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Kim Raver: we’re “creating that tension” of Jack and Audrey

FOX 50 has interviewed both Kim Raver and Tate Donovan.

Tate Donovan doesn’t consider Mark a bad guy:
“It’s funny, when I first got the role [people were asking] are you a good guy or a bad guy? And now they’ve seen a couple episodes and they’re like I can’t believe you’re a bad guy. And I’m like I’m not a bad guy! I just don’t like Jack Bauer, that doesn’t mean I’m a bad guy.”

Will Audrey and Jack get back together?
“Well, we’re working on it! Don’t tell my 24 husband,” said Kim Raver. “I think that’s the fun of it, the fun of 24 and sort of the complicated relationships and will they, won’t they? Not wanting to give away anything in 24, I think [we’re] creating that tension of trying to get Audrey and Jack back together but there being certain roadblocks.”

Tate Donovan jokingly interrupted “I tell you something, they shouldn’t get back together. She’s a married woman! It’s an outrage!” and Kim Raver closed out the interview with “I think we’re trying to find those moments of when, and how, and if… Stay tuned!”

Source FOX 50

32 Comments

Comments Closed
Kevin Reilly of FOX Broadcasting is stepping down – that isn’t necessarily good as I remember reading articles that stated Kevin personally pushed ’24’ through for approval & has backed it continuously over the years.

JackBauerFan1977
May 30, 2014 at 11:26 pm
I’m still waiting for a scene to take place when President James Heller gets furious at Mark Boudreau and then fires him for forging his signature. Mark will do everything that he possibly can for Jack to be handed over to the Russians and Audrey and Heller will eventually figure that out even if it takes those two until Episode #11 or Episode #12 to know about it. Of course Mark will probably tell Heller that Heller himself signed the “Jack should be handed over to the Russians” document and that Heller’s early stages of Alzheimer’s is giving him memory loss at an alarming rate and that he should offer his resignation as President of the United States. Heller might think that Mark is telling the truth at first, but by the end of this season, Heller will somehow know all about Mark’s secretive evil intentions towards Jack. I fully expect Audrey to break up with Mark by season’s end and become Jack’s girlfriend again. I’ve always wanted Audrey and Jack to fall in love with each other again and then live happily ever after as a couple.

I don’t think Mark is evil. It’s not as black and white as that, I don’t think. He seems to be doing everything he can to protect his family and, frankly, that family needs someone like Mark. If you had to watch the woman you love suffer for years because of her relationship with her ex, would *you* like that ex? Wouldn’t you do anything you could to protect your wife? Any decent man would. Anything shady Mark does he does to protect Audrey or Heller and that makes him more complex than ‘pure evil’. I don’t think he’d ever manipulate Heller over the Alzheimers– he clearly respects and loves him too much for that.

I am a HUGE Jack and Audrey fan, but I actually agree with you about Mark. At least thus far it seems like he is just trying to protect Heller and Audrey. But I am still skeptical, because his story of how he “brought her back” still makes no sense.

That story is weird, I give you that. I mean… even if overwhelming love for Mark brought Audrey back (which it didn’t but oh give poor Boudreau something to cling to lol), it took *three years*? That’s a LOT of hand-holding. I have to admit that I’m starting to think that the Mark plot is a ton of smoke and mirrors for a potential twist of Audrey as a mole of some kind. Maybe they want us to be so distracted by Mark that we forget that Audrey spent months being tortured by the Chinese, that her father is the only person in the world who would give her a high-ranking position after she was a POW like that, and that Heller was retired for a few years for awhile back when she was missing. He’s pushing into elderly in age with a heart condition but he’s the President? Did Audrey convince him to run again? The Chinese are circling around the Diego Garcia base? That’s kind of a random mention if it doesn’t fit into the plot somewhere later on. Not sure if this is the direction they’re going in but right now I find her more suspicious than Mark, whose motivations seem pretty clear-cut.

That thought has crossed my mind too, but I think it’s just too incredible. Why would she want to help the Chinese after what they put her through? And why would she sabotage her own father’s administration? I really hope they don’t go that route because it would be a little ridiculous.

It is a little wackadoodle, for sure, but remember when she came back? She was completely out of it. They used psychoactive drugs on her. For all we know, they could have brainwashed her into being anti-American. Maybe she harbors resentment for her father for not coming to her rescue sooner or blames his life’s work in the government and defense contracting for the hell everyone close to her went through. Her brother and first husband were targeted and tortured and framed, Paul wound up dead, Audrey herself has been kidnapped and shot up and accused of being a terrorist. Maybe all that, on top of China, just led her to crack up. After everything she’s seen and been through, she’s no longer as pro-U.S. as she used to be.

