Despite a “solid script and strong performances” SHIFTER’s Chris Harrison calls the new MGM+ series not yet must-see TV in his American Hostage series review.
“The first two episodes of American Hostage are a promising start with an intriguing enough premise, but don’t quite rise to the level of must-see TV.” – Chris Harrison
The first two episodes of American Hostage, the new MGM+ original are a promising start with an intriguing enough premise, but don’t quite rise to the level of must-see TV.
The series, set in Indianapolis, follows the real-life story of Tony Kiritsis (Giovanni Ribisi) and Fred Heckman (Jon Hamm), when Kiritsis, furious about when his mortgage goes into foreclosure without being given a fair shot, kidnaps the son of one of the city’s most powerful men, the head of a family with its hands in the construction, mortgage, and real estate worlds, a sort of perfect pyramid of exploitation. He rigs a dead-man’s line to his hostage, ensuring that the death of the captor will mean the death of the captured.
Kiritsis rants and raves, demanding an apology from the mortgage company’s patriarch and complete immunity, through a personally-chosen mouthpiece — Heckman, the beloved host of a low-stakes but popular Indianapolis radio show. He demands to be interviewed, live on-air, much to the chagrin of the local station manager, who is terrified of being fined for his constant profanity.
Heckman himself has his program down to a science, cranking out a series of well-received stories that are just interesting enough, but nothing especially game-changing (he turns down a great story pitch about policing in the premiere), while mulling over a chance to take his particular brand of easy-breezy journalism to a much larger stage in New York. When Kiritis calls and demands him personally, his world turns upside-down.
It’s in the interviews that the show shines. Hamm’s Heckman is cautious yet confident, and clearly gets off on the excitement of the situation, where he now holds another man’s life — who he says he vaguely knows from attending the same church — in his hands as he acts as the intermediary between the kidnapper and the police. A sly smile creeps across his face after he crushes the initial interview, as he can barely contain his pride and ego once he’s given the chance to re-establish himself as a real reporter.
What’s most striking about the hubbub around the interviews and the hostage situation is how many ways in which it’s business as usual for the crew. The station manager frets over losing sponsors due to the cursing and threats — won’t anyone think of Mattress Daddy?? — and celebrates the ratings bump as if it’s any other breaking news story. The station’s reporters work their new beat with a sense of self-satisfaction, just as excited by the high stakes as Heckman.
Through their reporting, the team starts to empathize with Kiritsis and his predicament, his dreams dashed by a company that that sold him a mortgage with the intent of flipping it for profit, as they start to dig into his past.
Ribisi puts in a strong performance as Kiritsis, who, through all his threats and bloviating, shows enough pathos to elicit feelings of pity in Heckman and the others around him, who insist that he’s actually not a bad guy. Same goes for Dick Hall (Kristoffer Polaha), the kidnapped father of two and part of the small-city business empire who manages to draw some empathy out of the man threatening his life.
The first two episodes raise enough intrigue and touch on enough interesting ideas (I particularly liked the idea of Heckman going from the lead reporter on the story to becoming the story) to suggest that sticking with the series will be worthwhile, thanks to its solid script and strong performances throughout the cast and Kiritsis’s crisis, being squeezed dry by an inescapably large business entity, is particularly resonant today.
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