24: Live Another Day [DVD] [2014]

For a finale to one of tvs best action heroes, it was a bittersweet ending. The rest of the series was breakneck and full of action, and was an excellent final series for Bauer. The smaller format of the show helped speed things along while still maintaining a credible plotline without skipping much other than filler dialogue to pad out episodes in previous series. By now I think most fans will have seen it, and those who never watched 24 before won't have bothered by this point, but regardless there are spoilers ahead for the ending of the show.When the russians were waiting for jack to walk to them in exchange for chloe being set free, that moment was one of the most powerful in the whole series so far, knowing how much those 2 went through over the course of the show, and it ending in basically a wild west moment of 2 people walking towards and past each other. We're never likely to see jack bauer again, especially when kiefer himself said in an interview he can't see himself returning to the series again, and reports of Fox gearing up to start shooting a bauerless 24 next year,mfocusing on a ehole. ew cast of characters instead. I think it would have still been fun to see tony almeida come into the fray properly for season 9/10 however you view the live another day series, especially when we saw in the bluray extra he was given an escape route from his maximum security prison by form of a map and guard routes in a pair of glasses by a lawyer.Overall it was an excellent series full of standout moments, the rampage jack went on near the end and the final showdown fight scene, the scene with the president walking onto the wembley pitch, the bust out of the cia hq, the eacape from the drone firing from the sky etc. I just wish it has one more series with bauer, to give him the sendoff he deserves. Maybe a huge paycheque will tempt sutherland back for the new season.

I'm an avid 24 fan and thoroughly enjoyed the latest series 'Live another Day' The shortened 12 episode format worked well, saving a significant amount of unnecessary filler. Some of the story lines have been far fetched over the years, although I'm not sure they couldn't happen at any point and dare I say it, some have also been a tad repetitive (a mole.....again?) But.....I still love it, it's one of the most fast paced, action packed programmes on the TV. The quality of the casting and acting is beyond superb and in my opinion, always has been. Even the frequently derided series 6 has some amazing, iconic scenes. One of the most memorable is the penultimate scene with Sec of Defence Heller & Jack Bauer. In 24LAD, Heller is now President and yet again the acting is of an incredibly high standard this season by all the cast members but the stand out performances are William Devane (Heller) and Kiefer Sutherland (Bauer) The final episode has some amazing scenes (credit to the production team & writers) which I can guarantee will generate emotion - even if not the normal emotions you have come to expect watching 24!For those of you who are also avid fans of the show, you will be aware of the tradition that the 24 team have had producing prequels and sequels in between series. This year is no different. According to the official FOX press release the BluRay has an extra feature. 24: Solitary, The Shocking Story Extension to Live Another Day. However, the run time for the BluRay is listed as 574 minutes versus the DVD's 571 mins. Once they've done the opening titles, the 'previously on 24' and the closing credits, I'm not sure there's a huge amount of time left for any shocking story extension! Hasn't stopped me from pre-ordering it though ;-) Oh and in case you're interested, Prequels have been made for Seasons 4, 5, 6, and 7(aka Redemption - film on DVD) And Day 6 Debrief - Most were only available on the Region 1 (US) DVDs but they are all (apart from Redemption understandably) on YouTube

Shortened to half its usual length and relocated to London, 24: Live Another Day has given the 24 TV series a fresh breath of life after its dazzling first few seasons faded into familiar, unexceptional repetition.Being a Londoner, it was also enjoyable to see some of the standard cliches of TV drama - the New York taxis, the steam coming up from the road - replaced with London traditions instead - the black cabs, the orange plastic road works barriers and even Stephen Fry as the British Prime Minister.We get that glance from Kiefer Sutherland in spades during this series, and it also packs in a large number of contemporary references, with controversial drone strikes and secret government documents being leaked online.As ever, the main problem the series faces is that you know the apparent imminent resolution of the plot on multiple occasions are all going to turn out to be wrong, at least until you're in the last few minutes of the final episode, and so it's hard to maintain the real tension when the viewer knows it's all a dummy.Bht the series does well to add in some extra twists to add to the tension and the apparent playing out of the plot three-quarters of the way through the series is very well done, setting up the final three episodes for some real uncertainty over what is going to happen.The only real let down are the final scenes where the futures of the characters are wrapped up as we've seen similar events so many times before in earlier 24 series (and also known how often the apparent resolutions have subsequently been undone). That said, the acting in the final scene with a US coffin is touchingly done (to avoid spoilers, I won't name the actor as it is someone whose survival is uncertain at earlier points).The extras on the final DVD are pretty thin though as (almost) ever the deleted scenes show that when it came to editing, scenes that added to the emotional depth of characters were usually first in line for the axe.All in all, good fun if also a reminder that the overall format had pretty much run out of steam.