Kiefer Sutherland may have left tough guy Jack Bauer behind, but ‘Designated Survivor’ presents a new side of the actor – as an unlikely President – and, ultimately, just as many tough possibilities…
When the President of the United States and Congress meet to present the State of the Union, procedure dictates that there is one member of the government who does not attend. The allocated person is sequestered away from proceedings in case of an incident that takes advantage of so many powerful people being in one place at the same time. That person is known as the ‘Designated Survivor’.
Tom Kirkman is Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, a family-man with a strong moral compass and a job he likes – but not one that demands a lot of respect in Washington – his initiatives often sidelined in place of pragmatic media-friendly statements by the Powers-That-Be. Selected to be the ‘Designated Survivor’ largely because of his lack of importance (he’s essentially been demoted just hours earlier), he sits across the capital and watches the proceedings taking place with his peers.
Which is when a massive bomb destroys most of the Capitol building and, as per procedure, Kirkman and his family – and indeed the entire country – is thrown into chaos as he becomes first in the line of succession and America’s new President. There are plenty of people who believe he’s utterly unsuitable for the job. Can he prove them wrong – and does he want to?
It’s been somewhat easy to dismiss Kiefer Sutherland as a template hard man action hero. Over a decade of Jack Bauer and ‘Dammit, Chloe!‘ have made him the Jason Bourne of the television screen – impossible to kill, impossible to ignore. So it’s easy to see why that risk of stereotyping meant he wasn’t convinced to return for another round of 24 (which will reboot in early 2017 with a ‘Legacy’ series and a mainly new cast). Instead, Sutherland has picked a project that shows quite a different side to him, a character that couldn’t be more different than Bauer. His Kirkman is almost bookish from the outset, an idealistic activist within the wheels of Washington but one who is resigned to being a very small cog in a much bigger, often disinterested and slow-moving clock – and not the kind that used to separate 24‘s segments. However, in much the same way that 24‘s debut and evolution felt like a cultural reaction to 9/11, Designated Survivor feels more along the line of a nation losing faith in politics – and the notion of Congress having its slate wiped clean (however tragically here) may resonate. Once again, Sutherland may have caught the right wave.
On a physical level, there’s no doubt that Kirkman could handle himself if literally pushed, but what we see in the show’s pilot is that he’s a man who is good at analysing situations and then simply doing the best he can. Kirkman knows he’s not the ideal man for the job but, having had it thrust onto him, he’s not about to merely shrug and hand it off to someone else.When he’s pushed by the military to act quickly, he prefers a more restrained mode – but when faced with an Iranian diplomat whose masters may be moving to take advantage of events, Kirkman is more than capable of using words to show how tough he’s willing to be – giving a warning that if Iran’s warships aren’t pulled back to dock, the headlines for the next day won’t be about the attack on Washington but the retaliation.
While there’s a distinct formula at work here, the series is absolutely off to a solid start, with a decent argument that the pilot could have actually been a bit longer, taking us through the first full day of Kirkman’s unlikely ascension. But Designated Survivor‘s success will largely rest, as with the new President’s in-story actions, on how the aftermath of the tragedy is dealt with. Shows like last year’s Quantico started off with a similar terrorist bang and then whimpered out, devolving into unlikely twists and soapy sub-plots and Homeland‘s initial run veered dangerously close to the ‘troubled teen’ story-arc that Designated Survivor‘s pilot flirts with as well. But Sutherland is a solid anchor and the supporting cast have been picked well. Maggie Q is an FBI agent suspicious about the expected lack of enemy ‘chatter in the hours leading up to the event, Kal Penn as a unconvinced speech-writer (the actor having been a real-life West Wing worker at one point) and Natascha McElhone as Kirkman’s understanding and equally strong and stoic wife. So while this may be no West Wing, it’s a solid addition to the schedules and it will be interesting how the conspiracy/action/politics balance in weighed in the weeks to come – all offering many possibilities.
And hey, however unlikely the premise feels (even if based on a legitimate procedure), one only has to look at the news to see far more unlikely poliical scenarios being played out thi Election year.
9/10
Designated Survivor airs on ABC in the US and has just been announced as part of Netflix’s expanding programming in all other territories – and is available now.
