Watching 24

Hey, everyone!! Sorry I’m late again today. I promise, I’m gonna have posts up in the mornings again! Anyway… I thought that since we have a new episode on later tonight, this would be a good time to take one last look at the last episode.

I found a couple of interviews from last week up online discussing the invasion episode. One was with Annie Wersching and the other is with Howard Gordon. Let’s talk Annie first. Her interview is about more than just the two-hour episode, although they do discuss it a bit. Annie talks again about being a fan of 24 before she got cast and just how last minute she was to the show. She also talks about the internal conflict Renee is going through, costumes and whether or not she’d like Renee to go bad. Here it is. I loved this interview… she seems pretty cool and she also gets to talk a little bit about possibly breaking a 24 record and her strange talents.

The next interview with Howard Gordon is pretty much all about the invasion episodes. It’s kind of interesting to see what his perspective on it all is considering the reaction a lot of us fans have had to it. He also admits to doing pretty much no research on the whole thing, either. Like that surprises any of us, right? Anyway… here’s the link to the interview. What do you all think? Post your comments below and let’s talk about it. See ya tomorrow morning with some thoughts on the new episode.

http://blogs.nypost.com/popwrap/archives/2009/03/24_rene_walker.html
http://blogs.courant.com/roger_catlin_tv_eye/2009/03/why-24-targeted-the-white-hous.html

Good morning, everyone. Is it just me or is 24 (and the stars) all over the place now? There has been no shortage of interviews and articles about the cast lately. Today, I found a really cool editorial about Jack and the grief he gets for being a ‘posterboy for torture’. It’s by Stephen King (yes, the horror writer) for Entertainment Weekly. It was scanned and posted onto a blog. I totally agree with him on the idea that it’s silly to put so much focus on one character when many others out there are doing worse. And when, exactly, did we all forget that TV is make believe and we shouldn’t take it that seriously? You can check out the whole thing here.

Here’s another article with Cherry Jones. In this one, she goes a little bit more into detail about her portrayal of the president and what she uses as models while acting a scene. She also talks about working with Kiefer, a recent surgery and what she’s going to do next (It’s on the stage, but she ain’t saying much else there). She also talks about the becoming a fan of the show and the bond presidents share.

On another note, here’s a page from Entertainment Weekly posted on a blog with a special feature. It’s called ‘When Bad Plots Happen to Good Shows’. It talks about some of the most infamous moments on the show (cougar, anyone?) You can read the whole thing here. What do you think? Do you all agree with these? Are there any that were left out? Comment and let me know.

Good morning, everyone! I hope y’all had a great weekend and you are ready for the new episode tomorrow. Before we get into countdowns, recaps and all I wanted to share some articles I found. A couple a little older, one is from only a few days ago. The first one is an interview Cherry Jones did with Newsweek. It doesn’t really get too much into the plot lines, but it does talk about who she modeled Taylor after, being anonymous and what she thought of the show when she first saw it. As usual, she comes across as a lot of fun and she doesn’t seem to take herself too seriously.

The next one is from the Boston Herald and has TV presidents giving advice to Barack Obama. Presidents from the West Wing, Battlestar Galactica and 24 all contribute some words of wisdom. It’s pretty amusing. I personally like Wayne Palmer’s and Charles Logan’s the best.

Finally, there’s another article from the Boston Herald that’s dated only a few days ago. It’s about Annie Wersching and her role on 24. She talks about that scene where she gets buried, being a fan of the show before she was cast (a week before the filming started) and how she celebrated the premiere of season 7. It’s a pretty good read. I think this is my favorite show to read interviews about. Everyone in the cast comes off pretty well and they all see very happy and grateful to be a part of the show. It’s pretty cool to read that when you have some stars out there being less than humble or even putting down the show. I think some fans of an ABC series can relate to that one…

Finally, it’s from a little bit back, but here’s an interview with Sprague Grayson. She’s playing the President’s daughter, Olivia. The funny part is they talk about how she seems to get killed in every series she’s been in. Will the same fate await her on 24? She’s not saying. Check it out thanks to Jonas Hodges:

So what do you think? Was the advice the presidents gave good? Did you like the things Cherry and Annie had to say? Comment and let’s chat about it. Take care and I’ll see you next time.

Hey, everyone!! So, have you been watching the new episodes of 24 and enjoying em, yet still shaking your head at the CIP device angle? Do you wonder about how it all works in the real world? Well, a reader I will call JR sent me a cool article that will answer at least a couple of questions. It’s called “Behind the Plot: 24’s Counter-Factual Version of Counter-Terrorism”. It confirms some of what we already knew about the holes in this plot and talks a little about what aspects are a bit realistic.

