" [ Register or Signin to view external links. ] " is quite simply the greatest [ Register or Signin to view external links. ] to appear on television in a good long while and [ Register or Signin to view external links. ] eight is its finest hour. Eight [ Register or Signin to view external links. ] in, series creators Joel Surnow and Robert Cochran continue to spring one unpredictable surprise after another, sending super agent Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland, by equal turns lethally charismatic and emotionally bruised) against his most formidable foes yet that include everyone and anyone from Russian Separatists, authoritarian double agents to high ranking members of the government. Fans of the season will know exactly who these baddies are, but for those unitiated, the head-spinning surprises are best left unsaid. What can be said, is that for this eight [ Register or Signin to view external links. ] the crack writing staff took a good hard look at the state of geopolitics and the authoritarian neo-conservatism championed by the Bush administration and worked in a cautionary tale about oil-lust and hubris taken to extremes. Besides Sutherland, special recognition has to go to Gregory Itzin as the weak-kneed President Logan, Jean Smart as the harried first lady and Mary Lynn Rajskub as the nerdy Chole O'Brien. For [ Register or Signin to view external links. ] , this season presented a tricky balancing act between the shows' signature slam-bang action scenes (there are still spectacular) and the sobering political commentary, but Surnow and Cochran nail it, making " [ Register or Signin to view external links. ] " a thinking man's thriller that is far smarter and far more relevant than anything else on television.

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