"24" Right/"60 Minutes" Damned Right
By Brian Lambert
I lost track of Jack Bauer three or four years ago, sometime after the
second nuclear bomb went off outside Los Angeles. Man, that is some
seriously distressed real estate out there.
Bauer got a lot of hype for his return Sunday night, and I just finished watching the second two-hour download. Frankly, after four hours, I think I have a pretty good idea where this is going. But I may hang in there—no election zaniness or the NFL to distract me on Monday nights anymore.
The cultural/political issue attached to 24, of course, is that the show is that rare, unvarnished expression of Hollywood conservatism. Co-producers Joel Surnow and Howard Gordon are close pals with Rush Limbaugh. (They were with him on the famous all-boys Caribbean vacation a couple years ago when Limbaugh was stopped as he re-entered the country with a bottled of "mis-labeled" Viagra. Only one pill was missing. Bummer of a party, I guess.)
Last season's run (actually a year-and-a-half ago) finally ran afoul of champions of the Constitution and critics of torture. Bauer—basically a Dirty Harry for the twenty-first century—regularly pistol-whips, garrotes, bludgeons, and gets way too close to terrorists and conspirators with what I'm thinking could be serious halitosis. But he's Dick Cheney without other priorities. The lunatics are going to set off another nuke or kill a bunch of kids—kids, for God's sake—unless Bauer extracts the truth, pronto, along with a half-dozen teeth.
My reaction to the "24 is an agent of regression" kerfuffle was "whatever." I actually think it's great someone in Hollywood other than Chuck Norris, James Woods, and Kelsey Grammer dare admit they don't vote in lockstep with Tom Hayden. A little range in our entertainment perspective won't hurt anyone. And if they want to fill time and make money with fantasies of psychotics with nukes and deranged, craven American officials, what the hell? It's just show biz. (Tell me that last Will Smith movie isn't a worse threat to American culture?)
Here's one of many sites where fans deconstruct the show.
My bigger problem with 24--beyond the preposterousness of the plots--is the dense filler required to inflate the story into twenty-four forty-two-minute hours. Post-Matt Damon and director Paul Greengrass's Bourne movies, any white-knuckled, relentlessly tense spy drama that pauses even for a second for some mopey love story loses huge points for wimpiness. As in: "The nuke is about to blow, but first let's discuss our relationship."
(In TV, you gotta deliver a female demographic for the advertisers; in the movies, the ladies will go with their boys on a date.)
Just to be clear, on no other level does 24 match the realism and intensity of the Bourne movies. Those things (there may be a fourth) are the new gold standard in smart action movies. Heck, look at what they did for James Bond.
After filling six seasons with super-geek computer surveillance, cell phones that never lost battery power, and full-strength signals to dungeons, there's been a lot of filler to 24. It's like a bad crab cake in that way. A drop of eau de crab and six tablespoons of corn meal.
Although I like the idea of the show finally getting out of LA (how many nukes can one town take?) and moving to D.C., everything else is pretty much as I remember it back in '04 or '05, whenever it was. Jack has found a mole in a terror cell; the dark and gossipy CTU office has been replaced by a bright and gossipy FBI office; Chloe, the super-nerd, can hack any computer and blind any piddly CIA/FBI/NSA surveillance; and there are turncoat spies in the White House . . . yet again. (Good lord, who vetted these people? John McCain's vice-presidential search committee?)
I like Madame President's right-hand stiff, Ethan Kanin, for a bad apple. Ditto, thinking big twist here, Janeane Garofalo for the FBI office plant. (Her weirdo colleague Sean and Moss the boss are too obvious. Although I don't like the curiosity of the obligatory statuesque office blond). And yeah, fellow liberal demonizers, Janeane Garofalo. Whatever Surnow and Gordon were doing with Rush and that one hit of Viagra in the Dominican Republic, it hasn't stopped them from signing a bona fide big-mouthed lefty to a major role in their comeback season. (Did you also catch the spot for Human Rights Watch in Sunday's premiere?)
So no, I can't get too worked up about this TV show's pernicious effect on our democratic ideals. We've been through much worse, and, hell, we actually voted that crowd into office. (If only we could have changed channels and had them canceled because of low ratings.)
Play on, Jack. For myself, I am far more eager for the return of Lost.
