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New TV Show "Designated Survivor" (1 Viewer)

Cjw_55106

Footballguy
Coming in the fall of 2016, Wednesdays, 10pm ET

He played the tough as nails counterterrorism agent Jack Bauer in the Fox hit 24 for nine seasons.

And now Kiefer Sutherland is back on television, albeit in quite a different role, as it was reported by Deadline on Friday that ABC decided to pick up political thriller Designated Survivor.

In the new show, the 49-year-old is unexpectedly appointed President of the United States after a devastating attack during the State of the Union address kills everyone above him in the cabinet.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEzqTSCQxgc

 
The premise is pretty cool, enough to get me in for the first episode. The presence of Kiefer will bring me back for a second. Beyond that, we'll see. 

 
I was disappointed when 24 was cancelled (discovered it around third season - first episode I saw was the one with Kim being stalked by a mountain lion, and got caught up within a few weeks), but it was admittedly getting a little formulaic as it wound down. The one off continuation later wasn't as good. Sutherland had a series titled Touch, but that was cancelled due to poor ratings after just one season (showing his presence alone wasn't enough to sustain the show, the new series is a completely different genre, and hopefully stronger material).

There is a new 24: Legacy series coming next year (premiers after the Super Bowl), but reportedly won't include Sutherland. There is a 24 reunion on DS, Mykelti Williamson will be a recurring character (he was also on Touch).       

 
Looks pretty mediocre.  Leave it to ABC to take a semi-original and interesting premise and screw it up.

 
Looks pretty mediocre.  Leave it to ABC to take a semi-original and interesting premise and screw it up.
Exactly.  Wish the creators of shows like Breaking Bad/The Wire/Other classics got a hold of some of these premises.  

Network dramas are just horrible all around in comparison.

 
Are there any new drams's this year that look watchable? I've seen commercials for this show and I'll probably give it a shot, but I don't expect that it will last more than 4 episodes.

I haven't seen much on other channels, but I don't watch a ton of commercials so I could be missing something.

 
I was disappointed when 24 was cancelled (discovered it around third season - first episode I saw was the one with Kim being stalked by a mountain lion, and got caught up within a few weeks), but it was admittedly getting a little formulaic as it wound down. The one off continuation later wasn't as good. Sutherland had a series titled Touch, but that was cancelled due to poor ratings after just one season (showing his presence alone wasn't enough to sustain the show, the new series is a completely different genre, and hopefully stronger material).

There is a new 24: Legacy series coming next year (premiers after the Super Bowl), but reportedly won't include Sutherland. There is a 24 reunion on DS, Mykelti Williamson will be a recurring character (he was also on Touch).       
The mountain lion was the low point of the series, and that's what hooked you? :mellow:

 
The mountain lion was the low point of the series, and that's what hooked you? :mellow:
That was just a scene I remembered to place when I started watching, possibly other scenes "hooked me", but I don't have a photographic recall of every scene in every episode from every season as to which specific ones? :)

* Off the top of my head, once I started from the beginning, I remember the plane getting blown up by the woman (season one?).

 
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I was disappointed when 24 was cancelled (discovered it around third season - first episode I saw was the one with Kim being stalked by a mountain lion, and got caught up within a few weeks), but it was admittedly getting a little formulaic as it wound down. The one off continuation later wasn't as good. Sutherland had a series titled Touch, but that was cancelled due to poor ratings after just one season (showing his presence alone wasn't enough to sustain the show, the new series is a completely different genre, and hopefully stronger material).

There is a new 24: Legacy series coming next year (premiers after the Super Bowl), but reportedly won't include Sutherland. There is a 24 reunion on DS, Mykelti Williamson will be a recurring character (he was also on Touch).       
The mountain lion was the low point of the series, and that's what hooked you? :mellow:
I think the Amnesia story line might have topped the Mountain Lion one for :rolleyes:  

 
"But how do we make Keefer, I mean the guy was Jack Bauer, look incompetent and week?"

"Put him in nerdy glasses but not cool/nerdy/hipster glasses"

"Brilliant! Harrumph Harrumph!"

 
If the speech scene is cool I predict 348 million Google search hits from people saying that they want him to be president in real life instead of Hillary or Trump.

