24 - 5x08 "2 P.M. - 3 P.M."

THE 24 FANTASY LEAGUE ANALYSIS

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Jack Bauer - Jack went put on a show when he disobeyed direct orders and tried to save everyone's life in the mall -- but despite this amazing spectacle, some critics are calling it a repeat of Kobe's 81. And hey, Kobe had two assists in that game; how many did Jack have?

Another unsettling aspect of Jack's performance comes in the form of 24's reluctance to allow an actual disaster to claim a lot of lives. Sure, tragedy suffuses the individual lives of its characters, but given the number of terrorist threats against the US as portrayed on the show, you'd think that, realistically, the deathcount would be far higher.

Realism, of course, is clearly not what the show is about -- but just from a dramatic standpoint, seeing Jack battle out of an impossible situation with negligible loss of civilian life, time after time, gets preposterous and even boring. I have to admit, I was actually pulling for the gas to be released into whole mall, if only to give the show a sense of consequence and urgency which are lacking when you have Jack pulling off that repairman uniform to reveal a big red S underneath.

Waiver Wire
Evelyn - Did you see when she had to express more than just frustration in her face? She got to do "concerned, with just a hint of confusion." And that was hott. Time to add her.

Next column: 3 p.m.
Previous column: 1 p.m.

Indie rating: some Earth song where I very badly want something like, oh I don't know, a CHORD CHANGE to happen -- let's just say, "German Dental Work"