Fox's 24: A Look at a Series of Stereotypes

Within the first four hours of Fox's eighth season of the hit show 24, a pattern worthy of Fringe emerged: stereotyping almost every group of people appearing on the show. 24, of course, has a bit of a history of stereotyping certain groups, particularly those from the Middle East, Hispanics, and Russians, who make up the majority of the show's terrorist agents. Yet the show has also shown favor upon certain groups in the past, particularly in the casting of the first Black president, David Palmer (Dennis Haysbert), in its first season and the current casting of the first female president, Allison Taylor (Cherry Jones). Yet in the eighth season, it seems nobody will escape the well-cultivated garden of 24 stereotypes. Here's a look at some of the stereotypes blooming in season eight of 24 thus far.

Black Men

The Counter Terrorist Unit, better known as CTU, has been started up again, with a new man in charge: Brian Hastings (Mykelti Williamson), the Special Agent in Charge of the New York division. Unfortunately for CTU, Hastings seems more interested in providing the agency with a good face than actually stopping any terrorists. When both Chloe (Mary Lynn Rajskub) and Jack Bauer (Keifer Sutherland) come to him with new evidence about a potential attack on President Omar Hassan (Anil Kapoor), Hastings all but ignores the obvious and pursues a bum-lead. Hastings has thus far proved a slouching, unsure-of-himself pseudo-leader who will likely be made to look foolish, if not simply fired and replaced, by the end of the season. Thus far, any other Black men who have appeared this season are also stereotypes: guys with big attitudes with little to no respect for authority and tending toward violence. (For more, see "Street Ballers" below)

Computer Analysts

Why are CTU's computer analysts so horny? This season we have CTU data analyst Arlo Glass (John Boyd), who is constantly hitting on Dana Walsh. In the past pretty much anyone who sat at a desk and analyzed computer data for CTU had such raging hormones it's a wonder any analysis actually got done. Maybe they just need to get out more, but seriously ... can we just have one completely normal, functional data analyst who doesn't turn out to be sex-craving, keeping secrets, somehow involved in a terrorist plot (would not surprise me at all if that proved the case with Arlo), or just plain weird?

Eastern Europeans

If and when 24 features a group of Eastern Europeans who are just friendly people, it will be a happy day. For now, we will have to settle for yet another family of Russians trying to introduce nuclear weapons to terrorists in some elaborate scheme to destroy the United States. In season eight of 24, it has been revealed that a Russian family is behind the attack on President Hassan, using his brother by agreeing to sell him nuclear materials. It is once again a father and his son, not unlike the whole Victor Drazen fiasco of season one. Thus far, the main terrorists of 24 have been Eastern European, Middle Eastern, Mexican, Middle Eastern again, Eastern European again, back to Middle Eastern with the help of some Eastern Europeans and Asians, African for a changeup, American (go figure), and now back to Middle Eastern and Eastern European. (For more, see "Middle Easterners" below)

Ex-boyfriends/Husbands

Ladies, in the world of 24 it is so much better to stay single. So far we have had a stalker ex-boyfriend who seeks to destroy the life of a CTU data analyst, and a NYPD husband who antagonized a man aiming a gun at his wife, resulting in his wife being shot in the leg. We've also had the hint that President Taylor's husband was a nasty piece of work during their divorce. It seems the basic idea is that men might make the best authority figures, but they are awful, I mean real nightmares, in relationships.

Hispanics/Latinos

In one of the early seasons of 24 we had a group of narcoterrorists who got Jack addicted to heroin. In the first four hours of season eight we had Victor Aruz (Benito Martinez), a former informant for Jack who helped get the Russian assassin into the states. The writers of 24 seem to have a keen distrust of folks of Spanish or Latin origin that they want to pass on to their viewers. If they aren't terrorists themselves, they are at least helping the terrorists get their jobs done. Even the great Tony Almeida (Carlos Bernard) turned terrorist last season! Por favor, 24 writers ... let's ease up on the villainizing of minority groups.