Or something. Who knows what they’ll do.

If it is something like that, then the irony of the plot would be something like Jack’s been working with terrorists because his government turned on him but when there’s an opportunity to save the day, Jack jumps on it because that’s the kind of guy he is. But Audrey? She’s been working with some “bad guys” too but when Jack shows up, it reminds her of how she used to be… but it’s still not enough. Then, a whole morning of ‘Audrey is the saintly First Lady and Jack is a traitor’ turns on its head towards the end of the day, if it becomes ‘Jack’s trying to save us all and Audrey’s not who we thought she was.’

i don’t know mark is pure evil but is definitely not a decent man. a decent man would protect his family of course but there is a limit on how far a person can go to do it. forging President’s signature was way out of line. and other thing is that giving Jack over to Russians is the same as murdering Jack, because that what the Russians will do. Mark knows that. So my question is that “is it acceptable to murder someone who you THINK will be a threat to your marriage? Is it ok to kill your wife’s Ex due to the fact that your wife has still has feeling for him (even though that ex did not make any attempt to break up your marriage).

So Mark is not trying to protect his family. He is just trying to look after his self interest by using cunning/immoral methods.

For example, lets say Jack is stalking Audrey and Audrey wants nothing to do with Jack. So here Mark have the obligation to protect his family. but when Audrey still have feelings for jack, mark don’t have the obligation to protect the family but he only has the right to win back audrey by showing his love and care. he can not anymore than that. I am pretty sure any decent man would let his wife go if his wife want to be with someone else more than you even after you tried to win her back in the RIGHTWAY. Let’s not forget what Mark always does is “taking decisions on behalf of others and all others are not qualified to make their own choices.

So i don’t know if Jack and Audrey will end up together. but if and when Audrey learns about Mark forging president signature to hand over Jack to Russians, that would be the end of their marriage.

Your points are well taken and I see what both submitted comments within a few minutes of each other. I did mine with a certain amount of tongue in cheek humor but couldn’t agree with you more on your assessment of Mark. Here! Here!

Keep in mind that no one showed Mark Boudreau the Day 8 DVDs. He doesn’t know about the conspiracy that Jack was trying to stop. Would that make him more empathetic to what happened? Probably. He’s already shown enough balls to man up and apologize when he realized he was in the wrong about Jack. (The ironic thing is that he might not totally *be* in the wrong if Jack has another agenda beyond just stopping the threat here.) But there is still the fact that Jack went a little crazy on Day 8 and he hasn’t held himself accountable for that. No matter how you shake it, Jack *did* kill two Russian diplomats, he did try to assassinate a foreign head of state. These things have consequences and Jack Bauer saying that they were slimy, murderous, evil bastards does not make it right. He has to pay some kind of price for what he chose to do because there were other ways of trying to stop that conspiracy, ya know? Chloe’s idea of blasting it everywhere using CTU’s servers (ironically, turning CTU into Open Cell) and letting the world sort it out was a lot better of an idea than Jack running around tearing out organs and impaling with fireplace pokers. Mark is not wrong– Jack *did* go on a killing spree and then he ran away from facing the consequences of his actions. Yes, it was a similar situation to the end of Day 4 in terms of the government could not be trusted so Jack went on the run instead of facing what he’d done (and what he did on Day 4 was a lot more reasonable than his trip to crazy town on Day 8.) That doesn’t change the fact that when he then became a coward on Day 5 and tried to run from the consequences of it *again* after he had nothing left that Cheng Zhi showed up and Jack couldn’t outrun his actions. And those were actions you could argue were morally more in the right (way more in the right) than Day 8.

Bottom line: Mark Boudreau signing the President’s signature? Not right. Definitely wrong. But not coming from a place of “pure evil”– coming from a guy who sees corruption in his wake and is stepping in to do what *he* thinks is necessary to stop it, damn the consequences. Ironically? It’s what Jack did on Day 8. It’s taking it upon himself to act as judge, jury & executioner to those he has decided are in the wrong. The funny thing here is that Mark and Jack are not all that dissimilar under the surface. The ironic thing is that Mark is slowly becoming a Jack Bauer here.

