At the end of season four, Jack Bauer faced the possibility of being arrested by the Chinese government for the accidental killing of one of their own. In turn, he faked his own death and walked away with the possibility of nothing ever being the same on the show. But then, the producers simply had him reappear back in L.A. for this season -- okay, I get it, they don’t wanna deal with it yet.
This season finale, we get a hint of that story coming back via a “slow boat to china” if you will. Now according to TV Squad, that’s not going to happen?
I’m getting pissed.
I’ve been put through the deaths of major characters (Tony, Michelle, and David Palmer) all year after their seemingly aborted leave from the show in Season 4 didn’t work. I’ve had to deal with yet another set of bad guys who don’t have nearly the personality and menace of Victor Gains or The Drazen family. Finally, I’ve had to deal with Crazy Jack again -- not the normal but-forced-to-do anything to get his family back Jack Bauer of season one. In short, Stephen Hopkins or whoever was the genius behind that brilliant first season, needed to be brought back some two seasons ago.
The show, which had the opportunity to be an interesting character study of the 24-hour work day phenom, has turned into a comic book with comic book trappings. It’s cool to add a splash of that now and then, but these past few seasons haven’t even tried to stay within some boundary of reality.
Take the Chinese government story.
According to Howard Gordon, it would take half the season for Jack to get back to the U.S. from China. Okay? So a highway with no traffic seemingly in the daytime was more feasible to deal with than Jack getting from China to the U.S? There’s tons of stories you could pull off in him getting back -- it’s even a good opportunity to explore how our border patrols are really done. Not only that, you have a government which truthfully is worse than our own in that rather than tap your phone, the Chinese will tap your ass -- even kill you. Use the hole you’ve already made for yourself, and find a way out of it that doesn’t involve freaking L.A. again -- we’ve already done that city to death.
Also if you aren’t going to hit upon the Chinese story for most of the season, why not give Curtis Manning a shot or even Chloe O’Brian – she can pack a pistol and whoop some ass. She would even provide some comic relief, which is more than I can say for Jack Bauer himself. Speaking of him, next season would have benefited from one realistic addition to his character -- making him actually go take a piss for half an episode.
I could on and on, but ultimately comes down to this: for one damn season, try to stick to something for god's sake. After you’ve gotten that down, attempt to do something new for a change -- especially with psycho Jack.
Posted by Matthew at May 26, 2006 06:26 AM | TrackBack