The Sentinels review – this thrilling drama about super soldiers proves TV can be done differently
It’s exciting, propulsive and not based on the same old threadbare franchises … this adaptation of a French comic book series is a steampunky tale of a secret experiment to inject wounded first world war fighters with a serum
The alternate history show has long been a TV mainstay, be it For All Mankind (what if the Soviets had won the space race?), The Man in the High Castle (what if the Axis powers had won the second world war?) or even Blackadder (what if Tudor history was essentially all nonsense?). The Sentinels enters this crowded, often conflict-heavy genre with a wartime premise of its own: what if, during the first world war, the French army had groomed a secret cabal of doped-up super soldiers, capable of incredible feats of violence?
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An unapologetic mashup of postapocalyptic, steampunk action and old-timey war drama with a distinctly Gallic (and Germanic) feel, this eight-part series – adapted from acomic book series by Enrique Breccia and Xavier Dorison – is an intriguing entry to the “what if?” genre. And if it sounds a little too on-the-nose (bad historical event plus major anachronisms equals … TV gold?!), know that The Sentinels is so confident in its worldbuilding that it manages to work not just as an alternate history, but as a solid sci-fi thriller.
Our reticent hero is Gabriel Ferraud (Louis Peres), a half-dead combatant with raging daddy issues who has been plucked from the battlefield in 1915 and dispatched to a top-secret research lab. There, he is injected with a serum in a risky experiment that quickly provokes a seizure. But that’s the least of the French boffins’ problems – the Germans stage an attack with the aim of getting their hands on their enemies’ research, killing one of the masterminds of the Sentinels programme in the process. (Naturally, we later discover that there was more to that initial killing than the audience – or the main characters – could have known.) Gabriel is desperate to be reunited with his wife, Irène (Olivia Ross), and their infant son, but he is essentially a prisoner in the Sentinels programme: if he blabs about the experiment or rebels in any way he will be classed as a deserter. Oh, and the serum is making his cells mutate, giving Dr Marthe (Pauline Étienne) cause for concern. “Loss of control is normal at first,” Gabriel is told by his new army pals – just what you want to hear when you’re getting high on an experimental drug against your will.
While most of the action is centred on Gabriel – played with a mix of steeliness and unease by Peres – there is a surfeit of side plots, too. Irène, a journalist, tries to figure out what has become of her husband, and why Col Mirreau (Noam Morgensztern) is gatekeeping information about soldiers who have died in battle. Her world collides with that of muttonchopped nightclub owner The Baron (Ouassini Embarek), who is caught up in his own dodgy, war-adjacent dealings. And Marthe – a canny cog in the French machine who clearly has some reservations about her employers – wonders about what Mirreau and friends were doing before the Sentinels programme, in a potentially even more secretive precursor titled Project Atlas.
It could all be un peu trop, and yet The Sentinels pulls it off. It does well to build a sense of intrigue while also – crucially – providing the answers to some of the questions it poses, rather than falling into the science fiction trap of a mystery box that becomes increasingly, frustratingly abstruse. The BBC’s press release makes reference to a “Frankenstein-ian level of depth and empathy”, which sounds a little bombastic at first but makes sense as the series unfolds. It is, ultimately, a story about two wars unfolding at the same time: the first world war, sure, but also the one that is being waged inside Gabriel’s body, as he submits to the drug he has taken under duress and which causes him mounting levels of mental distress. It’s not always subtle (“Je suis dangereux,” he declares at one stage), but there’s a Shelley-ish, ethical angle that persists. Not least when Marthe is also tasked with experimenting on a woman who has been sentenced to death.
The Sentinels has its flaws. The sci-fi tropes are many, and sometimes the shoot-’em-up sequences can feel more like sitting through video-game cut scenes than watching a television drama. But it is still exciting and propulsive, and proof that not everything on TV these days has to be drawn from the same old franchises and threadbare IP. The series ends with a final, brutal scene that all-but ensures a second run, and which swerves the temptation for a neat and happy conclusion to Gabriel’s tale. After all, alternate histories might play with the horrors of the past, but they don’t always outrun reality.
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The Sentinels is on BBC Four and available on iPlayer
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