i dont think you get my point here. Mark forged the signature. he signed it so quickly. without even do a practice signature. which is the proof that he has done it before. may be in a big way. so there is something hidden about mark. i think this will come and haunt him in coming episodes.
i am sure mark forging the president’s signature will send him to jail. because this is that serious issue doesn’t matter why he did it. it is still a big crime.
and i think audrey will definitively be upset. even now she doesn’t seems to have good speaking term with mark and it’s mainly because mark hid the fact that jack was in london. when she learn about him forging the signature to send jack to russia to be killed, she will definitely be upset. also since she heard about jack’s present in london , she is acting as if Mark is a stranger. even she said to mark when he apologized that he was wrong about jack, she said that the Her DAD needs him ,, not her, so jack has that much affect on her due to their history which no one can deny.
you said mark showed the ball to apologize when he was wrong about jack. but i am sure he has not changed about his position about jack even a little bit. that apology to Audrey is just to win her back and to improve the relationship between them two as it’s appear to be there is a rift between them two. i dont think it’s genuin. so no i dont think he has the real ball to apologize genuinely.
waaaahhh i can talk about all your other points but im at work .. so may be later . :D

thanks for replying ;) i’ll get mark to wipe your browser history so your boss won’t know *giggles*

I agree that Mark has been forging Heller’s signature for awhile. It is a very serious crime, absolutely. I guess what I’m arguing here is not that Mark isn’t doing some shady things (because he is) but that it doesn’t necessarily make him any worse than Jack, who also does some shady things and should be held responsible for them. If Mark should be held responsible for forging Heller’s signature and assuming powers of government that way, then hold Jack responsible for killing foreign diplomats on Day 8. Make them share a cell. *laughs*

Let’s put it this way: it’s too easy for Mark Boudreau to be pure evil. There is zero plot there whatsoever. It’s twelve hours of ‘Audrey married an evil guy we have to get rid of so she can be with Jack.’ What’s the further twist with Boudreau? He’s more evil than you suspected him to be? He starts cackling out some muhahahahas and screaming “I’ll get you, Bauer!” while shaking his fist in the air? No, they’ve got to make it a fair fight between these guys or else it’s not worth watching. Remember when the plot shifted on Day 4 and it turned out Paul Raines was, like, the best guy who ever lived? Yeah, that’s not happening with Boudreau (Paul was more a hero type to Mark’s antihero) but there is going to be a point where this shifts around and suddenly Mark is not the devil incarnate.

For all we know? By the end of Day 9, it could turn out Audrey’s evil and Mark and Jack are going out for drinks and making a blood oath to swear off women forevermore. Maybe Audrey’s really also pissed that Mark didn’t tell her about Jack in London because it’s going to interfere with her evil plans. Maybe her plot gets complicated because Jack arriving makes her question what she’s doing or something. Maybe the real plot here is that Audrey married the most perfect schmuck to make as her fall guy. She found this guy who had been pining after her for years and is smitten with her and would do anything for her and her dad and when it all goes to hell, she’s going to set Mark up for the stuff she’s been up to but he won’t have a leg to stand on in a fight because she’s aware of all this shady stuff he’s done for her and her father that she could use against him.

The only thing I disagree with you on is the genuineness of Mark’s apology. He meant it– to both Heller and Audrey. He realized that getting in the way of Jack might have put people at risk and he felt terrible about it. You can watch his eyes when they’re all learning about the stolen drones in the bits leading up to this and even when no one is really looking at Mark, he looks horrified. Oddly enough? Audrey is this expressionless blank for all of this but Mark’s the one who looks gutted.

Kim Raver said in an interview that she was shocked when she saw the 11th episode script . she was gasped out loud. so i have a suspicious that they would make her the mole. but i had enough with these dramatic twist and turn between these 2(jack and audrey) and wanted to have jack a happy ending. because lets face it whether we like audrey or not , he loves her. since it’s going to be the last season(im 100% sure) it would feel good to see jack happy at last. but if audrey turned out to be a mole, it will make his heart break once again and the series will finish with sadness for jack. a hell of a lot of jack/audrey fans out there who will pissed off too. anyways i hope they dont chose this path because 24 has already taken down that path in nina / jack affair in season one.

I disagree with parts of what you’ve said. I also want to see Jack have some happiness, though I go back and forth as to whether or not Jack really loves Audrey or the idea of having someone like an Audrey in his life. I feel like it’s really more the latter. Audrey right now is the best character to represent the consequences of what Jack’s life has been like. We have three characters in the plot (in Audrey, Heller, & Chloe) who have been around since the first half of the story and that history with Jack is the reason why they’re so important in this last chapter of his story here. To me, Jack gets happiness if he gets home to Kim and his grandkids. Considering that his penis has now been classified as a weapon of mass destruction, I’d be totally fine with him back in Los Angeles without a lady friend in his retirement. I don’t think Jack needs to get back together with Audrey in order to be happy or to have a happy ending to his story.

