I have both the Alias and 24 Season one and two DVDs. I have watched all but Alias Season One. (They only had Season Two at the store when I went to buy it, so I started with it first.) 24 Season one I was hooked on immediately. I watched the entire series within a two or three day span and thought it was great. 24 Season two was good, not up to par with Season One, though. Next I watched Alias. My reaction after the first episode was that it was Charlies Angels 2000 with just one Angel this time. Lots of kicking a nice story, kind of a nice story but nothing that was just MUST SEE. The more I watched, though, the more I liked it. Now I finished Season Two and really want to catch up on Season three (have not watched at all this year…didn’t want to ruin the season two ending). ANyway, it did kind of grow on me. ANd now with this rather pathetic season of 24, I may even like Alias better. Plenty of twists and surprises. Nice use of famous actors/actresses for two and three episode stints. Rather fast paced.
ANy comments from others that have seen both. And please use spoliers when necessary. I am baffled at Sydney waking up in Hong Kong 2 years later right now and don't want the drama ruined.
I have not seen 24 at all, but I’m a devout Alias fan, and let me tell you, Season 1 is a helluva lot better than Season 2 or Season 3 - Lena Olin notwithstanding. Watch it if you can - it’s unbelieveably good.
I watch them both - I find that while they overlap in terms of spies, covert ops and intrigue, they are sufficiently different to not really be comparable.
To me - 24 is earnest - try to make things believably gray in a black and white struggle and amp up the tension and stress. It is trying to convince me, IMHO, that it represents a real day in the life of real American heroes. While credibility gets stretched a ton of ways (can you say Amnesia and Cougars, people?) it accomplishes its goal sufficiently well enough to keep me coming back.
Alias, on the other hand, is much more fantasy - an updated Bond with cool techno soundtracks. It’s twists and turns - especially the whole Rambaldi plot/storyline - as an air of camp/fantasy about it - I don’t particularly want it to be real, I just want a cool story with cool twists. Only the superb acting - especially of Victor Garber and Ron Rifkin, but also of Garner and Vartan - anchor the show in emotional reality, if not actual reality.
So to me, they have differently goals and do a good job in each case of pursuing them…
Oh, and the general consensus among people I’ve talked to seems to be that while the first several episodes of season 3 of 24 were quite poor, it’s really kicked into gear now, and is back in top form.