Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: 24 - season 2 (2002)

7/08/2013

24 - season 2 (2002) - Jack Bauer's great first return

♥♥♥♥♥

Jack and the major characters of 24's second season

24's second run deals with the peril that the show was obviously made for: Islamic terrorism. 18 months after the events in the first season, a nuclear bomb gone missing forces the now elected President Palmer home from a fishing holiday, and Jack out of his slacker lifestyle to reinstatement with the Counter Terrorist Unit.

The following plot account contains SPOILERS:

CTU gets blown up, and chief Mason subsequently falls in the line of duty, - masterfully acted by Xander Berkeley (Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)). Paul Schulze (Nurse Jackie (2009-15)) is then introduced as a new office superior, and it is very evident why the creators increased his part in the following season; a very well acted part again. Slightly cheesy romantic intrigues surface at the broken down office. A subplot about an upscale LA wedding with a possible alien terrorist involvement unfolds surprisingly. Sarah Wynther (Jerks (2000)) and Laura Harris (Final Safe (2011)) are good as the yin-yang Warner sisters in this plot strand.
The merciless bad-woman of season 1, Nina Meyers' re-unification with the CTU office is played up as of almost mythic importance. First lady Sherry Palmer again writhes behind her husband's back, and yet she remains a joy to watch due to Penny Johnson Jerald's (Automatic (1995)) talent. The president is derailed by an internal cabinet coup-de-grace, and Jack actually dies, (for a short while), when things are at their worst.
The ultimate thugs of season 2, however, turn out to be Westerners: Great German actor Thomas Kretschmann (King Kong (2005)) and Saw-famed Tobin Bell (In the Line of Fire (1993)). They do well in the episodes leading up to the big, final struggle in the LA Coliseum.
The biggest issue for the show is, once again, the increasingly unlikely storyline of Jack's daughter, Kim Bauer (Elisha Cuthbert (My Sassy Girl (2008))). In season 2, she leads a bloody escape with a girl she babysits from the girl's violent father through LA, gets into a car accident, is chased by a puma, takes refuge with a hermit who locks her up in his scary safe-room; she escapes, but gets into a store hostage situation that turns extremely bloody again; but she gets out intact, and then has a final run-in with the mad father, whom she shoots. Her reactions to the conflicts around her are obviously supposed to be recognizably human, but are in fact totally incomprehensible. She is a ridiculous element and once again a faulty character that should have been written out of the series long ago.

But 24 is still a highly suspenseful series without equal, and the cliffhanger in the last episode creates chaos in a most thrilling way.

Best episode:

15 - written by Joel Surnow (The Equalizer (1985-86)), Robert Cochran (The Commish (1991-95)); directed by Ian Toynton (Bones (2007-15))
The bomb goes off

Related posts:

24 season 1 (2001) - TV action milestone
24 - season 3 (2003) - Viral suspense peak of great show

In lieu of a trailer for the season, no longer on Youtube, here is a part of Sean Callery's Emmy-winning score for the show to get you in the mood

Cost: Unknown
Box office: None - TV-series
= Unknown
[24 season was first shown 29 October 2002 - 20 May 2003 and spans 23 43-minute episodes, with the first episode 51 minutes long, totaling approximately 1,040 minutes. The season began the show's use of the Air Force One set initially created for Air Force One (1997). Lead Kiefer Sutherland (Taking Lives (2004)) was upgraded to producer as well for the season. The viewer ratings in North America were up more than 3 mil. from the first season to an excellent 11.73 mil. average for the season, which also received a rating of 83/100 on Metacritic, based on 23 reviews. The season was nominated for 9 Emmys, winning two, for Sean Callery's (Jessica Jones (2015), TV-series) score and one for singe-camera editing, and for 3 Golden Globes, which it didn't win any of. 143,625 IMDb-users have given 24 an average rating of 8.4/10.]

What series is TV's best replacement for 24 today?
What do you think of 24 season 2?

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William Friedkin has died

Born in Chicago, Friedkin accrued TV credits prior to his advance to the big screen as the director of Good TImes (1967), The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and The Boys in the Band (1970) before his major breakthrough, The French Connection (1971), for which he won his only Oscar. He followed it up with the even bigger smash, The Exorcist (1973), arguably the best horror film of all time, for which he was Oscar-nominated. Later credits include Sorcerer (1977), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Rampage (1987), Rules of Engagement (2000), Killer Joe (2011) and The Devil and Father Amorth (2017, documentary). Friedkin passed away at age 87. R.I.P.

