‘24: Legacy’ Cast on What to Expect From Fox’s ‘24’ Reboot Series
You know it’s Jack Bauer-less, but if that’s the only thing you know about Fox’s new 24: Legacy reboot drama, we’re gonna let the series’ cast tell you why you should tune to the show’s premiere after the Super Bowl on Sunday.
Anna Diop and Ashley Thomas, who play Nicole and Isaac, the wife and brother of new world-saving, terrorist-thwarting Eric Carter (Straight Outta Compton and The Walking Dead star Corey Hawkins), start with the main intel in the video above: that 24: Legacy retains 24’s signature real-time format, and that the original’s writers, directors, and producers are on board for Legacy.
And Hawkins drops the main storyline that will drive the action for Legacy’s 12-episode first season. Army Ranger Eric led his special ops squad on a mission to assassinate terrorist leader Ibrahim Bin-Khalid. Now back in the United States and living as a civilian, Eric finds out his fellow Rangers have been murdered, one-by-one, and the killers have just arrived at his home. A quick, brutal showdown reveals they’re allies of Bin-Khalid, and they think Eric and his squad took something when they raided Bin-Khalid’s bunker. Eric and his wife barely escape the attack, and now he has to turn to CTU — and its outgoing leader, Rebecca Ingram (Homeland’s Miranda Otto) — to help save his family’s life, and stop what could turn out to be the worst terrorist attack ever in the United States.
More complications in this action-packed 12 hours: Eric and Isaac have some seriously bad blood between them, as Nicole was Isaac’s true love before she became Eric’s wife. And Ingram is outgoing as CTU head because after years of supporting her career, her husband, Senator John Donovan (Jimmy Smits), is depending on her to take time off and support his bid to become the next POTUS.
As for those who worry about the absence of Jack Bauer in the series, there’s no Jack, but Kiefer Sutherland is an executive producer on 24: Legacy. Sutherland also, Hawkins says, gave him some great advice about creating this new 24 universe action star. “Mainly, it was just to allow Eric to surprise me, and to continue to surprise me,” Hawkins says. “As these scripts come in, don’t worry about doing justice, or filling Jack Bauer’s shoes, and that’s always sorta been my thing from the beginning, was to fill Eric Carter’s shoes.”
Filling Eric’s shoes has turned to be somewhat dangerous, in some surprising ways, Hawkins says in the second exclusive video clip above. He trained with real Navy Seals and Army Rangers, he built up his stamina, and he proved to be quite adept and jumping off things as part of Eric’s quest to protect the country, but he laughs that he found one, um, foe, to be a particular challenge during filming.
“There was a door, and I have to just put my head in and step outside of the door, and for some reason, I just kept hitting [the frame], and one time, I hit it and just knocked myself out,” the actor says. “And there were bullets flying and stuff, so someone’s like, ‘Did he get shot?!’ And I’m sitting on the ground like, ‘I’m an idiot.’ That door came out of nowhere.”
24: Legacy premieres Sunday, Feb. 5 following the Super Bowl on Fox, and moves to its regular timeslot, Mondays at 8 p.m., on Feb. 6.
