24 Season 4 *US episodes* *Spoilers*

jor el

s8n wrote:

when are RTE planning on showing this???

From what I've heard and read, they're not. Sky one, or download, may be the only place to see 24 this year.

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

DJB

I just got to watch episode 6....

quite good, jacks on the ball... lots of developments in this episode, leading up to future ones. Also, the characters are all developing well too, e.g. blackmailing biatch in ctu (what is she up to? another nina?), main terrorists son finding out his dad ordered him killed! Really looking forward to next few episodes!

Great scene for the rescue of sec. of defence! Good the way Jack kept his mouth shut when sec. of defence was commending head of ctu. He has her on his side now!

Roll on episode 7... 6 down, 18 to go!!!

Mr E

Day 4 Hour 6 was one of the best episodes out of the 78 hours so far. 'Nuff said. Fantastic stuff.

lynchie

aye, it was a good episode but

another mole in CTU? Not again.. please... do they not know how to vet their staff?

The new plot line regarding the nuke plants looks interesting.. hopefully the story moves quick and its not dragged out until ep 23

digiman

Was one of the best ever eps. I wonder will this story last till the end or will they have another twist half way through. They usually split the story into 2 main parts, the first part was over fairly quick so I cant see them running this part to the end.

Mr E

I think this part will be resolved about 15 or 16, and the rest will revolve around the president somehow.

daveJAM

lynchie wrote:

aye, it was a good episode but

another mole in CTU? Not again.. please... do they not know how to vet their staff?

The new plot line regarding the nuke plants looks interesting.. hopefully the story moves quick and its not dragged out until ep 23

Well in fairness, she's not a proper member of staff and she didn't have a very high level of access to their systems until she blackmailed Edgar.

adnans

6th episode

Behrooz has ****ed up once again. He left the body of Tarik and Debbie (in a black liner bag) in a middle of somewhere where someone around 12-13th hour will find and contact CTU and the net is going to close on the Behrooz's mum and dad (Dina and Navi). Jack rescuing Sec. of Defense had me on edge. I was punching air when the marines came.

Future predictions

Ok. so the main plot is the nuclear reactors in US helped since everyone wants to download the trial of Sec. of Defense from the Internet and overloading some firewall blah blah. Where is Homer Simpson when you need him O'Driscoll wont be able to handle this situation and will get Chloe back (whatever happened to that dude - chloe's friends - who was downloading warez and discovered dodgy net code?) to work her magic. Chloe will discover the mole cause she's like that. Heller's son will break soon (hopefully by next episode) and give us more action cause Jack is the new field agent. WOOO

-adnans

DrEvil

if you missed the prequel to this season it's on tonight and saturday on sky one

http://www.skyone.co.uk/programmes/24/feature.aspx

Thursday 27th Jan - 10:55pm
Saturday 29th Jan - 9:55pm

Or hit the red button on your remote to watch it on interactive.

ElNino

lynchie wrote:

aye, it was a good episode but

another mole in CTU? Not again.. please... do they not know how to vet their staff?

Anyone else thinking Sheree Palmer Mark II ? She even looks like a younger version of her. I woudn't be surprised if she finishes up like her as well.

Ajos

Just watched episode seven. Did anybody else spontaneously go "Yay!" when

Tony appeared

? I love this show.

Rew

Episode 7 I cannt belive it rumor's were true...

Tonys back!

As for the rest of it it was all fairly predictable. There falling back on stuff they have done in other series which is a bit crap

Mr E

Second episode in a row where I was cheering and clapping at the screen. If they keep this pace up, Its going to be a fun 17 hours !!!!

Loved the scenes between Dina and Navi too....

BTW, what an entrance!

vibe666

yep, woohoo'd and clapped too! (sad isn't it)

was starting to think there'd be no familiar faces.

have to say this is the best series yet. maybe i'm just easily pleased, but i like it.

ixoy

Ah pretty decent but I didn't go yay when

Tony appeared. I thought he'd appear much later on but just got a feeling of "bleh" regardless. Not much of a surprise. Hope we find out why he's out of jail so quickly and that they don't forget it. Still, when he said the one person he could trust, I feared Kim would show up...

.

I dunno - gunfights, racing through coridoors, we've seen it all before. Even the end was predictable:

So obvious, once they started going green, that a few would remain red. Yawn.

.

Also the boss' daughter? How irritating and pointless is that plotline. Still feels very tacked on. I wish they'd drop it because they've already got a pretty cracking mother/son plot line going which I genuinely like.

