24: Redemption Kill The Cockroach

I got around to watching 24: Redemption last night. It was 2 hours of classic 24. Very slickly done, looked like it would have worked as a movie in a theater.

An R-Rated movie, due to violence, including gun-toting, machete wielding, head chopping little kids and one 24 staple, that being Jack Bauer getting tortured.

At the start of the movie we see kids being kidnapped and then indoctrinated into a rebel militia in the non-existent African country of Sangala. At the rather brutal indoctrination we see one of the rebel leaders exhorting the kids to kill. We see kids practicing with machine guns. Then the rebels drag out some government guy who had been beaten to a bloody pulp. A machete is given to one of the kids, the rebel leader gets them chanting "Kill the Cockroach." The kid with the machete obliges.

It was unsettling.

Meanwhile Jack is working at a camp for orphan boys run by a former agent friend. The agent friend gets word of kids getting kidnapped. He is worried about some of his boys who were playing soccer nearby. Too late. The rebels had already been there, taken the boys, shooting 2, killing one.

The agent friend rushes back to his camp, calling Jack on the way, telling him to get the kids in the shelter. That is barely accomplished when the rebels arrives. Soon, Jack goes all Jack Bauer on them. That means there was a lot of killing.

Eventually the rebels catch Jack, and while they torture him to get him to tell them where the kids are, the agent friend flashes a signal. Jack then points the rebels towards the signal. The agent friend then goes all Jack Bauer on the rebels, killing all of them and freeing Jack.

They get the kids out of the shelter, along with the cowardly UN peacekeeper. They get on a bus and make haste for the safety of the capital and the U.S. Embassy.

Unbeknownst to Jack, back in the U.S., the President has ordered the evacuation of Americans.

Oh. I forgot a plot point. A government guy showed up at Jack's camp to serve him with a subpoena ordering Jack back to D.C. to testify before congress. Jack refuses. This plot point figures big in the coming season of 24.

After traveling in the bus for several miles they realize they have to hoof it because the rebels have the roads to the capital blocked.

Soon a helicopter is chasing them, firing machine guns at the running boys. The helicopter lands. As they run through the woods one of the boys steps on a mine. The agent friend tells the kid not to move and puts himself on the mine so the kid can get away. Soon the rebels find the agent friend, demand to know where the kids are, when he won't answer the rebel shoots the guy a couple times. Then the agent friend tells the rebel to go to hell as the mine goes off, killing all of them.

Jack and the kids make it to the city, but then are ambushed by rebels determined to avenge the death of one of the rebel leader's brother. One of the countless rebels Jack had killed during the 2 hours. Jack dispatches the rebel ambushers til there is only one, a little kid pointing a machine gun at Jack and repeating "Kill the Cockroach" over and over again. Jack talks him out of the gun.

They make it to the gates of the embassy, which is in pure Fall of Saigon mayhem mode. The subpoena server shows up. The only way the subpoena server will rescue the kids is if Jack gives himself up. After a bit of back and forth Jack gives in. Everyone gets on a helicopter and is heading to America.

There were several sub-plots back in D.C. during the movie that must figure in the new season of 24. The new President's son is one. Jon Voight is a bad man who sold the rebels the arms that allowed them to be rebels again, after having been previously beaten.

Anyway, 24: Redemption held my attention for 2 hours. That doesn't happen all that often. And after the movie was over a strange thing happened. I went in my kitchen and there was a cockroach on the floor. I killed the cockroach. I'd never seen a cockroach in here before. Unsettling.