On 24

What???!! Something good on television?

Scandalous!

It's easier to pick on TV than picking your own nose (picking someone else's nose is difficult enough to be an Olympic event). Once you get started picking (on TV, that is) it's easy to keep using the same broad brush once it becomes comfortable. (Then again, there is something deeply satisfying - so to speak - about nosepicking, too.)

I've never subscribed to the TV = Vast Wasteland theory, but I have subscribed to HBO and others since they first became available. Having uncut movies available to me makes the whole television experience a little more palatable. Some of you are already thinking - what rot!

Me: There are a couple of good shows on television, with sophisticated plotlines and three dimensional characters.

Some of you: What rot!

Me: Oops, my bad. I was watching the shows on DVD courtesy of Netflix. Technically, not TV.

The Fox Network show 24, which - as pointed out to me by Dustin - is riddled with graphic violence, came in the mail this week. (Of course, I had to see it, once I realized it was a TV bad-boy.) Season one, Disk one. Raring to rip. I'm not claiming it to be high art like Shakespeare or Larry the Cable Guy, but it IS pretty gripping, as TV shows go.

Quick thoughts...

1 . I told someone (several people actually) that I think I would actually VOTE for the Allstate Insurance pitchman, if he would run for president. Something about his on-screen presence exudes ability, confidence, and trust (probably required in actor contracts with Allstate), with the hint of scandal-possibility (probably required in politician contracts with America). Ironically - in 24 - Dennis Haysbert plays a senator running for president. All through the show, I had to fight an urge to locate a voting booth.

2. Television still doesn't have the big-movie budget. Bad-Guy-Teenager gets shot at near point-blank range, but he doesn't bleed. (Not that I'm looking for that, or needing it - I just thought every current show had to have the CSI gross-out factor.)

3. Bad-guy-teenager-with-a-heart (Bad-Guy-Teenager's sidekick) could bust into a whole new line of work, if he could just get out from under the thumb of his Big-Baddie-Boss. Big-Baddie orders Teen-Heart (What? You think I'm going to memorize all their names?) to bury his buddy, and tosses him a shovel and a one-liner.

Big-Baddie (tossing shovel): By the time I get back, you'd better have him buried.

Teen-Heart: Where?

Big-Baddie (with sarcastic snarl): In the ground.

Teen-Heart (doing a 3-Stooges finger-roll): Nyuck! Nyuck! Nyuck! (actually, Linda - that last line is made up...)

4. Since Big-Baddie has already shot his buddy, you'd think Teen-Heart would opt for the Crime Standard "shallow grave" - but NO! Working at a furious pace (except when he stops to smoke drugs), Teen-Heart digs the most beautiful square-cornered, six-feet-under, final resting spot - since Tales from the Crypt. The amazing part is how he does it without breaking a sweat or getting dirty.

5. Later, when Jack Bauer follows orders (against his will) and has to shoot his co-worker, he does it at the edge of a cliff, and the co-worker takes four or five shots to the brassiered chest before tumbling down the ravine. Luckily, he outfitted her with a flak-jacket first, which is probably why she didn't get too emotional at the moment of her impending demise.

Or maybe she saw the same trick pulled on the show Alias, the only other series I've received from Netflix.

Maybe it's a one-plot fits all World, after all.