24 (season 1)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

24 Season 1
Promotional poster
Country	USA
Network	Fox
Original runs	November 6, 2001 – May 21, 2002
No. of episodes	24
DVD Release Date	September 17, 2002
DVD Format	Widescreen boxed set

Season One of the television series 24 was first broadcast from November 6, 2001 to May 21, 2002. The season's storyline starts at 12:00 a.m. on the day of California Presidential primary.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

“

Right now, terrorists are plotting to assassinate a presidential candidate. My wife and daughter have been targeted, and people that I work with may be involved in both. I'm Federal Agent Jack Bauer, and today is the longest day of my life.

”

—Jack Bauer, monologue from 5 p.m. episode until the end of the season.

1 Season overview
2 Main cast
3 Trivia
- 3.1 Goofs
4 Episode summaries
5 External links

[edit] Season overview

Season One (2001 – 2002) takes place on the day of a fictional presidential primary during modern times in an unspecified year. Due to the hints in the program, most people believe that the season is set in March 2004.

The season's main plot revolves around an assassination attempt on Maryland Senator David Palmer, a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, on the day of the California primary. The central character is Jack Bauer, a former Delta Force operator who is the Special Agent in Charge of the fictional Counter Terrorist Unit (CTU) in Los Angeles. Bauer becomes professionally as well as personally involved when his wife Teri and daughter Kim are kidnapped by the people behind the assassination.

The season is essentially divided into two acts:

The first act revolves around a mercenary group's efforts to control Jack Bauer and force him to kill Senator Palmer by kidnapping Bauer's wife and daughter. This culminates in Jack's successful rescue of his family.
In the second act, the masterminds behind the plot are revealed and continue with their plans to kill the Senator as well as the Bauer family.

Fox initially ordered half a season of the show to try it out. The successful rescue at the end of the first half of the season was planned as a series finale in the event that 24 was not picked up for the rest of the season.

[edit] Major subplots

The show rotates between the points of view of each of the five main cast members: Jack Bauer, Teri Bauer, Kim Bauer, Nina Myers, and David Palmer, as well as one main villain - Mandy for the first 3 hours, followed by Ira Gaines, Andre Drazen and finally Victor Drazen. The day's situations — both ongoing events and the relationships between these five characters and their associates — form the basis for the season's subplots.

A mole at CTU is sabotaging efforts to stop the assassination.
Jack finds himself in situations where he confronts his complex personal definition of compromise.
The Bauer family is rebuilding their relationships now that Jack has moved home after being separated from Teri for 6 months.
There are tensions between Jack, his second-in-command and former lover, Nina Myers, and Nina's current boyfriend/rebound relationship and third-in-command, Tony Almeida.
Political scandals threaten to erupt, centered around Senator Palmer's son having been accused of killing his sister's rapist in the distant past, 7 years before this season.
Kim has a complicated relationship with her kidnappers, particularly the misguided Rick Allen.
Teri develops personal problems as a result of the day's stress and revelations.
Jack suffers great personal anguish due to worry about the safety of his family and the stress dealing with the consequences of his protocol deviations.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

[edit] Summary

The season starts and ends at 12:00 a.m. PST. The first half of the season centers on the efforts of a terrorist cell led by Ira Gaines to assassinate presidential candidate David Palmer. They kidnap Jack Bauer's wife and daughter in order to force him to aide in the assassination and take the fall for Palmer's death. Jack eventually defeats this cell in the process of saving his wife and daughter, but this only leads to information about a second group of terrorists who had employed the first cell. The second cell is led by those ultimately responsible for the day's events: Andre and Alexis Drazen.

Two years prior to this day, Jack Bauer was sent as part of a classified team to Kosovo on the orders of a secret Congressional panel headed by David Palmer to kill Victor Drazen, Slobodan Milošević's "shadow." In order to keep Operation Nightfall totally secret, the panel never met nor knew the team of operatives, and vice versa, therefore Palmer and Bauer never knew about each other. The Drazens found out about both Palmer's and Bauer's involvement in their father's death (incidentally, Jack Bauer was believed to be the only operative still alive), and the whole assassination plot had been a means to get back at them -- Palmer would be dead, Jack would be imprisoned for the assassination, and his family would be killed.

