★★★★★ 0/5

Axed: 24

Dammit. After eight season the TV clock is finally about to stop on Jack Bauer.

40
Leave a comment

The axe sure is swinging today.

After eight seasons, 24 will stop the clock.

The groundbreaking action drama will air its final real-time episode in May, the victim of a confluence of circumstances: a swelling budget, declining ratings and creative fatigue. The show’s ratings dropped 16% this season and while a 3.8 adults 18-49 rating is still healthy numbers for a scripted drama, it was not enough to overcome the increasing costs, and pay increases for contract renewals for Kiefer Sutherland and producer Howard Gordon.

Producers did pursue  other networks, namely NBC, with 20th TV offering to lower its $5m per episode license fee to $3.5 million to keep the show going. NBC ran the numbers and passed, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Gordon says the show’s writers felt they had exhausted the real-time possibilities for Bauer and never came up with a truly compelling idea to proceed with Day 9.

“If one of the writers came up with a good idea, I’d happily pitch it to Kiefer and then happily pitch to a network, whether FOX or someone else,” Gordon said. “We just don’t have that idea, and that’s where everything has to start.”

But life may not be over for Jack “Dammit” Bauer. Studio 20th TV is developing a theatrical film that takes Bauer to Europe, and showrunner and executive producer Howard Gordon says other possibilities are being explored as well.

“There are other possible iterations of Jack Bauer and his world,” Gordon said.

24 effectively TV drama’s response to the wave of world terrorism that unfolded from September 11. When it hit screens in November 2001 we were mesmerised by its real-time storytelling together with its action, stunts, conspiracies, CTU moles and a gritty Kiefer Sutherland. 24 thrived under the Bush years, and introduced both African-American and female presidents to viewers.

Rumours about the show’s demise have lingered all year. Season 8 currently airing on 7TWO has been but a pale shadow of its former self, with lacklustre numbers evident of its disappointing shift from LA to NYC. Its last creative high was season 5.

As the weeks tick down to the show’s final hour, Gordon promises a strong finish coupled with the current New York-based storyline taking a dark and creatively risky turn for the final episodes.

And then time for a cuppa coffee and a lie down, eh Jack?

Source: Hollywood Reporter

  • Tagged with 24

40 Responses

  1. Really disappointing news that 24 has been axed. I am sure all the home-critics below who are happy to see this quality show meet its maker are also fans of cutting edge tv such as Two and a Half Men and the CSI franchise.

    Thing is, 24 has always had excellent and not-so-excellent seasons. Season 3 for example was pretty ordinary, but came back with a bang in Season 5. Season 6 wasn’t amazing, but Season 7 went a long way to restoring faith in the concept.

    It’s a shame that in a climate where it is easier for networks to make safe programs like Law and Order (in all its incarnations), and where innovative programs are few and far between (or buried in late night time slots), so many “critics” are happy to jump up and down and cheer the end of an excellent program simply because its current season has been a little slower than others.

    I’ll miss 24 and the originality that it brought to network television. To have maintained such a unique concept for 8 seasons should be applauded.

  2. To be honest this last season has been a little slow but its picking up now, my mother who is 74 loves the show and its got a massive following in the UK. In my place of work were always talking about it, there was talk that they had started to make season 9 but kifer had some kind of accident. The only thing that gets me about 24 no matter what season it’s been there’s a lot of unanswered questions in it and it might be good to answer them, there was talk of a movie what happened to that?

  4. One of the great shows of its time but unfortunately (and I hate to say this) it has probably run a couple of seasons too long. Very few episodes since the season 5 finale come close to the earlier episodes. It was a very unique and watchable format but the writters seem to struggle now to live up to expectations, perhaps a result of killing off to many main characters.

  7. Well, it’s not really “axed” if the production decides to discontinue the show.
    The problem is they made the show reliant on Jack Bauer and CTU. If they had scrapped the cast and scenario each season they would have had a lot more possibilities for stories.
    They could have even done that in the current series if the same staff didn’t work 24+ hour shifts. If after 8 or 10 hours a new staff came in for a shift and took over from the original cast, it could have kept the series fresher.

  8. @Shaun Who is this mysterious “they” you speak of? Way to hate on an entire country too. It’s actually okay to like a show without everyone else in the world agreeing with you. There are shows I like that don’t air here at all – I know, shocking, right? Whether anyone in Australia watches 24 or not had nothing to do with it being axed.

  9. 24 has had its ups and downs, but I’ve honestly always been excited for a new series of it every year. This year has been less exciting, but its still been very good TV compared to a lot of what is on the tube.

    I’m bittersweet about its end, but no one can say that is hasn’t had a great run. I’ll be sad to see it go, but happy not to see it run right into the ground, which it hasn’t this season thankfully.

  11. I use to absolutely love this show. But the past few years have been poor and didn’t watch last season and stopped watching this year, mainly due to clashes, but also just same old same old.

    What was season 5 storyline?? I think the last good season i remember was with Kim Raver in it.

  13. I’d say Jack will finally get to go to the toilet! I really enjoyed the first 3 seasons, but really never got back into the other seasons mainly due to 7 moving the show around all the time… I’ll have to catch up with them all on dvd one day…

Leave a Reply