We are 14 hours into the eighth season of what has to be my hands down favourate show on television: 24. Now, it’s easy to criticize 24, the predictable nature, the reused plot lines, the blatant fan service, but I personally don’t care, because all I see is some kick-ass action set against a backdrop of awesome. I remember when 24 first premiered, I thought it was stupid. “Jack Bauer has 24 hours to stop a murder, and save his family,” the promo went. I thought, “Okay, that’s the first episode, then what?” Because I was not used to the idea of real time, most TV shows tend to cover a day or a week in one episode, and I had no reason to suspect 24 was any different. In fact I remember an episode of ER when one character said they had five minutes to do something, and I started timing it…ten minutes later I’m like “what the fuck!?” It pissed me off at the time, so when my mom mentioned 24 was in real time, I was like, “Son of a bitch! When’s it on!?” And I’ve been hooked ever since.

But as I said, it’s easy to criticize, and this season is susceptible to it more than any other, specifically with the reusing of plot-lines, the only thing that has really changed is the location (see Day 7). The threat in the early episodes was the assassination of a major political figure (see Day 1), then it quickly shifted to the acquisition of nuclear materials which can easily be converted into a bomb (Day 2, 4 and 6). Then there’s the past three episodes where we see the terrorist give the president an “out” by making certain demands, (Day 3, 5 and 7) the president is betrayed by someone within his/her administration, (Day 2, 5 and 7) a mole is revealed in CTU (Day 1, 4, 5 and 7 (FBI counts)) and an attack is made on CTU (Day 2, 5 and 6). I assume this all means they are running out of ideas, or this season is meant to be a greatest hits package because as sad as it is for me to say this, this might be the last season of 24. Continue reading →