(MINI SERIES) Prisoner Season 1 - Fast Paced & Action Packed 6 Part Action Thriller Series

I watched the trailer to this series on HBO Max few weeks ago and thought it looked really good. But I did not realize it was released on 30th April and only got the chance to watch it 2 days later. Anyway, why don't I just get right to the series now.

Brief Story Line

After taking maternity leave, Amber Todd (Izuka Hoyle - The Outpost TV series, Persuasion etc) left her baby daughter with her husband Olly (Finn Bennet - A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms TV series, Warfare etc) to return work as prison transport guard. On her first day, she was tasked with additional job of transporting high level prisoner named Tibor Stone (Tahar Rahim - Madame Web, The Looming Tower mini series etc) who was key witness in the trial of Harrison Dempsey (Brian F. O'Byrne - Conclave, Nightflyers TV series etc), leader of Organized Crime Pegasus. Unfortunately Harrison's son Declan (Laurie Davidson - Cats, The Road Trip TV series etc) assigned Pegasus trusted assassin Nina (Leonie Benesch - The Teachers' Lounge, Around the World in 80 Days TV series etc) to kill Tibor using any means necessary. 

Meanwhile the National Crime Unit (NCU) led by its director Josephine Campbell (Catherine McCormack - Spy Game, 28 Weeks Later etc) had been working on bringing down Pegasus for years. When they found out that Pegasus was trying to kill Tibor, the director of operation Alex Tebbit (Eddie Marsan - Supacell TV series, The Contractor etc) tried his best to protect the prisoner.

So how would the story conclude? You could find out in this series.

End of Brief Story Line

I said above that I was interested in the series due to its trailer which I had to say was pretty well made. It showed glimpses of the action and suspense that I was hoping for and I was really pleased that the series truly delivered. It was fast paced and very intense with plenty of good enough action sequence & even got some surprising twists. The whole series only had 6 episodes with duration of 44-50 minutes which made it felt compact and easy to finish as well. I managed to binge watch the full series in 1 night. 

The story was not complicated and pretty easy to digest. But the good thing was the way it succeeded in giving few surprises. I did get it right on the twist in 2nd episode, but I did not see it coming in the 5th. And the finale was really awesome as well with a crazy turn of event that I totally did not expect but made it more exciting. The ending was very good too, although it did seem to have few things unresolved which begs the question if there is going to be a second season. At the time of writing, I did not have any info if it is going to be renewed. However I personally felt they could make it more conclusive if they wanted to make this a limited series. If they really want to make multi seasons, then the story might not be as interesting with such ending (unless they do the lazy thing and just write simple change to the character's fate).

Btw, this is a British TV series created and written by Matt Charman who was screenwriter for critically acclaimed movie Bridge Of Spies and also creator of Black Work TV series. From what I read though, it was shot in Wales, but the final episode seemed to be in London? Anyway all episodes were released on British pay TV channel Sky Atlantic and on HBO Max in other selected countries. So we in Indonesia are quite fortunate to have the chance to watch it. The first 3 episodes were directed by Otto Bathurst (Robin Hood 2018 version etc) and the remaining by Pia Strietmann whose past experience was directing episodes of TV series. Aside from the names I mentioned above, there were some support cast including Ken Nwosu (Christopher Robin, Killing Eve season 1 etc) as Amber's supervisor Phil, Sam Troughton (Black Doves TV series, Mank etc) as Agent of NCU Will O'Neill, Youssef Kerkour (Napoleon, Home TV series etc) as Harrison's trusted man Miles Zahidi, Marie Bunel (Little Girl Blue etc) as Carla Dumont and several others. 

The action sequence here was the part that I really liked. From the first episode it already showed some explosive actions (except for 1 scene which was pretty bad looking computer generated, but other than those everything were great). I also liked the 4th episode's action and the finale. There were few things that I thought could have been written a bit better, but in general it was OK. So if you are in the mood for action packed six episodes British series with little drama and some surprising twists, then I believe you would like this just as I did. And even if it's just a one season series, I still think it is worth the watch.

Mike's movie moments rating: 3.75 out of 5 stars