WARNING: PLOT SPOILERS AHEEED!
Well this weekend I finished watching the last season of 24, which brought an end to one America's most entertaining and enthralling, yet preposterously over the top series. Perhaps that was one of the flaws of the series, at the start 24 was quite incredible but as the series progressed the scenarios get more outlandish. Jack Bauer has been through more than most soldiers in war have even gone through in their lives maybe! (well perhaps not). One of the minuses of the show in a way has always been that annoying digital clock which chimes throughout the show, I can swear the clock is actually saying "Cheekbones, cheekbones". Listen to it, I maybe mad but I can swear it is lol!
But I must admit I always get a kick out of the watching it, especially when the main baddie gets their comuppenace from Jack, or Jack torturing one of the real bad guys of the show. Although I do think at times 24 crossed the uncomfortable line of what is acceptable in a TV show and what isn't, as torture is a frequent inclusion of the show, and Jack Bauer is frequently shown as a man who will do whatever it takes to get information out of one of his enemies. Its also funny how you see Jack go from a loving family man with a daughter and looking for her, to becoming a vicious agent who will shoot, garrote, torture to get what he needs. One such incident in the last series (PLOT SPOILER coming up!) is when his lover Renee is killed by an assassin, Jack eventually captures the assassin, whom he beats, attacks with pliers, sprays with oil and a blowtorch, and finally disembowls him in order to obtain a SIM card from the man's chest. By 24 torture standards that one was pretty strong.
All the same the show was great for melding its multiple plot strands together, also many of the major twists and turns involving the main characters over the years can be quite thrilling and unpredictable. Some of the best characters of course have included the seemingly good Nina Myers who went on and killed Jack's wife (Jack gets revenge and shoots her in season 3 of course), President Palmer, a man of strong conviction and decency, although he resigns his presidency and later only to be assissinated. Jack Buchanan, another decent guy who later on also gets killed in an act of self sacrifice during an attack at the Whitehouse. And of course there is Tony Almeida, who once was the Director of CTU and also a decent guy, but he turns bad in Season 7 after he felt betrayed by the Government after the death of his wife.
But of course one of the best characters of all is Chloe O'Brien, the mouthy analyst who helps Jack immeasurably throughout the show, she may engage mouth before brain, but she sure has a brain! Chloe quite often was the most intelligent character in the show as she frequently showed great tenacity as well as technical skill. Of course she has some ludicrous moments as well, one of which I think was in season 4 when she was in a position where she had to kill a bad guy, so she took out an M14 (or whatever the gun was) and blew the guy away. Ridiculous but great fun of course.
Which also reminds me of one of the show's most ridiculous scenes where Jack dresses in full bullet proof armour suit in Series 8 in order to abduct one of the series primary sleaze ball characters. Great stuff but very silly.
In the end though, the show is about basically fighting terror with terror, Jack Bauer is the perfect anti-hero, but he gets the job done, even if he has to kill, maim, torture and dismember as many baddies as he can throughout the show. But 24 has always been about high thrills entertainment, and definitely will be missed after its 9 year long run, a feature film is in the works so we will see how it goes for Jack Bauer in the future.
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