I think they need to up the ante a little - the bad guys are getting knocked back too quickly. It's too easy, currently, to believe that they'll solve all their problems without much difficulty.

ElNino

Good episode. I wouldn't mind seeing Kim and her two bazookas make a brief guest apperance either

Ajos

ixoy wrote:

I think they need to up the ante a little - the bad guys are getting knocked back too quickly. It's too easy, currently, to believe that they'll solve all their problems without much difficulty.

Ah ha, that's what they want you to think! Those devils...

Probably.

vibe666

was saying the same thing about the bosses daughter thing, but i reckon it's going to pan out.

i was thinking she'd cark it and then the boss would have to step down and let jack at it (or maybe tony) but jacks out of the question cos then he'd be off field ops which is where he's at his best, and i don't think they'd have tony back after all the other stuff. I'd say that jack had a hand in him being out on the street though, which would bolster the 'one person i know i can trust' line.

lynchie

Good to see

Tony back too.

I still think there is more to the plotline than just the current problem. If things go the way they are, the nuke plants should overload in 3 hrs. So that still leaves 14 hrs left - surely they are not going to spend 14 hrs hunting down the bad guys There has to be another attack lined up...

jor el

I wonder if President Palmer

pardoned Tony before his term ended.

It wouldn't surprise me because he seemed to forgive all of Jack's little excursions and was even going to give Nina a pardon for killing Jack, and he lied to protect his ex wife. Surely a little leeway for poor

Tony

isn't much to ask for.

The story with Erin's daughter is crap too. Unless this turns out to be something major, it's going to put a downer on an otherwise pretty good series.

Since the reactors plot is set to end in 3 hours time I'm wondering where the plot will go next.

I've been thinking, everytime they show a shot of Airforce One, that the terrorists will shoot it down, queue Palmer's return. Maybe a long shot but something major has to happen. I reckon at least one of the reactors will blow too.

FatherTed

Does anyone find it disconcerting seeing President Palmer doing the Allstat commercials during every 24 show on FOX?

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

Cina

It's a good series so far, first 7 episodes have been good. Then again I thought the first 11 episodes of series 3 were good until

They decided to kill off Ramone, who was a great bad guy

after that it went downhill and got pretty awful.

jor el

FatherTed wrote:

Does anyone find it disconcerting seeing President Palmer doing the Allstat commercials during every 24 show on FOX?

Did anyone see the A-Team on Saturday evening on RTE2? Same president was an orderly in the mental hospital that Murdock was in.

</Pointless Info>

Rew

Eps 8

SO Tony was pardoned by Palmer and Michell is out of the picture (dosnt really make sense that she would bugger off but any way). Definate governemt consiricay stuff growing with things like "You will be taken care of, you know that" being said to whats here name the mole in CTU

ElNino

Rew wrote:

Eps 8

SO Tony was pardoned by Palmer and Michell is out of the picture (dosnt really make sense that she would bugger off but any way). Definate governemt consiricay stuff growing with things like "You will be taken care of, you know that" being said to whats here name the mole in CTU

Probably the weakest episode so far this season. Haven't we seen the CTU mole and the sniper killing a suspect before he could be interrogated all before? It was a way too predictable episode from the wrong person being arrested as the mole in CTU to the sniper at the end. Lets hope the next episode is better.

adnans

episode 8

holy sh.it almeida is back and he's drunk with rage. see him at the end handle the situation at the roflcopter. michelle will definitely be back in the picture as she's the deputy director at the division (they always get involved) plus tony doesnt have any love for Jen, that girl in his place. im glad audrey is safe now and there won't be much on jack's mind while he's trying to save america (again). poor sarah getting cattle prodded. why do they always cattle prod the irish? bring back chloe, they need her now that sarah is messed up and they're running low on techs. one third of the way done. 16 hours to go woooooo.

-adnans & co

lynchie

ElNino wrote:

Probably the weakest episode so far this season. Haven't we seen the CTU mole and the sniper killing a suspect before he could be interrogated all before? It was a way too predictable episode from the wrong person being arrested as the mole in CTU to the sniper at the end. Lets hope the next episode is better.

I agree. It wasn't the best episode. Too predictable..

digiman

Very predictable alright. I was just expecting them to drag the audrey story into a kim one by having her kidnapped or something. Its the same every year though, there is always the really good eps and some filler eps like the last one. Its still turning out to be a brilliant season.

ixoy

Thought this was a very dull episode. As was said:

All the same old - moles, torture [already had it this season!], suspect getting shot. Yawn. The season has potential but I'm still quite underwhelmed because it seems to be sinking back into familiar patterns. And Tony? STFU whining. It's boring.

jm2k

i disagree ...i think its been a disappointing series so far, much more predictable than the previous 3. Especially tonight

when they pick the wrong mole

However I thought ep 8 was better than the rest, didnt expect the

car bomb

or even the

assassin

. Tonight was the first time I actually wanted to see the next episode, thats whats been missing up till now.

