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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

24, 2200-2300 on the day of the yadda yadda yadda [contains smugness]

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Our Lady of The Two Towers

20:55 / 11.08.02

Re; Episode 23- 2200-2300, specifically about 2259;

Damn but it's great being right. American TV take a memo; Try to make it a surprise when you reveal who the double agent is.

Otherwise, I'm wondering if they're going to go for the Minority Report ending, it's all right for one child to die when there's another on the way to replace it.

Regrettable Juvenilia

22:49 / 11.08.02

Notice how 'Yelena' suddenly started acting blatantly evil this episode - particularly with her attempts to "calm down" Teri, and just generally EVIL looks all over the place.

Anyone who couldn't see this one coming ever since they started using the "people I work with may be involved in both" voiceover over a freakin' shot of Nina looking suspicious at the start - let alone anyone who thought the traitor was the dodgy balding guy - hasn't been paying much attention. I don't think it's at all plausible, though - I've heard of "deep cover" but she's helped Jack far too much in the past 23 hours to be a baddie, surely? If flashbacks were an option then maybe they could explain it... but what the hell, it's not like 24 hasn't got enough plot holes as it is, and it's still essential viewing.

I doubt Kim will die, since she's the only female character in the entire show who isn't a) evil, b) a complete victim, c) dead or d) a completely dead evil victim (hello, Victor Drazen's best friend's daughter! and - blam! - goodbye! STUPID BAUER!). I think the best ending right now would be for Jack to go out in a blaze of glory, but I'm assuming Kiefer's signed up for Season 2.

Disappointed that my theory about Patti working for the Serbians was proved wrong, along with the one ages ago about Palmer or Mrs Palmer being behind the whole thing to ensure election.

Vote David Palmer! He'll make a much better president than President Bartlett...

The Return Of Rothkoid

03:32 / 12.08.02

Er. Spoilers. Um. I've only just seen the first two episodes. It started here last week.

Our Lady of The Two Towers

08:50 / 12.08.02

Sorry Rothkoid. But 24 has been massively over-rated and is a bit crap. I'm with Flyboy, although the 'people I work with might be involved with both' over her is probably an accident rather than intended.

But, you have a choice of three people who would be a mole. 2 of which have tried at various times to get Jack shut down, one of which has stood by him all the way. If you want to do a surprise, who would you make the mole?

I'll be watching next week only to see if they remember that there was also supposed to be a government conspiracy at work too.

09:20 / 12.08.02

24 is extremely overrated but I have enjoyed it. It's definitely gone downhill very quickly when it shifted gears from 'Mysterious forces target Palmer' to 'Cliched Euro-terrorist family target Palmer and Bauer for revenge'.
[Puts on analysis hat] Seems to me that 24 is about three families, the Bauers, the Palmers and the Drazens. All of the families have fathers that have let work get in the way of their family duties, all of them have siblings that just 'seem' to get involved in major crimes (Drug deals, Accidental Murder, Political Asssassination) and , um, well. My theory runs out of steam at that point.
My guess is Yelena is a semi-reluctant mole with links to the Drazens beyond cash. She'll die an honourable death saving Jack. Maybe.
Rothkoid, sorry about spoilers.

09:26 / 12.08.02

To say "24 is massively overrated and a bit crap" is understatement of the year. It's very crap. I found it unwatchably crap, though I can turn on every now and then to watch an episode, switch my brain off, and find that it makes no fucking sense anyway, because it doesn't appear to be the same programme I was watching a few weeks ago.

And as for the ending - the editing may have pointed to it, but, apparently, they only decided to do it two thirds of the way through the run. They didn't know where they were going, and made it up as they went along.

It doesn't show at all, does it?

09:30 / 12.08.02

I agree that it started to go downhill about half way through the day, but I'll be interested to see how the finish it, I'm betting on alien lizards...

09:35 / 12.08.02

What do people here think of the rumour that Season 2 won't be using the 24 episodes/24 hours schtick? 'Oh yeah, let's remove the one element that isn't a total cliche...' Morons.