In a lot of ways, hooking Jack & Audrey back up just makes them both insanely unlikable. I’m at the point of hoping that Audrey is up to something dastardly and that poor Kim Raver’s vague “finding her voice” talking point is suggesting that her voice is now a little bit pissed off. Right now, she’s an enormous wet blanket who is overshadowed by all the other characters in her plot. I don’t do ship wars– I think every love interest Jack’s had has served a purpose of illustrating what he needed from someone at that point in his life or highlighted what Jack’s own issues were. I think the only reason why Audrey keeps popping up is because they’ve built her slowly to be the one that lashes back. It’s not Jack/Nina, it’s ten times worse, because with the exception of her mother dying when she was a kid, every awful thing that’s ever happened to Audrey has been because she was sleeping with Jack. It’s not Jack’s *fault* and that’s the darkest, most fun part of all of it. It’s just by being in his world and by loving him– maybe loving the idea of him, at times, more than Jack himself.

Audrey becoming this tragic person who is dangerous and deadly and it’s all because of Jack’s life works for me because it’s also balanced out by Kim, who went through a life of hell because of her father but who emerged a strong, loving, good woman and is passing that along to Jack’s grandkids to boot. It shouldn’t all be sunshine and rainbows for Jack at the end, IMO. I feel like they were foreshadowing this type of end for Audrey on Day 5. Then, she wasn’t a mole and Jack thought she might have been. He wondered then if maybe everything that had happened to Audrey because of him had pushed her into becoming a different kind of woman. That he was wrong then would make for a great story now, where he thinks Audrey is still the same and won’t see the betrayal coming. To me, that’s a more full story and makes Audrey way more interesting than the day ending with Mark getting served divorce papers and Jack and Audrey picking out curtains.

Not every bad thing Audrey has suffered has been because of Jack. Almost everything she went through in season 4 was because of who her father was, not because of Jack. Which is what makes Heller’s little speech to Jack at the end of season 6 really hypocritical.

It’s not really clear that Jack ever thought Audrey was a mole in season 5. He interrogated her the way he did because he was trying to protect her from worse torture by Agent Burke. He was pretty clear at the beginning of the episode that he didn’t think she was guilty. He might have had some doubt after he found out about Walt Cummings but it didn’t take him long to be convinced that she was telling the truth. Which she absolutely was, and if they go back and try to rewrite that history it would be completely ridiculous.

I agree that to rewrite Day 5 now would be iffy. If they make her a mole, it has to be from Day 6 on.

Sure, Audrey was in the position she was on Day 4 because of her father but it was also because Jack failed to see the attack coming. That moment in Marwan’s underground hideout there when he’s looking at the surveillance pictures of the Hellers on the wall and he’s in the background of one of them? He’s like ugh. How did I not catch this? How did I fail to see this coming? A guy with his background charged with aiding and protecting the Secretary of Defense and this goes down on his watch. And Paul dying? Jack made the only real call he could make there but it was still his call to make. He’s still the reason Paul is no longer alive, even if it wasn’t his fault that Paul got in that situation to begin with.

Another way to maybe see it might be that because none of this is really Jack’s fault and is more of a by-product of him being in Audrey’s orbit that if they go a darker route with Audrey, Jack could eventually get over it more because it wasn’t directly because of him.

Also, you mention that you think they’re trying to hint that Audrey’s the mole with Kim Raver’s gasping aloud comments and stuff like that? I agree. A red flag for me was also that first scene with Audrey in the premiere with her and Mark and the vanity mirrors. At first, we only heard her and we couldn’t see her. Then, we can see the back of her but not her face. Then, we see her face in the jewelry box that she has Mark bring to her, which ties into what she says later on, that Mark sees her as “a fragile keepsake in a box”. Her expression in the mirror in the jewelry box is of a fragile, broken woman. Mark picks out a necklace for Audrey and puts it on her and we see her in the big vanity mirror, saying “you read my mind” to Mark in this weird way that says she’s probably humoring him. That she wants Mark to think he picked the right necklace and knows her but he really hasn’t a clue.

