Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: A terrorist group with ties to Eastern Europe smuggles nuclear weapons into an American city. The only thing that stands between millions of innocent civilians and instant death is a ragtag group of cops and soldiers hastily assembled for a secret task force.
The Countdown, which premieres June 25 on Prime Video, isn’t the most original concept for a TV show, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. From Reacher to The Terminal List, Amazon’s streaming service has found remarkable success through the kind of pulse-pounding crime dramas that used to print money for network television. The Countdown is just the latest example of a genre that includes The Wire and The Shield, and while it doesn’t rise to the quality of those all-time classic shows, it’s still a very entertaining season of TV.
Photo by Elizabeth Morris courtesy of Prime Video
Comfort Food
Actually, the best comparison is probably 24, which packaged post-9/11 paranoia (and Islamophobia) into a must-watch television thanks to its ticking-clock concept. Despite its title, The Countdown ditches that ticking clock for a more leisurely story that unfolds over days and even weeks. So while the pressure never feels quite as high, the constant threat of nuclear apocalypse is enough to keep you hitting that “next episode” button.
Every Amazon crime show also needs its hunky white dude, and in this case the honor goes to Jensen Ackles as Mark Meachum, a cop with a death wish who reluctantly joins the task-force. Ackles ratchets up the gruff persona established as Soldier Boy on The Boys (another Prime original), and gradually settles into a deeper character study of a man with nothing to lose as the season goes on.
Ultimately, The Countdown is probably not going to win any awards or go down in TV history. But for fans of Reacher (and Amazon knows that’s a sizable chunk of its customer base), The Countdown is a worthy addition to the company’s growing library of dad-core crime dramas.
