7 TV Shows That Went From Must-See To Completely Forgettable

Given its late 2001 air date and focus on terrorism, it’s a miracle that 24 ever made it to air at all. The novelty of its real-time approach, which saw each of the 24 episodes cover a single hour of one day, certainly helped it case, making it stand out and get viewers heavily invested in the likes of Jack Bauer and David Palmer as they underwent horrific ordeals.

Shocking moments and an ‘anyone can die’ approach created major talking points but over time 24 become incredibly formulaic. Over the course of the day each villainous individual or group would gradually be revealed to be a pawn of another entity, who in turn would be doing the bidding of a higher power and so on and so forth. These would inevitably be supported by some combination of moles embedded within CTU and corrupt elements of the US Government.

By the time it ended after 8 seasons, 24 was tired. Its extensive focus on torture had become hard to ignore in the wake of scandals about the likes of Guantanamo Bay, whilst Jack had transformed from believable everyman into a superhuman and nothing could be seen as a credible threat to him anymore.

A follow-up miniseries to ostensibly tie up loose ends was okay, but it was nothing special, using the usual revolving door of villains (Islamic terrorists, corrupt agents, Russians and the Chinese) and merely reminding us that the real-time experiment was past its sell-by date.