Fox’s ‘24’ clock to start ticking again

By AMY AMATANGELO

Once again, Jack’s back.

“24” has been off the air for nearly 20 months, and the seventh season doesn’t begin until Jan. 11. To tide fans over, Jack Bauer returns in “24: Redemption” on Sunday at 8 p.m. on Fox.

Like the series, the two-hour movie will unfold in real time. Jack (Kiefer Sutherland) is avoiding a subpoena to appear before a Senate subcommittee and is living in the fictional African country of Sangala. The world-weary former federal agent is working at a school run by his old friend Carl Benton (Robert Carlyle).

And, back in the United States, it’s Inauguration Day for new President Allison Taylor (Cherry Jones). Series fans know it won’t be long before these two disparate story lines are intricately and mysteriously connected.

Though the movie, filmed on location in Cape Town, South Africa, can stand alone, it also links Seasons 6 and 7.

“We had a very existential way we ended Season 6,” executive producer Howard Gordon said. “Jack was sitting on the cliff and it was a very uncertain and atypical ‘24’ ending and it really could have meant a lot of things. The emotional framework of Jack’s character just needed some more context and this helps draw that bridge emotionally from Season 6 to Season 7.”

“24” also must win back fans who became disillusioned during Season 6 — including those who accused Jack of being unnecessarily violent. The show had to confront the notion that “Jack is this torture-happy secret agent,” Gordon said. “Seven years after 9/11, Jack Bauer has become a different character. Things that he’s gone through and things that he’s done make him a far darker and more complex character.”

“Redemption” re-establishes Jack as a heroic figure. When a rebel group, funded by some nefarious characters, begins a coup attempt, all of the children at the school are in danger. The rebels want the students for an army. At great personal risk, Jack must lead the children to safety.

“It is a western,” Gordon said. “Jack is cast in the role of the hero who has hung up his six-guns but whose past won’t let him go. It comes from the central idea of who could possibly touch Jack? Through whose eyes could we make Jack human again?”

The violent unrest in Sangala will be a key plot point of Season 7, which will begin with Jack on trial for the illegal detention and torture of prisoners. The thought-to-be-very-dead Tony (Carlos Bernard) will return — except this time he’s on the wrong team.

“It’s a bit of a ‘Heart of Darkness’ story,” Gordon said. “Somebody that Jack knew who has gone to a dark side and who Jack is enlisted to hunt down.”

Gordon conceded it was a “risk” to make a fan favorite a villain, but that the story came alive with Tony in it. “Hopefully the audience will go along for the ride.”

For theater actress Jones, playing the president has been a thrill ride.

“With ‘24’ there’s no past, there’s no future there’s literally just that moment,” said the Tony Award-winning actress. “You come in to ‘24’ knowing so little about your character. I didn’t know what state I was from. I didn’t know how many children I had. I didn’t know whether I was a good guy or a bad guy.”

X“24: Redemption” will be released on DVD on Tuesday (20th Century Fox, $26.98). Though the civil war portrayed in the movie is fictional, the plight of child soldiers is real. The DVD features a documentary that was made in conjunction with UNICEF and Human Rights First about child soldiers.