And he *doesn’t* have a clue because he’s all smitten and telling her she looks beautiful and no one will pay attention to the politics going on because they’ll be looking at how lovely she looks. In their first scene together, did Mark give us a little meta on the plot? No one will notice what’s really happening because they’ll just see how lovely you are? And then Audrey takes it one step further, teasing him a bit. No, she says, they’ll all be looking at *you* and that ugly tie you have on. The tie thing reminded me of Logan and his ties and maybe this is kind of an inverse of Martha and Charles. The mentally ill First Lady this time around is *not* trying to stop a conspiracy and expose her husband but maybe is part of one and is setting her husband up. If it turns out Audrey has another agenda, that scene with the mirrors becomes chilling– it’s Audrey saying oh, you dumb idiot, you have nooooo idea. They’ll all be looking at you and thinking I’m just a delicate necklace that needs to be taken out of its box…

ohh god .. you read into too much from even a simple scene. i have no doubt what audrey and jack had was love. i think your hatred toward jack/audrey relationship clouds your judgment in this matter. anyways we will see what happen in 2 months time,. seeya

*shrugs* yeah, we’ll see. who knows what’ll happen but i don’t think i’m (to borrow a phrase from Day 9) letting my personal feelings cloud my judgement where this is concerned. :) as for “reading meaning into a simple scene”, i have no idea right now if my interpretation is correct or not because this season isn’t over and we don’t have the full picture of what the writers and directors and actors are going for here but if you aren’t trying to find out more from the “simple scenes” you’re watching (or reading), then i feel like you might be missing out on half the fun. trust me, from someone who writes, it’s never just about what is happening on the surface. never.

You think Audrey’s really going to be that upset? She seems to love Mark protecting her as much as it frustrates her. She’s totally okay with the fact that Mark covered up the drone strike and reacts in a way that might have implied she knew about it as well, maybe helped. (She certainly did not seem surprised.) If things go south with Jack today in terms of trying to stop this crisis, I think Audrey might surprise in her willingness to hold Jack accountable for his actions.

Mary wrote on May 30th
“I don’t think Mark is evil…. If you had to watch the woman you love suffer for years because of her relationship with her ex, would *you* like that ex? Wouldn’t you do anything you could to protect your wife? …”

Your Honor if I may I rise to address the jury and the court in this case of Jack vs. Mark

Say whaaat?! Let me see if I have this straight.; End of season 5: Jack leaves Audrey for a few moments at her encouragement to go receive a phone call they both believe to be from his daughter Kim. When Jack gets to the phone he is jumped from behind by a Chinese military/government person holding a chloroform soaked rag over his face and he wakes up in the bowls of a freighter taking him to God only knows where and for what we know by the horror of his screams isn’t a “Welcome Wagon meet and greet time!

How pray tell is this and what ensues over the next several years eventuating in the mental break down of Audrey Jack’s fault?! I suggest your honor that it is/was the is the closing of government ranks and a lack of any real help from the likes of “Daddy Dearest” and his ilk that make it nigh on to impossible for Audrey to find Jack. This is when she thus finally decides to try on her own to go to China and find Jack herself and gets captured and is tortured in the process. What in the Sam Hill was Jack who didn’t have a clue about any of this supposed to do to help her from his prison cell and how is it that makes him the cause of her suffering for pity sake?!

When she is drugged when she is returned by the Chinese, to the states by the Chinese. This is done for the sole purpose for them to use her to get to Jack once again, it doesn’t succeed. The minute Jack hears Audrey’s voice calling his name and begging him to help her, well let’s just say saving her is the only thing that matters to him. All bets and previous promises are off the table; he is going to find Audrey at all cost and try to get her back.

Now, in this “undeclared war on Jack” by several, who have alluded to or used this list as Jack’s crimes against Audrey if this is all they have and with it they therefore expect it to absolves hubby Mark of any any and all wrong doing. Well then I think what is being cited here as evidence in favor of Mark should be thrown out and orders given Your Honor for it to be completely disregarded by the jury.

What we in fact have here besides a willful knowingly with malice of forethought breaking the “Chain of Command” by Mark is a case of the “end justifies the means” which is never right and it is in fact nothing more than “situational ethics”! Your Honor the real enemy of the state here is Mark who is a double dealing, back stabbing, power grabbing control freak who is doing what they all do, parading as a caring husband. Mark needs to be exposed for what he really is which is a frightened little man who is, by his willingness to risk people’s lives, a treasonous terrorist who by his lying and cheating is undermining duly elected heads of state who are tasked with the responsibility to do what he has no right to, make executive decisions regarding war and everything ugly that goes with it.

