June 6th, 2010. The last time I watched a brand new episode of 24. 1,431 days ago. On May 13th last year, 359 days ago, FOX announced the return of the show in the form of 24: Live Another Day. Since then, I have been on edge, desperately awaiting its return. Monday night, I finally got my wish. I had high expectations. The premiere didn’t hit my expectations.
It exceeded them, damn it!
It didn’t actually occur to me just how much I had missed 24 until that clock, 6 minutes into the opening episode, came onto my screen. And the return did not disappoint. 24 is known by many of its fans for its high-quality premieres, and ‘11am-12pm’ certainly falls under the category of high-quality. It was well-paced, which is what every episode of the season needs to be. It was high-octane in places; slower in others, and this worked well. While an hour of high-octane action can work well, it doesn’t always. This was a good combination, and I really enjoyed it.
We were introduced to a plethora of new characters (this wasn’t a major change from previous seasons, with the exception of seasons 2 and 5 perhaps, as we did usually get a lot of new faces on a season-by-season basis), many of whom I liked. Kate Morgan was the real stand-out, portrayed as a sort of female Jack. She had an interesting backstory in that her husband was selling secrets to the Chinese (hey, better to tell us the mole got caught BEFORE the season began than have one throughout), but despite her powers of deduction with Jack (really though, these guys are CIA, tracking Jack Bauer, yet don’t know a thing about him. This could totally be 24: The Following), she didn’t know what was going on with her husband? If she turns out to be the mole, there may be some angry remarks from me.
I wasn’t really sure what to make of Steve Navarro, head of CTU CIA London. I am drawing some parallels to Lynn McGill, in that he thinks he’s doing the right thing for both the country and his career. Catching Jack gives the potential to advance his career, while also preventing (or thinks he’s preventing) Jack from harming the President (or committing other terrorist attacks).
Erik Ritter, billed as Kate’s replacement, immediately frustrated me. He’s the kind of guy who has no regard for anything but his promotion, and because this is his only focus, he’d be oblivious if a grenade went off next to him. Now, I’m not trying to imply he’s an idiot, because I’m sure that he’s perfectly competent. However, I do really want him to actually start focussing on the task at hand, rather than continue to whine about Kate being kept on.
Mark Boudreau, Audrey’s husband and President Heller’s chief of staff. He has already become a love-hate character for me. While his idea of handing Jack to the Russians made me hate him, he is trying to protect his wife, which is understandable. However, it wasn’t until the second hour that I began to like him. His seemingly over-the-top outburst at Heller in an attempt to replicate a potential Parliament session was fantastic. He isn’t afraid to be realistic and aggressive, even with the President. Some may have seen this as harsh considering Heller’s illness (more on that in a minute), but I respected him for it.
Adrian Cross, introduced in the second hour, was promoted as the head of a WikiLeaks-like organisation, yet, he seemed to end up taking orders from Chloe. He also seemed to have some sort of grudge with Jack (I could be over-analysing it, and he was just pissed that Jack broke into his hideout). I’m looking forward to his development this season, though can we not have a relationship between him and Chloe please?
Michelle Fairley was briefly shown as terrorist Margot, and she made a hell of an impression. She’s not the kind of terrorist you want to even think about double-crossing. In fact, her daughter seems even more evil than her thus far. The best villains usually make great first impressions, and these two have certainly done that.
The other character we were introduced to was Jordan Reed, who felt like the new Chloe. Skilled on a computer, he helped out Kate despite the fact that she wasn’t authorised to look at the files he acquired for her. Their dynamic is already very Jack-Chloe like.
And now for the returning characters. Heller, having been absent since the end of season 6, has managed to work his way up into the Presidency. Audrey, who last we saw was mentally ill after being held captive by the Chinese, has recovered and is now living the high life with her father (and new husband Mark). Things aren’t all fine and dandy for Heller however, as he has early onset Alzheimer’s. It clearly affected him in these first two hours, as he forgot the name of the fourth soldier killed by the drone. It’s sad to see him like this, because I came to like Heller all those years ago.
