[DevSop]

The Counter Terrorism Unit has already nullified the threats of Murder, She Wrote and The West Wing...but now they face the Man of Steel. Can Clark Kent before tights and flight hang with Bauer like he has with Criminal Intent and Fall Guy? Personally, I hope so.

7) 24




vs.


10) SMALLVILLE

[Jack Quinn]

fuck this, can both shows lose?

[DevSop]

As soon as you realize you've already lost at life Moose.

[Jack Quinn]

hey, you are the one considering suicide, not me.

I still think it is probably your best option.

[BC]

Once again willing to trade votes for Smallville

[National Champion Chris Cole]

Once again one of my favorites is up against a Superhero show. Might be trouble for my show.

[creepy]

Although Smallville is another gay superheor show, I'll vote for it to hopefully get that faggoted 24 out of here.


Almost all of these final shows are shitty. Way to go, Puns House!

[The Jewish Cunthead]

Hey don't blame me Creeps. You know I was gonna vote Homicide to win the whole thing.

[creepy]

Yeah, Homicide jobbing to Quantum fucking Leap is a joke.

[National Champion Chris Cole]

How is 24 gay? I can see the argument that it is very unrealistic, and has been formulamatic for the last three years. But gay?

Also, the twist at the end of Season One might be the greatest twist I've ever seen on TV. The problem is it was so great that they've failed five years straight at trying to recreate those twists.

[Jack Quinn]

metallikid said:

How is 24 gay? I can see the argument that it is very unrealistic, and has been formulamatic for the last three years. But gay?

It has sex with other male shows?

I have never seen either one. Smallville is a superhero show, so that is a strike against it. 24 is annoying and has spawned too many 24 wonks, so that is a strike against it too. I haven't voted for either, maybe someone could convince me of which is the better of two shows I don't care about in the least

[National Champion Chris Cole]

I'd say vote for 24 because of its unique format. The events in real time was pretty daring to try and could easily have fallen flat on its face. Now granted the format is somewhat responsibly for some of the irregularies of the show but it managed to pull off an innovative idea.

Anybody that doesn't want to know about storylines can lok away now.

The twist at the end of Season 1 was as good as my favorite movies. Jack is betrayed by a longtime ally and a former mistress. They teased Nina as being bad early in the show but had the audience fairly convinced she was good until the last episode. Not only are we blindsided by her betrayal but we also get a Holy Shit moment when after all the events seem to be over our hero Jack learns that his wife Teri was killed by Nina. All the joy of seeing Jack win is taken away and the final ticks of the clock with Jack holding hs dead wife were chilling.

Each season after has continued to be a good mix of action and suspense. I can't argue that it has gotten formulatic but the first season was absolutely brilliant and the other five have been at worst, fun action-packed hours.

[creepy]

24 had a cool little premise that felt somewhat genuine for TV. It now just keeps redoing the same story because it worked for one season. A guy has to save the country/president/world in 24 hours 6 times? And he never gets killed or fucked up bad enough to incapasitate himself for more than an hour at a time? Almost everyone dies on that show but Good Ol' Agent Bauer?



Sounds pretty gay to me.


What mighta made it kinda cool was if there was a revolving door of Agents that every year or two were killed off and replaced by their partner. Maybe have an Agent be "the man" for a year and then die. Add some depth and a little bit of originality. Maybe have people question IF the agent can get out of this mess, not what form of bullshittery he is gonna insult the viewers intelligence with to get out of the mess.

[National Champion Chris Cole]

James Bond never dies. Is that your big sticking point? Bauer is too good? I think they have shown him get messed up and screw up enough times to show flaws. In the end it is fiction and Bauer is clearly the star in the mold of a Bond. If we can buy Bond saving the world 19 times or John McClane saving the world/city 4 times or countless other heroes then why not Bauer?

I can agree with a lot of other critques but 24 IS Bauer. The show will not survive without him. They should freshen it up. Why do all attacks happen to Los Angeles? I want to see Jack adapt to New York, Washington, or Miami. As far as the same story? At the end of the day it is an anti-terrorism show. Do you want House to stop treating patients? NYPD Blue to stop catching crooks? Lost to stop being about survival? The details of the story have been different enough for at least 4 of the 6 years.