But while waiting for 24 Sunday night, I caught a segment of 60 Minutes about the oil industry that had been hyped with a line to the effect that "what you hear may surprise you" about who and what controls prices. Skeptic that I am, I was not at all prepared for a major American television network ("the network of Dan Rather") laying out what, until now, has been the view of spooked-out conspiracy theorists: namely, that supply and demand has almost nothing to do with the way our primary energy cycle is gamed and that the same giant banking operations that have cooked the world economy with content-free derivatives (and are now refusing to disclose what they've done with $350 billion in taxpayer bailout money) also essentially control the price the world pays for oil.
Here's a link to the segment. It's a terrific piece. It could have been part of the script for Syriana. But as much as I wonder why it took so long for an American network to drop this--on its signature magazine show--I suspect it has something to do with the deservedly low regard the public has for the once-luminous icons of Staggering American Profit. Reduced far lower than Big Oil--which, after all, produces something--Big Finance is on the ropes and staggering badly enough that an advertising-based broadcaster finally dares tell the truth some of us have known for years.
Finally, as a special, extra, double-secret bonus, here's a related article from the German magazine Der Spiegel that I've squirreled away since last spring. "The Attack on Prosperity: How Speculators are Causing the Cost of Living to Skyrocket."
Here's a reassuring money graph:
Bauer got a lot of hype for his return Sunday night, and I just finished watching the second two-hour download. Frankly, after four hours, I think I have a pretty good idea where this is going. But I may hang in there—no election zaniness or the NFL to distract me on Monday nights anymore.
The cultural/political issue attached to 24, of course, is that the show is that rare, unvarnished expression of Hollywood conservatism. Co-producers Joel Surnow and Howard Gordon are close pals with Rush Limbaugh. (They were with him on the famous all-boys Caribbean vacation a couple years ago when Limbaugh was stopped as he re-entered the country with a bottled of "mis-labeled" Viagra. Only one pill was missing. Bummer of a party, I guess.)
Last season's run (actually a year-and-a-half ago) finally ran afoul of champions of the Constitution and critics of torture. Bauer—basically a Dirty Harry for the twenty-first century—regularly pistol-whips, garrotes, bludgeons, and gets way too close to terrorists and conspirators with what I'm thinking could be serious halitosis. But he's Dick Cheney without other priorities. The lunatics are going to set off another nuke or kill a bunch of kids—kids, for God's sake—unless Bauer extracts the truth, pronto, along with a half-dozen teeth.
My reaction to the "24 is an agent of regression" kerfuffle was "whatever." I actually think it's great someone in Hollywood other than Chuck Norris, James Woods, and Kelsey Grammer dare admit they don't vote in lockstep with Tom Hayden. A little range in our entertainment perspective won't hurt anyone. And if they want to fill time and make money with fantasies of psychotics with nukes and deranged, craven American officials, what the hell? It's just show biz. (Tell me that last Will Smith movie isn't a worse threat to American culture?)
Here's one of many sites where fans deconstruct the show.
My bigger problem with 24--beyond the preposterousness of the plots--is the dense filler required to inflate the story into twenty-four forty-two-minute hours. Post-Matt Damon and director Paul Greengrass's Bourne movies, any white-knuckled, relentlessly tense spy drama that pauses even for a second for some mopey love story loses huge points for wimpiness. As in: "The nuke is about to blow, but first let's discuss our relationship."
(In TV, you gotta deliver a female demographic for the advertisers; in the movies, the ladies will go with their boys on a date.)
Just to be clear, on no other level does 24 match the realism and intensity of the Bourne movies. Those things (there may be a fourth) are the new gold standard in smart action movies. Heck, look at what they did for James Bond.
After filling six seasons with super-geek computer surveillance, cell phones that never lost battery power, and full-strength signals to dungeons, there's been a lot of filler to 24. It's like a bad crab cake in that way. A drop of eau de crab and six tablespoons of corn meal.
Although I like the idea of the show finally getting out of LA (how many nukes can one town take?) and moving to D.C., everything else is pretty much as I remember it back in '04 or '05, whenever it was. Jack has found a mole in a terror cell; the dark and gossipy CTU office has been replaced by a bright and gossipy FBI office; Chloe, the super-nerd, can hack any computer and blind any piddly CIA/FBI/NSA surveillance; and there are turncoat spies in the White House . . . yet again. (Good lord, who vetted these people? John McCain's vice-presidential search committee?)
