The Following Takes Place Between Writer Strike And A New Season

It would normally take a couple of nukes, some CTU mole, the Chinese Government and a whole lot of kidnapped family members and loved ones to even slow Jack Bauer down. There seems to be one thing that can put the fear of God into Jack and that is the Fox network and with their track record on pressing the cancellation button, I would say it’s for good reason. I doubt you will find anyone who can defend Season 6. Besides making Six Flags a radioactive fun land, It was a terrible season. The writers admitted it, the general audience tuned out. It was just terrible. No matter how bad the last season was, it doesn’t deserve what fate had in store for this season of the show. Keep in mind that filming a single episode of this show feels like its own episode of 24. It is very long hours and very tough work. It’s a lot like the show, only those of us who worked on the show actually get to go to the bathroom. So by no means is this an easy task. So the problems that this season has faced already is something amazingly unlucky. Let’s take a look at the couple of problems that have struck the set of 24 this season so far.

The only bomb he’s finding is of the Irish car variety.

C.T.U.ing on a D.U.I

The first speed bump in our nonstop action packed Bauer hour roller coaster ride was one that Kiefer took after pounding them tall boys down. After a (typical) night of drinking heavy, Mr. Sutherland got pulled over and had a D.U.I tossed at him. The end result is that he’ll have to spend 48 days in Jail. This was some sort of higher power telling the writers that they will have more time to come up with a good season this time. It was worked it out so his jail sentence wouldn’t effect production by sending Bauer back to the Chinese prison during the winter production break for 18 days and then the remaining 30 sometime before July. Crisis averted and all is well, right? Wrong

WHERE’S THE FIRE?!?!?!

Production on the new season was rolling along better with the prison deal figured out when, much like the show, all hell broke loose and wild fires started popping up all over the place. The Santiago fire caused so much smoke to be blown over the marine corps base in Irivine where they were filming that the entire location shoot had to be canceled and moved to a different location. This burned a lot of time on an already rushed production. But you would be foolish to think that some fire would stop Jack Bauer. Hell, if you really must know what caused those fires to be put out at a quicker pace, it was Jack on a Helicopter pouring water out of his Jack Sack. He found out fire’s weakness by torturing a lighter for a good half hour. Jack sure enjoyed that!

Ok Kiefer, I think we’re done with your Rembrandt light... DEAR GOD!

VAMPIRES!

Nothing stops production on any set more so than vampires. When I worked on Garfield a vampire Odie nearly killed half the lighting crew and delayed the production a whole day. I don’t know how many times I’ve been adjusting the key lighting for an actor and all of a sudden they burst into flames. 24 is no different. Vampire Corey Feldman and Corey Haim kept coming on the hot set and screwing up the shots bumming smokes off the crew and bugging Kiefer about a Lost Boys sequel. The last straw was broken when they raided craft services. You mess with a mans food and you mess with their emotion! I say Vampires because the only thing that would stop them was a stake through the heart and I sleep easier at night thinking that the shallow grave outside Tucson city is filled with the bodies of undead blood suckers and not just 80’s teen idols.

DAYLIGHT SAVING TIME!

Let’s see you try to change the countdown clock timer. It’s like trying to adjust the one on your microwave. Even with the instructions it’s a tough son of a bitch. You can’t very well run down the clock and count 24 hours without the use of the countdown clock and it wouldn’t be 24 without that Beep Beep Beep at the end. All this because of daylight saving time. And it’s not like they can leave the clock unchanged. It would be an hour off. What would really be a trip is if they had day Eight started on daylight saving time. That would be one extra hour of Bauer. Well, if it was a Halloween terrorist. If it was a Jack saving the world from an Easter threat it’ll be an hour less. And yet again I go back to the well for daylight saving time jokes. Eventually someone figured out how to change to clock and this crisis was bypassed. But all this was for nothing as the one thing that could stop Jack happened...

THE WRITERS STRIKE!

What is there for Jack Bauer to say when he has no one to write it? Because of contract talks going sour between producers and writers over residuals, it caused a writers strike to happen. In the last few seasons of 24 the network wanted to have no breaks between episodes. With only 8 episodes in the can and the unknown amount of time that the strike will go on for, it’s hard to tell when production can continue on the show. And so the one thing terrorist, amnesia, chemical agents and a whole lot of government paperwork couldn’t do, the networks did. That is, silence Jack Bauer. You wont see Jack saving the world. Hell, you can’t even call Jack in to stop the strike

With Jack Bauer being put into the Chinese government prison known as the Fox executive’s shelf, it’s unknown as to how long this will last or when we will see Day 7 of 24. Fox wants the entire season done with before it will start showing these. I would wager that it’ll be April or May before we get to see any of this season if we are lucky. Till then Fox announced their line up and in replace of 24 we’ll be getting more reality shows and more American Idol. If that doesn’t show that the terrorist won, I’m not sure what does.

n the end it is all because of the dispute between the WGA and AMPTP. I’m standing by the WGA on this issue. Not because I’m against the studio, nor arguably a writer. When you illegally download something and the network doesn’t get any cash for it, they call it piracy. But when you download something or watch streaming video with commercials and the writers don’t get any money for it, the networks call it a promotion? This should not be considered kosher. I’m bummed that 24 is going to be postponed but if it creates more incentive for the writers to get properly compensated, I can take the delay. In the meantime, create your own Day 7