Day One, A Federal agent is torn between his duty to protect a Senator, and his duty to protect his family. That’s all Day One was. Try as you might you won’t be able to come up with a similar one sentence description for Day Eight. Certainly there are parts which have been just a simple, the most simple an idea was Jack’s fight for justice during the last 7 hours. Which is why these last 7 hours where the best of these last 24. Why certain parts of these last two where so touching, emotional and even moving, whilst others where simply plot.

Everything involving Jack and Chloe was terrific. Logan was mostly the usual delight to watch. The action, as so often in these final episodes was tense and dramatic. Unfortunately however a number of other moments either fell flat or where horribly guilty of missed opportunities.

The show almost tortured those final moments at the UN podium until Taylor pulled out. How much better, more dramatic and hopeful would it have been if Taylor, looking resolved, steely, but oddly calm walked up to the podium after the others had signed and made a speech mirroring her Inauguration speech seen in Redemption, declaring her values of openness, peace and understanding – those which had lead her to seek high office, and whilst the initial work done in forging this peace her guiding principles meant she would unfortunately not be able to sign the treaty.

However in the places that mattered there was very little too complain about. These two hours wrapped up the Day 8 story nicely and neatly. But why then do I still feel a little reserved in my judgement?. Perhaps this is why…

The end of 24 needs to deal with what happens to those who go down that road. Can they turn back? Can there be a happy ending? Or is there simply a dead end?

I wrote that 6 months ago when looking back on 7×24 and looking forward to Series 8. Previously i’d written how 7×24 should be the last we saw of Jack Bauer, (and possibly 24) as it was the most perfect closure and judgement Jack was ever going to receive. The viewer could decide whether Jack died quietly and peacefully with Kim by his side or if simply the Jack Bauer we knew died on that hospital bed and a different man woke. Nothing in the past 24 episodes has fundamentally changed that opinion, most especially because we are no nearer an answer to the key question I pose above.

Perhaps it is an unanswerable question, perhaps that is precisely the point.

Overall a very fine end to the day, if only a satisfactory end to the show as a whole.

Best then perhaps that 8×24 is not “goodbye”, but merely “fair well, for now”.

In the meantime, back to the boxsets it is, and I would like to salute everyone who has contributed to the show these last 9 years.

Thank you very much for so much fine entertainment.

The last few episodes really hadn’t done much for me, I still wasn’t getting excited, because of all the procedural rubbish that was going on around the edges I was finding it hard to get emotionally invested (or connected). But in 21 and 22, as we see just how far Jack is willing to go, and is going. Suddenly I get it, i’m with it. I’m edging ever so slightly towards the edge of my seat.

It’s all a bit more guilty pleasure than it was back in the good old days of Series One when you gained some satisfaction from deciphering the plot and perhaps guessing a plot twist no one else saw coming, the 2010 breed is a little more “detach the brain and enjoy the ride”, but hey, if the ride is this enjoyable then sure i’ll let a few plot holes (Novacovic gave the order to shoot Renee, not the Russian Pres.) the size of Manhattan flash by me. Same goes for a little repetition (Logan undone by a microphone after a rough and ready encounter with Jack).

Really is worth ignored when where treated to such gloriously scenes as Jacks full on assault whilst masked and in full body armour wielding an AK or something similar. Any encounter between Jack and Logan is worth watching and 22 didn’t disappoint. Truth be told any scene with Logan scheming, and twisting and being so Machiavellian and Nixon-esque is worth watching.

A lot of the problems of previous episodes was still present in these episodes, I just found myself not caring so much.

The show has set itself up for a very promising end, lets see if it delivers….

Wait, you already know if it delivers. Lets see if I think it delivers…. (yeah, thats better.)

The article linked to above now cites Howard Gordon stating that Jack might become a regular visitor to the big screen:

“Our idea is to make Jack Bauer someone we can revisit on a regular basis.”

I’ll leave you to judge for yourself whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing. I’m approaching it with mixed feelings. While I will probably miss the show on TV, I’m not sure how a show that fundamentally depended on real-time and a 24-hour time span can even successfully transition into 2 hours of screen time. Sure, we had “Redemption”, but I’m not a big fan of it, either. Redemption worked as a sort of a prequel to the following season, but a movie would be a stand-alone story and a whole different ball game.