The writer addresses most of the main questionable aspects of the season. This includes the ATC attack, the use of firewalls and who really is in charge of protecting the infrastructure. They also tell us what part of the infrastructure is actually a bit vulnerable. Check it out. So what’s the verdict? Did you enjoy that? Do you not really care about the actual hows and whys of things portrayed in the show? Comment and let me know.

That’s not all. While browsing around, I found a cool article that talks about Mary Lynn and Janeane, who are long time friends and recently did a joint interview for USA Today. They do mention a couple small things are aren’t big spoilers, but they are some details some really spoiler-sensitive people may want to avoid. The link to the article can be found here. I just finished reading it and thought it was pretty cool. They talk about how Janeane gave Mary Lynn her first TV part and their shared connection with the Larry Sanders show. Enjoy! I’ll see y’all tomorrow with some actual episode stuff. Sorry I had to delay it today. I had car issues that had to be resolved. Don’t worry though…. countdowns and some other stuff is one the way!

Good morning, everyone!! How are y’all doing? I wanna take a minute to let y’all know that I had some car issues and stuff to deal with that kept me from watching 24 last night. I do, however, have it on tape and will watch it sometime this afternoon and have some episode-related stuff up ASAP. In the meantime, though, I wanna talk about an interview Kiefer Sutherland recently did with a British website (I think it’s also a publication).

After reading it, I had a couple reactions. One was to say ‘AMEN’ to almost everything Kiefer had to say. Another was to wonder what’s up with the writer, as the article (to me, anyway) has a bit of a mean tone to it. As with a lot of 24-related articles this year, much of it talks about the terrorism/torture debate and the fact that some people in the military were getting ideas after watching the show as well as the current debate the characters are having over whether or not torture is actually effective and right.

Kiefer, for his part, is against the use of torture, as you’ll see in the final line of the article. He does, however, defend the show and I love him for what he says. I personally have always been against the idea that TV can ‘make’ people do anything- especially violent acts. When Kiefer implies that there are obviously more serious problems to address than the show itself if military people are actually taking the show that seriously, I almost cheered out loud. Good for him for saying so. The article also contains some hardly new background info on Kiefer and some pretty good quotes as well. Check it out. So what do you all think of it and the debate of TV vs. Reality? Comment and let me know.

Good morning, everyone!! Another week, another new episode on the way! I think this week, I will be posting the Character Countdown on Tuesday instead, followed by mole hunt and other features before posting a recap since so many people seem to enjoy them so much. Speaking of the Character Countdown, the search for a new logo is over! I wanted to go ahead and debut it for you now, as a thank you. It was created by a reader who wants to be credited as commanderlock:

Thanks again for the great logo! I’ll be putting it to good use! In other news… I’m sure you remember that story I told about Carlos and the writer’s room. Well, there’s a transcript of an interview when he tells it. It’s a nice interview and there’s not any real spoilage for those of you who have watch all the episode that aired so far. Actually, you’re probably safe even if you only saw the first 3 or 4. My only issue is they talk about exploring Tony’s dark side and he and Jack being at odds. They were on ‘opposite sides’ for only what, 2 or 3 episodes, before Jack joined up with him to help and all along Jack didn’t really fully believe Tony was bad. I hope they end up playing with this a bit later on, because that was one of my favorite aspects of Tony being back. So far, I feel like it’s been a bit of a wasted opportunity and think the promotion of Tony has been a bit misleading. I will say, though, that one fight where he brings up Teri was awesome. Here’s hoping we get something like that again at some point.

So what do you guys think? Are you happy with how it’s going? Are you hoping for a shift in the Tony story? Be sure to comment and let me know.

Hello again! I wanna thank everyone for their comments and apologize to those who asked questions awhile back that I didn’t answer until yesterday. I didn’t see them until the new wordpress look came into effect. That said- let’s get down to business, huh?

So, I’m used to watching shows from people like Joss Whedon who tend to pretend everything is great and refuse to acknowledge when they do stupid things with their plots. In fact, when a particular season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer was widely mocked, he claimed people just ‘didn’t get it’. That’s why I was so happy to read a story shared on some forums yesterday. Apparently, Carlos Bernard did a radio interview and talked about visiting the writer’s room occasionally. One day, he walked in and saw them all wearing t-shirts that said the words ‘season 6′ on them. When he asked what was up with that, he was told they were wearing them to remind themselves of all the problems last season and shame themselves into never letting such bad writing happen again.

Now, from what I remember of Season 6, it wasn’t the worst thing in the world. Was it great? No. I remember being pretty bored at some points by what they were doing. Still, I think it’s awesome that they are taking that criticism so seriously and they aren’t just pretending it’s not their fault at all for fans and others not really enjoying that season. Here’s hoping other writers follow their example. So what does everyone else think. Was season 6 bad? Are you wondering what all the complaining was about? Be sure to comment and let me know. Take care and I’ll see you later on today with another post. For now, I leave you with a couple of clips of Kiefer on the Jimmy Kimmel show, thanks to the show’s official youtube channel. Enjoy em!

