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Jack Is Back For Another '24' On The Attack

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By WALT BELCHER wbelcher

@tampatrib.com

Published: January 9, 2009

No television series tapped into the post-9/11 fear and anger better than "24."

Debuting two months after the devastating September 2001 attack on the World Trade Center, "24" gave us a dogged, indestructible, patriotic, stop-the-bad-guys-at-any-cost kind of hero.

Special Agent Jack Bauer offered a vicarious relief in his fictional world while, in the real world, Osama bin Laden remained on the loose, the terrorists became a faceless enemy, and military operations in Iran and Afghanistan bogged down.

With swift justice he has saved America from terrorist destruction six times. Each time, he did it in one jam-packed, nail-biting day.

But he operates in a world of corruption and conspiracy where even the U.S. government can't be trusted to save us. So he has to break the rules of the Geneva Convention.

On Sunday, "24" returns for a seventh season and another high body count from Bauer(Kiefer Sutherland). The four-hour kickoff runs 8 to 10 p.m. Sunday and Monday.

Sidelined last season by the writers strike, "24" comes back at a time when the threat of terrorism has been pushed aside by the threat of economic collapse.

And with a new sheriff named Obama coming to the White House this month bringing themes of "change" and "hope," Bauer's biggest challenge may be in finding relevance this season.

NO REGRETS: "24" opens with Bauer facing a congressional hearing into his extreme use of torture during past missions. He is unrepentant before a self-righteous senator (Kurtwood Smith) and is "more than willing to be judged by the people you claim to represent."

"I will let them decide the price I should pay," he says. "But please do not sit there with that smug look on your face and expect me to regret the decisions I have made. Because, sir, the truth is, I don't."

In Bauer's fictional world, the end has always justified the means because every suspect he tortured or killed was indeed guilty.

Later in the episode, he confides to an admiring FBI agent that he is glad everything is coming out in the open because the public needs to know about the secret world that the government created.

NEW MISSION: Just as the hearing begins (8 a.m.) Bauer is called to action by the FBI. There's a new terrorist threat, this time, to the nation's capital.

Presumably, he will have to testify the next day. But first, there will be blood.

America is on the verge of war with the fictional African nation of Sangala to stop genocide. So the first female president (Cherry Jones) doesn't have time to grieve for her grown son who has committed suicide (or was he killed?).

Bauer's old Counter Terrorist Unit team was disbanded but the key players will resurface. Computer whiz Chloe (Mary Lynn Rajskub) and former CTU director Bill Buchanan (James Morrison) show up on Monday's episodes.

Jon Voight guest-stars this season as a shadowy super villain. Bauer's former buddy and fellow agent Tony Almeida (Carlos Bernard) wasn't killed off after all and is back as an apparent bad guy.

Also, romantic tension builds when Bauer is paired with attractive FBI agent Renee Walker (Annie Wersching). And Janeane Garofalo plays an FBI analyst who is exactly like Chloe. Look for their little tech war on Monday night.

TUNE IN TONIGHT

"Stargate Atlantis," 9 p.m., Sci Fi

The 100th and final episode of this series brings down the curtain after a five-year run. At 10, the new series "Sanctuary" ends its first season.

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