The main problem is that someone seems to have made the decision to go for a thrill-a-minute show. None of the little plots seem to have time to fully develop IMO and that detracts from the show hugely. Been watching 24 from the word go, and they've managed to maintain a really high standard so far, I'd hate to see it slip.

Hopefully now its taken a turn for the better.

doh.ie

They're already in second gear (24 seems to go in batchs of 8 episodes) for a new plot, which is starting to stretch the credibility of the real-time plot. I mean, bad enough last year with the axe to Chase's hand and then in the hospital in less than 6 minutes, but

Tony showed up within MINUTES - less than 5 - of Jack's call! But it took 15 minutes to drive back in ep 8! (Traffic must've been light...)

The ONLY elements I'm enjoying fully this year are echoes of the past. Terror Mother (and an Oscar nominee at that!) reminds me of Sherry Palmer, and I think her accent is classic - "Berr-us, your fahhther wanted the American girl, Debb-ie, to be kill...ed" - and Marianne is quite funny with her never-doing-any-work-undercover-spy-operation.
But it's old hat, at that. And nuclear attacks... again?!

24 needs new ideas - we were promised a cast clearout to make for a new angle on the format. So far, it's no different from previous years. To be honest, only seasons 1 and 2 were in any way unique, and even 2 was weak as hell in places. They originally talked about trying to do multi-arcs of 8 hours each, but with completely separate stories (i.e. on different days), but they seem to have decided on that anyway WITHIN the same day, and as formats go, it's just not working any more, or so far this year. (To ditch the Mexican brothers are 10 episodes last year and move in a new direction completely is no different from this year having a mock trial, only to ditch it in favour of a new baddie who has a somewhat forced connection to earlier events... Same with Chase's baby last year - Driscoll's kid is just another red herring that has no bearing on anything.)

Time will tell. As someone said, maybe it's now taking a turn for the better.

Rew

Episode 9:

At least they are going ahead with the melt-downs, one anyway. Covering up the mole getting in to CTU is obvioulsy going to come back and bite them in the ass. Anyone see Edger getting the blame at some point? I did like the very end "Did you get that?" -> Clock

Im begining to get board with the story TBH. When it kicked off in episode 1 my heart was thumping but now you can see the next step coming a mile off. With the reactors melting down in the next 2 episodes they have to pull somthing alot more intresting out of the bag...

ixoy

Another pretty poor episode. Frankly, I'm beginning not to care. We've seen it all before - as doh.ie pointed out. I mean

dragging Edgar's mother in this week was a tiresome piece of filler material...

Nuclear reactors - shrug. We had a nuke in S2. Because the real-time format has been compromised so much, I don't even feel the tension anymore. I mean for one example, take the last couple of minutes each week. Watch when the clock hits xx:57 (or whatever) on the screen. Count the time. It's generally 3-4 minutes that pass before we hit xx:00. And that's before we get to their teleportation mode of transport...

The show really needs a shot in the arm. There may be new charactes but they're not doing anything new or interesting. Maybe we'll get a nice kick once

the reactor story winds down (seems to be in 2 weeks) and can hope it picks up, as S3 did towards the end.

As it is now, '24' is - judging by some of the rave reviews here - the most over-rated show currently on TV...

Rew

ixoy wrote:

Another pretty poor episode. Frankly, I'm beginning not to care. We've seen it all before - as doh.ie pointed out. I mean

dragging Edgar's mother in this week was a tiresome piece of filler material...

Knew there was somthing I forgot, yeah compleatly agree...

ElNino

I thought episode 9 was average enough and as pointed out above was just a rehash of earlier seasons interspaced with filler. I really think that they should call in a day after this season is finished.

Does anyone know if the ratings are down much Stateside?

ixoy

ElNino wrote:

Does anyone know if the ratings are down much Stateside?

Pretty solid in fact. They've dropped a little since S4 began but nothing significant and often rate among the highest for the coveted 18-49 timeslot when they air.
What's more is that, for the next 3 weeks anyway, it will be preceded by "American Idol" which should lead to a jump in viewership as the lazy-assed Americans don't bother to change the channel once their programme has ended.

doh.ie

ixoy wrote:

I mean

dragging Edgar's mother in this week was a tiresome piece of filler material...