 
Son drug dealer, really?  Cmon.  The main story is interesting enough. Why do that?  I hate writers sometimes. 
:yes: Need thefamily drama, can't all be about rebuilding a decimated government. The Presidmet will have to deal with, and most likely ignore, the family issues which will bring added tension in the White House.  "You abandoned us when we needed you Tom!!!" 

 
:yes: Need thefamily drama, can't all be about rebuilding a decimated government. The Presidmet will have to deal with, and most likely ignore, the family issues which will bring added tension in the White House.  "You abandoned us when we needed you Tom!!!" 
Which is just lazy writing.  So his wife loves her job as an attorney which means she is not going to want to stop - so we will have the First Lady wanting to hold a real job and she will have problems as a result.  And probably have a client or make an argument in court that makes her husband look bad.  Yawn.

The drug dealer teenage angst son.  He will continue to try to live the life, probably get arrested or someone will try to blackmail the President or something.  Yawn.

The little girl who only wants to spend time with her dad.  She will start to hate him because he never does anything with her anymore and his family life will all come crashing down around all of this.  Yawn.

They are already setting this up for the big 2 episode story about him finally choosing to run for re-election on his own and the torment his family will go through with it.  Yawn.

Just stick to how the government will operate in this mess, the dictatorial power he will have for some time, and the interfighting of the Executive branch and how the politics of the country would change while trying to seat an entire new government.  That has enough drama.  The family stuff is going to annoy me to no end if I'm even half right about the above.

Overall though, I'm good.  For now.

 
Saw some reviews before last night that seemed pretty good so set up the record on DVR. Hope it's worth keeping.

 
Enjoyed the premiere except for the Cliche "We must go to war NOW!" General..

I understand they have that certain mentality, but I would hope most would wait for evidence of who did it before jumping into the tired WE MUST BOMB NOW!!! :angry: speech. 

 
Yankee23Fan said:
Which is just lazy writing.  So his wife loves her job as an attorney which means she is not going to want to stop - so we will have the First Lady wanting to hold a real job and she will have problems as a result.  And probably have a client or make an argument in court that makes her husband look bad.  Yawn.

The drug dealer teenage angst son.  He will continue to try to live the life, probably get arrested or someone will try to blackmail the President or something.  Yawn.

The little girl who only wants to spend time with her dad.  She will start to hate him because he never does anything with her anymore and his family life will all come crashing down around all of this.  Yawn.

They are already setting this up for the big 2 episode story about him finally choosing to run for re-election on his own and the torment his family will go through with it.  Yawn.

Just stick to how the government will operate in this mess, the dictatorial power he will have for some time, and the interfighting of the Executive branch and how the politics of the country would change while trying to seat an entire new government.  That has enough drama.  The family stuff is going to annoy me to no end if I'm even half right about the above.

Overall though, I'm good.  For now.
This is right where I'm at.

Why can't they just give us "Jack Bauer becomes the President"

 
I liked the pilot but I'm worried its going to be the best episode. I can quickly seeing this devolve into a ordinary CBS type show with a whodunit. I suspect it will be an inside gov't conspiracy. I will give it another week or two but I bet I quickly drop it as it turns pretty dumb.

Love having Maggie Q though. She's awesome.

 
I did not love it. I will probably watch a second episode.

I tihnk the investigation is actually more interesting than him being president.

I'm guessing this will get a very long leash and probably not be in any danger of being cancelled any time soon.

 
While it would be the lowest rated show in the history of TV, it'd be fascinating if they went through the steps of rebuilding the government after something like that

 
I thought it was a great episode. 

Although something about having Kiefer Sutherland in the role...my mental clock kept thinking that the entire episode was 1 hour of real time...so a few times I was like "no way could that have happened that fast"....oh wait, it's not 24.

 
Enjoyed the premiere except for the Cliche "We must go to war NOW!" General..

I understand they have that certain mentality, but I would hope most would wait for evidence of who did it before jumping into the tired WE MUST BOMB NOW!!! :angry: speech. 
You nailed it there. More lazy writing and it appears from next week's previews that he's planning a coup also.

Hopefully by the end of next week's episode someone on President Jack's staff makes a trip to Lens Crafters for him too. Those things look like they came out of the bottom of a prop bin from Leave it Beaver.

