Yes, I'm very late to the party, but I haven't had the time to dedicate to watching this series until recently. I knew about the show's format (each episode is a single hour in a 24 hour period) and thought it was interesting, but I wasn't sure if I missed an episode it'd throw me off.
Anyway, I'm about 3/4 the way through the first season. Some random thoughts:
1. This is more of a soap opera than I expected. The action and suspense is great, but...
2. The characters do some really stupid things. (This is a pet peeve of mine--characters do really stupid things that they have no motive to do just to move the plot along.)
3. Jack Bauer is schizophrenic. I suppose this could be written off due to his lack of sleep (taking weeks to shoot episodes that span minutes might sound like a valid reason too, but it wouldn't a problem for pro actors). Whatever the case, we seem to like crazies like that don't we? The borderline psychotic behavior would be a nightmare in real life, but we love it on screen right?
4. The twists! In the end, this is what saves the show for me. There are twists galore, and ones that are clever.
That said, I'm getting bored with season 1. I'm holding out hope that subsequent seasons are more interesting. So to anyone who watched 24: Will I be wasting my time going on? Is it more of the same, or does it get better?