I call for the jury to declare Mark guilty of all of the above by exposing his actions and to be sure that Heller’s refusal to allow Jack to have any contact with Audrey ever again be fully disclosed. Let it also be known the only thing Jack is guilty of is loving Audrey with an unconditional love, as he declared to her he would. Where his encounter with Renee falls in the timeline of the world of ’24’ is at this time unclear but I suspect for Jack it was for a moving on with his life after his encounter with Heller.

Your Honor I rest my case.

I respectfully rest my case

I’m not saying that what happened to Audrey is Jack’s fault. I’m saying that from Mark’s perspective because he’s yet to see the DVDS, it is Jack’s fault. If you were Mark, you probably see this phantom Jack Bauer guy whose shadow hangs over your family as the ultimate bad guy. Your father-in-law treated him like a son and he turned out to be a traitor. He had such a mental hold over your wife that she followed him into the abyss and was in psychiatric care for years as a result. And that last part is true– it certainly isn’t *healthy* for Audrey to be around Jack. Is that Jack’s fault? No. It’s the circumstances of Jack’s life. Her association with Jack has destroyed Audrey’s life. It’s not Jack’s fault but it is the reality of the situation.

Heller is not a “Daddy Dearest”– he is a father and a man whose daughter was delivered back to him in a catatonic state unable to make her own decisions so he had to do something to help her. Do not for one second think that if someone brought Kim home to Jack like that, that Jack wouldn’t cut off that guy’s balls and feed them to him before slitting his throat. Heller was *nice* to Jack, considering that Jack put a *gun to his head and tried to kidnap his daughter*. Yes, Jack had had an enormously terrible day where he got back from being tortured by the Chinese to find out that his family was evil and his father-figure Heller was pissed at him (and this bit here was definitely not Jack’s fault– he didn’t ask Audrey to go to China for him, she made that choice.) But both Heller and Jack were in the wrong here. Heller didn’t respect that Audrey had made the choice to go there herself because he was just so angry that this had happened to his daughter and trouble only ever started for Audrey like this when she started sleeping with Jack but Jack also gives Heller *reasons* to be pushed away after Day 6. What reasonable father is going to hand over his daughter to the guy who had just been tortured for almost two years and is pointing a gun to his head? Gimme a break on this “Daddy Dearest” nonsense– Audrey was in a coma. A *coma*. Someone had to do something about the fact that Jack was so bananas that he thought running off with her was a great idea.

If you want to charge Mark guilty of situational ethics (and you should because he is), you’d better take a hard look at Jack on Day 8 because these two guys, if they knew what the other’s side of the story was, would find they have a lot more in common than they think they do. :)

Also what you said here:

<>

So…. Mark is Jack Bauer at the end of Day 8?

our Honor the real enemy of the state here is Mark who is a double dealing, back stabbing, power grabbing control freak who is doing what they all do, parading as a caring husband. Mark needs to be exposed for what he really is which is a frightened little man who is, by his willingness to risk people’s lives, a treasonous terrorist who by his lying and cheating is undermining duly elected heads of state who are tasked with the responsibility to do what he has no right to, make executive decisions regarding war and everything ugly that goes with it.

Sorry quote didn’t work the first time, LadyJ, so I added it after.

Not a problem Mary,

I am glad to see that you could play the game with me by using my trial spoof. I used it because I didn’t want you thinking I was coming after you personally in all of this you’ve shared as has happened in a couple of other posts, But rather I was using it ,and probably will again, to put ideas, plots, or trends that are happening on trial to see if they stand up to the test of reality, of being logical or at least true to the character. I also want you to know that I find a lot of the ideas you put out here for plot possibilities to be interesting, that you’ve certainly given much thought to them, and you’re moving in directions many of us had probably not thought of at all and it can be a good mental challenge for us.

For the sake of clarification my use of “Daddy Dearest” is not intended to imply that Heller is doing anything near that of the abuse in the tell all book “Mommy Dearest”. Abuse is, as we all know, not just physical and we are seeing a lot of its variations on display here among all of the characters. I am seeing a lot of it in Audrey’s role that of being “a good girl” to please daddy. Library shelves are full of books on all of what it entails being the reason I refer to Heller as “Daddy Dearest”. Up front, I don’t like the character of Keller that William Devan plays; as a matter of fact he plays the role so well I don’t like him either when I see him in these commercials about buying silver and gold, LOL

I see him as an elitist, inside the beltway, arrogant D.C. politician and to me he had it on full display and proved it when he verbally went after Jack tearing him to shreds for being the very thing/CIA type operative Heller and others helped to create. He profusely used, the likes of Jack Bauer and others and then when politicians and their sorry butts were saved they discarded the Bauer’s as cast asides, no longer needed and not wanting Jacl around as a reminder of the way things were.

