'24's Deadliest Femme Fatales

There's been a lot of testosterone oozing out of 24 of late, with Jack Bauer and Tony Almeida locking horns with each other and a procession of dastardly geezers like Colonel Dubaku, with General Juma now on the horizon. But looking back over the past few years of 24, there have been several supervixens who have grabbed the men by their balls and showed them the true meaning of girl power. Thatcher and the Spice Girls have a lot to answer for...

Mandy

Oh Mandy, you came and blew up a plane and escaped by parachuting. Oh Mandy, you came and you gave President Palmer a good poisoning. Anyway... ruthless mercenary Mandy popped up in the very beginning of Day One under the payroll of terrorist Andre Drazen, seduced a guy on a Boeing 747, nicked his wallet during sex, and detonated the plane in mid-air after jumping out to safety immediately afterwards. Sure beats the usual post-coital cigarette.

After her girlfriend Bridget was killed by her bosses, Mandy disappeared until the stunning finale to Day Two, when she shook the hand of President Palmer and imparted a supposedly lethal toxin into his body in the process. Fortunately, Palmer managed to survive the attack but continued to suffer from the crippling after effects on his body.

Mandy next resurfaced in the dying hours of Day Four, now working for Big Bad terrorist Habib Marwan and plotting the the kidnapping of Secretary of Defence James Heller and his daughter Audrey Raines. When her domestic whereabouts were discovered by CTU, she killed her boyfriend Gary and a friendly neighbour to aid her escape, and took Tony Almeida hostage. After Curtis Manning caught up with her and thumped her in the face, Mandy managed to wriggle out of danger by spilling the beans on her employer and gaining immunity from prosecution. Zip up your pants, guys, she's still lurking out there.

Nina Myers

Naughty Nina lied, screwed and murdered her way through her job at CTU before being outed as a mole for terrorist Victor Drazen at the end of Day One. Before then, she had been Jack Bauer's trusted confidante and former lover, although she also found time to slip under the duvet with Tony Almeida as well. She simply had the boys wrapped around her dastardly little finger. Nina's credentials as an abhorrent person were underlined when she shot dead Jack's wife Teri in such a cruel manner.

When Nina next came face to face with Senor Bauer in Day Two, she was spared from death because she possessed important information about certain nuclear bomb-wielding baddies. While Jack was transporting his prisoner Nina on a plane, the aircraft was downed by a missile attack and Jack had to uncuff his sworn enemy so that they could fight together to repel the Coral Snake Soldiers.

The uneasy alliance was made harder when Nina turned her gun on Jack, called up President Palmer and demanded an official pardon for the murder of her old pal in return for the location of the nuke. The deal was agreed, but Nina was hit by a CTU sniper in the nick of time and placed in custody.

Day Three featured the freshly released femme fatale finally biting the Bauer bullet, but not before the pair shared a less than amorous snog when Jack tried to convince her he had turned bad. At the time, they were both in Mexico trying to buy a deadly biological weapon, with the woman ultimately coming out on top. She was soon six feet under back in America though, as Jack finally avenged his late wife's death by killing her before she could shoot his daughter Kim.

Sherry Palmer

"Behind every great man, there has to be a great woman," famously sang Annie Lennox and Aretha Franklin. Well, David Palmer's other half was certainly a sister doing things for herself judging by her crooked manipulations and shady dealings. In Day One, she covered up a murder committed by her son, sabotaged Jack Bauer's attempts to deceive the terrorists and even asked someone to seduce her husband to get a few bits of information - all because she was so determined that David was elected President.

A divorce quickly ensued, but Sherry's duplicitous acts still continued when she tried to regain some power within David's administration in Day Two. She was brought back by David in Day Three to help him fend off political nemesis Alan Milliken, but she took things too far as she effectively killed her ex hubby's foe by stopping him taking his medication. David was outraged, pulled out of the re-election race and Sherry, spurned again by her husband, was killed by Milliken's bereaved wife.