keifer sutherland

...himself!

Keifer Sutherland says that the upcoming season of 24 will have everyone's favorite, tired hero Jack Bauer not saving the world, but saving himself, from bad guys who are hunting him around the world and want to kill him.

I think this is a fantastic idea. It would make the show more Bourne Identity and less James Bond. Meaning, more a personal story about survival than a story about bad guys trying to destroy the world. I think I'll even watch this upcoming season, even though I haven't watched any of the other seasons (not a knock against the show. I love spy/action shows, but there was always something else on).

The FOX show returns in January.

[via TV Tattle]

I'm taking this story with a grain of salt, but if true it's pretty funny.

While vacationing at a ski resort, 24 star Keifer Sutherland was approached by someone who said they worked for the CIA. That person told him his portrayal of uber-efficient (and seriously sleep-deprived) Bauer had set expectations for CIA operatives too high. Seems the agent's mother had remarked to him that he should be more like Jack Bauer, who gets things accomplished quickly. No word on if the mother in question also advised her son to shoot people in the legs should they not cooperate willingly.

Anna mentioned earlier that Elisha Cuthbert will return to the 24 universe tonight as Jack's daughter Kim. The character is rightly surprised to find her father alive after believing he was...you know...not. In fact she's so surprised she hires a therapist to see if he can't calm Jack down a bit. That therapist will be played by none other than the Soul Man himself, C. Thomas Howell. Howell's character will debut later this month. I mean later in the day. I mean.. oh just forget it. Sometime after what's happening now and before what happens later. I'm keen (did I really just say that?) to see how Jack will react to the idea of therapy in the middle of trying to contain the latest terrorist threat that only he can prevent. Maybe if he just shoots Nina again everything will be fine.

In advance of this fifth season of FOX's 24, we were told everything from "You don't know Jack" to the fact that the premiere would be "explosive." Little did we know what the show's creators had in mind for us. Jack is playing "Frank Flynn," and attempting to get some work on an oil site - apparently part of his cover since he's supposedly dead to the U.S. government. Palmer is in the middle of working on his book, Tony and Michelle are back together, and even Chloe's got someone in her bed (and who knew she had ink?!). But 24 wouldn't be 24 without a big way of opening the show. Just minutes in, we see Palmer shot in the neck from a sniper at a building across from where he is standing - and it appears that he really is dead, no faking. And it would only get more intense from there.

The last person we expect to be sleeping with a co-worker is definitely Chloe, but sure enough, there she is with Spenser, who works for her, shortly after the open. Clearly she'll be integral to Jack's return to the living, if she can only make it through the barrage of hitmen who are after anyone connected to Jack and Palmer. Seeing Tony & Michelle at home was a nice scene, which wouldn't last long enough for us to say goodbye. We're quickly thrown into asking who is behind this whole thing, and what's the point. Thankfully, the producers didn't make us wait too long to figure out what was going on - this was clearly a way to spring Jack from wherever he was hiding, and get rid of a few "loose ends" in the process.