hopelessly devoted to deconstructing popular culture and conventional wisdom, one blog at a time

Published Wednesday, January 12, 2005 by seanlmccarthy | E-mail this post

"24" MAKES NO SENSE: This show is as infuriating as ever in its fourth day of real-time thrills and real-time plot problems. And yet I cannot stop watching 24, even when my beloved bachelorette Jen is a channel click away. I know, I know. But the questions persist after the first four hours...and I don't mean questions about what will happen next. I mean...

If the train bombing in the opening scene was a big deal, don't you think someone would have mentioned that there was a dead guy with a bullet hole and handcuffs lying several yards from the wreck?

Why have the mother and son from House of Sand and Fog come back from the dead to seek vengeance on America? Which really leads me to wonder, why are they cast as mother and son again? Are there no other actors of Middle Eastern heritage available? And why do they go back to the poisoned tea? Did the 24 writers lift anything else from House of Sand and Fog? Will Ben Kingsley make an appearance? Excuse me. Sir Ben Kingsley.

Why, oh why, is the Counter-Terrorism Unit based in L.A., other than to provide easy access to filming locations? And why do at least half of the people who work there still think so selfishly about themselves when they're supposed to be preventing a terrorist strike? And why, after having Jack save the nation from terrorists at least three times, would anyone question his tactics?