Chloe returned, with possibly the most ridiculous look I’ve ever seen. Clearly she’s made some lifestyle changes in the past four years. I miss the geeky Chloe we got in season 3. Anyway, she is now in charge of a group of hackers, an organisation whose sole purpose is to expose government secrets.
And now for the main man. It took him three quarters of the opening hour to speak, but finally we were able to say that Jack is back. Of course, we had seen him take out the majority of a CIA team before this. But Jack could never be truly back until he said that famous word. And damn it, it was fantastic! Though, his second, rather loud utterance was even better (we even had another of my favourite Jack lines just before, in “son of a bitch”).
It was sad to see Jack refuse to admit that he has friends. Chloe’s reassurance that she is his friend was great to see, but Jack’s supposed lack of friends is a depressing thought to have for our hero. For those new to the series, all of Jack’s other friends were either killed or became a terrorist and tried to kill him, so I can sort of understand Jack not making any new friends. He’s protecting people by being a lonely, lonely man.
As for the story, it was very quick to pull me in. All the pre-released material (press releases, promos etc.) alerted us to the fact that this was going to be about a threat to Heller and an attack involving drones. But, other than the final minutes of the premiere hour (and Boudreau’s eagerness to assume Jack is in London to harm Heller), there wasn’t really any indication towards either of these plots until the second hour. The first hour focused almost solely on introducing us to the new characters and Jack rescuing Chloe. As aforementioned, this allowed the story to progress at a well-constructed pace, and that really helped make the episode one of the better ones the show has done.
I felt that the first hour was a much better hour than the second. Now, that’s not to say that the second hour was bad, because it wasn’t. I just felt that the first hour was superior in each aspect of the show. I’ll admit, as excited as I was for the return, I was terrified that Live Another Day would be a complete failure. However, this premiere proved me wrong, with two brilliant episodes that really set the tone for the rest of the season.
Decrypting the CTU files (otherwise known as odds and ends):
- The list of Jack's kills was cool.
- One of the main things I love about 24 is the unique title sequences, time stamps and the awesome credit music. The lack of a title card until 6 minutes into the premiere freaked me out. As did the lack of a ‘Previously on 24’ in the second hour (even with traditional two-hour premieres, we get a previously). We must have one next week, surely? The split screens worked brilliantly as usual. The much brighter light used for the text didn’t sit right with me, and then the credits used the traditional brightness of text. The credit music is still fantastically unchanged, although it did run a little short.
- One thing I loved about this premiere was that it felt like 24 again. The opening scene worried me, since there was no clock or ‘The following takes place between 11am and 12pm. Events occur in real time’ until after Jack was arrested. I worried then that this may not feel like 24. However, I was again proven wrong, as the next 114 minutes felt as if the show had never been gone.
- “Intelligence agencies keep secrets, because what they’re doing is criminal.” Back up a second Chloe. What did CTU do on a regular basis? And you worked for them…? I don’t like hypocritical Chloe.
- “You know who I am. Trigger an alarm and I’ll blow your head off.” “You probably think I’m at a disadvantage, I promise you, I’m not.” Jack has not changed in the slightest, and I love it.
- Nice inclusion of Kim. But 24, if you’re going to include her in this series, no cougars please.
- Sean Callery! How I’ve missed you and your awesome scores. Nice to see that the music quality hasn’t declined over the four years the show has been gone.
- Colin Salmon sounds weird with an American accent. On that, this show is set in London, yet the majority of main/recurring characters we come across are American. It feels weird.
- It’s been four years. Jack, have you had anything to eat or drink in the past four years? Or gone to the toilet?
- Ranking time. I’m only comparing the first hour here. I would rank this second out of the nine so far, behind the sublime season 5 premiere (which I would never expect any television episode to ever surpass in terms of quality).
- Thanks to Sky 1 (24's UK broadcaster), we have a Jack Bauer bingo card to play around with. I count seven already.
So, that was the 24: Live Another Day premiere! Please leave a comment with your thoughts from the episodes. I’m particularly interested to hear the thoughts of those of you who didn’t watch the original show, and whether you thought it was easy to follow. 24 old-timers: how does it feel to have Jack back?