 
You nailed it there. More lazy writing and it appears from next week's previews that he's planning a coup also.

Hopefully by the end of next week's episode someone on President Jack's staff makes a trip to Lens Crafters for him too. Those things look like they came out of the bottom of a prop bin from Leave it Beaver.
Yea I think the odds of it being terrible writing in the rest of the series are pretty high. 

But his glasses are great. He should keep them. 

 
You nailed it there. More lazy writing and it appears from next week's previews that he's planning a coup also.

Hopefully by the end of next week's episode someone on President Jack's staff makes a trip to Lens Crafters for him too. Those things look like they came out of the bottom of a prop bin from Leave it Beaver.
I don't see it as lazy to have a general wanting to grab power and bomb Iran within the first night, especially if Iran was making provocative moves.  I personally thought the writing was far too conservative in what would happen.  If that event actually happened, the country would absolutely flip out.  The warmongers after 9/11 were everywhere.

 
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I don't see it as lazy to have a general wanting to grab power and bomb Iran within the first night, especially if Iran was making provocative moves.  I personally thought the writing was far too conservative in what would happen.  If that event actually happened, the country would absolutely flip out.  The warmongers after 9/11 were everywhere.
Short of an absolute vacuum, General Haig here wouldn't be on the Bat Phone an hour after the bombing moving carriers around and scrambling bombers. Especially since he didn't even know he was the rankingest guy left. He was on the phone in that war room chaos and wanted somebody to get him in touch with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and apparently didn't know they were all toasted in the bombing.....unless of course :tinfoilhat:

 
I'm ok with the General so far.  The FBI scene tried to implicate that maybe it was an inside job somehow.  Frankly it would be massively tough for a foreign power to hit the Capitol Building like that with such total destruction anyway.  The security for the State of the Union is pretty ungodly, not to mention the basic security in the building itself.  So the inside job aspect isn't so far fetched to me for a TV drama.

But the General is very reason why I don't want the family drama.  The interworkings of what happens in the situation room after something like this is drama enough.  I'm actually surprised that it was just the General being the gung ho guy.  CIA and FBI didn't seem to have a voice at the table, no one from National Security seemed to be there.  And the whole point of the drama of the moment is that no one really does know who is in charge in the heat of the moment.

But I know I'm the nerd in this potential group that would get a kick out of things like simply the manner in which he rebuilds the government.  The Office of the President has the power to run the country for awhile without Congress if necessary.  With an attack like that on the homefront, there is no constitutional block to declaring martial law immediately, suspending habeas corpus and putting the country in a state of war by insurrection.  In that President 24 can pretty much do whatever he wants.  Mobilize the full military on the homefront, federalize the national guard, and use the military to run the country for a time.

But from there, what is the next step?  I would assume the first thing he has to do is suspend trading the next day.  The problem is that the SEC has to do that, and we have to assume that the commissioners were in the Capitol.  If a majority of them are still alive, he would need to tell them to do it before the floors open.  AT the same time he would need to call the German Chancellor, Prime Minister of Britain, Japan and France and beg them to do the same if they don't do it on their own. If there aren't any commissioners, he could argue it's a war measure and do it himself, and I doubt anyone would fight him too much, but that would have to happen.

But where do you go from there.  He can't operate in a vacuum indefinately and there needs to be a Congress.  I would think that the easiest thing to do is get all 50 governors to immediately appoint 2 temporary Senators and seat a new Senate.  That can be done in about a week.  Once the Senate is seated, he would need to nominate an entire new Cabinet, especially a Secretary of Treasury and Seretary of Defense.  Whoever is the highest ranking officer in the Attorney General's office would take temporary hold of that job.  He could let the highest living member of Interior, Commerce and those types of agenies just get bumped up for the time being to focus on the big cabinet posts.

From there, every state would have to hold special elections for the House.  Which would be a cluster.  I doubt he focuses on the Supreme Court at all anytime soon and he shouldn't.  The most important government arms after this crisis would be the top 3 cabinet spots and a full Senate.  I would think.

