You know what they say. If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the drug smuggling across the Sahara racket. Alas, these are wise words that young cartel driver Max (Alfie Allen, bringing exactly the reckless high energy the character and venture require) has failed to heed. We first meet him speeding across the Algerian portion of the north African desert with a companion called Carlos (Nezar Thalal) on their way to Beirut to exchange a great deal of cocaine for some antique statues, when bish, bash, wallop, what’s happening?! An ambush by a militant group armed with machine guns who kill Carlos and are about to kill Max? But then one of the group turns on the others and kills all of them stone dead instead, before flinging Max and the coke in the car and hightailing it out of there? That is what’s happening! Goodness me and welcome to the first 37 seconds of Atomic, a five-part miniseries you shouldn’t expect to let up any time soon.
Max’s rescuer (Shazad Latif) is averse to providing his real name so Max calls him JJ – short for “Jihadi John”. If this offends anyone’s delicate sensibilities I think you should have left 37 seconds ago. JJ reroutes them to Benghazi for unspecified reasons. Max can hope to return to his original plans thereafter.