10:29 / 12.08.02

It would be a bit pointless if they did that, unless they have some other idea for the new series not sure what else they could try though?. I thought that they would probably create the new series in the same style maybe telling the story of the Drazen's - but at the start Jack says that this is the worst day of his life so if they did create a prequel series you'd know that the day wasn't quite as bad..

Our Lady of The Two Towers

16:50 / 12.08.02

The second series would be a massive improvement if it were set over 24 days rather than 24 hours. The strains that that format places on it ruined what was actually a fairly interesting story.

03:13 / 13.08.02

What strains??? Considering thsi was the first time off the launchpad for a show like thsi I think they did a damn good job. It was better than most of the new stuff on tv. Personally, I credit all the canadian actors for making it as good as it was

07:18 / 13.08.02

Pin and I made three, THREE plans to record this and they all failed.

And now i have to wait until the DVD boxed set next week.

Our Lady of The Two Towers

09:51 / 13.08.02

Kegboy, the fact that they can travel anywhere in the city between 8 am and 10 pm by car and not once have any problem with heavy traffic.
What about the first episode where all Jack does is shoot his superior officer up the arse with a tranq. 'to get him to tell them the truth about their mission'. The fact that every other hour Kim is kidnapped.
The fact that you can get top-level Government clearence for information that is ultra-top secret in about 5 minutes.

I also have a couple of thematic problems with it, mainly that if you are running for President of the Unites States you will be honest and noble and without flaw because all Politicians are, and also that all poor and underpriviledged people are inherently noble and if you'v nice to them they'll overlook your privelidged background and help you back at the cost of their life and/or freedom.

10:10 / 13.08.02

My theory for the show is:

Palmer is conspiring with Drazen, and the assasination attempt plot was created to distract Jack, so that Andre and Alexis could rescue their father.
Which is why Nina was than happy to help Jack run around like a chicked without a head for so long.

Big Furry Bear

11:32 / 13.08.02

I agree with the feeling that Yelena's revelation was terribly disappointing (I had kinda been hoping for Jack's superior from way back, who got shot dead seemingly, to make a re-appearance and be unmasked as the Government Operative behind it all).

Nina makes sense in a way. She has always been the most obvious mole though. The only thing I can think of to make her actions and the continuity is that her brief from the Drazens was to actually 'protect' Jack so that he can get on with doing what they want him to do. She has spent a lot of time covering for him, sorting out equipment etc. (Also do we now suspect Nina of killing Jamey? My memory feels like she was the first person we saw with Jamey after the seeming suicide).

But, as many have pointed out loads of holes, for instance, why not 'break cover' and tell Victor that Alexis was alive - far more important than Palmer not really being dead you would think.

Have enjoyed it all though - like a shot of neat adrenalin on a Sunday night. Next week's going to have a lot to do to redeem itself and turn it all into something more than just an exciting 18 hours of TV.

Our Lady of The Two Towers

12:23 / 13.08.02

I do suspect that Nina killed Jamie. However, we've seen nothing yet to suggest that the junior Drazen brothers have infiltrated the American Government, beyond knowing their father was alive and where he would be at a certain time. Therefore we have a big government conspiracy thread flapping in the wind. If Nina had been working for that her tracking down of Jamie would have made sense, two conspiracies at cross-purposes.
As it is, it seems remiss of Nina not to have dispatched Jamie before she gave away as much as she did.

Regrettable Juvenilia

16:38 / 13.08.02

Quite a few Spoilers have emerged about Season 2 - it will use the same format but start at 8am, and the stakes get raised considerably (think: Sum of All Fears). Plus it sounds like a lot of plot threads will get carried over from the end of Season 1, so we might find out more about the enemy within after all...

17:47 / 13.08.02

I think there are a couple of things that have held 24 back from being the epic and quite brilliant drama series it had the potential to be. These are 1) that the whole plot arc WASN'T detailed before the series began, and in fact they have been writing it serially, episode by episode. This is a terrible shame because it means that there's no escalation of any kind - no overwhelming plot point to be made - no potential for a truly awesome twist etc. etc. 2) It took the potentially interesting idea of a real-time TV show, which SHOULD mean that they pass over quite a lot of the clichés of normal spy drama and - by the end - are just as generic as they always had been...

