On the Tube
Jack Bauer finally comes out of hiding
In some ways, Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland) is the television equivalent of James Bond, a superhero who can survive machine gun and missile attacks against overwhelming odds that force the viewer to suspend disbelief.
It happens repeatedly in “24: Redemption,” the television movie that airs at 8 p. m. Sunday on WUTV Channel 29. Like Bond’s “Quantum of Solace,” the slow-starting “Redemption” deals with the hero’s battered and disillusioned psyche.
It doesn’t have the constant level of surprises that viewers expect from Bauer and his counterterrorism two-hour Bauer film has more than its share of entertaining, suspenseful and preposterous action moments. It also sets up the nonstop action dealing with an African conflict. The African story continues Jan. 11, when the series returns to Fox after an 18-month layoff caused by last season’s writers’ strike.
As long as viewers go in knowing that the movie isn’t trying to duplicate the pace of the hour series episodes, disappointment will be at a minimum.
When we left Jack in May 2007 at the end of a critically slammed sixth season, he was disheartened after bringing down his father and some bad guys, and having his love Audrey (Kim Raver) land in a coma. The movie tells viewers where he has been since then.
Part history lesson, part civics lesson and part bromance, “Redemption” is set in a fictional small African country, Sangala, where 10-to 12-year-old boys are being recruited by a group plotting a coup.
Jack is there hiding from the U. S. government and helping his crew, but the buddy from special forces, Carl Benton (Robert Carlyle), deal with 14 kids at a school whose peace is disrupted by the coup leader’s plans to have them become soldiers. Among the 14 is a child named Willie, who gently “interrogates” Jack in some early scenes and who is a moving symbol of the dangers that young African kids deal with in unstable regions.
In an interview last July in Los Angeles, Sutherland suggested the African story line was inspired by the administration of President Clinton.
“There is no question there is an unbelievable economic depravity on the continent of Africa and a level of violence that has been unparalleled,” said Sutherland. “A massive problem in how the world has dealt with Africa ... is no one can justify going there because they have no viable reason ... Meaning oil or money. [The fictional new president’s] response is a human one, ‘We can stop a genocide.’ I think that’s something Bill Clinton apologized for not doing with Rwanda. And we centered a show around that.”
The prequel movie eliminated the biggest problem the writers had with the African story they planned for Season Seven before they abandoned it — disrupting the show’s real time aspect to get to the United States from Africa.
In the film, Jack is in Sangala to avoid being sent back to the United States to testify before a congressional panel investigating torture tactics. In the hours that the coup is being attempted, America is preparing to inaugurate its first female president, Allison Taylor (Cherry Jones), a plot line that would have been more timely if the season had run as scheduled in 2008 when Sen. Hillary Clinton was a presidential candidate.
Still, the movie has timely elements. As President-elect Obama has said, we only have one president at a time. And as Vice President-elect Biden has said, a new president will be tested quickly.
The current “24” president, Noah Daniels (Powers Boothe), isn’t ready to let President Taylor handle the crisis situation any sooner than she is entitled to. In other words, the transition isn’t going as smoothly as we expect the Bush-Obama transition to be handled.
The failed machine gun and missile attacks may be easier for many viewers to accept than the idea that an outgoing president wouldn’t allow his successor to handle a crisis that will be hers in a few hours.
But, hey, this is “24.” So roll with the punches and enjoy the shots at greedy stockbrokers, dispassionate American bureaucrats and gutless United Nations officials.
There also is a climactic moment that asks viewers to believe Jack wouldn’t immediately do the right thing even at great personal pain. (See above paragraph). And there’s Jon Voight, introduced as a really bad guy with excellent connections.
Nit-pick if you want. But in a TV season that has been noticeably devoid of anything to get passionate about, “Redemption” is about as good as it gets and provides hope that things can get much better when the new president takes over in January and has to deal with an African crisis and the greedy men and shadowy organization behind it.
After the movie ends, the preview DVD had fast-moving scenes that illustrate that Jack’s former CTU colleagues Chloe (Mary Lynn Rajskub) Bill Buchanan (James Morrison) and Tony Almeida (Carlos Bernard) will be back when the series resumes with its usual intensity in January.
Almeida’s return is the most surprising, since his character was left for dead a few seasons back. Without spoiling his return, let’s just say it looks like the relationship between Tony and Jack may have as many rocky moments as a new presidential administration.
TV Review
“24: Redemption”
★★★½
(Out of four)
8 p. m. Sunday on WUTV, Channel 29
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