And all of that is the interesting thing to me.  None of it gets to other things that would have to be done like calling on NATO to active all military personnel in the world, requiring the UN to formally vote on measures to ensure as much stability in the world as possible until the US is running smooth again, and things like that.  All of that is like 3 seasons worth of drama.  I don't need angst teen drug dealer calling his dudes from the east wing looking for a score.

 
I'm ok with the General so far.  The FBI scene tried to implicate that maybe it was an inside job somehow.  Frankly it would be massively tough for a foreign power to hit the Capitol Building like that with such total destruction anyway.  The security for the State of the Union is pretty ungodly, not to mention the basic security in the building itself.  So the inside job aspect isn't so far fetched to me for a TV drama.

But the General is very reason why I don't want the family drama.  The interworkings of what happens in the situation room after something like this is drama enough.  I'm actually surprised that it was just the General being the gung ho guy.  CIA and FBI didn't seem to have a voice at the table, no one from National Security seemed to be there.  And the whole point of the drama of the moment is that no one really does know who is in charge in the heat of the moment.

But I know I'm the nerd in this potential group that would get a kick out of things like simply the manner in which he rebuilds the government.  The Office of the President has the power to run the country for awhile without Congress if necessary.  With an attack like that on the homefront, there is no constitutional block to declaring martial law immediately, suspending habeas corpus and putting the country in a state of war by insurrection.  In that President 24 can pretty much do whatever he wants.  Mobilize the full military on the homefront, federalize the national guard, and use the military to run the country for a time.

But from there, what is the next step?  I would assume the first thing he has to do is suspend trading the next day.  The problem is that the SEC has to do that, and we have to assume that the commissioners were in the Capitol.  If a majority of them are still alive, he would need to tell them to do it before the floors open.  AT the same time he would need to call the German Chancellor, Prime Minister of Britain, Japan and France and beg them to do the same if they don't do it on their own. If there aren't any commissioners, he could argue it's a war measure and do it himself, and I doubt anyone would fight him too much, but that would have to happen.

But where do you go from there.  He can't operate in a vacuum indefinately and there needs to be a Congress.  I would think that the easiest thing to do is get all 50 governors to immediately appoint 2 temporary Senators and seat a new Senate.  That can be done in about a week.  Once the Senate is seated, he would need to nominate an entire new Cabinet, especially a Secretary of Treasury and Seretary of Defense.  Whoever is the highest ranking officer in the Attorney General's office would take temporary hold of that job.  He could let the highest living member of Interior, Commerce and those types of agenies just get bumped up for the time being to focus on the big cabinet posts.

From there, every state would have to hold special elections for the House.  Which would be a cluster.  I doubt he focuses on the Supreme Court at all anytime soon and he shouldn't.  The most important government arms after this crisis would be the top 3 cabinet spots and a full Senate.  I would think.

And all of that is the interesting thing to me.  None of it gets to other things that would have to be done like calling on NATO to active all military personnel in the world, requiring the UN to formally vote on measures to ensure as much stability in the world as possible until the US is running smooth again, and things like that.  All of that is like 3 seasons worth of drama.  I don't need angst teen drug dealer calling his dudes from the east wing looking for a score.
I don't think you are alone in this. I think everyone wants to see what happens. That's what's interesting about the premise of the show. Not the dumb family drama. Not the conspiracy theories. 

The entire reason the premise is cool is to see a) what the hell happens now? and b) how does an academic HUD secretary transform into the President. 

Anything else is just dumb writing.

 
Damn... I thought this was a reality show where they take severe alcoholics and send them out to a bar with a group they're supposed to designated drive for.   We watch them itch and crawl in their skin, trying to have a water, then an O'douls and then they finally break down when someone orders a round of shots and one ends up in front of them, then it's down hill.  Designated Survivor. 

 
I found it entertaining, although it had its  :rolleyes:  moments.  Him standing outside alone or watching his children from outside the bedroom door instead of being briefed on everything with under an hour left before his speech were a couple, but the one that annoyed me the most was the "What's a designated survivor?" question on the phone early on right before a commercial. He paid attention during cabinet meetings but didn't know that? It would have been so easy to switch it to just "Designated survivor?" or "I'm the designated survivor?" to get the same effect.

It bugged me that I thought the daughter looked familiar but know didn't why until it finally dawned/donned on me - she looks more than a bit like little Sally from Mad Men.  

 

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