![]() ![]() ![]() Stuart is the load-bearing personality: He is stern, withholding, determined, and conspicuously more eager than his subordinates to shoot hostages. Their diversity seems engineered from a casting perspective to avoid saddling any one ethnic group with any unfortunate stereotypes but also from a dramatic perspective to enhance the early intrigue as everyone wonders: Who even are these people? Elba plays opposite Neil Maskell’s Stuart, the leader of the hijackers. ![]() The five hijackers include a white girl who weighs no more than 140 pounds and a gray gentleman built like Michael Caine in Harry Brown. Their reluctance to do so is yet another mystery of Hijack. Sam moves through the cabin with disastrous confidence, daring the hijackers to just shoot him already. He makes himself useful enough to the hijackers-anticipating problems, flagging weaknesses in their game plan-to earn some grudging, fleeting favor at points but is troublesome enough to subtly sabotage their plans, even with his hands tied. But chiefly, Sam thrives in this situation through his utter inscrutability at every turn. He’s a Swiss Army knife of a man: a body language expert, crisis communications adviser, high-stakes game theorist, hacker, chaplain, spy. Once guns are drawn onboard, Sam is out of his seat and chatting at gunpoint at every opportunity. the negotiation,” as his son and his ex-wife explain at one point. Sam strolls to the designated gate with a dainty gift bag and no carry-on luggage. Sam Nelson is a bit more spoiled than John Luther, admittedly. And though it pains me to say it, I also believe he’s finally making a clean break from Luther. Apple TV hasn’t reinvented the hostage thriller with Hijack, but Elba is having some good fun with the form. Hijack will inevitably remind you of a few different things: Air Force One, Inside Man, 24, The Commuter. The sold-out Kingdom Airlines flight is the central stage, but we also follow a variety of external perspectives, including those of Sam’s ex-wife and their son, awaiting him in London. Luckily, on Wednesday, Apple TV+ premiered Hijack, in which Elba plays the enigmatic hostage Sam Nelson in a real-time seven-episode series about a hijacked commercial flight from Dubai to London Heathrow. There’s no salvaging Luther, I suppose, and that’s a shame, because Elba really does excel as a leading man in this sort of violent, high-strung television thriller. There’s a lot of TV out there. We want to help: Every week, we’ll tell you the best and most urgent shows to stream so you can stay on top of the ever-expanding heap of Peak TV. ![]()
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