Downtime is scary on 24

Posted by Kyle May 10th, 2006 at 05:45pm In Jack Bauer

So over the years people have enjoyed speculating about the whole real-time thing on "24." When do they go to the bathroom, eat, update their blogs, and approve their MySpace friend requests? The answer of course, is during the commercial breaks. Chloe has 344 MySpace friends.

In general the show is non-stop action, which makes sense when there are supernaturally organized terrorist networks out there who sometimes tell the president what they're doing. You can start to get a little numb to it all.

"Terrorists have nerve gas! They're going to release it in L.A.!"
"L.A.? Give me a break. Jack Bauer lives there. Wake me up when they make a move for the O.C."
"Don't call it that."

"Oh no, the natural gas plant blew up and Jack was inside!"
"I'm sure Jack's fine. He's come back from the dead more times than Buffy."

"Secretary of Defense Heller DROVE HIS CAR OFF A CLIFF INTO THE WATER!!!!"
"Did you actually see his body?"
"Well… no, but…"
"Not dead."

But every once in a while we see something close to downtime. And that gets really scary.

"Jack got the recording and he's snuggling with Audrey. He said everything's fine. I'm glad that's over with. Now President Logan can be brought to justice."
"Uh oh. What episode is this?"
"Ummm… 21."
"Oh, well it's not the last episode. At least she's not going to die. Jack still has the recording in his hands right?"
(very small voice) "no"

Yeah, that scene was more nerve-wracking than anything else this season. Whenever Jack gets to rest and enjoy time with his lady friend that doesn't involve a tourniquet you know things are going to get really bad. Why Jack? Why can't you be happy?

In extra Jack Bauer news, check out this Rolling Stone profile of Kiefer. My favorite part: "He once heard that some college-going 24 fans had developed a drinking game in which you have to down one shot for every time Jack Bauer says, "Damn it," which is the show's "fuck" and "shit" substitute. So during one episode, in one scene, he took it upon himself to say "Damn it" three times in a row, "Boom, boom, boom. And that was just one scene. By the end, there had to be fourteen 'Damn its.' And I could just see all these college kids going, 'Oh, fuck!' " "

Upon hearing that he was played by Kiefer Sutherland, Jack Bauer killed Sutherland.  Jack Bauer gets played by no man.