everything they have:

- terrorists kidnap the Secretary of Defense
- terrorists seize black box and attempt meltdown of every nuclear reactor in the US
- terrorists steal a Stealth fighter
- terrorists shoot down Air Force One
- terrorists steal nuclear weapon
- ???

So far this year the writers have reused political assassination (Season 1), nuclear threat (Season 2), and traitors in CTU (season 1); it’s not too late for biological weapons to make an appearance! What’s left for season five — terrorist asteroid strikes?

Allah is certainly with these terrorists, for they are terrifically lucky. The suitcase with the black box that can melt down all civilian nuclear reactors — perhaps the most dangerous suitcase in the country, no? — is guarded by one person, fortuitously dead in a bad guy-induced train derailment. Later, Air Force One is flying conveniently close to their stolen stealth fighter, and when they shoot it down, they are at the wreckage in minutes to recover another remarkably preserved suitcase, this one with the location of in-transit nuclear weapons (another black box!). Luckily, they have another team in Iowa to steal one.

At the same time, the diabolically clever bad guys vacate a hideout but leave behind enough diagrams, pictures, and other information to put CTU back in hot pursuit.

(We will not not not get started on the magical meltdown-in-a-box and nuclear ‘football’ suitcases.)

Plot points are left hanging … not, apparently, because they’re red herrings, but for no reason. Early on, Jack’s cell phone is tapped by the terrorists, but then nothing comes of it. The Secretary of Defense’s son knows something … but the issue is dropped. A major defense contractor is involved with bad guys … dead end. Jack believes one character provided facilities to the bad guys, to the point of torturing him … but once he saves Jack’s life, all is forgotten.

And the use of torture has become as common as someone saying “S/he’s our only link to the terrorists!”

The whole season seems like a multi-author serial novel where writer A hands off a chapter to writer B, writer B has to move everything forward in chapter 2, then writer B hands off the mess to writer C for chapter 3 (for a comedic example, see here). Everyone has their own idea as to where the plot should go and no one is in control. Either that, or the writing staff has become like a cocky sports team that figures they don’t have to work hard early in the game, because they can always pull it out in the final quarter (in “24,” this usually means killing off major characters).

If this is what the rest of “24’s” run is going to be like, they should kill everyone off now in one very special episode, and put the audience out of its misery.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 1st, 2005 at 4:11 pm by A Senior Administration Official and is filed under Brilliant, but uncategorizable, Weekend Edition / Features. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.