I don't think any beginning could be as good as last year's 24 opener, in which President David Palmer and Michelle were killed.
This season's beginning didn't quite have that punch, but it made up for it with excellent characterization of Jack, released from two years of torture in a Chinese prison.
We've seen Jack coming back from the dead before - from heroin addiction, the loss of his wife, and equally traumatic interludes. But this resurrection was handled with more subtlety than usual. Jack's feeling that he just can't do it anymore - just can't operate as an effective CTU agent - is just brewing below the surface, in a way that doesn't quite impair Jack's capacity to save the hour...
There are some powerful plot twists along with this. David Palmer's brother Wayne is now President, Buchanan and Karen are married, the terrorist our government is after is really trying to bring peace...
One aspect I wasn't too thrilled with: the Arab family next door in the suburbs, who may or may not be terrorist. We've seen this before.
But a superb two-hour start, nonetheless - which I would rate as at very least a close second to last year's, and in some ways, because of its replacement of some of the punches in the stomach with subtlety, perhaps even as good.
High praise from me, because I think 24 is one of the best shows now, and to have ever been, on television.
Listen to a podcast of this review: Levinson news clips
No comments:
Post a Comment