The other reservation I have is about trying to raise Bauer to an indestructible status of James Bond, and that’s essentially what would happen if he became a serial movie killer. Is this really necessary? Won’t Jack become just another action  hero? Won’t the essence of “24″ get lost in the process? Knowing that Jack will come back for another movie would make any real tension impossible because you’d know he can’t die (once I stopped believing they’d ever kill Jack on screen, that seriously dampened my “thrill” watching the seasons). Kiefer Sutherland has been saying for quite some time that he believed that Jack could go on as a character even if someone else played him. I suppose this might be the beginning idea of that transition. Just like Bond.

Nothing is etched in stone yet, of course, as a “revisit” will likely depend on how well the first movie does. So we’ll see.

In the meantime, let’s try to look forward to the movie and the return of

“…some familiar faces”

in the (first) movie, notably Chloe O’Brian. I’m still hoping for Tony, too.

More details on the film include “cold war themes”, and Jack’s remaining status of a “fugitive from everyone”, at least at the start of the movie. So it’s probably safe to say that Jack still has it in for the Russians. Suwarow is still alive, after all.

I wanted to let you know that I hadn’t dropped out the picture. I will be posting my thoughts on the final hours of Series Eight just as soon as I’ve seen them, (i’ve got the last four episodes to watch) and while the urge to simply rush through them is very great, knowing that these are the final 4 hours I’m resisting that temptation and will wait to watch them when I can really savour them.

Looking forward, I also wanted to let people know that we’ll continue to cover 24 whatever form it now takes. Hopefully this will be a Movie in the not too distant future, or it may be that the Movie doesn’t happen straight away and we’ll have to amuse ourselves in the meantime with a look back at the show over the years.

The clock never stops.

How did this happen? Wasn’t I one of the advocates of the “It should have ended years ago” and “It’s time to stop the clock”-credos? Didn’t I firmly believe myself past my 24 addiction?

And why exactly am I crying?

There’s no easy answer to that. The simplest and most detached explanation would be “because Howard Gordon wrote a damn good script and the actors did a damn good job of acting it”. But that reply doesn’t tell you why it has made me cry. I can try to dissect things a little. I know that I’m sad over “24″ ending, despite everything, because it has been a part of my life and the best thing on TV for the last 9 years. I’m sad because back in 2001, when “24″ first happened, I felt like I’d been searching for that very TV show to come along for more than two decades of my life; never before had a TV show so completely and thoroughly consumed me, engaged me, made me wonder, fear, tremble with anticipation and want more like a junkie in desperate need of his next shot. Never before had a show (re-)awakened the writer in me and inspired me to write hundreds of pages of fanfiction, pushed me to create my own storylines, fill in the blanks for existing characters, spin the thread further, create my own world beyond the show. But most of all, it was so bloody entertaining to watch.

‘The moment of truth’, a friend just told me as I revealed to her that I had much more than just watery eyes when the yellow ticking clock counted the final three seconds of “24″ down to zero (sorry if you consider this a spoiler, but it was a really nice touch and I had to mention it). I suppose that’s what it is. The simple truth is: Yes, I’m still a fan. I admit it, no need for coersive interrogation.

And yes, I will go out and buy the season. In fact, I will go out and buy all the seasons again, even those that I already own (some of my DVDs are kaput, so that’s why). Whenever that S1-8 DVD box comes out, I’ll get it. Even though I might never watch S5 or S6 (which I haven’t hitherto owned), now that “24″’s clock has ticked and died away, it does not feel appropriate for a fan who’s shedding tears over the finale not to own the complete DVD set.

Do you consider my reaction hypocritical, taking into account that I have been criticizing a good part of the 8th season earlier? Have I been lying to myself when saying that “24″ was better off dead? Maybe. Or maybe I have been preparing myself for this, inevitable, painful moment that comes about when you finally realise that “Never again” has just gained a new meaning. But on the other hand, I think that my criticism was also a way of demanding that things get better. I do believe that true fans have the right to criticise; the only people who don’t are those who actually have no idea what they’re talking about. I myself have never really given up on the show, even though there were things I didn’t like. I watched each season as it aired, even when the show was at its worst, and I hoped that when it finally went away, it would go out with a bang.

And boy, did it do that.

