Issue date: 5/13/07 Section: Features

Maybe it's time for Jack Bauer to take a day off.

Television's most intrepid and intense action hero, played by Kiefer Sutherland, has been saving the world (well, Los Angeles) from terrorists for six harrowing, non-stop "days" now. He has risked life and limb, lost loved ones and experienced more pain and suffering than any normal human being could possibly imagine, all for the sake of our viewing pleasure. Are we not entertained?

These days, not so much. In its sixth season, "24" has hit the wall of creative bankruptcy. In its earlier seasons, Fox's real-time thriller was unique and enthralling, with enough genuine momentum to carry us through its frequent lapses in logic. Whatever complaints one could lob at "24," no one could call it boring.

But boring "24" has indeed become. In its current season, the series has officially succumbed to numbing repetition, to the point of becoming self-parody. Virtually everything this year has been recycled from prior seasons. Interoffice politics and romantic entanglements distracting the counter-terrorism employees of CTU from the mission at hand? Been there. The President of the United States being plotted against by members of his own Cabinet? Done that. Jack going rogue? Fun the first dozen times.

Coming off the show's acclaimed, Emmy-winning fifth season (the acclaim of which baffles me, as I contend that "24" has had that not-so-fresh feeling since Season 4), fans and critics alike looked to the new season with great anticipation. After a promising start, however, enthusiasm quickly tapered off. The fact that the show airs opposite the new NBC phenomenon "Heroes" fails to help matters.

One glance at the "24" fan forums on the popular website Television Without Pity, which allows users to discuss their favorite shows, finds comments about the season ranging from indifferent at best to hostile at worst.

A significant factor in the show's staleness comes from the writers' reluctance to change the rubric the series has followed so strictly for so long. For every year since Season Two, the plot has focused upon a group of international terrorists bringing a dangerous weapon to U.S. soil and threatening the populace with it, forcing Bauer and CTU to chase them down and save the day.

The writing staff essentially just changes the nationality of the terrorist group and the form of WMD each year while the overarching formula remains intact. And there is a fair amount of regurgitation in that respect as well. For instance, this year, the terrorists were of Middle Eastern descent and their weapons were nuclear bombs. Middle Eastern terrorists also threatened the country with nukes in seasons two and four.

Even Jack Bauer himself has lost his spark. When "24" failed to fire on all cylinders in the past, the audience could always count on Bauer's resourcefulness and brute-force tactics to keep things interesting. But Bauer has become little more than a scowling automaton who grunts and bellows the same handful of commands over and over ("Drop your weapon!" "Copy that."). His inclination toward torturing suspects for information has presented itself with such astonishing frequency that it has long since lost any of its inherent shock value.

Most irritating is the fact that the writers had a chance to shake up Bauer's character at the outset of the season. Returning from 20 months of torture in a Chinese prison, Bauer initially appeared to be a broken man, haunted and unsure of himself. But, by the fifth episode, Bauer had reverted to his old superhuman, emotion-free self, and any intriguing permutations of his character were shelved.

Making matters worse, season six has given us few peripheral characters to care about. After the mass slaughter of nearly the entire long-running supporting cast last season - including Bauer's longtime allies, President David Palmer and Tony Almeida - there remains almost no one at CTU nor in the White House that either the audience or Bauer himself particularly gives a damn about.

Sure, veteran sourpuss analyst Chloe O'Brian, played by Mary Lynn Rajskub, still frumps around, spouting technobabble and snarky comments, but she alone cannot generate the amount of investment necessary to keep the audience engaged. And this season's new crop of characters has failed to make any impression whatsoever (with the possible exception of Powers Boothe as the genuinely creepy Vice President). If any series needs to start bringing characters back from the dead, this is it.

Is there still life left in "24"? Possibly, if the producers are finally willing to take some chances and shake up the show next year. Some suggestions: Set the action anywhere other than L.A. Scale down the threat from the shopworn "millions will die" scenario. Give Jack some much-needed new character elements. Perhaps try to plan the storyline out in advance so it neglects to seem so clearly made up on the fly.

Bottom line: Do something - anything - different. It would be great to be able to feel excited once again to watch Jack Bauer punch the clock for another crazy day on the job. "24" can torture its characters all it wants, but it would be nice if it stopped making its fans suffer as well.

Brandon Wolfe can be featured at features@statehornet.com

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