Ah, 24. We've had some good times over the years.
Remember when main character Jack Bauer became hopelessly addicted to heroin and ended a series crying in utter self-loathing? Boy, that was a chuckle and a half. And that bit when a supermarket full of people were told that they were all going to die from a hideous new virus, and that the best way out was to swallow the cyanide pills that were being handed around? Fun, fun, fun.
Anyone who shares these sentiments may want to shed a tear, however, because it looks like – after seven-and-a-bit years of boss-killing, suspect-beheading, nuclear-bomb-crashing and whispering in a hushed grimace – 24 co-creator Joel Surnow reckons that he's taken the acting skills of Kiefer Sutherland roughly about as far as he can.
This isn't the first disaster to befall 24 of late. Season Six was generally seen as a letdown – far from the overblown, post-pub perfection of the earlier runs, the show was now beginning to recycle itself in the most boring of ways, and not even the fiery extermination of a sizeable chunk of Los Angeles could distract from this. Furthermore, the recent writers' strike has seen production grind to a halt – and if no-one's around to scribble down 34 "Dammit Chloe"s an hour, then there ain't no televisual realtime fun to be had.
Still. Fox TV have taken the whole thing well:
"Joel created one of the landmark series of this decade in 24 and his contribution to its creative excellence over the years has been immeasurable. While he leaves the show in the incredibly capable hands of the talented Howard Gordon, his input will always be welcome."
The reason they're being so civil? Obvious – with the main creative force behind the show gone, the networks can now finally make the version of 24 that they really want to see. So expect an all-new action packed season relaunch called 24: Extreme, in which Kiefer literally grows to 70 feet tall when angry and hisses out terrorist-baiting threats with such force that evil gangs in warehouses shiver the nation over.
We hope for his sake that Surnow didn't leave any killer plot ideas with the network, though. Now he's left, they're almost certain to be Fox property, and chances are he won't get a penny if they're implemented. And – trust us – that sort of creative theft can be annoying. Almost as annoying as if another high-profile Entertainment News site saw how well your 'betting odds' features were doing, and decided to nick it for themselves.
Tsk.
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