No, fear not, nobody got blown to pieces in the final moments. But Gordon came awfully close to ending the show with something that I and other like-minded fans have believed from Day 1 would be the only real way, the only fitting way, of wrapping things up. If I hadn’t known about “24″’s plans for the future, I would really have gotten worried. But even so, it had gripped me. I was right there in the midst of it. I was anxious about Jack, Chloe, Cole, I was yelling at Taylor to finally do the right thing, I was wishing that Logan would just drop dead, and for Dalia Hassan to stand up to Taylor…

But even though I knew that the remainder of the season rested on Jack’s revenge spree (hell, he gave us Darth Bauer ©TheJackSack) and although I wanted Logan to finally die and pay not only for his role in this season, but also for what he’s done to David Palmer, Michelle Dessler and by proxy, Tony Almeida, I couldn’t make myself root for Jack to kill Logan, or President Suwarow. Ever since Renee was killed, the path that Jack took made me feel very ambiguous about him. He chose to race down this road to ruin, and as much as I sympathised with him, as much as I understood his anger and pain, I couldn’t in good conscience side with him. There are limits, Jack, even for you.

I won’t give away how things eventually played out, you’re going to have to watch the eps yourself if you want to find out. I’ll just say the ending has left me torn. Okay, I can’t end this without addressing a couple of things that are definitely considered spoilers, so if you haven’t seen the finale, DON’T READ the rest of this until you have.

Obviously, I’m torn on the Logan issue. While I couldn’t sanction Jack’s taking him out, I’m also not really happy with him potentially surviving the season, and possibly getting away with another slap on the wrist. However, kudos to him for finally having the balls to do ‘the right thing’, put that gun to his head and pull the trigger. That was the perfect way to give us all what we wanted, and keep Jack out of it.  Now, I don’t believe in suicide, but in Logan’s case, I had no problem with the death penalty – by his hand or the government’s. death was the just punishment. It was just fitting that he’d try to take the coward’s way out and kill himself rather than facing another public humiliation. But I was in fact surprised that he killed his watchdog. Not bad for a wuss! Funny, though, he blew his own brains out and the EMT’s were able to say just a couple of minutes later that he will probably survive (at least we got the mention of permanent brain damage). Way to go, Charles. You can’t even commit suicide right!

I’m also torn on the Jack issue, though. If there had been no movies planned, I would have really wanted to see Jack die on screen. I believed that it was the finality of Jack’s death that “24″ needed in order to really call it quits. We’d discussed the options numerous times in forums, and the finale almost got us there three times. It was almost as if Gordon was going through the possible death scenarios in his head and then decided to include them all: a) ‘killed by a friend’, b) ’suicide’, c) ‘killed by a foe’. But since neither Chloe, nor Jack himself, nor his executioner actually put a bullet in Jack’s brain, Jack survived. Now, I’m surprisingly okay with that – in fact it feels a little comforting to know he’s still out there and ready for a day at the movies. But he was also given yet another free pass – and that makes me feel a little betrayed.

I understand that Alison Taylor felt the need to give Jack a head start, and I applaud her for not just granting him a pardon. He was, after all, about to assassinate some very high-ranking politicians just minutes prior. But why is it that Bauer always gets to flee the country and go dark while Tony gets slapped over the head with the rule book and the law book and left to rot in a federal penitentiary? I know, because Jack is the star of the show. But it still doesn’t sit right with my Almeidaist heart. There, I had to say it.

However, I did love the episodes. They were so well written. Never, not for a moment before Jack and Chloe began to say their goodbyes, did it feel like we were heading towards the end of the series. It just moved on, pushed on, raced on, and made you wish there was more than just the 7, 6, 4, 2 minutes left. And I guess what really made me tear up in those final moments was Jack’s mention of Kim, and when he made Chloe promise him to protect her. His family has always been his soft spot. And now he’s once again left to run for his life and forced to disappear from Kim’s life after just having reconnected with her. Poor Kim, she must have gotten used to it by now. And Alison Taylor, she proved to be very much like David Palmer. Not only won’t she seek re-election, but she’s stepping down and turning herself in. Finally. I’m glad she’s found the way back to where she used to be before that snake Logan started slithering around.

Anyhow… I think I’d better stop. I think what I’m going through is no different from what the people on the set were going through when shooting that final ep. One more shot of Kiefer’s knee, another shot of his ankles, another shot of his elbow… Dragging it out just so that ‘the next one’ would be that last shot of the series. So… I will stop dragging things out on my end.

Overall, I’ve enjoyed the season. It has done what it had set out to do – entertain me. I hadn’t been as invested and as addicted to it as I had been in some earlier years, but at the end of the day (literally), it has managed to move me. And that is a good way to remember it. Thank you, all.

00:00:03 — 00:00:02 — 00:00:01 — 00:00:00

I feel no sadness about the demise of the sniper dude, but I am finding it increasingly difficult to stay on Bauer’s side and see him as a real good guy. I get the whole, “You killed Renee, so I’m gonna kill you” attitude, but with some of the things he’s done in this ep he crossed the line, and like his pal said, “This path you’re on, there ain’t no coming back from it.”

