The British series Atomic aired on Sky in 2025, depicting two strangers who end up smuggling uranium across North Africa, chased by the CIA, the cartel and more. Now the series is on this side of the Atlantic, thanks to Hulu.
Opening Shot: A sign says “SAHARA DESERT, ALGERIA.” Then it says “A SMUGGLING ROUTE.”
The Gist: Max (Alfie Allen), a cartel drug smuggler, is driving across the desert with a partner named Carlos (Nezar Thalal). Max, who has a picture of his girlfriend on the dashboard, talks about how he believes in love, right before Carlos is shot in the head. The SUV is overtaken by a group of jihadists, led by a Brit (Shazad Latif) who speaks English.
The Brit is about to shoot Max in the head when something he sees in the sky changes his mind; he instead shoots his fellow jihadists and tells Max to get into his truck with his merchandise. Max is transporting cocaine to Beirut, where he’s supposed to pick up two statues to transport to Morocco, all of this for the cartel he works for. But the British jihadist wants to go to Benghazi, in Lybia.
Max tries to get the jihadist’s name, but gets nowhere, so he decides to call the man with a gun “JJ”, joking that he’s a second version of “Jihadi John.” They get past a checkpoint, but then they discover a truck with a number of dead refugees on it; there they discover a young boy hiding beneath the truck. JJ, who has claimed he has no nation, and isn’t religious, is affected by the boy and tries to help him. Max tells him that they can go to an oasis where they can go their separate ways.
In the meantime, a Russian operative named Oksana Shirokova (Avital Lvova), has two cases being transported to Beirut. Those cases, which need to be six feet apart at all times, turn out to be cylinders full of uranium, which are then hidden in statues.
At the oasis, Max, JJ and the young boy are attacked by the family of the jihadists JJ killed, and they burn Max’s shipment. With assistance, Max and JJ escape, and they both end up flying to Beirut.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Created by Gregory Burke and based on the book Atomic Bazaar by William Langewiesche, Atomic is an action-filled series along the lines of The Terminal List.
Our Take: Atomic is more or less a chase thriller. Sure, we’ll get scenes where Max and JJ start to trust each other, and figure out exactly the leverage they have holding the uranium cylinders that the cartel wanted delivered to Morocco. One of the main people pursuing them will be Cassie Elliott (Samira Wiley, who you’ll remember from Orange Is The New Black), a scientist working for the CIA. But the cartel and a group of mercenaries with thick Scottish accents will also be after them, so there are many opportunities for the two of them to build that trust.
The show certainly has a tone problem, though. The signage indicating where and what each location is indicates that there is some sort of whimsy to the show, as are the needle drops like “You Sexy Thing” at the beginning of the episode and “Welcome To The Jungle” at the end. But in between, there’s chases, gunshots, violence, discussions of belief and religion, and people handling uranium. It’s all serious stuff, and there is little to no indication that the tone of the show matches the less-serious narrative touches.
What we don’t know is if any of the subsequent episodes will be as intense as the first one, where there seemed to be a lot of deep conversations, untimely deaths, tragedies, and other big moments. Now that the Max-JJ pairing is in place, the intensity might decrease, even though the two of them are carrying enough plutonium to “blow up the city,” as the man who handled the cylinders tells his cartel contact.
Performance Worth Watching: Shazad Latif’s character JJ seems to have the bigger emotional journey in the first episode, given how he’s affected by the boy he and Max find, and how his actions belie the statements about life and prayer that he says to Max.
Sex And Skin: None in the first episode.
Parting Shot: Where does the pilot leave us? Hanging off a cliff, or running for the hills?
Sleeper Star: Max and JJ run through the streets of Beruit, having taken the cylinders with plutonium from Max’s cartel bosses.
Most Pilot-y Line: “I’ve been after this c**t for years,” says the Scottish bounty hunter.
Our Call: STREAM IT. We’re giving Atomic a mild recommendation because there might be enough chasing through various Northern African locations to make the show a visual treat, and we’re curious about the dynamic between Max and JJ. But it also feels like show that might repeat itself too much as the two men run around with those satchels of plutonium.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.
