Idris Elba Is a Badass Action Hero in Wannabe ‘24’ Series ‘Hijack’

Idris Elba’s corporate negotiator Sam Nelson is no Jack Bauer, and Hijack is no 24, but that’s not to say that George Kay and Jim Field Smith’s airborne thriller doesn’t provide some pulse-pounding pleasures. Undercut by occasionally sloppy and inane plotting, and playing fast and loose with its real-time conceit—the seven-episode series takes place over the course of seven harried hours—Apple TV+’s latest (dropping June 28) never truly takes flight. Still, led by its commanding leading man, it remains an intermittently watchable exercise in pulpy tension that at least has the good sense to keep things fast, taut and concise.

Given its central conceit, there’s scant excess fat on Hijack’s bones, as the show is too busy focusing on its moment-to-moment action in the sky and on the ground to indulge in superfluous flashbacks and detours. It picks up in an airport in Dubai, where Sam and scores of others are making their way through security checkpoints to their scheduled flights. Sam’s downcast expression and ambling gait—even as other passengers frantically race to get on the plane—indicate that he’s in no rush to depart for Heathrow.

The fact that his sole carry-on is a bag containing jewelry for his ex-wife Marsha (Christine Adams), and that her texts are ordering him to not return home, suggest that Sam is on a potentially reckless mission of attempted reconciliation. An impending face-off with his former spouse, though, quickly turns out to be the least of his problems, considering that, following take off, the craft is commandeered by gun-wielding hijackers.

That nefarious group is led by Stuart (Kill List’s Neil Maskell), who swiftly convinces pilot Robin (Ben Miles) to relinquish control of the cockpit—something that requires Robin to callously bash in the face of his non-compliant female co-pilot. Stuart and his minions clearly mean business, but Hijack keeps their motivations and goals secret from both us and the plane’s passengers, who are left to cower, whimper, and—in the case of two older gentleman who are coded as racist—hatch misguided plots to attack the villains. Sam isn’t nearly as foolhardy as those abducted compatriots, and instead strikes an early, surprising deal with Stuart: because he only cares about getting home to his family, Sam pledges to help the hijackers achieve their ends.

This is an obvious ruse, since there’s no mistaking Sam’s desperation for selfish amorality. Yet for a short spell it works like a charm, bolstered by Sam’s recurring decision to betray his fellow scheming passengers. As Sam tries to build trust with his adversaries in an apparent effort to set them up for a later fall, Hijack periodically shifts its attention to various others who’ll play a part in the ensuing calamity. In London, Marsha is prepping for a big presentation and dealing with the friction between her teenage son Kai (Jude Cudjoe) and her new boyfriend Detective Investigator Daniel (Max Beesley).

When Marsha receives a text from Sam indicating that something is amiss on the plane, Daniel passes the message along to his own ex, Zahra (Archie Panjabi), who works in counterterrorism. She, in turn, hears from a Dubai air traffic controller that it was a false alarm, as does this official’s London counterpart Alice (Eve Myles), although nagging suspicions that things aren’t what they seem persist. Before long, everyone is grasping the severity of the situation, if not its expansive dimensions.

Kay and Smith’s above-below narrative balancing act is reasonably assured, and it’s aided by a fleet, furious pace. Hijack’s ticking-clock forward thrust keeps it from ever growing dull, and its efficiency extends to its characterizations; in quick strokes, it defines a variety of men and women aboard the flight, as well as their captors.

It also repeatedly presents new challenges for hero Sam, who has to deal with both armed maniacs whose intentions are vague, and panicked civilians who don’t all speak the same language, have a variety of competing personal priorities, and can’t be counted on to maintain clear heads during a crisis. Factor in that Stuart is extremely wary of Sam and his oh-so-helpful routine (with good reason!), and the series does an admirable job of setting up shop on the razor’s edge separating order and chaos.

Elba’s Sam is at once purposeful, empathetic and cagey, and the actor’s force of personality contributes to Hijack’s suspenseful intensity. Working against him, however, is some frustratingly ramshackle storytelling. A key death takes place during the jump between episodes, such that it’s difficult to discern the victim’s identity, and Kai’s prolonged attempt to evade abduction in his dad’s apartment is similarly, weirdly resolved off-screen. Because the proceedings are generally quite lucid and streamlined, these and other minor chronological blips and blunders stand out, as do those instances when the scripts resort to unnecessarily leaden exposition to keep things on track.

Such shortcomings are far more deleterious than the material’s melodramatic twists, which emerge at regular intervals. Hijack exploits the idea that even the best-laid plans can be thwarted by any number of ordinary unforeseen incidents, and the show is most assured when it fixates on Sam and company’s harrowing troubles, their situations complicated by a cascading series of unanticipated and hostile conflicts and dilemmas. Consequently, once the hijackers’ identities and demands are finally exposed, the energy flags, undermined by the fact that this entire conspiracy hinges on fanciful notions of omnipotent underworld boogeymen with idiotic ideas about how to accomplish their pedestrian objectives.

The show’s silliness goes hand in hand with its modest spinelessness, as it habitually strives to avoid clearly defined political elements or viewpoints that might step on anyone’s toes—to the point that even the idea of calling Stuart and his mates “terrorists” is overtly corrected by British Foreign Secretary Louise (Hattie Morahan), who’s the good government-official foil to bad Home Secretary Neil (Neil Stuke). Increasingly determined to avoid controversy by setting its tale in a hazy and phony facsimile of reality, Hijack ultimately sabotages the very authenticity that was the ostensible goal of its real-time gimmick.

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