I think it's a terrible shame that people don't go to sleep and wake up several episodes later - I think it's a terrible shame that there's not a truly ensemble cast that could carry that off effectively - I think it's an appalling shame that they had to resort to kidnapping and keeping the family apart every few episodes - by the last time Kim was kidnapped my eyes were so far rolled in my head that I looked like I was looking forward, but my optic nerve was all tangly and painful inside my head...

17:49 / 13.08.02

PS. You know what would be nice? If someone did a real-time series that used hours spread around a bit more - like you get a one hour real-time episode when a crisis starts - another key hour four or five days later, another one a week after that... etc. etc. etc....

The Natural Way

18:24 / 13.08.02

Must agree w/ Tom. The plot's such a mess it kills a lot of the drama.

I remember mulling over the identity of 'the fiend within' and ticking off each character w/ a 'No, it can't be her/him.' They ALL seemed so unlikely: some because, well, it would've just been boring and shit, and others (like Nina) because it couldn't be them. They'd helped Jack out too many times; actually helped foil the baddies plans again and again.... But, of course, in the end I realised it HAD to be Nina and I just slapped my head and moaned because it summed up just how messy, inconsistent and silly the series actually was.

Enjoyed it in the main, but COULD OF TRIED HARDER! C+

19:45 / 13.08.02

What Tom said. I've been saying that to everyone I know for the past three months and been pooh-poohed to hell and back.

I think what would be even better is some REALLY tangential, experimental episodes. Such as: one episode following, say, a traffic cop for an hour. And about thirty-seven minutes in, he pulls over a car going too fast... which has one of the villains in. Or our Keefer.

Basically, you come in at an angle, and the "main show" suddenly becomes a sideline... but the main plot of the episode has certain repercussions on the overall plot. That could be great. And also: really mess the timing up. IE: some episodes just end. No big climax. No crisis-on-the-hour. Just ends. And then, twenty minutes into the next one comes the big bang/crisis, and you've got forty-whole minutes to watch people cope with it.

It's such a good concept shot to hell be ridiculous lack of realism and reliance on cliche.

20:23 / 13.08.02

' It's such a good concept shot to hell by ridiculous lack of realism and reliance on cliche.'
The sad thing is, that phrase could apply to dozens of TV series, especially in the US...

20:54 / 18.08.02

Oh.

Gosh.

It's all over. Bad people died. Hurrah for America! Good people died. Oh, that's a turn up for the books. Bollocks. Still, another series to go, I'm sure Jack'll get over it all.

I must admit, that episode was a fair bit better than some of the middle-distance ones. But having read in the Sunday Times that it wasn't all off the cuff - they simply started making it up after the thwarted assassination attempt - that's about right. Because after about 8am it REALLY went off the rails.

Overall? Never before in the history of TV has so much bunkum been given such praise. I hated 24. I will probably hate the second series more. And I hate it the most for a) almost being good, because the idea's brilliant and b) screwing up a series after a rather promising first episode.

I can now watch Six Feet Under unperturbed, though. (The West Wing, which finished on C4 an hour earlier, on the day of the final episode of twenty-four, which does not take place in real-time, was far better).

21:02 / 18.08.02

I loved it.

Not sure how Teri was shot though, unless Nina went back a few minutes later, or did it when my back was turned from the screen.

21:06 / 18.08.02

It was off-camera. Like, it's real-time, you know? When it cut away after Nina/Yelena had that "I've had an evil but necessary idea" face to Jack in the car... that's when she thwapped her. I mean, it was basically execution, and quite nasty, and they probably didn't want it onscreen. Violent death of henchmen with dodgy accents is fair game, though.

21:11 / 18.08.02

"Tonight's 24 was, without a doubt, the worst episode ever. Rest assured that I was on the Internet within minutes, registering my disgust throughout the world...'

21:12 / 18.08.02

P.S. But I agree, it was crap. In so many ways.

22:41 / 18.08.02

Fist up, this episode had some great lines-

Nina: <some stuff in a language that totally isn't German about ninjaing people asses or something>
Terri: You speak German?
Nina: Frankfurt Division
Terri: Oh

Guy With Cameras: OK, I got it
Jack: I Have a screen in my car. Think you can upload it and patch it over?