Journalists

In the history of 24, journalists have always had some sort of agenda. Be it attacking the authority of the president, blackmailing political figures, having affairs with terrorists, or being involved in assassination attempts, journalists always manage to stand in the way of antiterrorism. This season, we have Meredith Reed (Jennifer Westfeldt), a journalist who was implicated (falsely) in the assassination attempt against President Hassan and admitted to having an affair with him. She may be innocent thus far, but with twenty hours left it would not surprise me one bit of it turned out she actually was somehow involved in some sort of terrorism, or blackmail attempt, or something even more devious.

Medical Professionals

If you ever find yourself bleeding to death in an episode of 24, do yourself a favor and go to anyone but a medical professional. In episode four of season eight, the highly trained medical officers at CTU had a little trouble recognizing some highly radioactive matter. In almost every season, medical professionals in hospitals and in the field manage to mess things up somehow. They trigger biohazard alerts. They fail to recognize the severity of wounds until it's too late. They give key witnesses so much morphine or other pain killers that they slip into comas or die. They stand too close to terrorists with scalpels and wind up with those scalpels through their windpipes. Maybe 24 should do itself a favor and fire all the current doctors in exchange for Dr. Gregory House. Same network ... they can borrow him, right?

Middle Easterners

Thus far in season eight, anyone associated with the Middle East has proved some combination of disloyal, adulterous, or elsewise sneaky. Even President Hassan, the peace-keeping president of the fictional Islamic Republic of Kamistan, has proved less than completely trustworthy in his affair with a journalist. His wife is cold and bitter, and his brother is discovered to have played a major role in an assassination attempt against him. Of course, even this representation of those from the Middle East is better than in past seasons, where people of Middle Eastern descent were either terrorists, extremists, or otherwise suspect of something. (For more, see "Eastern Europeans" above)

New York City Police Officers

24 just made the move to New York and already the cops are as blazing a stereotype as you can ever hope to get. Within the first four hours we saw a New York City police officer beat up Jack Bauer because, rather than listening to the guy who's pretty much saved the world for seven full seasons, he jumped to the conclusion that Jack was a cop-killer. The NYPD has thus far managed to be indecisive, incapable of reading between the lines, and just barely escaped being responsible for the assassination of a world leader. At least, thus far, none of them that have worked alongside Jack have died terrible, terrible deaths ... but we've still got twenty hours to go. It's gonna happen. To save time and avoid repeating myself, let's just group former FBI agents, current FBI agents, and any security officers that aren't Jack Bauer with the cops, shall we? They all, according to 24, seem almost equally incompetent.

Street Ballers

I could have grouped this with Black men, but as I recall the group of street ballers encountered by Jack Bauer was at least a somewhat diverse group of minority hoodlums. Apparently, the semi-suburban neighborhood that served as the home of at least one family of police officers still managed to have a basketball court where a couple of hoods could hang out and cause trouble for Jack. Jack asked them a simple question and got the response, "We don't like nobody else on our court." All it took was a hundred bucks to get one of them to blab about the whereabouts of a man Jack was looking for, despite being warned by one of his fellow baggy-pants-wearing, attitude-enriched pals that "You don't even know what's goin' down." According to the writers of 24 it don't matter what's goin' down as long as "I got me a hundred bucks."

Women
24 also seems to have a thing against women in authority. In the past, any female with power (including three female heads of CTU and a couple White House officials) have been indecisive, flaky, and otherwise seemingly incapable of maintaining control in any sort of hostile situation. This season, we have President Allison Taylor who seems to question everything she does and her security team suggests, new CTU analyst named Dana Walsh (Katee Sackhoff) with a secret dark past, and former FBI agent Renee Walker (Annie Wesching) who suffered a mental breakdown and thus far has not seemed to have recovered from it. At this point even Chloe O'Brien fans have to hope she's never promoted, lest she become just as incapable as any other female authority figure.