Good morning, everyone! I hope y’all enjoyed the new episode, I know I did. So, has anyone ever heard of the show Shatner’s Raw Nerve? If you haven’t, here’s the scoop: It’s a talk show hosted by the former Star Trek actor. In it, he interviews celebrities (sometimes good friends of his) in a very casual setting. They’re usually sitting in chairs facing each other. The whole point behind the show is he asks about things the usual late night people wouldn’t and gets down deep into the psyche of the stars. A lot of the time, he’ll get them to admit to something or other and you can just tell they’re sitting there thinking “I can’t believe he just got me to say that!”

Last night, he interviewed his friend John Voight. (Ya know, Jonas Hodges from the 2-hour movie. He’s supposed to be making an appearance or two during the season as well) It was a pretty good interview. They spent the hour talking about everything from his movies to his divorces to current events. At one point, John cracked me up with his response to Shatner drilling him about gas prices and other similar issues. He seemed to get into it for a second, but finally just threw up his hands and jokingly (I think!) begged Shatner to back off those questions because ‟I’m just an actor‟. I thought that was pretty cool for him to actually say something like that. There are many actors out there who are only too happy to go on about issues all the time, whether they know a lot about them or not. Anyway… it was a great interview and John seemed to have a good time doing it. If you wanna catch it for yourself, check out the repeat tonight at 11:30 PM. You can also see full episodes on the bio website.

Happy Friday, everyone!! Are you all ready for the weekend? I know I am! Before it comes, though, I have something to share with you guys that I found on yahoo!news. If you’re a big fan of the show, I’m sure you’ve all heard the talk about a big-screen version of 24. It’s actually been floating around for years now. The only thing standing in the way is the fact Executive Producer Howard Gordon doesn’t want to make it until after the show is over. He thinks they can’t really exist side-by-side and I tend to agree.

Well, he and Kiefer recently spoke to the press about the movie and have said it’s still going to happen. They just don’t know exactly when because they’re taking the show day-by-day. Gordon did mention, though, that he and Kiefer have been playing with the idea of ending the series at the end of the eighth season. Which means that the show could potentially have only one more year left in it. Whenever the show does eventually end, as all do, Gordon says there’s a real possibility that the movie could send the show off with a bang- literally. If you wanna read more and see what he means, head on over here. There’s also a very cool quote about Jack and being a human being from Kiefer in the article.

Well, I guess that’s about it for today. Since the new episode is only a few days away, I wanna leave you with two promos for the new episode, courtesy of Jonas Hodges on youtube. Enjoy and don’t forget to check back on Sunday for the Character Countdown!

Good morning, everyone!! Later on tonight, I’ll have a recap of the two hour premiere for you. For now, I wanted to share a little run down of Kiefer Sutherland’s appearance on the David Letterman show. Most of the interview focused on Kiefer’s label and his rodeo days (and the fact 24 has lasted 7 seasons. Letterman was amazed, mentioning that every couple of minutes).

From what he said, it sounds like Kiefer is going to sign a new band to his label soon. They’ve also just finished the last project they’re planning for release this year. The label is a small operation and apparently is making nothing right now. It’s more a labor of love more about just getting new music out there. We’ll see how that all goes with the music business getting tougher lately.

Letterman was really fascinated with Kiefer having been in the rodeo and wouldn’t let the subject go, asking Kiefer to talk about how he got into it (he thought it’d be fun to do during a break between films), about how you don’t make much and the moment that made Kiefer decide to step away from it. He apparently saw a guy lose a thumb, something that he said happens often in that line of work. After that, he decided it was time to try and get back into the acting business. The interview showcases one thing I like about the guy, despite his occasional issues: he’s humble and can laugh at himself. If you want to see what I mean for youself, check out the video below. It’s courtesy of littlebritainuseusa (don’t worry, it’s spoiler-free!):

Hello again! With only four more days until the premiere, more reviews are coming out and they’re all raves. Variety, TV Guide and Hollywoodchicago.com have all praised the first four hours of the season, saying they are “smart”, “crisp” and that it’s an “excellent” premiere. And no, those are not quotes that I’m taking out of context. I have to say that this definitely gives me hope for the episodes to come.

There’s more good news out there… with the start of the season, there are all kinds of stories out there about the cast and the show. One in particular, from buddytv, discusses some of the changes this season and how the cast has reacted to it all.

Location manager John Latenser talked about how tough it was to shoot in Washington due to all the different districts. All the different jurisdictions kept them wondering if they were actually allowed to shoot in a spot only a few feet from one they knew they could film on. They did say, though, that taking the trip to do some filming has given the show a new energy and was exciting for them all. Especially once they found out they have several fans in high places. Check out the full story for yourself here.

