The fourth season of 24 has been exceeding expectations for most of the time during the first eight hours of the storyline.
First of all, mtv3 is showing two episodes per week, which naturally increases the pace of the story. And the pace has not been slack lately, several major plot devices have already been seen and even closed.
The fictional CTU seems to be one of the most dysfunctional workplaces in the world. Indifference and enmity seem to be the order of the day, not to mention the frequently encountered moles. The personnel has seen a few changes since the last season – and most of them for the better. Especially Kim Bauer’s absence does the show a lot of good, the believability of the world’s most accident-prone girl was strected too thin during the first few seasons.
Jack Bauer keeps resorting to violent methods over and over again, and the scenes with torture seem well-placed after the reality show in Abu Ghraib (and probably in quite a few other undisclosed locations as well). Arabs are (again, like in the second season) the villains of the tale, but it’s likely that the conspiracy will be uncovered in an onion-fashion, with other groups being revealed as the 9mm retirement options are liberally distributed.