[Lucky]

I don't agree with Creepy's level of disdain, but I do kinda have the same reaction. Note, I've never seen a Bond film either because the secret agent who manages to get it done perfectly never appealed to me. Not even in cartoons when I was a kid. The focus on one guy has always been my major turn off and the biggest reason I'm not watching the DVDs I own.

I've argued for years that the best storytelling device would be for Jack to have agents who work for him and for the show to groom a replacement. The guy should be around for a couple of seasons and Jack should get killed, very surprisingly, in the middle of a season. You shouldn't see it coming but it would make the show more than a cartoon. It would be a complete shocker. It would shake 24 fans to their core. But it would be something EVERYONE would watch. And if you had a good enough actor, character, and writers you could create a new "Jack." Its the same reason you can have 5 or 6 Bonds and most of them can work. You don't need the guy to be "Jack Bauer." You just need him to play that role Jack Bauer plays. Because if its the brilliant acting skills of Kiefer Sutherland that has you guys so damn hooked then you're all retards. Sorry. But I'm reasonably confident its not. I'd bet its the nature of the show that makes it must see tv.

And just like Bond it would create a true franchise out of 24 that isn't dependent on Sutherland being alive, willing, competent, and out of prison. You could do films with new agents, you could have new 24 series focused on new agents. You'd always have to hold true to certain world designs and keep links for your fans. The new agent should be someone MKid already knows. But it can work and it would be the best think ultimately for that brand.

But every time I even suggest killing Jack every 24 fan acts like I just killed his puppy.

[DevSop]

It's basically because they've tried to create his replacements in a few seasons and failed miserably at the true attempts at a successor. I don't think Keifer's as bad as you're suggesting Lucky, but I do agree that the show has needed new blood for a while to at least start making it clear that Jack won't be around forever. It was said that the upcoming season would have at least gotten them out of Los Angeles so that was a step in the right direction, but then bringing characters back from the dead that never should have been killed off was another knock on the upcoming season that won't be airing because of the strike.

And then there's the network issue of once a show is a hit, they're going to milk the show, the concept, and the stars as long as they can. Prison Break is a prime example. The show is at best a 1 season concept but because it was a hit for Fox, it's now finishing a 3rd season-2 of which have just gotten worse and worse. 24's a concept that doesn't have a set finish, but what it needed was constant fresh ideas and at this point, it's very recycled and true fans of the show can predict the exact nature of which episodes have the twist, when the true villian is revealed, etc. But Fox will milk Keifer/Jack bone dry because people will watch and no one takes risks anymore in order to freshen it up.

[Lucky]

Oh, I get that its a risky move and a hard decision to make. But ultimately when Kiefer is rung dry, either because he's no long able or willing to continue this or because people have just lost interest in him then they're going to try to create a replacement and its going to be a lot harder and problem much worse done. Killing Jack would be a risk but it would creating a new guy while the show's popularity is still high. And if done right that could wield a ton more profit than waiting. And the truth is at the moment you're all probably still loyal enough to give them a little lee way if they don't do it perfectly. In a season you might not be. Plus, if you did actually manage to make it a surprise then it complete shakes up that "recycled" think you're talking about and gives the show an extreme "WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?!" power that it doesn't seem to have for you guys anymore. But of course, this could not be done if you just telegraphed some new leading man stepping in and clearly being Jack's successor where you were just waiting for the sword to fall.

The best example I can think of is X-Files. They had that long, drawn out story of Mulder's sister and family and alien abductions and they just seemed to delay it forever. And they wanted to do a film but they kept pushing it. They wanted to milk every last drop out of the show. But by the time they did do the film and reveal the stuff they had already completely turned me off and I no longer had any interest. I believe I asked my father what happened and I've forgotten completely. And my impression was I was far from the only one who had just lost interest with that show and felt it had done all it could and become derivative crap by the time they tried to pay off. 24 managed to produce a season last year that almost every fan I know seems to just concede was absolute shit. And you have no problem calling the show derivative. So it strikes me that they're perilously close to the moment in which 24 loses its strength and becomes just another show with its loyal fans.

I've never hated Kiefer or anything, but I must say that some of the clips I've seen of him from 24 are just some of the worst acting I've seen in high budget, well regarded TV/Film ever. And most 24 fans seem to laugh with me when they're watching them with me.