I like Madame President's right-hand stiff, Ethan Kanin, for a bad apple. Ditto, thinking big twist here, Janeane Garofalo for the FBI office plant. (Her weirdo colleague Sean and Moss the boss are too obvious. Although I don't like the curiosity of the obligatory statuesque office blond). And yeah, fellow liberal demonizers, Janeane Garofalo. Whatever Surnow and Gordon were doing with Rush and that one hit of Viagra in the Dominican Republic, it hasn't stopped them from signing a bona fide big-mouthed lefty to a major role in their comeback season. (Did you also catch the spot for Human Rights Watch in Sunday's premiere?)
So no, I can't get too worked up about this TV show's pernicious effect on our democratic ideals. We've been through much worse, and, hell, we actually voted that crowd into office. (If only we could have changed channels and had them canceled because of low ratings.)
Play on, Jack. For myself, I am far more eager for the return of Lost.
But while waiting for 24 Sunday night, I caught a segment of 60 Minutes about the oil industry that had been hyped with a line to the effect that "what you hear may surprise you" about who and what controls prices. Skeptic that I am, I was not at all prepared for a major American television network ("the network of Dan Rather") laying out what, until now, has been the view of spooked-out conspiracy theorists: namely, that supply and demand has almost nothing to do with the way our primary energy cycle is gamed and that the same giant banking operations that have cooked the world economy with content-free derivatives (and are now refusing to disclose what they've done with $350 billion in taxpayer bailout money) also essentially control the price the world pays for oil.
Here's a link to the segment. It's a terrific piece. It could have been part of the script for Syriana. But as much as I wonder why it took so long for an American network to drop this--on its signature magazine show--I suspect it has something to do with the deservedly low regard the public has for the once-luminous icons of Staggering American Profit. Reduced far lower than Big Oil--which, after all, produces something--Big Finance is on the ropes and staggering badly enough that an advertising-based broadcaster finally dares tell the truth some of us have known for years.
Finally, as a special, extra, double-secret bonus, here's a related article from the German magazine Der Spiegel that I've squirreled away since last spring. "The Attack on Prosperity: How Speculators are Causing the Cost of Living to Skyrocket."
Here's a reassuring money graph:
This is about more than just economics. It is also an ethical and highly moral question. Much depends on the answer, including the credibility of our economic system.
Perhaps this is why there are so many voices seeking to defuse the issue and calm things down, those who admit that speculators are at work in the commodities markets, but who also insist that they have little influence over prices. And if they do have an influence, these people say, it can only be a good thing, because it will force humanity to prepare itself more quickly for the unavoidable: the growing scarcity of resources.
"This is not about blame," US Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson recently said. "It's about supply and demand." According to Paulson, "speculators have had very little impact."
© 2008 MSP Communications, Inc. All rights reserved
I don't watch 24. But Jane Mayer says that everyone in the White House does. Rove and co feted Surnow with his own white house luncheon. The dean of West Point who wanted to ask Surnow to knock it off, however, because it was making it hard to get cadets to believe that torture doesn't work, and because it was making the rest of the world hate us, had to go out to Surnow's studio to make his appeal. Surnow blew him off, blaming ADD.
Anyway, everyone appears to like what Jack Bauer embodies except the guy who plays him. Keifer Sutherland is creeped out by the torture b.s.
The show is gross, and so are the local Fox news stations and everyone else drinking the promo milk being passed around this week.
LAMBERT: I was trying to find the link to Dorothy Rabinowitz's WSJ review. A classic of neo-con orgasmics.
Posted by: Paul Scott on January 13, 2009 at 9:05 AM
It aint' the terrorists who're keeping me lying awake nights. Cue Pogo.
Posted by: Jim Leinfelder on January 13, 2009 at 11:04 AM
I will still watch it but Jack Bauer has got to get some new writers. Did I actually hear Madame President's advisor say that American citizens faced the risk of "dehydration" at the hands of terrorists? Probably not in Minnesota.
Personally, I'd like to send Bauer into Ritchie's and Acorn's offices, see what really happened in the election. In one day, we would have an answer. No waiting for a tedious election contest.
LAMBERT: Jack Bauer and Fritz Knaak, trapped in an elevator. Think about it.
