“Christ, you’ve got an attractive personality.”
An assassin has arrived to take out Jackie Price, but the killer (Christine Adams), can’t help but be frustratingly enchanted by her target.
Indeed, it’s no exaggeration to say that nearly everyone who meets Jackie Price, played by Catherine Zeta-Jones, finds themselves enthralled. It’s also no stretch to say that, amid hours of gunfire, handy knife work and various explosions, Jackie’s personality essentially drives the plot of the eight-episode action series “Kill Jackie,” which premieres Oct. 2 on AMC+.
Based on the hit novel “The Price You Pay” by Nick Haraway (in which the main character is a man named Jack), the show chronicles what happens when Jackie’s past as a high-end drug dealer returns to threaten her new life as a luxury art dealer. Twenty years after Jackie thought she’d left it all behind, her relatively quiet, respectable life is threatened by an elite team of killers who’ve set out to assassinate her as an act of revenge.
Turns out there’s no timeline on retribution.
From the creators of “Killing Eve” (Damon Thomas), “John Wick” (Peter Lawson) and “Gangs of London” (Conor Keane and Tom Butterworth), the series is action-packed, fast-paced, hip and charming. Sometimes, however, those charms wear thin. In short, “Kill Jackie” exudes vibes, but the vibes sometimes mask the show’s convoluted plot and muddied stakes.
Luckily, Zeta-Jones’s considerable charisma — and endearing native Welsh accent, the first time she’s used it on camera — is enough to carry the load, even during the show’s weaker moments.
The story opens with Jackie enjoying her days as a luxury art dealer — a far cry from her drug smuggling era. But the past can be hard to escape, especially if the past was more exciting than your present, more respectable reality. So, when Jackie learns that The Seven Demons, a squad of brutally relentless hitmen, have been hired to take her out, she doesn’t exactly panic.
In fact, she actually seems to perk up a bit with the news.
Jackie, whip-smart and calculating, immediately clocks that it’s someone from her nefarious bygone days who’s contracted The Seven Demons.
Knowledge may be power; however, power doesn’t mean survival will come easy. Soon Jackie realizes that in order to escape she’ll need to confront — and atone for — her prior actions.
Here’s where things get messy, though, both for Jackie and the viewer.
The Seven Demons is a ragtag band of mercenaries helmed by a vengeful frontman, Friedrich (Julian Rhind-Tutt), and engineered by an ambitious frontwoman, Karenina (Sidse Babett Knudsen), who is, in turn, working for a mysterious leader who is, in turn, beset by the antics of his useless, rich boy son. (Sorry, no spoilers here).
Once Jackie figures out that this leader must be someone whom she crossed in her previous, seedier life, she loosely assembles her own squad. That group includes her young and eager protégé, Charlie (Hattie Hook), her amiable but bumbling lawyer, Sam (Daniel Ings) and a longtime associate, Zigor (Óscar Jaenada), who, as it turns out, is seeking his own revenge for past hurts.
From there, the show expands into a bit of a labyrinthine mess. Just about everyone’s got an agenda, and just about everyone is ready to double-cross anyone if it means saving their own hide or, worse, if it aids in their greedy pursuit of acquiring or hoarding all the potential riches.
While Jackie exhibits a sturdier moral compass than many of those around her, she’s also consistently and maddeningly glib, which, despite her magnetism, may leave some viewers less invested.
Even when Jackie’s most shocking secrets are revealed and even when the darkest or most painful parts of her past confront her, she exudes a wry calmness that often feels incongruous with her purpose. Perhaps it’s just about staying true to the show’s quips-and-machine-guns genre, but does Jackie actually care about the outcome, or is she just here to have a bloody adventure, outcome be damned?
Speaking of bloody adventures, the show’s got a lot of them. Each episode is packed with loud explosives, shattering glass, flying knives and just about any other form of death and assault that one could imagine — and more often than not, Jackie is at the wrong end of the weapon or scheme. There may be Seven Demons, but Jackie Price has nine lives.
“Kill Jackie” is inarguably a stylish, kicky romp executed with obvious nods to the likes of Quentin Tarantino and Guy Ritchie and storytelling that recalls the cat-and-mouse hijinks of “Killing Eve.” Its settings are lush — Spain, Wales, London, et. al. — and there are some fun cameos, most notably an all-too-brief appearance from Ron Perlman. Audiences will likely stick around for the entire frenetic ride, but by the end they may also be left asking the question: What does Jackie Price actually want — and why should we care?
“Kill Jackie” premieres Oct. 2 on AMC+.