[DevSop]

This upcoming would be season of 24 was going to be crucial in the show's future because last season was epically bad. Most of the time, I can put up with the suspensions of disbelief if the action and/or drama is working but the last season of 24 was horrible. They had killed off a ton of fan favorites within the last 2 seasons and brought on the black hole of acting known as Richie Rich to try and be the successor to Jack that you mentioned, but that didn't work at all. He was probably the 3rd guy they've tried with and none have had any connection with the audience.

People had grown tired of Jack in LA. People had grown tired of the same recycled nuclear bomb storyline even though they finally came through and had one go off in downtown LA, but it had no long-term effects on the story. And I personally, for the first time in 24's run began to DVR 24 and watch Heroes in real-time as it were. Throughout 5 seasons, 24 always had the priority of being the show to watch when it originally aired. It had gotten so bad by the end of last season, I was watching 60 minutes in about 25 because half the cast was bad and the half of the story with a good cast was bad.

[Lucky]

Right, and that's a sort of logical progression for a show like this. There's a good chance that you'll hate next season. Or that you'll like it more than you did last season but it won't be what the show once was to you. They lost ground with last season. They have a good chance of losing more, even if they don't do as poorly. Because fans will forgive 1 bad season or storyline because its not the norm. But if you follow that up with a subpar or uninteresting one? That's now what your show is.

I didn't realize they've failed to do successors before. Obviously I can't judge how they did but I suspect their failures would in large part be because of their scripting and casting choices. Like I said, it can NOT be obvious. It has to be a dude who been around awhile and who fans care about. And honestly, if I was running the show I'd add at least 3 guys. I'd give Jack a team. 3 guys and a girl. It would become Mission Impossible to an extent, but with Jack always running the show. That would give you all options. You wouldn't know who the successor was and different fans would pick different favorites. You'd argue over which you wanted, and you can add drama by killing off one of them in another story. That would surprise people if he was a favorite and add drama. Then the goal would be to make the timing a mystery. And that would take years to do right. If I was running the show I would have started this shit in Season 2 or 3.

Then again for all I know Jack DOES have a team and he HAS had a number of possible successors who you all have just rejected.

But it seems like many fans have the opinion MKid expressed. "24 is Jack." And if you're not willing to move off that then they'll never be able to make a proper move.

[DevSop]

The perfect seasons in my opinion were 2 and 3 when he actually did kind of have a team behind him. Tony and Michelle were perfect complements to Jack and then you added Chloe as a comic relief type character and the show seemed to be working really well. They tried with one guy as like Jack-lite, but they put him in a dead end storyline with Kim, whose only contribution to the show was being hot. And then for whatever reason, the producers decided to kill off Michelle and President Cerrano within the first 5 minutes of season 4 and the show lost a lot of its connection. That was strike 1 with me, strike 2 was the overall shittiness of season 5 including the abortion that was the Audrey storyline, and that brings us to the upcoming season 6 where I've already had a foul tip for strike 3 with bringing Tony back from the dead, I was waiting to see if the catcher held before walking away from the show.

[National Champion Chris Cole]

Lucky, here is my take as a fan. We are 6 seasons in. 24 is Jack now. Had Jack died in Season 3 or 4 I can see your storyline progressing. I think if Jack was killed off now we'd have one crappy season and then they'd end it like That 70's Show without Topher Grace. I can't imagine taking the face of a show 6+ years running and replacing him and seeing it work.

In hindsight Jack's death earlier would probably be the best for the series. Looking ahead I think less drastic measures like a change of scenary or increased role for some of the bit characters would be welcome. I like the idea of Jack having a team. Chloe seems ready to be one of the team. They killed off Curtis too early because he would have been good in that role. They seem to forget all about his "partner" from season 3 Chase who happened to also be banging his daughter. That was a huge mistake to drop that story.

[salmonjunkie]

First 3 seasons of 24 were money. The 5th season (whatever one that the president is the villain at the end and it has the russians) was good. The last season was absoulute shit.

Smallville has never had a season as awesome as season 1 of 24. But it's never had a season a shitty as last season.

So I don't know which way to vote. If this was before the last season, 24 easily. But boy..... that season was so fucking bad I don't care about the upcoming season in the slightest.

[DevSop]

Smallville wins.