You always wonder when a novel that has already been turned into a two-hour-plus movie could be turned into a ten-hour miniseries. However, if there is any feature that can be extended in this way, it is Novel by Fredrick Forsyth Day of the Jackal. A new limited series does just that; It has the added bonus of starring Eddie Redmayne and Lashana Lynch.

Opening Shot: An old man repeats German phrases that he has recorded to sound like the voice on a tape recorder.

Main idea: As we can see, the man who looks like a grey-haired old janitor actually has a complex structure; He killed the real grizzled old janitor to impersonate him. He goes to the headquarters of a media company in Berlin headed by a man running for chancellorship. After retrieving a concealed handgun, he shoots his way into the office until he reaches the man’s son. But instead of killing him, he shoots the man in the knee.

When she escapes and returns to the apartment she rented, she takes off her make-up. We later learn that he is an assassin named the Jackal (Eddie Redmayne). His aim was not to kill the man’s son, but to take the emperor out; Far from the hospital, he measures the wind with a windmill, then disassembles his bag and reassembles it into a high-powered rifle. It fires a high-precision shot that hits the target after a few test shots. He quickly turns the gun into a bag, leaves an explosive gift for the authorities to find, and leaves. He also blows up the car he used to escape.

In London, MI6 agent Bianca Pullman (Lashana Lynch) hears about the shooting while at home with her husband Paul (Sule Rimi) and teenage daughter Jasmine (Florisa Kamara). When he goes to work the next day, he sees a meeting with German intelligence. He finds a way to meet because he is a weapons expert and knows he can help. Although her superior sends a note to director Isabel Kirby (Lia Williams) that Bianca is a “troublemaker,” Kirby is intrigued by Bianca’s description of a custom-made rifle turned into a briefcase. He also has a presence in Northern Ireland who knows the person who may have made that rifle.

Meanwhile, the Jackal makes his way to Paris through a constricted border line, which he crosses with little difficulty. At a train station internet cafe, he logs into the dark web portal where he receives his work and payments. While he is waiting for his client in Berlin to confirm payment, someone else comes to him and offers $10 million for his services. The client (Eleanor Matsuura) wants to meet, something the Jackal won’t do. So he negotiates the down payment just to meet up. When she speaks to the client—she makes sure she doesn’t meet him face to face—she learns that he wants her to kill tech guru Ule Dag Charles (Khalid Abdalla), who promises to create apps that tell users where he is. corporate money comes and goes.

When Bianca’s presence refuses to give up the location of the rifle manufacturer, MI6 brings in the woman’s daughter for questioning after she allegedly was arrested during a protest she organized. However, after they threw him into a cell, he was found unresponsive.

Which TV Series Will It Remind You Of? Day of the Jackal Created and written by Ronan Bennett (Best Male) and is adapted from Fredrick Forsyth’s 1971 novel of the same name. The book is also Filmed in 1973.

Our View: Day of the Jackal It’s a pure cat-and-mouse thriller, further deepened by the knowledge both the chaser and the chased have about their dealings. While there are many side characters in this story, success or failure depends entirely on the performances of Redmayne and Lynch, both of whom portray their characters masterfully; It’s likely that both have some external motivation that influences their decisions.

Redmayne’s The Jackal, who seems rather cold-blooded and unemotional about his job, is not only faced with the opportunity to make money from a big job and retire, but he must also pursue payment for the job in Berlin. For Bianca, she will have to balance her search for the Jackal while staying in touch with her family. Even as early as the first episode, she prioritizes talking to her source over a family function, and her daughter’s reaction to this tells us this is far from the first time.

While the first episode doesn’t seem to feature much of a plot, it definitely sets the stage to tell us who the main players are in the story, which definitely makes us want to see more.

Sex and Skin: There is nothing in the first episode.

Parting Shot: At home in Spain, the Jackal logs into his portal and tracks the Berlin payment that has not yet arrived. All he gets is two lines: “FUCK. YOU.”

Sleeping Star: We’ll give it to Ursula Corberó, who plays the Jackal’s wife, Nuria. We wonder how much she really knows about what her husband is doing.

Most Pilot-y Lines: There is a scene in Stuttgart where the Jackal buys a chess set. While the set becomes an effective thing in the scene where he crosses the tightened border, we’re not sure why the scene where he buys the set is so long. Maybe to show that he has hobbies?

Our call: TURN ON STREAM. We expect lots of tension and action. Day of the Jackal. Redmayne and Lynch’s performances give hope that the tension can last for 10 episodes, but we are not sure whether the intensity of the first episode can be maintained.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and technology, but she’s not fooling herself: she’s a television addict. His articles have been published in the New York Times, Slate and Salon. RollingStone.com, VanityFair.comFast Company and elsewhere.