Of course, Jack wasn’t planning on coming back. He’s a man with a mission, a suicide mission, and wants only revenge. And so it makes you wonder, is Logan’s faithful underling all that wrong when he says the simple truth is that Bauer has lost it? I’m not sure how much I can support his eye-for-an-eye attitude at this point. As entertainment, what he’s doing is fun and finally gets me sort of excited. It’s great to watch. But when you think about it, what he’s doing  - going after Logan while shooting at Secret Service agents (although he “shot to wound”, not to kill) just gives you that bitter taste in your mouth where you ask yourself, where does the good end and the evil begin? And that’s regardless of what kind of a bastard that guy is, and how much he does deserve to die.

But this is just 24 doing what it’s’ been doing when it was at its best: making you think, making you wonder. How far would you be willing to go? How far can or should Bauer go?

If you’ve seen the ep, you’ve probably answered the questions yourself. Are you having trouble supporting Bauer’s doings?

I won’t go into the details of the ep, but there is one really good synopsis & review of it on TheJackSack. It’s a bit longish, but well written, and with a great sarcastic undertone. There’s really not much to add to it. Go and read, and chuckle.

It’s probably too much and unnecessary to try and dissect every single detail of the ep. But on the whole, it stroke me as the perfect combination of character development, action, tension, politics, betrayal, moral, intrigue and great directing/camerawork. And military choppers in pursuit of Jack Bauer; too bad that part ended after just 3 minutes (but then again, the F/A-18s in Season 3 didn’t last much longer either). Seriously, though: who doesn’t enjoy watching Jack land a chopper on the roof of a building and go against everyone and every rule in the book to do what he believes is right? I know I do.

The keyword of this ep: conflict. One really must have conflict for 24 to work. Without conflict, it’d have a whole different brand of viewers. We have Jack and Chloe, Logan and Taylor, Logan and Kenan and Kenan and Logan, and to a lesser extent, Cole and Jack/Chloe…

The Jack and Chloe situation isn’t really a surprise. Jack has been known to butt heads with Acting Directors of CTU, so why should it be any different with her? However, if Chloe’s sticking to the presidential order and going against Bauer isn’t proof enough that she’s grown up then I don’t know what is. Then again, she might have done it only because she really believed that Jack was wrong. Or maybe because there is no Director to go up against by siding with Jack. It’s her in the hot seat now, her head that will roll if things go bad. She could be acting out of self-preservation, but I’d like to think that it’s purely because she’s a loyal CTU employee under presidential orders… After all, the friendship she and Jack have had for years shouldn’t be worthless all of a sudden.

So, rather than yet again supporting Jack’s rogue operation, Chloe goes against him. The funny thing is that Jack knew in his gut that she would. I’m going to enjoy the next ep(s) with Jack and Cole running field ops together. Let’s just hope Cole doesn’t get killed in the process…

However, no matter how fun it has been to watch Jack do his action parts, the real strength of this episode lies in the moral disintegration and corruption of President Alison Taylor by none other than President Charles Logan, that sleazy bastard I’d been wanting to see dead since Season 5: the snake, the apple, the temptation and the Devil on Taylor’s shoulder.

Greg Itzin’s so brilliant he makes me yet again hate Logan with a passion. Obviously, Charles Logan has planned this whole thing including all contingency plans from the get-go, figuring out how to stay ahead of Taylor’s every move, anticipating her decisions and manipulating her into a situation where she’ll have to do what he wanted from her… Yes, he definitely had pursued his own agenda… Who’s surprised? It indeed seems that in the years since his own conviction he has perfected his manipulative skills. Step by step, he’s led her “so far into the woods she’ll never be able to find her way back” as Ethan Kenan has so fittingly put it.

It really hurts to watch Alison follow him down this slippery road to Hell, and break with the morals she has so strongly been in touch with since we first met her. She’s put her own daughter in prison in order to uphold her morals, for God’s sake! And now she’s authorizing illegal detention and torture… The very things she wouldn’t let Jack get away with not too long ago. And yet, the crumbling of her moral ground and her stance on torture is painfully credible. Thanks to Logan, she no longer has another option if she doesn’t want to let everything she worked for just slip through her fingers… To be continued…

Logan played center court in the political game, not only with President Taylor, but also with Ethan Kenan… I must say I almost got goose bumps during that last scene between the two. With Kenan depicting Taylor’s corruption by the ever-scheming Logan, her downfall, his break with her administration, the tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife…

“She wasn’t like you. She wasn’t like any politician I’ve ever known.”

