In 2002, you couldn’t have paid me to watch 24. As soon as I heard about the show, I figured that there was no percentage in watching twenty-four hours of television featuring Kiefer Sutherland before I got to hell. I didn’t even buy into the concept behind the show. Kiefer Sutherland saves the President? Not unless the President was buried under a metric ton of marijuana.
However, a couple Thanksgivings ago, I was looking at a long day by myself while I waited for my girlfriend to get back from her family’s house, so I picked up the 24 season one DVD, because based on what stores were open, I pretty much only had two choices to kill my day: Jack Bauer or Jack Daniels. I went with the former because I figured that no matter how hard it would be to watch Kiefer all day, getting an ambulance on Thanksgiving would probably be harder.
It only took about three hours for me to get completely hooked in. And what did it for me was when Jack’s wife gave up her goodies to one of the terrorists to save her daughter. That is dark, man; you don’t get things like that on most television. Hell, you don’t get things like that in real life. I talked about it with my Mom, and she said that, if it would save me, she would be willing to negotiate with terrorists, but under no circumstances will she even consider the MasterCard billing Nazis to be terrorists. She’s useless to me.
A lot of people call 24 a “completely unrealistic portrayal of real Homeland Security operations”. I call those people “douchebags”. It’s entertainment, stupid. I also don’t get a realistic portrayal of the world of professional cheerleading from Debbie Does Dallas, and a woman is nothing like a Kleenex, but I don’t let either of those ugly little facts stop me from enjoying the experience.
I don’t want to watch a realistic portrayal of a Homeland Security operation, thanks; I want the Jack Bauer Power Hour. Because Jack Bauer will never tell me to stock up on duct tape and plastic sheeting; he’s already using all of it to secure the fucking suspect. Jack Bauer will never tell me that I should be on Orange Alert; Jack Bauer always sees red. And frankly, if you try replacing Jack Bauer with any ten real Homeland Security bureaucrats, you’ll have to rename the show 56, A Massive Explosion And A C-Span Hearing To Discuss The Failure.
When Jack Bauer tortures a guy, you know it’s because he knows he’s got the bad guy, and he knows he’s gonna get the truth, and it’s gonna involve electrodes, bullets and kneecaps, and it’s gonna be fucking cool to watch. So fuck your “realistic portrayal”. If I wanted my torture to involve pointing at genitals and giggling, I’d start dating again.
[tags]24, Jack Bauer, Kiefer Sutherland, Department of Homeland Security, dark humor[/tags]
Keifer got drunk in a bar and tried to kiss my brother.
That’s it. That’s the whole story.
Dude, if Keifer was that drunk, that means that he probably thought that you were Eric Roberts… making it the first time ever that someone benefited from someone mistaking them for Eric Roberts.