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Have you ever been on a plane? Do you know how to behave on a plane? I’m betting a lot of you think you know how to behave on a plane and you actually don’t, just based on the simple maths that says a percentage of humanity are natural-born jerks and I’m sure that some of those jerks read websites. Jerks don’t usually know they’re jerks. I don’t make the rules.
You know who knows how to act on a plane? Idris Elba, that’s who. His sense of propriety is so acute that anytime anyone does something on a plane that he deems unacceptable, he gives them a look of such disgust that it’s a wonder the plane doesn’t fall right from the sky. For Idris Elba, there are two types of air travel passengers that are completely unacceptable: people who start chatting immediately after take-off, and people who hijack his plane when he just wants to get to London to make up with his missus.
In the airborne thriller Hijack, Idris Elba (right) knows how to behave on plane. Credit: Apple TV+
Hijack is a seven-part Apple+ show, starring Idris Elba, about … a plane that is being hijacked. What did you expect? The beauty of the show is that it is just quite literally about that. No, you don’t need to know any backstory. No, you will not need to look up Wikipedia to figure out what’s happening. If an alien came to earth, that alien could watch Hijack without any context and still thoroughly enjoy it. Frankly, I’m not sure why the genre “could an alien enjoy this?” doesn’t already exist, but it should. It’s a perfect show, is what I’m trying to say.
Hijack’s final episode airs this week, so I won’t spoil anything for latecomers. The basic premise is that a businessman named Sam (Elba) takes a flight from Dubai to London, and that plane is taken over by several armed passengers with obscure motives. Sam has seven hours to stop the hijackers and get home safely to his estranged ex-wife and son, by using his superpower: his negotiation techniques. That’s not a misprint. Sam does not have superhuman strength. He is not an ex-marine or assassin. He is a man in a cashmere jumper whose special skill is corporate mediations. Did I mention that I love this show?
Of course, it’s a familiar concept, but it’s also a rich one. As a setting, planes are perfect melting pots of weirdness, bringing together people of all walks of life in a strange intimacy. A hundred different stories could be playing out on a single plane trip at any given time: fights, love stories, chance meetings. It’s one of the only times you can sleep in front of strangers and it’s socially acceptable. There’s a level of vulnerability on a plane that’s kind of unusual.
Sam (Idris Elba) does not have superhuman strength. He is not an ex-marine or assassin. He is a man in a cashmere jumper whose special skill is corporate mediations.Credit: Apple TV+
One of the main reasons why Hijack works is the sheer star power of Idris Elba. There are few people that have that sort of gravitas and glamour onscreen – the same sort of energy of your George Clooney, Julia Roberts or Denzel Washington. I’m not sure the show works without his movie star charisma – or his ability to sell very silly situations. Call me crazy, but Idris Elba just seems like he would know how to defuse a bomb. (The way he would defuse is just by looking at it disparagingly.) If Idris Elba needs to somehow pilot the plane – which I hope to God he does – he would simply step into the cockpit and the plane would be too scared to disappoint him.
If an alien came to earth (which seems to be on the cards?) that alien could watch Hijack without any context and still thoroughly enjoy it.
I can easily imagine him sighing and saying “I’m too old for this shit” before doing something fantastic that saves the world. He just seems to know things. Every time he tries a new negotiation tactic out on the hijackers, he sort of dips his head on an angle and peers at them with a steely gaze. It’s like watching Thor use his hammer, but a million times better.
It’s hard not to think of 1980s and ’90s blockbusters while watching Hijack, bombastic movies with high stakes but in a relatively contained world. When the show leaves the plane and depicts what’s going on on land, it’s still entirely connected to what’s going on in the air. Like us, the secondary characters are always thinking about that bloody hijacked plane. It’s easy to imagine this story with Harrison Ford or Bruce Willis in the starring role, an everyman hero who we can root for without complication. The simplicity of the story is what makes it so addictive (though if this was a ’90s blockbuster, Idris Elba’s character would obviously be named “Jack”).
It’s not just the content that makes it feel nostalgic. Dropping new Hijack episodes weekly was a real masterstroke by Apple, making each episode’s cliffhanger feel more urgent and delicious. It reminds me of Kiefer Sutherland’s action drama 24 in that way, with each second counting down in real time. Will Idris be able to win over the hijackers in time? Will he be able to ascertain their aim and exploit their weaknesses in the process? Will the other passengers held hostage help him or do they have their own motives?
Well, we don’t know. The inner lives of everyone else on the plane are largely secondary – this is not Lost; we don’t need to know who they are or what put them on this plane! The only clues to their backstories are where they’re sitting on the plane and how they behave before they know their lives are threatened. In the first episode, there’s a scene entirely dedicated to the etiquette of putting your bag in someone else’s overhead bin. I’m sure Idris Elba would have known what to do.
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