This is the s4 equivalent of Adam and his virus-infected sister towards the end of s3, which lasted an episode or two. On both occasions, they've

taken a CTU staff member and used a weak family-member-affected storyline to try to fatten out the plot until it can move into its next phase. What made it worse was that it was so bloody obvious it was filler material! Now, as unpatriotic and lacking in bravado as it might have been, wouldn’t it have been so much cooler if Edgar had challenged Driscoll; “I’m the one who stopped 97 reactors from blowing up and sending us all to nuclear hell; I exposed the CTU mole as well, and saved you from torturing poor Sarah. So, let me get this straight - you can’t spare one chopper to go and pick up my housebound mother? I’ll get her myself, I quit.” etc.

Plus, where is Driscoll’s kid – the girl who, erm, nearly DIED, at the end of episode 8?! No mention of her in 9 at all! Despite the fact that her daughter is the s4 equivalent of Chloe and the baby from last year, and that she’s completely unrelated and uninteresting, it’s pretty shoddy storytelling to completely ditch a story element that seemed so important an hour before.

ixoy wrote:

Because the real-time format has been compromised so much, I don't even feel the tension anymore.

This is true. 24 now more or less just follows the traditional four-act divider of tension, keeping the key plot turns for the act breaks (those fade-to-blacks; most UK broadcasters have a thing for cutting those out.)
So the tension comes across all peaks and troughs. Tension-wise, this year the only plot element that really brings me back week to week is the Araz family (I love Terror Mother’s nasally accent and her insane logic).

The real-time element is also particularly bad this year when you consider that Jack staged a robbery at a garage petrol station a mere FIVE hours ago and rescued Heller and Audrey THREE hours ago.

ixoy wrote:

Maybe we'll get a nice kick once

the reactor story winds down (seems to be in 2 weeks) and can hope it picks up, as S3 did towards the end.

It’s incredible when you think that

not only did Audrey and Heller’s kidnapping end in record time (7 hours), but now the plot which was kicked off as a result of that (the nukes) is likely to not stretch much more than a few more episodes either. The only issue is if the override is to be this season’s main plot or, with the plants already heading postal, they’ll recover the override only to find something else requires their attention. You can just see Jack now: “Of course! Get CTU! The kidnapping was just a cover for the override, but the override was just a cover for THIS!!”

This messing with the real-time format by overloading the plot has really gotten out of control in recent seasons. It was less obvious in season one when the programme was newer to the viewer (although could Kim have been kidnapped/escaped more often…?), but since then it’s standard for the writers to cobble together one event/attack which connects another which then connects the “big” event/attack/supremo bad guy.

And it’s becoming very old hat.

I’m not saying I have answers to how to fix it, but there must be a way to plan out 24 episodes that connect and focus on one group of people, without the mini-plots reaching their end and moving on to the next, new set.

(If a show like Lost can tell its story in a slower, but much more engrossing way, 24 should be able to too. Every single episode does not have to be a wannabe Die Hard.) Only problem is that since ratings and acclaim are now at their highest since launch, it’s unlikely the producers will revise anything they are doing and try something fresher.

ixoy wrote:

As it is now, '24' is - judging by some of the rave reviews here - the most over-rated show currently on TV...

Definitely. S1 was fresh, s2 was very watchable, 3 pushed it a bit for me by being far too disjointed and 4 is heading the exact same direction. It’s not even a show I rush to see every week any more, and in my book that’s what makes some TV series rise above others. (That said, ep 9 was still an improvement on last week’s woeful episode.)

OFDM

Wasn't the

Edgar's mother

plot done with someone else last season with the hotel that was

contaminated with the virus

?

Love the way everyone's predictions aren't coming true...

Cina

I agree, It sure as hell is enjoyable television on first look, but if you look past all that you'll see many a plot hole and no apparent proper use of real time in a show that got it's originality in the real time format in the first place, it's just annoying me now, there was so much potential.

ElNino

Episode 10

Another average, by the numbers episode.

It is getting so predictable that any time they find somebody who might have some pertinent information that they will be shot in minutes. I was disappointed that Chloey wasn't brought back to CTU

OFDM

Ep 10:

• Tony reinstated with no objections from Driscol
• Timeline mess up were Secretary of Defense said he talked to Jack about Tony being reinstated 15 minutes before - when Jack had only told Tony he would try to get him reinstated in the previous 5 minutes
• BlackBitch#2™ dead
• The Nivster gets wacked by his son
• Hot chick gets a pay rise

Overall was a bit of a filler episode

doh.ie

OFDM wrote:

Ep 10:

Overall was a bit of a filler episode

You said it. Very disappointed with this one; in fact, increasingly this series so far. Glad Terror Mother survived, her deer-in-headlights expressions are very entertaining.

