Jack Bauer Gets Fall Prequel

Kiefer Sutherland’s Jack Bauer will be back sooner than we thought.

The producers of Fox’s “24” are developing a two-hour “prequel” to the upcoming seventh season of the television thriller. The movie is going to be designed to bridge the two-year gap between Seasons 6 and 7 and is targeted to air in the fall, leading to the show’s January return.

As pretty much everyone knows, the writers strike stopped work on the seventh season of “24″ with just eight episodes filmed. Fox decided against airing any episodes until the season could be completed which meant putting off the season completely until January, 2009. At one point a few weeks ago there were rumors that Fox would split the season in two and air half in the fall and half in the new year, but Fox was quick to put that rumor to bed.

The upcoming seventh season of the Emmy-winning series is set in Washington and features the first female U.S. president, played by Cherry Jones. The “24″ writing team is back at work, with production on the remaining episodes of the seventh season slated to begin in April. However, the series will have to continue without series co-creator/executive producer Joel Surnow because he left the show at the end of the strike for reasons unclear.

I am uncertain what Surnow’s departure will mean for the show. I also have not heard much about the announced big-screen adaptation of the show that was originally supposed to hit theaters next year.