“That’s right. She’s finally got some teeth!”

If you didn’t want to just punch Logan’s smug face… I did.

I’m sorry to see Ethan go, but I’m still hoping this won’t be the last we’ll see of him. It’s true, for now, Taylor seems to be siding with Logan, and it seems a logical step for him to resign since she’s not following his advice. “[There’s] only room for one of us.” He’s right. For now. But maybe, just maybe, she’ll come around again. It is to be hoped.

Many moments have been beautifully put to the screen but maybe the best and most memorable part was right at the end… Alison’s speech about the price that has to be paid… That peace has to come, sometimes at a very steep price.

“Peace must and will prevail, no matter the cost…” Ethan leaves, and Taylor is momentarily stunned into silence… “No matter the cost, no matter the compromises.” At the same time, Dana Walsh is subjected to waterboarding, on the authority of the President of the United States.

Yes, compromise she did. She’s crossed the line. A line I don’t think she’ll be able to live with in the long run. I want to see how it’ll end. With a resignation, most likely. I’ll leave you with this thought of Early Jack Bauer from Season 1:

“You can look the other way once, and it’s no big deal, except it makes it easier for you to compromise the next time, and pretty soon that’s all you’re doing; compromising, because that’s the way you think things are done. You know those guys I busted? You think they were the bad guys? Because they weren’t, they weren’t bad guys, they were just like you and me. Except they compromised… Once..”

It stuck me watching episode 15 just how good the show still is at setting up a individual scenes, individual moments, individual “scenarios”, for all the roll your eyes bad moments the show can have, it can still deliver a good edge of your seat moment. Dana and Arlo (is that how you spell his name) was a perfect example, it had genuine suspense, genuine intrigue, Arlo’s reveal made you jump, and for a split screen put you on Dana’s side as you shared her surprise, then you quickly where back on Arlo’s side as you remembered what Dana had done (and was doing), and was they quite literally switched places you hoped Arlo wasn’t going to get a surprise of his own. Fortunately he was saved by the bell.

Another great moment was the countdown to the bomb possibly going off. In both these moments the show used our knowledge of the show against us, we’ve been watching the show long enough to know that it really doesn’t mind killing off supporting characters when it serves the very immediate purpose, or indeed setting off nuclear weapons. We’ve been trained to expect the unexpected, Dana killing Arlo and the bomb going off was the unexpected, so we expected. And thats why neither happened. We’ve now come full circle in which we have to retrain ourselves to expect the expected!

It’s in these moments when the show really flourishes, when it has your full attention. Unfortunately in between these moments the illusion is really starting to slip, the threads holding all these moments together is starting to become frayed. Everything is becoming more and more unbelievable, and I mean everything, even the moments i’ve mentioned above, it’s just that with these moments your too enthralled to notice and so you don’t care. But then the immediate threat passes and you have time to think…., why aren’t agents banned from taking calls on personal cellphones?, why would the President invite the wife and daughter of a visiting president into too watch and operation the odds suggested could go horribly wrong?, why after 8 years have CTU still not learned to establish a secure perimeter to ensure the baddies don’t just drive off? (and those are just the questions I can remember asking myself during this episode).

Looking beyond these questions and the glue which is supposed to be holding the season together, to make all the episodes relate and build on top of one another. Hmm, I’m struggling to think what that glue is supposed to be. I suppose it’s supposed to be the peace talks, but really the show got bored with that a long time ago, in recent episodes it’s just been something to keep Taylor busy. We’ve had other things, (Renee’s dark side, A Russian Mob Family, IRK Rebels trying to overthrow Hassan, Hassan slowly going mad) etc etc, but none of these things have been consistent. That’s the problem with this season, it’s got no overridding theme, no arch, one conspiracy doesn’t fold into another, one conspiracy simply takes up the reigns when another fails. Of course even that would be enough if only we understood the motivations of the antagonists. In this episode Hassan’s chief of security, had the chance to explain his motives, but they simply didn’t make sense as the best he could come up with was accusing Hassan of enjoying the limelight too much. But at some point Terran agreed with Hassan politics, what does it matter too someone that a politician enjoys the limelight if you agree with his policies?

With the main thread having no weight or credibility, it means that each episode only has the momentum it’s able to generate itself, as you have no sense importance brought from the previous events, there is no sense that the stakes are continually building.