There are also a couple of new interviews out there, courtesy of the FoxFix. One is with the producers and another is with John Voight. You can check them out below. They pretty much cover a lot of the same stuff we’ve talked about here, but it’s an interesting watch.

Ask Ausiello also has a little information for us. It’s not very spoilery, so I won’t put it behind a cut. According to him, you really wanna watch out for the words “deep sky”. Apparently, something big happens very quickly. Well, that’s all for now. Take care and I’ll see y’all next time. By the way… don’t forget that Kiefer’s being interviewed this week.

Hello again, everyone! How are y’all today? I’m doing alright, just bracing for the week to come (but aren’t we all?). Anyway… I thought today I would take time to introduce you to someone you have already seen if you saw the TV movie. If not, check it out on DVD. You won’t have to see it to follow the new season really, but it helps introduce a few people and sets up the plot for the new day. We already talked about Cherry, who plays the president, so let’s meet the man playing her husband: Colm Feore.

If you’re a real theater buff, you probably already know him. Especially if you’re into Shakespere, since he’s been in several of the playwright’s works. In this interview, he talks about some of those roles and how he got himself ready for them. He also admits in the interview that acting was something he pretty much gambled on because he didn’t feel he’d be able to do anything else. It’s too bad he’s playing someone who is most likely one of the good guys. From reading that interview, it seems he’s real good at playing the bad ones (and getting you to root for them, too).

If you don’t recognize him from any of those, you might recognize him from his movie roles. He’s been in Face/Off, City of Angels, Titus (the Shakespere play), Pearl Harbor and Changeling, just to name a few. He’s also done some guest parts on TV. Oddly enough, one of those was playing the President on Battlestar Galactica.

Here’s a couple personal facts for ya. Colm is Irish and spent his childhood and college years in Canada, although he was born in Boston and lived in Ireland for a bit when he was very young. He’s a french speaker and married a choreographer named Donna. That’s her with him at the Toronto International Film Festival in September. Well, that’s all for now! Take care and I’ll see you again tomorrow!

Since we’re about to have a new administration in real life and on the show, I thought I’d take the time to introduce you to the lady who played the President-Elect on 24: Redemption. Her name’s Cherry Jones and she’s, of course, going to be a regular in the new season. I personally didn’t know about her before she got the role and I’m sure some of the rest of you don’t either so here’s a little run down.

She’s a well-respected Broadway star and Theater Actress. One of her best known roles was as the lead in The Heiress. That one actually won her a Tony Award in 1995. She made waves that year by thanking her domestic partner in her acceptance speech and has since worked in support of gay rights. If you’re wondering where you may have seen her before, she’s been in Signs, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood and Ocean’s Twelve. The picture you see, by the way, is of Cherry at the New York Premiere of the movie version of Doubt. She’s pictured with Meryl Streep, who’s playing the same part Cherry played on Broadway.

Cherry recently did an interview with nymag.com where she talks about her new character, Proposition 8 and being in New York during the 9/11 attacks. You can read the entire thing here. One of my favorite parts of the interview is when the interviewer tries hard to get her to spill the dirt on Taylor’s husband and other plots and she plays coy, refusing to give away much of anything. Keep reading to get a little tidbit I read elsewhere. If you don’t want to be spoiled, I suggest skipping the rest of this. (more…)

Good morning, 24 fans! It looks like they’re off the ground and running. Executive Producer Howard Gordon got the chance to sit down with IFMagazine and do an interview. It was posted in three parts and is a bit of a spoilery read. Still, it’s pretty interesting. I’ll summarize some of it for you. If you want to read the whole thing yourself and aren’t scared to be spoiled, here are the links: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.

So, according to Howard, the writer’s strike ended up being a positive for the show this season. He says it gave them the distance to see when something was working and when it wasn’t as well as the time to correct it (something they did again just recently). He talks about how all 24 episodes have been completed and they are going to start working on the next season after a little break to re-charge. That is definitely unusual, considering not a single episode has aired yet!

He also mentions that what we see this year will actually be their third attempt at the season. They originally were going to spend a bit of the season in Africa and it finally evolved into making that the prequel movie and having the season elsewhere. He also talks about how Jack is kind of a “wish-fulfillment” character…. the guy who gets things done no matter what and is a hero for troubled times. I can see where he’s coming from on that. One of the things I like most about Jack is he knows how to get things done and he’s not afraid to do what has to be done. He also says he regrets not getting to travel to Africa as well, but he had to stay here and write.

Well, that’s about it for now… I can’t say much else without spoilers. Take care and I’ll talk to you all again tomorrow!