Posted by: Paul Kane on January 13, 2009 at 11:46 AM
Hey! What's with the long-winded discussion of media in the media column? Weren't we just talking politics? I'm sure you're about to get to it, but please don't forget to castigate your boy, Al Franken, for his craven, extra-legal attempt to have himself declared the winner of the still-contested senate race. I mean, you hit Coleman hard for exercising a lawful court challenge to the recount, so now that Franken has decided to race him to the moral lowground I assume he'll get similar treatment.
But...whatever. All I know is that if the election were held again today Barkley would win in a landslide.
LAMBERT: Franken looks bad getting slapped down of course. But he at least has won a full and meticulous recount. I'm not saying Coleman's suit is "unlawful", just silly, desperate and without any apparent evidentiary merit. ... but you already know that.
Posted by: Frogman of Grant on January 13, 2009 at 11:48 AM
So, for instance, if a terrorist knew information that could be used to stop say, a bus bomb on which bus your children were riding, you'd rather the terr NOT be waterboarded?
The ridiculousness of the left has no bounds.
"Torture" is what the Japanese, the Koreans, and the North Vietnamese did in their wars.
It's not waterboarding.
But the liberal mind can not understnd the distinctions.
LAMBERT: Is it necessary to have lost your own mind to have such a deep understanding of someone else's?
Posted by: bertram jr. on January 13, 2009 at 12:32 PM
My how that ticking time bomb thing has the villagers enchanted. Here is a decidedly not comic book analysis of said, taken from Mayer's 2007 New Yorker piece on 24:
"At the meeting, Cochran demanded to know what the interrogators would do if they faced the imminent threat of a nuclear blast in New York City, and had custody of a suspect who knew how to stop it. One interrogator said that he would apply physical coercion only if he received a personal directive from the President. But Navarro, who estimates that he has conducted some twelve thousand interrogations, replied that torture was not an effective response. “These are very determined people, and they won’t turn just because you pull a fingernail out,” he told me. And Finnegan argued that torturing fanatical Islamist terrorists is particularly pointless. “They almost welcome torture,” he said. “They expect it. They want to be martyred.” A ticking time bomb, he pointed out, would make a suspect only more unwilling to talk. “They know if they can simply hold out several hours, all the more glory—the ticking time bomb will go off!"
BTW, the CIA got nothing of use out of waterboarding KSM according to the One Percent Doctrine, whose source was Tenet. They even threatened his kids, which almost made him happy...
LAMBERT: I think it was in Suskind's book where it was mentioned that the one technique that showed good results with sexually repressed fanatics was doling out pornography. Clearly a particularly vile form of torture to our own sexually repressed fanatics.
Posted by: Paul Scott on January 13, 2009 at 6:32 PM
That Bertram, Jr.'s a real movie buff but has some sort of disorder wherein he conflates these celluloid flights of fantasy with reality, a common disorder with conservatives, it seems. He must've recently rented "Speed" and then marinated his dark imagination in the very special two-hour premiere of "24."
LAMBERT: "Hellboy" really has him worked up.
Posted by: Jim Leinfelder on January 13, 2009 at 7:15 PM
Seven Pounds? Did you lose a bet? I told you to go see Let the Right One In, perhaps now you'll finally start listening to me.
LAMBERT: I was weak. It was close.
Posted by: Matt Gamble on January 13, 2009 at 7:58 PM
Re realism...
In the Bourne Movies Damon is constantly making cocking sounds with his poly framed semi-autos. This does not occur in real life, and is a disqualifier of that realism unfortunately. It's almost as bad as Errol Flynn and Ronald Reagan carrying Colt Peacemakers in Santa Fe Trail...
I liked Valkyrie a lot, and walking in I was predisposed to not liking it (the history pedantic that I am). Good grief, the Woodbury 10 was crowded last Friday. There's a counter-intuitive recession themed story out there for some enterprising reporter.
Never seen 24. Working, suburban, Palin-loving households with kids watch AFV on Sunday nights.
LAMBERT: "Valkyrie" surprised me. The director has adapted a very old studio look to his films. But he gets the camera in the right places and tells his story well. Excellent supporting cast.
Posted by: 108 on January 14, 2009 at 9:58 AM
Quite preferable ito conflating socialist utopian unicorns with "reality", Lein-puffter.
