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Adventures in TV Land

Editor's note: this week we hired a new writer, who has not seen a television in fifteen years. How that came about is a long, sad story, and not relevant to our important business here. We asked him to watch the hit show "24" and write a review for us.

Mea culpa - I misspelled the name of the protagonist on "24."

Fans are pissed ( see comments ). I missed the opening credits because I was mixing a pitcher of cocktails to blunt the trauma of watching TV.

The cocktail in question is one I invented, called The Cold War – vodka and cranberry with a jigger of pomegranate juice and lots of lime, serve over ice (Patent Pending, all rights reserved).

The hero's name is Jack Bauer , not Bower, and thanks to one of my three readers for so eloquently pointing that out.

I get it now, this " 24 ."

The show happens in "real" time, so it's a one-day-in-the-life-of kind of deal. I totally missed the point of the first episode. I blame it on too much Cold War.

Here's the story arc: An African warlord is blackmailing the US government, and using white paramilitaries (and someone high up in the White House) as his nefarious proxy.

Another group of shadow operatives is trying to stop the bad guys. The bad guy that Bauer captured in episode one is a shadow op, ergo, good. Bauer springs him from FBI headquarters, making them both fugitives and royally pissing off both the Bureau and Bauer's love interest, the red head hottie. (She proves faithful to Bauer by torturing a suspect, true love.)

Both fugitives then go undercover, infiltrating the bad guys to try to stop the evil plot. The deadline for the warlord to start evil-doing approaches, and the President must decide whether to capitulate to the warlord, or to take a stand against the terrorists. They. Must. Be. Stopped. 

"24" is lousy with inanities. You doubt?

Why is an African warlord blackmailing the President of the United States? The warlord is, true to his revolutionary praxis, fighting a war to depose the leader of his country, Sangalia.

Unfortunately, his troops are committing genocide against innocent civilians. You see, in a fit of moral conscience unlike anything seen in our nation's recent history, the US has sent troops to Sangalia to prevent the slaughter. America's good name restored!

Hold the presses.

Africa … Africa … genocide … genocide. I seem to remember some connection there. Ah yes, Rwanda in the 1990s, when Hutu militias killed nearly a million Tutsis (estimates vary by several hundred thousand).

O yeah, the Janjaweed in Sudan. And, yes, genocide in the Congo, and in Somalia, and for many years there was that apartheid thing in South Africa, the troubles in Zimbabwe, the killing in Algeria.

So, really, the US is intervening in the sovereign affairs of another country to prevent genocide? When we would gladly invade a country in the Middle East for all the wrong reasons -- oil … uh … I mean to promote democracy. Feh, feh and again feh.

Witness the FBI's treatment of their suspect. Before the interrogation they ask him, "Are you comfortable?" The interrogator then walks into the room to face his hardened suspect with a Bluetooth in his ear.

This is supposed to inspire what– fear, respect, confidence? No, he looks, as do all people who wear a Bluetooth in public, like a freaking bozo. The suspect clams up.

When it's Bauer's turn to get info what does he do? He goes all heroicidal and chokes the guy. It works!

Inexplicably, the shadow group's hideout is a marble-lined hallway resembling the waiting area in a courthouse restroom.

In the space of three hours, Bauer has tortured two people, bloodied many, shot several people dead, corrupted one FBI agent, escaped from FBI headquarters, wrecked several cars, joined the good guys, then the bad guys who are good guys, then as a good guy he goes undercover with the real bad guys and convinces the main villain he is baaaaaad by … what else, beating up some bad guys.

He has not once used the bathroom, eaten, drunk anything, smiled, told a joke, scratched his ass or told anyone he loved them.   

Bauer likes to hit people, to hurt people. It's his métier; he is an artist of the flying fist, the shoot and run, the commanding presence, the veiled threat, the opposition to authority, the weight of the world demeanor and the McGyver improvisation.

Here's the thing about the FBI – it's full of hot, young, smart women. They have no sense of humor, but they are nonetheless sexy in some way. They boss around men with relish, and the men dig it.

FBI agents are expert at doing urgent things with their eyes.

They have black helicopters.

They play by the rules.

You get the idea.

I had really hoped the love interest between Bauer and the FBI hottie would be the centerpiece of the show. Can he trust her? Can she trust him? Will he teach her torture techniques to prove his love for her? Will she turn him from the dark side?

It's not about love as I had hoped; it's about fear and paranoia, about ends justifying means, about the better angels of our imaginary selves, about easy sentiment and thinly veiled analogies to current events.

It's all very claustrophobic, there's nowhere to turn, nowhere to run. It's fraught with urgency and purpose and patriotism and treachery.

And who knew there were so many secret places in Washington, DC, where bad guys can safely hide?

How this show stays on the air is anyone's guess. The thing is "24" is wholly unnecessary.

Why a fictional TV show about genocide, torture, terrorism, hijacked planes, corrupt government officials, competing agendas, divided loyalties and conspiracies when reality is rife with such ripe and juicy plums?