Sunday, January 18, 2004
...I know, it's been ages (again!) and I promise I WILL update with a whole bunch of things I've been meaning to mention, but right now I've got something on my mind that I have to talk about. So I will. It's about 24's third season... and I promise, no spoilers.
You all know how much I love 24. I really, really love that show. Except I fear I might just be... "over" it. Now mind you, though I thought Season 2 wasn't quite as good as Season 1, I never actually thought it was bad or stupid or anything -- it's still VERY good, just not quite up to the mark set by Season 1. Season 3, however, has me a bit mixed.
I did enjoy it at first. It started a little slowly, but the general plot strands were rather cool, and experience with the series tells me to wait and see how they play out. And it improved. There were some really cool moments in the first third of the season, and I enjoyed those episodes. But now we come to the point I'm at, just shy of the half-way mark, where things have slowed down. Every season of 24 seems to have this slow patch, but where the first two kept me going, this one hasn't done so. Mid-way through Season 1, after they resolved the "first" plot of the series and switched gears to set up the final plot, I had similar feelings. But considering the first 13 hours kicked ass and I felt I was watching something special, I knew I had to push on... and I was rewarded. In Season 2, the brakes come on at the two-thirds mark. But with only a few episodes to go, I knew I had to watch on to see the conclusion, and again it was enjoyable. Here... I don't know. It's way too early for it to go slow. They haven't quite set the scene properly. And even the re-introduction of some old characters left me a bit cold. I might be over-analysing things, so the best way to illustrate how I may be "over" 24 is simply the fact that I didn't watch the episode for four days. Normally, I'm itching to watch it the instant I can. I'll try to grab the file the second it's available -- even forcing Rajé to get it for me. Now... I had it early (I downloaded it in ELEVEN MINUTES), but I didn't care enough to watch it.
In the end though, I have to say that the episode WAS better than the last and did rekindle something inside of me, but the show needs to really kick into gear soon or this season will be a total waste.
There's a greater problem here though, and that's that 24 might have broken too much ground for its own good. There will simply never be a twist like the first season's twist. It just can't happen. Aside from the fact that the there's too much history with the characters to allow them to swing one way or another, there's also the fact that it's already been done before. It's like how Star Wars has ruined a lot of other twists. I mean, nobody (in any movie, TV show or book) can EVER do the whole "NO, I AM YOUR FATHER" thing without people thinking of Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker. It just can't happen. It'll feel cheap. Same thing with 24. And then there's the fact that the characters are too entrenched now. In the first season, nobody was safe. In the second, there was still some uncertainty (and a couple of deaths). But now you feel that if the characters are there, they'll be there until the show's end. Like Jack Bauer. We didn't know if he'd live or die (or live until the last minute and then dramatically die) in Season 1. Every fight he waded into was life-or-death. Season 2 got a bit silly in that department, yeah but it's all gone in Season 3. He's Jack. Seeing him do remarkable things was a novelty in the first season. It was wearing thin in the second. In the third... well... you're wondering how much he can take. Kiefer Sutherland knows this, and has made no secret of the fact that he wants to kill Jack off. But he must also know that Jack is what makes the show work. There's nobody who can replace him. So unless Jack dying is the big twist that ends Season 3 -- and the whole run of 24 -- there's no way he can go.
I hope I'm wrong, and I hope 24 can regain the sheer brilliance that it's known for, but I fear for it at this point. Still, if any show can pull this off... it's 24. The clock is ticking.
Posted at 6:26 AM