Louise Fletcher has passed away

Born in Alabama to deaf parents, Fletcher got her first credits in late-1950s TV-series.She took a 10 year-long sabbatical to devote her time to motherhood after the release of A Gathering of Eagles, but then came back and soon saw her career's most important part, as Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which she won her sole Oscar. Later credits include Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Lucky Star (1980), Brainstorm (1983), Two Moon Junction (1988), Cruel Intentions (1999), A Perfect Man (2013) and many more. Fletcher passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Jean-Luc Godard has passed away

Born in Paris, France, Godard lived much of his life in Switzerland. He wrote for French film criticism magazine Cahiers du Cinema and became foundational for the New French Wave that inspired new waves in scores of other countries across the world with his Breathless (1960). Later credits include A Woman Is A Woman (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Le Petit Soldat (1962), Contempt (1963), Alphaville (1965), Pierrot le Fou (1965), 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), Weekend (1967), Every Man for Himself (1980), King Lear (1987), Century of Cinema (1995, documentary), Goodbye to Language (2014) and many more. Godard died of assisted suicide at age 91. R.I.P.

Wolfgang Petersen has died

James Caan has died

Caan was born the son of Jewish immigrants from Germany in New York. He got his start on TV in the early 1960s. His credits include El Dorado (1966), The Rain People (1969), Brian's Song (1971, TV movie), The Godfather (1972), - for which he earned his only Oscar nomination, - Slither (1973), The Gambler (1974), Funny Lady (1975), Rollerball (1975), Silent Movie (1976), Hide in Plain Sight (1980), - the only film he also directed, - Thief (1981), Misery (1990), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Bottle Rocket (1996), Eraser (1996), Dogville (2003), Elf (2003), Las Vegas (2003-07), Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and many more. Caan passed away at age 82. R.I.P.

Jean-Louis Trintignant has died

Born in Vaucluse, France, Trintignant's theatrical debut as an actor was in If All the Guys in the World... (1955). Later credits include ...And God Created Woman (1956), The Seven Deadly Sins (1961), Inferno (1964), A Man and A Woman (1966), My Love, My Love (1967), A Man to Kill (1967), The Great Silence (1968), Z (1969), The Assassination (1972), Three Colors: Red (1994), Amour (2012), Happy End (2017) and many more. He also wrote and directed two films in the 1970s. Trintignant passed away at age 91. R.I.P.

Ray Liotta has died

Adopted from an orphenage at a young age, Liotta got hooked on acting in high school. He had various TV credits in the late 1970s and early 80s, with his film debut in The Lonely Lady (1983). Later credits include Something Wild (1986), Field of Dreams (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Cop Land (1997), Hannibal (2001), Blow (2001), Narc (2002), John Q (2002), Identity (2003), Observe and Report (2009), Youth in Revolt (2009), The Details (2011), Killing THem Softly (2012), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012), Shades of Blue (2016-18), The Simpsons (2018, TV-series), Marriage Story (2019), The Many Saints of Newark (2021), Black Bird (2022, TV-series) and many more. Liotta passed away at age 67 in his sleep while on production in the Dominican Republic. R.I.P.

Philip Baker Hall has died

Born in Ohio, Hall didn't start acting until he was 30. His long list of credits include Zabriskie Point (1970), Miami Vice (1987, TV-series), Midnight Run (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Cheers (1993, TV-series), Hard Eight (1996), The Rock (1996), Air Force One (1997), Boogie Nights (1997), Seinfeld (1991-98), Rush Hour (1998), The Insider (1999), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Bruce Almighty (2003), Dogville (2003), The Zodiac (2005), Zodiac (2007), Curb Your Enthusiasm (2004-09), Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), Modern Family (2011-12) and many more. Hall passed away at age 90. R.I.P.

William Hurt has passed away

Born in Washington D.C., Hurt's first film role was the lead in Altered States (1980). Later credits include Body Heat (1981), The Big Chill (1983), Gorky Park (1983), Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985), for which he earned his only Oscar as Best Actor; Chilrdren of a Lesser God (1986), for which he was also Oscar-nominated; Broadcast News (1987), for which he was again Oscar-nominated; Smoke (1995), A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001), A History of Violence (2005), for which he was again Oscar-nominated; The Good Shepherd (2006), Into the Wild (2007), Robin Hood (2010) and many more. Hurt passed away at age 71. R.I.P.

Ivan Reitman has passed away

Born in Chechoslovakia, now Slovakia, Reitman's family fled the Soviet regime to Austria, then Toronto, when he was 4 years old. Reitman broke into movies as a director with Foxy Lady (1971). Later credits include Cannibal Girls (1973), Meatballs (1979), Stripes (1981), Ghostbusters (1984), Twins (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Kindergarten Cop (1990), Junior (1994), Father's Day (1997), Evolution (1998), No Strings Attached (2011), Draft Day (2014) and more. Reitman's son Jason Reitman is also a great filmmaker. Reitman passed away at age 75. R.I.P.

Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!

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7/08/2013

24 - season 2 (2002) - Jack Bauer's great first return

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