Wow, that sounds like I hated it, I didn’t, I actually enjoyed, but when the episode was over I didn’t feel an urgent need to immediately watch the next episode (odd since I could have clicked a few buttons and started the next episode) like I used too. The 7 day wait for a new episode used to be torture, Sunday night after i’d just seen a new episode i’d barely get any sleep, Monday it’s all i’d be able to think about, by Wednesday i’d seriously be jonesing so bad i’d often rewatch the previous episode (or previous episodes if it was really bad). On Sunday morning i’d think the anticipation just might kill me.

I just don’t feel that any more, when I’m watching an episode i’m enthralled, when i’m watching those perfectly crafted scenario’s play out i’m hooked again. But it doesn’t carry the weight it once did.

This is why the show is having to end, it can still pitch a perfect ball, that perfect scenario like it always has, but it just doesn’t seem able to knock em out the park any more.

It’s got my attention for another 9 hours, i’ll keep watching and waiting for that last home run.

Hope remains for those of us who’ll be left wanting MORE, as Howard Gordon hopes we will, as the movie is taking shape. But as far as the Series goes, the clock has tick-tocked for the last time.

Like you might have noticed in some of our previous posts, some of the 24 crew are present on Twitter. On “24″’s final day, they have shared their thoughts, too. At a guess, the atmosphere on the set must have been quite emotional. Below are some Tweets and two final-day images courtesy of Rodney Charters.

Annie Wersching (Renee Walker):

“9 years ago, in 2001 I had just moved to LA and started watching 24 in my beatup studio apt in Hollywood and became a forever Fan.  9 yrs later, after 3 years/2 seasons 24 has again truly changed my life forever…here’s to the end of an era and to truly one of of the most groundbreaking, original and kick ass shows of all time!”

James P Morrison (Bill Buchanan):

” Thinking about my 24 pals on their last day. I’m a better man having worked w/you all. Glad I’m not there tho. I cry best by myself ”

Mary Lynn Rajskub (Chloe O’Brien):

“I’m going to miss all these damn people- 24 family…”

Jon Cassar:

“I’m sadder today about #24 coming to an end then when I left over a year ago. I guess there was comfort in knowing it was still being made.”

Rodney Charters:

“Last scene with ML; wow strange disjointed atmosphere on set.”

The Lights go out on New York:

The Good-Bye Cake:

A little Twitter exchange between Cassar and Charters:

“I’m a little emotional this morning looking at your final pictures from the set. We all knew it had to end, but it still smarts.”
“Back at you Jon you were missed but very present if you know what I mean.”
“Thanks for that. I feel sorry for the crews we work with in the future, because they’ll have to endure hundreds of #24 stories.”

And I’ll give the final word to Rodney:

“4:00am my body cannot believe there are No More Wake Ups to a day of work on the 24 set, its a new day and a song bird is warbling outside.
It was emotional and memorable, thought of Jon missing it in TO, cannot comprehend the friendships & joy of work we will all miss sharing. Huge thanx to all Peeps who follow us I will try and post images from the set as the final shows are aired. Buy the Blue Ray or use iPad. List of visitors: Gary Newman 2oth Chairman Joel Surnow Anil Kapoor Glen Morshower speeches choked back emotion lotta lovin. Bye Kiefer.”

The article does not really contain spoilers, so don’t be afraid to read it.

Below are a few excerpts from the article, answers to questions you might be asking yourself.

Q: When’s the soonest that fans could realistically expect a feature film?
A: … It could be as early as next year depending on how things come together.

Q: How do you want “24″ the series to be remembered?
A: We loved this show from the very first hour to the last hour, so I hope people think of it being consistently at that quality and that it’s never dipped too terribly – except for Season 6.

Q: Can you tease to the rest of the season?
A:  We’ve taken a risk in the last eight episodes. It was challenging to the writers [and] to the actors. [...] Without spoiling what’s to come, it’s pretty dark and complex and a place that was uncomfortable for us to write and for some of the actors to act. We really swung for the fences. [...]

Q: How has this decision creatively impacted the ending?
A: There have been a couple other season enders that would have been spectacular series enders – Season 4, Season 5 and last year [Season 7]. I was more aware this time of ending something that really felt surprising but not cheap; emotionally consistent. Some will throw their shoes at the screen, inevitably some will be angry, some will say they hated it the last three years. [...] I’m hoping the first feeling people have is, “Damn, I miss it, I want more.”

Read the full article at: hollywoodreporter.com