(MINI SERIES) Elite Force - A Series Focusing on French Elite Tactical Unit with Some Interesting Drama & Few Shocking Twists

This series was released while I was away on holiday trip with my wife. Though it was interesting, I chose to wait till I was back and could watch it on my TV as it was an action series. So I started watching yesterday which was exactly 2 weeks after it was released on Netflix and finished it on the same day. All right then, let's just get on with the series.

Brief Story Line

Story focused on the French elite tactical unit referred to as GIGN with its main mission that included counter terrorism, hostage rescue, protection of officials and others. After going through various challenges, few people were finally accepted as new recruits in GIGN which included the strong-willed Max (Tristan Zanchi - Dangerous Liaisons 2022 French version, The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon TV series etc) and the intelligent Rapha (Nelly Lawson - In Tandem TV series etc). 

Meanwhile Commander David (Tomer Sisley - Don't Look Up, We're the Millers etc) who had been working for many years in GIGN was planning to retire to spend time with his wife Jessica (Judith El Zein - Divorce French Style, La recrue mini series etc) and their teenage daughter Manon (Leah Aubert). However when there was a major attack resulted to the stolen of tons of dangerous explosives and seemingly having to do with something happened in the past, David decided to postpone his plan to capture the people responsible and stop the threat.

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

End of Brief Story Line

Just as expected, this series had plenty of intense action sequence that were better seen on a larger screen compared to watching on tablets. The early part of the first episode already showed us what was in store in the series. After some standard intro of the characters and a little background story, it ended with something that got me excited. Subsequently the series was moving quite fast combined with some drama here and there. I like how they gradually revealed the connection of the recent attacks with things in the past. 

The amazing thing was this series had few shocking twists that I did not see coming. To be honest I thought this would just be a simple action series, but turned out they had other ideas and planted some surprises which was pretty awesome. For a gritty action adventure limited series (at least that was how Netflix categorized it) of only 6 episodes, it was rather unusual to have such kind of twists. I was not too surprised with the people behind the attacks and their intention. However I was shocked on the revelations in the last two episodes. And the ending was so crazy that I thought it was not really fair for the series to end just like that. Until now though, there was no official greenlit from Netflix if this would be renewed as it totally depend on viewership. From what I read, Tomer Sisley informed a second season scripts were already being actively worked on, so we will see what would happen in the next month or so.

This series was created by Sylvain Caron (creator of Anaon TV series and writer of Balthazar series etc) together with Julien Leclerq (director of Braqueurs aka Gangland TV series, The Bouncer etc) who also directed all 6 episodes. It has a duration between 42 to 56 minutes which would make it very easy to binge watch full season in a day like I did. I read that GIGN was also involved in the making of the series which showed the serious level of its production. The cast though were almost entirely unfamiliar to me (which should not be surprising considering I have not watched that many French film or series). Aside from the names I mentioned above, there were several additional cast like Guillaume Gouix (Gone for Good TV series, Rosalie etc) as Cedric another senior member of GIGN, Thierry Neuvic (Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, Code Unknown etc) as David's superior Christophe, Leanna Chea (Asterix & Obelix: The Middle Kingdom, 14 Days, 12 Nights etc) as Tanya the demolition expert, Neggzzia as Amal and few others.

As a series focusing on a special unit, this one reminded me a lot of the SWAT in US with its series adaptation and also movie. It even had similar characters of a senior member of the unit with the new self confident & a bit cocky new guy. But it also had similarities with the legendary series 24 due to the main character who had to deal with personal issues with his wife and teenage daughter and having to work on dangerous job plus another specific trait that you would know once you finished watching this. In any case I was quite satisfied watching this series as it was brief, got some cool action and even had few shocking surprises. So if you are in the mood for something that you could easily finish having the attributes I mentioned, then you are welcome to give this a try. 

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