By the way also to clarify, I absolutely hated Season 8 especially what the writers did to Jack’s character, and was angry that Kiefer went along with them so he could see just how dark jack could get. It was the pits and something I have yet to forgive the whole pack of them for. It was disgusting and I was made as hell about it. You want to wallow around in the bottom of an outhouse filth?! Fine and dandy but you do it without my support then or now. I have not nor will I give my good hard earned money to buy Season 8 DVD either, am not interested in watching it again at all ever!

I won’t defend Jack’s use of a gun to let Heller know he meant business, but to me that’s the sort of hard core force it would take to get through all of his trappings Heller had around him, wealth, power, and sadly with it came greed with a capital Greed! Jack rightfully returned the favor to Heller by reaming him a new orifice in defense of what he had to do to keep guys like him safe in their homes at night. He also reminded Heller that what Heller was really angry with/about was/is how Audrey showed all of them up and had they given her the support, resources, and means she needed to go after Jack and then to be able to bring him home she wouldn’t be in the shape she was.

China/Pinko Commies were/are the enemy and cause of Audrey’s situation; as is her own father and his ilk, not Jack Bauer. This is why I call him “Daddy Dearest” and I stand by that, it is Heller and all he represents that set the stage for Jack’s kidnapping. Yes Heller wasn’t alone others were part of it including to some degree Jack himself. Heller like King Midas had the magic touch, with it came wealth and riches, and of course there were the power brokers, and with them was the ability to make and break friends and enemies alike domestic and foreign. Unfortunately Midas/Heller’s daughter’s life is destroyed because of the choices Heller made. Not Jack! It is/was Heller and his D.C. power broker cronies who are the ones Audrey can thank for putting her into the same hands that put Jack into a freighter bound for China.

Sadly Mary you’re right Mark is covertly what Jack was overtly in Season 8, except for this fact, Jack Bauer is not a coward and Mark is. Maybe the writers will prove me wrong and have Mark “fall on his sword” to give them the time to escape in some fashion or another. Mark is a coward, and while I think as much as he can define love, a lot of what he loved about Audrey is the Package she came in, namely with her comes Heller and Mark wants what Heller can bring into his world, he wants to be the POTUS.

Again I thank you Mary for not being personal and or snarky with me in our “court trial” of plot themes in Season 9 LAD. There is so much here that we could continue making points on as well as picking apart and shredding plots into something akin to a “pulled pork” sandwich! While that is a beautiful thing to many at lunch time here in Texas, my Jewish friend Ruth would not go anywhere near it! Either way Mary, be blessed and I look forward to continuing to follow your postings.

Oh yes, one more insight about the direction of postings for this Season of “24”. In Season 8 most of the postings, at least at the blog I was seeing on Fox, were being shared by retired military personnel, many of whom were pilots, special forces, and were very knowledgeable about the weapons used by Jack, the planes, ammo and other combat resources that were being used. For me personally I loved it because to a person they shed light on a facet of that particular season was in places dull, boring, and frankly a joke. One of the regular contributors was a guy using the name Jack, and he was not only into the equipment being used but like you was very much into the plot line, the characters, who and what they were in previous seasons and how if at all was it helpful to this season. I so looked forward to Jack’s postings as did many others and I was hoping he or some of the others from that blog might show up here on this one. But what we have going here is interesting and certainly not dull. Will confess that I went so far as to have copied out several of Jack’s postings at the time and L came across them recently; they were really good to reread again..

I am curious if anyone else here remembers what I am talking about or were in fact a part of that following of “24”? Would love to hear from you your observations on what I said about those sharing’s and do we need some military input and thoughts on these drones??

Thanks for your thoughts and the insights that all of you share on this blog.
Blessings, Lady J

Hi LadyJ,
Thanks for the comments & compliments. It’s fun to play this out with you & everyone here. A nice bit of stress relief from the real world ;)

Here’s my thing about the ‘Daddy Dearest’ idea– I have to ask that if that’s what you think the Heller & Audrey situation is, why would anyone like Audrey as a character? Any woman who can’t create her own sense of self and have her own identity is a sad woman and Audrey is in her forties by this point. We aren’t talking about Kim’s daddy issues when she was a teenager here, we’re talking a grown woman. It’s especially sad the longer it goes on and robs Audrey of any agency. I don’t think you are necessarily incorrect in that she wants to be daddy’s little girl but that’s also part of why I don’t particularly respect her character. It’s her job to be her own woman, though, and Audrey never has. The show and Kim Raver insist that Audrey is this sassy thing that’s opinionated and outspoken but she’s really, IMO, a woman who has never had a job that wasn’t for her father, whose opinions aren’t usually different from those of her father’s, and whose biggest contributions to the plot have been love triangles in which all the men involved are more complicated and more interesting than she is.