During the last few episodes, the plot twists revealed many surprises. It was revealed that Bauer's team had only killed Drazen's body double. Drazen's wife and young children, however, were inadvertently killed, prompting the "eye for an eye" aspect of the plot: as Drazen's family died, so would Bauer's wife and daughter. We also discover that the real Victor Drazen was being held in a top secret underground prison later revealed to be under government control, and the Drazens' primary goal was to free Victor Drazen.

Eventually, in order to satisfy the Drazens, Palmer's death is faked. The Drazens recapture Bauer's daughter Kim and offer to exchange her life for Bauer's. However, Kim escapes and the Drazens soon learn that Palmer is still alive. In desperation, the freed Victor Drazen tells his mole inside CTU, who we discover is Nina Myers, to call Bauer and tell him that his daughter is dead and that the Coast Guard has found her body. Drazen does this because he knows Jack will come to kill him, and, hopefully, be killed in the process. As it turned out, Jack Bauer came and did kill not only Victor Drazen, but also Andre Drazen (Alexis was dead already) and all their henchmen. After that, Jack Bauer called the Coast Guard to arrange to claim his daughter's body. The Coast Guard informs Bauer that they did not find a body that night. Hearing this, Bauer realizes that Nina Myers is the mole. He calls the head of CTU and tells him to detain Myers, but Myers, who heard that Bauer had survived, was already preparing for exfiltration by erasing all the incriminating information on her computer. Bauer's wife, Teri, was confused about the events surrounding Jack's attempt to rescue their daughter, and looked for Myers, whom she trusted. Teri realized that Myers was the mole, however, and Myers tied her up and shot her. Jack came to CTU and let them take Myers into custody (as opposed to killing her). He then discovered his wife's body.

The season has a dramatic and unexpected ending: the death of Teri Bauer. Many fans were dismayed by this sudden plot twist, while others applauded 24's genre-defying willingness to kill major characters with little warning. The producers also filmed an alternate ending in which Teri, Kim, and Jack are reunited, and another in which Teri is shot, but survives. However, they eventually decided to go with the death of Teri Bauer as the climax of season one. The first alternate ending is available on the Season 1 DVD boxed set, although it is noticeably less dramatic than the eventual ending that was aired.

[edit] Series timeframe

Although it is not clear which year it is set in, it is known that it takes place during a presidential election year. Some fans have surmised it is the 2004 election and therefore, the date would be a Tuesday in March of 2004. However, others believe that this year is incorrect (whatever "incorrect" means with respect to a date of a fictional event in a fictional story) since, during Season 1, Jack Bauer states that he took part in a covert operation against a key member of Milošević's government two years before. Since Milošević was ousted from office four years before 2004, there is doubt as to whether this is the actual date. This is also evidence that the fictional story is not intended to be set in any particular actual year.

However, some fans do argue the possibility that Victor Drazen was not found and attacked by Bauer's group until two years after Milošević was taken down. Another credible argument is the fact that, in Season Two, Gary Matheson states that his credit card expires in 2007. If season 1 takes place in 2004, then season 2 would take place in 2005, giving said credit card a life span of less than 2 years, which is not an unreasonable amount of time. Also in season 2, Aaron Pierce mentions that he joined the Secret Service during Reagan's second term (1985-1989), and Palmer acknowledges that it's been almost twenty years since then, making 2005 a strong possibility.

Also, in Season 3 it is noted that Jack's mission in Kosovo, in which he believed Stephen Saunders to be killed, happened eight years prior to that point in the series. Seeing as the U.S.-NATO military intervention in Kosovo occurred in 1999/2000 and that that season takes place during a Presidential election year, it can be assumed that Season 3 takes place in 2008. Therefore, since Palmer is running for his second term in 2008, then he was first elected in 2004, and this is when Season 1 takes place. But the original reference to "Operation Hell Gate" being two years earlier in season 1 is more evidence that there is no attempt on the part of the writers to be consistent about which particular actual date this fictional story takes place.

