Idris Elba Thriller Hijack Struggles to Stay Airborne: TV Review

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It’s been more than 20 years since “24” first aired on Fox; its real-time conceit, with a relentless ticking clock moving characters toward collision, made it the kind of hit that’s difficult to duplicate. “Hijack,” a new drama on Apple TV+, doesn’t precisely aim for the sort of thrills and chills “24” generated, but it is indeed another real-time drama about a terrorist plot. Unfortunately, the central device doesn’t quite work, and “Hijack” ends up feeling like a flight to nowhere in particular.

Here, Idris Elba plays Sam Nelson, a corporate type who finds himself at the center of international drama when his return flight from Dubai to London on the fictional Kingdom Air gets taken over by a group of armed criminals. They eventually gain control of the cockpit through blackmailing the pilot, proving their craftiness and the extent of their preparation; it falls to Sam to play quick-thinking action hero.

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The show isn’t much to look at, and few characters other than Sam really pop, a missed opportunity to draw out the various types who might intersect on a plane. (One family in particular is broadly drawn as a sort of loony comic relief, rubbing awkwardly against the kind of tension “Hijack” is meant to generate. The presence of children on this flight could gin up real drama, and fewer jokes about their overprotective mom.) On the ground, Archie Panjabi does her best as counterterrorism officer Zahra Gahfoor, but the specific way this show uses its real-time format works against her, as her presence studs the story at somewhat awkward intervals, when there’s a lull in the action in the sky.

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It’s never really clear why the show needed to be told in purported real time, and it both makes it stretch on at least an episode too long (to simulate the length of a flight, it seems) and kneecaps the ability to cut between scenes and build tension. Elba is a credible lead, but we already knew that; nothing “Hijack” asks him to do feels especially novel. By series’ end, you may be tempted to clap, as nervous fliers do once their plane lands — not because the piloting was notably skillful, but because now you get to disembark.

“Hijack” launches with two episodes on Wednesday, June 28, on Apple TV+, with new episodes to follow weekly.

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Idris Elba Thriller ‘Hijack’ Struggles to Stay Airborne: TV Review

Apple TV+. Seven episodes (all screened for review).

  • Production: Executive producers: George Kay, Jim Field Smith, Idris Elba, Jamie Laurenson, Hakan Kousetta, Kris Thykier.
  • Cast: Idris Elba, Archie Panjabi , Christine Adams, Max Beesley, Eve Myles, Neil Maskell, Jasper Britton, Harry Michell, Aimee Kelly, Mohamed Elsandel and Ben Miles.

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