Smile, it's time for a new season of '24'

PASADENA, Calif. — In the first few minutes of the eighth-season premiere of "24," Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland) does something he's almost never done in the first seven seasons.

He smiles.

"It felt weird to do it," Sutherland said with a smile of his own.

Because it hasn't happened with great frequency. Jack, of course, has been so busy saving the world time after time after time that he hasn't had much time to find the humor in all those terrorist acts.

"The only time Jack Bauer smiled … was in Season 3, when he had captured Nina and was flying back with her on the cargo plane," Sutherland said. "He had her in handcuffs — he looked at her and smiled.

"And that was about four episodes before he got to shoot her."

As Season 8 begins (the first four hours air Sunday 8-10 p.m. and Monday 7-9 p.m. on Fox/Ch. 13), Jack is retired. He's recovered from his, um, seemingly fatal poisoning last season. He's spending some time with his grandchild — thus, his uncustomary happiness.

"So this was a different kind of smile," Sutherland said. "But I must say, when we first shot it, it felt awkward for me and I think everybody else involved."

Of course, "24" is not about to become a family drama. Let alone a happy family drama. Jack is sucked into yet another crisis of global proportions. Within the context of the show, it actually makes sense.

But we're talking about a show in which terrorists in scuba suits crawled through tunnels into the White House last season. But, in this case, Jack coming out of retirement is actually quite easy to accept.

Which is not to say that "24" is suddenly absolutely believable. There's a character who works at CTU in a job that requires the highest of security clearances and presumably the toughest of background checks — who is living under a false identity.

But this season does start from sort of a different place than what we've become accustomed to.

"They put Jack in such a positive place at the very beginning of this series that it gave him something to fight for," Sutherland said. "I think just inherently we have taken the character in some very dark places — the loss of his wife, the estrangement from his daughter, the death of (love interest Audrey Raines). And one of the great things as an actor is to be able to take all those kind of tragedies and mount those as part of the character for the following season.