The new show Nautilus (which debuts with two episodes on AMC and AMC+ on June 29 at 9pm Eastern Time/8pm Central Time) keeps the core elements of the book Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea while tossing out or reworking others, and the results are incredibly entertaining. It’s set in the 19th Century and filled with steampunk gadgets galore.
The show feels like a combination of Blake’s 7 and an underwater version of Star Trek, with Nemo and a ragtag group of former slaves and prisoners hijacking the titular Nautilus submarine. They use it to wage war against The Company, a mammoth conglomerate that’s enslaved and killed people in various countries around the globe even as they get richer and more expansive. The Company is even more powerful than the British Empire itself and they killed Nemo’s wife and daughter, enslaving Nemo. Above all else, Nemo swears to get revenge on them by bringing them down.
The Company’s experimental submarine, the Nautilus, is the perfect tool for Nemo’s revenge if he can get his hands on it. The first episode perfectly sets up the series as we’re introduced to Nemo and the other slaves who either join him voluntarily or are accidentally swept up in his hijacking of the Nautilus.
Shazad Latif, who plays Nemo, is no stranger to the fantastic. Among his many other past roles, he starred on Star Trek: Discovery as Ash Tyler, a Klingon who was cosmetically altered to look human, and he brings the same intensity to the role of Nemo. He’s fascinating to watch because not only is his acting on point in every scene, the character is also written well. This isn’t a borderline insane, one-dimensional Nemo clawing at the walls and commanding with an iron fist. There’s also a vulnerability in Latif’s Nemo.
Yes, he’s obsessed and willing to push the Nautilus, himself, and everyone else to the breaking point to achieve his goals. But there’s a desperation too, as if he’s fighting against time itself and has the weight of the world on his shoulders. Even in those times when the crew are bonding and laughing, he can barely force a smile, his mind always seeming to be focused elsewhere, calculating his next plan like he’s playing an eternal chess match.
The other characters in Nemo’s crew are equally intriguing and there are plenty of them. They have a great mix of backgrounds and personalities and it’s fun watching them interact with each other, both in the action scenes and in the quieter moments.
The group includes Kai (played by Tyrone Ngatai), a giant man who’s not only an intimidating fighter, he’s a great cook too! He’s a man of few words and the actor reminds me of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, having the same mix of charm and strength.
Humility Lucas (Georgia Flood) is the daughter of a rich family and has been set up in an arranged marriage with one of The Company’s big shareholders. She rails against being forced into marriage and wants to follow in her father’s footsteps as an engineer, but with it being the 19th Century, women are forbidden to attend universities. So she spends all her free time studying mathematics, physics, engineering, etc. and is quite brilliant.
Her bodyguard Loti (Céline Menville) is a formidable woman and the opposite of Humility, in that all her training is physical instead of intellectual and she’s a master of martial arts and knives (both throwing them and fighting with them).
Gustave Benoit (Thierry Frémont) is a scientist and one of the designers of the Nautilus. He knows the vessel inside out and he agreed to help Nemo hijack it because he thought the ship would be used for scientific research. He and Nemo are friends and Nemo relies on his expertise, but they occasionally argue over Nemo’s need to get revenge versus Benoit’s desire to explore the ocean depths.
That’s just a sampling of the several members of the crew and there isn’t a boring one in the bunch. Don’t get too comfortable with them though, because the show delivers some shocking plot twists and like The Walking Dead and Game of Thrones, none of the characters are safe from being lost or killed.
The main villain of the show is Director Crawley (and what better name for a creepy villain than Crawley?). Crawley will make your skin crawl (no pun intended) and Damien Garvey imbues him with such arrogant evil that every time he appears on screen you wish someone would just punch him in the face to wipe his malicious smile off.
He’s a senior member of The Company and borderline (maybe not so borderline?) racist. He’s determined to take down Nemo and the crew, not just because the Nautilus is The Company’s property but also because he’s not going to let an Indian man make a mockery of him. Nemo and his crew are definitely underdogs here and who doesn’t cheer for the underdog?
But the show’s not just about battles with The Company, over the course of the season a lot of fantastical concepts drop in. The team does some exploration of the deepest ocean depths and in one episode (that’s reminiscent of the film Aliens) the crew battle a horde of starfish-like creatures. And that’s just one of the “monster movie” things they encounter over the course of the season.
The show’s special effects are excellent and do a great job of capturing the mystery and wonders of the ocean, akin to how Star Trek captured the wonders of outer space. Some of my favorite scenes of Nautilus are those moments when one or more of the characters are looking out of the ship’s many viewports and taking in the infinite variety of sea creatures darting about the depths.
The Nautilus’s design makes it look like a giant shark, it’s elongated hull dotted across the top with metal spikes that look like fins. The glowing view portal on the bridge of the ship makes it look like it has a massive Cyclopean eye. It’s a lovely and sleek design.
Nautilus is escapist entertainment at its finest. The first season is 10 episodes and I guarantee you’ll be wanting more when the end credits roll on that 10th episode.
See you on June 29th!
Nautilus two-episode series premiere airs Sunday, June 29, on AMC.
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