When Hijack premiered on Apple TV in June 2023, it arrived with a deceptively simple premise: a plane from Dubai to London gets hijacked during a seven-hour flight. But what creators George Kay and Jim Field Smith delivered was far more ambitious than a straightforward thriller. They crafted something that felt both urgently contemporary and deeply character-driven, proving that the confined setting of an airplane cabin could become a pressure cooker for exploring human nature, desperation, and morality. The show didn’t just entertain—it sparked genuine conversations about how streaming television could reinvent the real-time thriller format that had been dormant since the glory days of network drama.
What makes Hijack remarkable is how it respects the intelligence of its audience. Rather than relying on cheap twists or melodrama, the show builds tension through meticulous character work and the slow-burn realization that nothing on this flight is quite what it seems.
What’s particularly fascinating about Hijack‘s trajectory is how it managed to become the second Apple TV+ series to crack Nielsen’s streaming top 10, a significant achievement in a landscape crowded with prestige productions. That success didn’t happen by accident. The show’s 7.6/10 rating reflects something interesting—this is a series that divided audiences thoughtfully rather than universally delighting them, which often signals a show willing to take risks. Over its first season’s seven episodes and into its expanded second season of eight episodes, creators maintained a commitment to complexity that rewarded careful viewers while challenging those expecting conventional thriller beats.
The genius of the creative vision lies in how the unknown episode runtime actually became an asset to the storytelling. Rather than padding or trimming scenes to fit rigid time slots, Kay and Field Smith allowed their drama to breathe naturally. Some episodes might feel taut and claustrophobic; others give space for character moments that deepen our understanding of the ensemble. This flexibility proved crucial in a show where tension comes as much from what people aren’t saying as from external threats.
- The central premise: a hijacked flight becomes a microcosm of human conflict
- Idris Elba’s protagonist navigating impossible choices in real-time
- Supporting cast members with competing agendas and hidden motivations
- The plane itself functioning as a character—confined, vulnerable, a system under stress
- Psychological warfare replacing conventional action sequences
Season 2’s expansion to eight episodes signaled that the show had earned the trust of both creators and platform. Rather than stretching a seven-hour story, it suggested a deepening of the narrative—that the hijacking’s aftermath, its implications, and its human toll warranted additional exploration. This decision revealed something important about Hijack: it was never really about the hijacking itself, but about what the hijacking reveals about the people trapped within it.
The cultural moment for Hijack felt particularly resonant. Released during an era when streaming audiences had grown increasingly sophisticated about thriller conventions, the show arrived offering something that felt both timely and timeless. The conversations it sparked weren’t just about plot mechanics—they centered on questions of agency, consequence, and the gray areas where morality becomes complicated. In a media landscape often hungry for easy answers, Hijack insisted on complexity.
- Season 1: Established the high-concept premise and proved the format could sustain tension
- Season 2: Expanded the scope and deepened character investment with additional runtime
- The arc from confined thriller to something more psychologically intricate
What’s most impressive about the show’s creative achievement is how it demonstrates that contained drama can be genuinely gripping. There’s a temptation in television to equate scale with stakes, but Hijack proved that seven hours in the air over the Atlantic Ocean—with a diverse ensemble, diverging agendas, and mounting pressure—could generate as much tension as any sprawling saga. The drama emerges from character, from the impossible situations people face, and from the slow revelation that seemingly straightforward answers collapse under scrutiny.
The show’s willingness to complicate its protagonist and supporting characters meant that viewers couldn’t simply root for “good guys” versus “bad guys”—everyone became implicated in the moral complexity of the situation.
For anyone paying attention to where premium drama was heading on streaming platforms, Hijack represented a template worth studying. It showed that Apple TV could develop original properties with genuine artistic ambition, that thriller formats could be revitalized through character focus, and that audiences would show up for stories that trusted them to navigate moral ambiguity. With a Returning Series status and its journey from premiere to expansion, Hijack earned its place in the conversation about what elevated drama looks like in the streaming era. It’s the kind of show that doesn’t necessarily need universal acclaim—it needs the right audience finding it and recognizing what it’s attempting. And that’s exactly what happened.