The one thing I’ll disagree with you on is that I don’t think that this is Heller’s fault. I think you and I see Heller very differently. Where you see elitism and entitlement, I see a self-made man. He apparently went to school on a ROTC scholarship and founded his own company pretty young, on top of being a decorated war hero. The Hellers aren’t old money– I feel like Heller built his own success and he’s that kind of guy who knows how the other half lives because that’s where he comes from. He’s down to earth.

I see him as not really much different than any guy from his generation who is in over his head with a bunch of really common life circumstances. He’s lost two wives and his second wife is pretty much the only character in the 24 world who died of something (sadly) “normal”, in that she had cancer. The story he told Erin on Day 4 about dealing with her death was terribly sad and I think one of the reasons why he is so protective of Audrey is because she is really the only family he has. He’s a widower twice over and he has an estranged relationship with his son– Audrey is pretty much all he has. He’s had health issues before in the series–he had a heart attack sometime before Day 4 because Audrey mentions his pills when they’re held hostage and now he’s in the early stages of Alzheimer’s. It’s kind of hard to hate a guy who has been through so much but is still fundamentally decent.

Do I agree with a lot of his actions? Eh, not really. *laughs* I don’t want to turn this into a political debate because that never ends well and one thing I love about 24 is that characters from all sides of the political debate are complicated enough that none of them are ever purely good or purely evil, but all shades of gray in between. I disagree with pretty much everything we’ve been presented that Heller stands for when it comes to politics. But as a man? I kind of love him. Few political characters in the 24 world are as fundamentally decent as Heller is. He has never once seemed like he was not trying to do what he felt was the right thing. I feel like he holds people to a high moral standard, including himself. I like that he is a character who can challenge Jack and has the history with him for it to mean something.

I also just find him highly entertaining. Everything is more fun with William Devane in it, IMO. Who else says “who’s takin’ hostages?” in the same tone that he probably says “what’s for brunch?” :)

I don’t see Mark as a coward because I think he’s in a position where there is nothing “overt”, as you phrased it, that he can do. The thing that’s so interesting about Mark is that his job is his family and his family is his job. We don’t even know how he feels about Heller even being in office with his Alzheimer’s. He might wish Heller would resign from office and Heller might listen on a work level but what happens when it becomes a family level? Mark’s that guy trying to convince his father-in-law to let him and his wife take care of him now that he’s getting older but the stakes are insane because this isn’t just some guy who can retire from his 9-5 and move in with them or something. This is the President of the United States. If Heller resigns, it affects more than their family– there’s a political party at stake, a nation, and right now? The world. Up those stakes and the line between what is the right thing to do gets a little blurrier because it affects more people. Doesn’t necessarily make what Mark is doing right but in such a sticky situation, what is really right? You can make a case that Audrey and Mark are both complicit in keeping Heller in office when he’s incapable of doing the job and more people are either already in the know or are catching on. Everyone in this plot who knows there is something wrong with Heller is contributing to a shadow presidency. Shouldn’t we be condemning Audrey for this, too? Why is only Mark getting the blame when they all know?

Also, this might be *enormously* soapy but are we even sure that Heller actually has Alzheimer’s (or other form of dementia)? So far, he’s seem extraordinarily sharp, even for someone in the early stages. Alzheimer’s isn’t the only thing that presents as reversing nouns (like the Roosevelt brothers mix-up in the premiere) or temporary memory loss, which seems to be what he has going on. Is someone poisoning him?

Oh and forgot to respond to the last things you were saying– I know who and what you mean when you say those posts from around Day 8– very education reads! I’ve been watching since Day 3 was first airing (whatever year ago that was now lol) and I used to post on the 24um but mostly lurked for the last couple of years. How do we kick it old-school without the Fox site message boards? Is it now just all #bringbackkatewarner on Twitter or what here? :)

I can’t believe any of you cannot see the obvious. Audry dumps her husband for Kate Morgan.

kiki vanderway
May 31, 2014 at 1:19 pm
Really? I think Chloe is more her type….

Audie’d have good taste, then :)