Tick Infection
Heres a little ditty about Jack and Assad, two torture experts both tragically flawed. Yes, among the myriad of dynamic pairings on display in the compelling season six of 24, the most brutal is that of our heavily scarred hero, Jack Bauer, and Hamri Al-Assad, a handsome, Islamic version of Yasser Arafat who is ready to make peace after a long career of terrorism. With 10 U.S. cities already resembling Jerusalem after a rampage of suicide bombings, the best that the White House can hope for is to stem the tide. Enter Jack, fresh from 17 months of torture in a Chinese prison. One shave and a haircut later, hes ready to offer himself up in exchange for peace. But nothing ever quite goes as expected on FOX, and before you know it, more American commuters are blown to smithereens while Jack and Assad take turns sticking their knives into the shoulder and kneecap of a traitor.
On one hand, if youve never watched 24 this is not the season to start. Episode 1 jumped right in, so if you didnt mist over when Jack spoke his first post-prison word, Audrey, and you didnt recoil when you saw Chloe with dark hair, then the backstory of the current president and the odd promotion of Milo at CTU will no doubt be lost on you. On the other hand, there are hints that this season will turn at an angle new to everyone. Will Jack finally lose the ability to save himself? Given all the high voltage, hot lead and acid his body has withstood, not to mention the dead wife and murdered friends of seasons gone by, his self-destruct sequence has just about counted down to zero. In past years hes pulled through because theres always been a loved one hes needed to protect. But now all he seems to want is to die for a meaningful cause. Gulp.
Kiefer Sutherland is Emmy-worthy as ever in his ability to go from whispering assassin to forlorn lost boy. Alexander Siddig, who played the irksome Dr. Bashir in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, fully redeems himself as Assad, unrecognizable behind a performance both brutal and earnest. The same, unfortunately, cannot be said of Peter MacNicol, portraying the overzealous presidential advisor du jour. One squeaky line from his quivering lips and five years of Ally McBeal come rushing back. Give me a knife in the kneecap, please.