How lazy are they?!

So anyway- Nina can be seen as performing her mole duties in that she basically pushed Jack further into the arms of the Drazen crew by getting everyone else off his case. BUT she didn't even know their fucking plans...

And why didn't Kim just get hit by the fucking truck?! That woulda so ruled!

The main problem with this series is that it got lazy when it realised it had a second series. So they could just leave the government conspiracy and randomly stick a random fucking mole fucking randomly in it and could explain their way out of it next series. Bastards.

Did the series even need a mole? No. It didn't. The only thing in the whole series going "Mole!" was Nina, for fucks sake. They only had a mole so that there was a twist at the end. Bastards.

And how drunk was Mason by the end?! And where did the guy from Six Feet Under go?!

I'm thinking series two will next be liek Blade Runner 2 and make up total crap and explain all the fuck ups as actually very very important indeed.

This is very incoherent? Why is it incoherent? Because I have absolutly no idea what I just spent six months of my life on. AT ALL. They pissed away every good idea I ever thought for them, but at least they finally killed a major character (even if it IS as motivation for the revenge of the next series... ).

And I hope the alternate ending on the DVD is actually just a major fucking bloodbath where Jack's about to tkae out Nina, and then Mason does, and then Jack takes out Mason because Nina reveals that HER SON WAS THREATENED (I don't care how implausible this is. I want violence) AND THAT'S WHY SHE ACTED THIS WAY. And then Tony takes out Jack cos Mason is actually Tony's father. And then Kim get's food poisoning and her whole day has been a total waste and she dies.

07:20 / 19.08.02

Now you're talking...

Our Lady of The Two Towers

14:16 / 19.08.02

The only thing worse than the ending was turning over to BBC Choice after and watching the first five minutes of '24- The Post-Mortem' where the presenter said 'It's been called the best show since 'Twin Peaks'...' Grrr.

Still, the fact that Nina wasn't working for the Drazens but someone else affiliated with them, that she actually said "but that will blow my cover!", and that she actually killed Teri did a little to lift it up from the total fuckbath it could have become.

But mainly, wank.

17:29 / 19.08.02

GOOD-
Bleak ending and killing Drazen midway through the episode.

BAD-
A little more exposition and a little more action needed.
The Drazens proved to be incompetent boobs in the euro-terrorist area, trying to lure Jack in and then legging it when he arrives.
Nina's total and pointless character shift.
The episode also revolved around the three key ideas of the series:
1) Assuming someone's dead when they're not (Victor, Alexis, Kim,twice)
2)Kidnap and Ransom (Kim, Teri, Kim, Jack, Alexis, Kim. Kim.)
3) Women are evil (The lesbian terrorists, Sheri, the presidential aide, Nina)

The sad thing is I already know I'm going to watch the 2nd series. I have no dignity.

18:07 / 19.08.02

Incidentally, the "alternate" ending is... That Terri lives, and they all live happily ever after.

Now, a better ending would have been if Palmer died. Or even better... if Palmer had died halfway through the series.

Hopefully with the second series they will have learned from their mistakes. And get rid of Kiefer Sutherland -doubtful I know- who just can't act and has an amazingly boring face... He just comes across as someone who became an actor because he had nothing better to do.

19:55 / 19.08.02

I've heard that series two will be set on the Number 24 bus.

I've only seen the final episode and the second half of the penultimate episode... but boy, was it dull. The finale in particular suffered from completely running out of steam, with the plot revelation that whats-her-face was a mole much better placed about halfway through that episode (wouldn't have taken much replotting either). As it was, after Hopper got shot the tension died a slow death. Or maybe it just did for me because I had nothing invested.

Nice lighting, though.

00:25 / 21.08.02

We are actually told that Nina is the mole in episode 2 when Jamie looks at the key card Walsh gives Jack before he dies.

"The card, it comes from Nina's computer."

Nice "foreshadowing", totally forgot about that.

Our Lady of The Two Towers

12:30 / 23.08.02

But did the card actually matter to anything in the end? I forget...

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