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The retirement of Jack Bauer

I admit that I gave up on 24 after about Season 4. It was all too stressful and didn't agree with my blood pressure medication. According to recent reports, it's now become too stressful for the TV executives too, who are pulling the plug on the show after they finish shooting the current batch of episodes.

24 was to the noughties what The X Files was to the 90s - a seminal series, which managed to create its own vivid parallel universe. To conspiracy theorists, both shows revealed supposed truths about the actions of sinister government agencies. But 24 was more shocking and brutal because its subject matter was terror rather than the paranormal and extraterrestrial. It will be remembered for its social and political context - the climate of fear existing post 9/11 - as much as for its relentless pace and amphetamine-driven plotlines.

The question now is whether Jack Bauer can ever truly retire. I'm picturing an old folks' home in southern California in about 2040. An aged CTU agent is served dinner in his chair and excess soup is mopped from his chin by a member if staff. Suddenly a call comes through. It's the President.

One last mission. He will be back by this time tomorrow night. Godammit! Where's his razor? He starts barking orders at his carers. 'Get my phone on a charger. And bring the SUV round the back...'

Comments

  1. Brian Gilbert11:28 PM

    Thankyou for the best report of my candidature yet, if a bit lighthearted. I am not 'intent' on a career in Parliament as at 78 it would be rather short. I am rather intent on waking up the sleeping voters who feel that as the chains of slavery to the EU are not yet physical they will not become so. The Germans in the 30s and the Russians immediately after their revoloution probably felt the same. Read 'The Road to Serfdom' by Friedrich Hayek. Start saving up to pay off the £300,000 or more debt this government has incurtred on your behalf.

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