Kiefer Sutherland tells Jimmy Fallon a 'great idea' would bring him back to '24'

It's been almost 10 years since the last Jack Bauer adventure, but that doesn't mean Kiefer Sutherland is done playing TV's favorite counter-terrorism agent.

After the 2014 event series 24: Live Another Day, Sutherland handed the reins of the 24 franchise off to Corey Hawkins and Miranda Otto, who took over for 2017's 24: Legacy. But Jack Bauer's not dead, and he's not necessarily retired either. So, could Sutherland ever return to the character that became one of TV's biggest names?

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Sutherland stopped by The Tonight Show this week to promote his new thriller series Rabbit Hole, and in between discussions of the show and his recent interest in gardening (imagine Kiefer Sutherland leading a donkey around a farm), host Jimmy Fallon brought up the continued love for 24, which rocketed to high ratings and loads of pop culture cache after its launch in a post-9-11 2001 landscape. In discussing the series' continued popularity, Sutherland didn't take credit for the show's longevity. Instead, he pinned that on the format from which the series derives its title: A 24-hour day, depicted in real time, with each episode representing a single hour in Jack Bauer's latest mission.

Watch Jimmy Fallon talk to Keifer Sutherland about 24's future on The Tonight Show:

"I've always felt that the show was the great star," Sutherland said. "The idea of a thriller in real-time, that's just special, and it should go on forever, with me or without me."

But while Sutherland was certainly quick to endorse the idea of another Legacy-style story set in the world of 24, he was also quick to clarify that he would still be game for more Jack Bauer adventures. 

"But if they wrote it...this is so unfair," Sutherland said with a laugh. "Howard Gordon's gonna kill me for this, and he was the lead writer of the last [several] seasons of 24, but if everybody came up with a great idea, I would not be the person to say no. I would not be the reason that it didn't come back."

So there you have it. If you want more 24, the ball is in the court of the writers. We'll see how, or if, they respond.

New episodes of The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon air weeknights at 11:35 p.m. ET on NBC, and all episodes of the current season are now streaming on Peacock.