One other thing to note is that in the third episode of season 1, Nina proves her innocence (the first time) by showing that she could not have been the one who programmed a keycard containing vital information about the assassination plot. The card was created on Nina's computer on January 14th of the same year that season 1 takes place in. Nina then says that she could not have created the card because she and Jack had gone away together on that day. She remembered because it was the 2nd weekend in January. 2000 was a presidential election year and January 14th was on a Friday (technically the 3rd weekend). In 2004, the 14th was on a Wednesday.

In the end, this is a fictional story, and there is no evidence that the writers have made any attempt to have the story be taking place on any particular actual year, or to be consistent with such an attempt.

[edit] Plots and twists affecting future seasons

The death of Teri Bauer.
The relationship developed between Jack and David Palmer.
The relationship developed between Jack and Tony Almeida.
The divorce of David & Sherry Palmer.
George Mason becoming director of CTU.
Nina Myers revealed as a mole.
The future appearance of a man Jack Bauer busted for taking bribes.
The disclosed events of Operation Nightfall and its aftermath, going beyond the Drazen household.
Jack kills the brother of Abu Fayed, sparking a hatred that would rise in season 6.

[edit] Main cast

From left to right: Mandy, Palmer, Nina, Teri, Jack & Kim.

See List of characters in 24 for a more thorough list.

[edit] Trivia

A scene from the pilot episode depicting a Boeing 747 exploding was re-edited for broadcast, with the image of the plane exploding removed, in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, which had occurred less than two months earlier. ^[1]
In the pilot episode, the opening titles sound slightly different. When the "24" flashes up on the screen, a gunshot is heard. This is the only time this happens.
The Drazen Operation to seek revenge of those who were involved in Operation Nightfall did succeed in one aspect: While the murders of Jack Bauer and David Palmer were never successful, they did manage to murder the man who connected the two, Robert Ellis, who was killed in a bar bathroom in New Orleans.
In the final episode, various pictures could be seen on Nina's laptop. The pictures were of various cast and crew members, including a shot of Kiefer kissing a stuffed animal.
Ironically, the two people that Jack Bauer trusted in CTU, Jamey Farrell and Nina Myers, turned out to be the only two moles in CTU.
All of the "Previously on 24" recaps at the beginning of each episode during the original broadcast were removed on the Season One DVD.
Until season six, this was the only day in which the action begins and ends at night, because of the irregular filming schedule during Daylight Savings Time.
During the opening credits, when Bauer is recapping the major plot points to the audience, he states "...and the people I work with may be involved in both". While he is saying that, a shot of Nina Myers is seen looking up at Jack's office at CTU. Nina then indeed turns out to be the person that is indeed involved in both.

[edit] Goofs

In episode 2 ("1:00 AM - 2:00 AM"), while Jack and Richard are trying to dispatch their attackers, upon walking through a particular door, crew members can be see in plain clothes.
In episode 8 ("7:00 AM - 8:00 AM"), when Nina is in the house right after Jack shot her in the flak jacket, just before she picks up the phone for the second time, one of the cameramen slides into the shot. (0:13:20)
In episode 12 ("11:00 AM - 12:00 PM"), while Alberta is interrogating Tony for the first time, a camera is clearly visible on the left in the shot that faces the back of the room.
In episode 13 ("12:00 PM - 1:00 PM"), Kim wants to run to the helicopters because she does not see anyone around, but there is a crew member standing almost next to her. Later, as Teri and Kim first meet the CTU team, Teri drops her pistol in one clip and is clearly holding it in the next (33:25).
In episode 14 ("1:00 PM - 2:00 PM") When Jack is placed in a holding room for questioning he puts his head in his hands, his wrist watch shows the time to be 2:55.
In episode 15 ("2:00 PM - 3:00 PM"), during one scene of Jack's debrief, the shot changes to a split screen. In the left box, Jack stands up from the table before he does in the right box. (0:04:08).
In episode 24 ("11:00 PM - 12:00 AM"), while Jack is chasing Andre and Victor out on to the docks, there is a split-second shot of a man in a blue mask standing next to Jack as he returns fire on the Drazens. (00:16:10)