And still, BL offers nothing on Mickey Rourke -maybe his quotes today in the Guardian about Bush and 9/11 will get you off the dime....
Maybe I'll tee up "Wild Orchid" this evening, and conflate me some Jackie Bissett...
LAMBERT: So Mickey Rourke is your latest socio-political guru? What are his thoughts on global climate change? Every bit as valuable as a NASA climatologist I'm guessing.
Posted by: bertram jr on January 14, 2009 at 10:01 AM
Bertram Jr. uses 24 as a time to clean his weapons.
I understand many viewers do this, nationally.
LAMBERT: Somehow I imagine you home alone cleaning your weapons as you watch, "Dancing With the Stars". The show doesn't matter much, right?
Posted by: bertram jr. on January 14, 2009 at 5:36 PM
Back to media! Excellent!
Have you watched Damage? The first episode last week was fantastic. Also Big Love returns Sunday, another favorite of mine.
I was also impressed that In Treatment was noticed at the Golden Globes. That show was solid with some great acting.
I gave up on 24 years ago, too many higher quality alternatives.
LAMBERT: i haven't spent any time to speak of with any of the other three, although my pals tell me I'm an idiot for not checking them out. (My pals tell me I'm an idiot for a lot of different reasons.) The one I'm told I should really take the time to catch up with is, "Battlestar Galactica". And this from people who I don't take to be Trekkies.
Posted by: Dave on January 14, 2009 at 5:48 PM
Uh, how's that "global warming" working for you recently?
And, yes Rourke may have smudged his Oscar chances, but he spoke the truth - THAT is refreshing compared to the usual Hollyweird political blatherings.
I also expect he'd take Timmy Robbins down in about 1.5 seconds flat.
Posted by: bertram jr. on January 15, 2009 at 10:30 AM
Brian: Sorry to add this to the comments section for 24 but we do not have your direct email address. Please list this event in your great blog and hope you can swing by on 1/24. Thanks! Sammy & Julian
WHAT: Ballpark Tours 2nd Annual "Final" Hot Stove League Banquet and Charity Auction for St. Paul's own Dunning Field Little League.
WHEN: Saturday, 1/24. Doors Open: 5:30 pm. Festivities Begin: 7:10 pm.
WHERE: The Historic Harriet Island Pavilion Building (across from Dtwn St. Paul via the Wabasha Avenue Bridge). Plenty of free parking.
GUESTS: Former Twins and Brewers great Corey Koskie, MLB Umpire Tim Tschida, another Twins Alumni (TBA), a tribute to our friend the late sports artist Andy Nelson, Strib Twins beat writer LaVelle E. Neal III and other special guests. Our emcee is MPR's own baseball contributor and Strib editor and blogger Howard Sinker.
TICKETS: $30 for adults, $25 for youth 16 and younger, $5 more at the door. Available at Anodyne @ 43rd, 4301 Nicollet Ave. So. in Minneapolis, Golden Thyme Coffee & Cafe, 921 Selby in St. Paul and at the door.
INFO: 651-227-3437, 651-644-9254, ballparktours@qwestoffice.net or twinsfansam@gmail.com
LAMBERT: Sadly, I'm out of town. But i urge all local baseball fans to attend. Smoke your moth-eaten "Save the Met" t-shirts if you've got 'em.
Posted by: Sammy on January 15, 2009 at 10:56 AM
Not sure if you are still out there Brian. First I read that the Strib filed chapter 11, then that you lost your job.
My best to you and your family and I hope you land on your feet quickly.
LAMBERT: Thanks, Dave. Obviously I appreciate everyone -- even bertram -- who stops by here to check out what's going on. I actually hope this blog will improve now that I'll have more time to devote to it instead of other duties.
Posted by: Dave on January 15, 2009 at 11:11 PM
I am confused. Why the big stink regarding 24? Isnt it just another mindless TV show polluting the airwaves and making America dumber for watching it? How is it truly any different than Lost or any other program? To enjoy Lost you need to accept moveable islands and ghosts of dead people walking about and, to enjoy 24 you need to accept bombs going off in LA every other Tuesday. It takes imagination to watch any program. Here is the question. Is your imagination limited to shows that follow your political belief?
LAMBERT: No. But it is limited to programs that are artful enough to sustain suspension of disbelief.
Posted by: carter on January 21, 2009 at 8:30 AM