You're right about some key person being killed every bloody time we're about to get some answers. I liked

Marianne - she could have provided many more cool blundering spy storylines. But, no, had to kill her, barely two hours after she survived the bomb intended for her. (I assumed she was out for the count in ep 9 - no sign of her. Why did they wait a full hour to interrogate her without any explanation of where she'd been?) Wouldn't the Evil Corporate Guys have been better off keeping her alive to find out what she had told CTU so far?! Gah! Same with Navi - the chance for some decent drama between him/Jack/Heller/Driscoll all wiped out.

As for the Evil Corporate Guys, why does everyone on 24 express such shock when an *American* is involved in terrorist activities?! Always makes me laugh. "But you're an American - why aren't you rejoicing in your freedom?!"

Only scene I liked in ep 10 was Sarah vs Driscoll. Finally, someone with some balls at CTU willing to work the system. I would have just gone home if I were Sarah - tell them to expect a call from my lawyer for substantial damages!

Shades of Driscoll not being quite the good guy here again, so I'm half-expecting her not to last the full year. Also something very odd about how eager she was to accept Tony's reinstatement - without even putting in a single condition of her own on it. OK, so she asked Sarah to keep an eye on him, but it was still very unopposed hiring, considering his past.

I get the impression the writers are clutching at straws a little. None of this so far seems to be tied together very well, at least not compared to previous years.

lynchie

Was an ok episode, better than the last.

But how is it that the CTU security teams who should be the best of the best always seem to be taken out so easily.. I mean those corporate guys appeared in that office really quick, with no resistance from the two guys posted outside the door.

*sigh* Now I have to spend the next episode watching Curtis being tortured for info.. We've seen it before... give us something new and different..

doh.ie

Knew I meant to add something...

lynchie wrote:

But how is it that the CTU security teams who should be the best of the best always seem to be taken out so easily.. I mean those corporate guys appeared in that office really quick, with no resistance from the two guys posted outside the door.

Bingo! This is driving me nuts week after week. These are supposedly among the *best* the US have?! It's failure after failure, week after week! And couldn't a larger team at least have swept the building first, or use the infrared thermal check to see who was in there, no matter how deserted it seemed?!!!

ixoy

I fell asleep watching this episode: true story. I nearly did again as I struggled to finish watchng it. What an annoying by-the-24-bloody-numbers this one was.

If they have another informant shot, I swear I might damage the TV! This isn't even funny any more - it's actually just insulting.

Yeah and I completely agree with you all on the Crap Team Unit's that are always sent out to defend people. Ugh.

And they're surprised a businessman is behind all this? WTF? Didn't they see Season 2? Twats.

So many tired things here:
* Go into a room - noone appears to be there. *play tense music* Oh look someone suddenly died!
* Jack tells someone not to do something! They do it! Oh look Jack arrives at the last minute to save it - thank fc*k for his teleporting jeep: cuts through all the traffic
* Someone tortured for info. Fills up the screen. Yawn.

Do they know where they're heading this season and why should I care? Please end it this year and let's not do a Buffy-2-seasons-too-many on it.

Mr E

It wasn't a bad episode by any means. I still look forward to the next episode, week after week. Its a little bit predictable, but after the next two hours, the story is going to have to go somewhere else. I'm interested to see what they do with it.

Oh, and if anyone is interested about the next couple of episodes,

check out the talkback section on Aint It Cool News on their latest 24 article

. (No spoilers revealed in that spoiler, just info on where to get spoilers!)

OFDM

doh.ie wrote:

Why did they wait a full hour to interrogate her without any explanation of where she'd been?

She was

unconscious

- there was a very brief shot in the previous episode that

showed her on a trolly in the CTU clinic room

.

Just thought of some more time-warping in episode 10:

Edgar says his mother just died - wasn't he just talking to her a few minutes ago?

As for the CTU guys

guarding the door who get taken out

- they're just like the guys in the

red uniforms in an away team in Star Trek - you just know they're going to bite the dust

radiospan

OFDM wrote:

Just thought of some more time-warping in episode 10:

Edgar says his mother just died - wasn't he just talking to her a few minutes ago?

Maybe he mean't she's effectively dead.

Also, couldn't Curtis just have taken the dead guys thumb for the thumbprint thing, instead of having to bring along Mary Anne Taylor?