The Undeclared War

Plus: a profoundly reverent portrait of the first black player to win the Wimbledon men's singles titles.

All in all, then, the signifiers don’t lie: The Undeclared War is a very classy thriller indeed. (John McEnroe’s behaviour, he told one interviewer, made him both irritated and envious of such ‘emotional freedom’.) Slowly, however, he edged towards a realisation of which side he was on – although never to anything so impolite as outright militancy. Never afraid of a big issue, Kosminsky has previously tackled the invasion of Iraq (The Government Inspector), British Isis volunteers (The State) and the postwar history of Palestine (The Promise). Now he takes on cyber warfare, which has the rare property of being both terrifying and undramatic, with much of the action consisting of people doing advanced computer science. The setting is April 2024, when Saara (Hannah Khalique-Brown), the young woman from scene one, joins GCHQ on the very day that Britain comes under cyber attack. But even if The Undeclared War doesn’t quite solve the central problem its subject poses, the subject itself is still a powerfully intriguing one. The Undeclared War has many of the traditional signifiers of a classy thriller: the assiduous letter-by-letter captioning of every location; the weirdly precise time-checks (‘Sunday 09.47’); above all, the frankly baffling opening scene.

Writer Peter Kosminsky, who was behind a television adaptation of Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall, describes cyber terrorism as "the most urgent battle of our time".

The Undeclared War is not short of popular actors. But how do you win a war most of the public don’t know you’re fighting? Interestingly, some of The Undeclared War was filmed in Wales, which you can read about here.

Peter Kominsky's new thriller imagines a surprise cyber attack on Britain by an unknown foreign aggressor.

That by the end of the series we may be none the wiser as to how a cyber attack really works doesn’t matter – it seems that no-one in the room where it happens is too sure either. But Saara has an active imagination, prompting surrealist scenes reminiscent of Sherlock’s sprawling mind palace: as her brain rattles through the cipher we see her comb through libraries, unlocking doors and climbing stairs. It’s here that the series shows its emotional side, interrogating the experience of a young British-Asian woman who is underestimated by those around her and with ambitions beyond those expected of her. As you can imagine, there’s not exactly a lot Saara is trusted with at this point, but while playing around with the offending malware in a sandbox programme she spots a piece of hidden code and alerts the team to a second imminent attack. The series – streaming in full on All 4 or airing weekly on Thursday evenings – follows the tug of war between a cautious, considered GCHQ and a kneejerk government facing public scrutiny as Britain suffers an unexpected cyber attack from an unknown aggressor. Now, it’s time to see what all the fuss is about.

The Undeclared War promises to take viewers on a compelling ride as Britain finds itself under cyber attack. Set in a post-pandemic UK and in the run-up to the ...

The Undeclared War is going to be airing on Channel 4 tonight (June 30) at 9pm. It imagines how the next few years might play out in the domain of cyber warfare – a battle unseen by the public but with potentially devastating consequences. How many episodes are in The Undeclared War on Channel 4? The Undeclared War airs on Channel 4 tonight at 9pm and the full series is on All4 now How many episodes are in The Undeclared War on Channel 4? THE UNDECLARED WAR will be launching on Channel 4 this evening - but how many episodes are in the new series?

Peter Kosminsky's intelligent, chilling drama about a Russian cyber attack on the UK is hampered by some implausible Hollywood plotting.

After six episodes, you’ll be gripped by the idea that a real-life enemy wouldn’t have to drop bombs – they could do untold damage simply by taking us offline. The drama is set in 2024 and includes plenty of real-life references. No! He tells her she can pop up to Harrogate if she fancies it, and when she returns with some more bombshell information from a Russian whistle-blower they casually discuss it in the canteen. It’s a lovely characterisation of a solitary figure, and you may find yourself wishing Rylance was in more scenes. But first you need to swallow the ludicrous idea that the only person capable of staving off World War Three has been in the job for two hours. It is disturbing to learn how easily we could be brought to our knees – an attack that takes out the internet and cash machines, grounds planes and shuts down the rail network, and that’s before we get to the disruption of gas and water supplies.

(Image: Channel 4/Playground Television UK (TUW) Ltd.) Laura Aviles, Senior Film Manager at Bristol Film Office, part of Bristol City Council, added: “With ...

Speaking on filming in Bristol, Robert Jones, Producer, The Undeclared War said: “The Bristol Film Office were incredibly supportive in helping us find and service a wide variety of locations in and around the area for The Undeclared War.” A major new drama series filmed in Bristol is set to air on Channel 4 on Thursday night. When a routine stress test of internet infrastructure goes awry, 21-year-old GCHQ intern Saara Parvin (played by Hannah Khalique-Brown) suddenly finds herself operating on the invisible frontier of high-stakes cyber warfare.

Adrian Lester, Simon Pegg and the Mark Rylance star in a glacially paced show where GCHQ staff seem like bored office workers, and the one-note dialogue ...

Kosminsky’s involvement presumably explains the appearance of such heavyweights as Adrian Lester (prime minister Andrew Makinde, who apparently ousted Boris 15 months ago), Alex Jennings (head of GCHQ, David Neal) and – still to come in later episodes – Mark Rylance (John Yeabsley, a former GCHQ asset brought back to help them deal with the attack). At the moment – and only one episode was available for review – they don’t have much to do. Alas, The Undeclared War has taken the other route and is clearly designed to induct us all into a new field of worry. And you should be careful what you wish for if, like me, you were hoping The Undeclared War would deliver the perfect dose of quality hokum and escapism from the real world as it crashes and burns around us.

The Undeclared War, featuring Simon Pegg and Adrian Lester, was shot at a host of sites across the country.

The Undeclared War was shot at a host of sites. Peter Kosminsky said: “The Undeclared War has been many years in the making. Set two years in the future, new thriller drama The Undeclared War depicts an urgent incoming cyber attack in the heart of a fictional government during the lead up to a general election.

Hannah Khalique-Brown and Adrian Lester also star in Peter Kosminsky's ambitious but flawed Channel 4 series.

Politically, too, the series is muddled. Fanciful vignettes dramatising the coding process are particularly naff (we see Saara strolling through library corridors, solving puzzles and opening doors to represent what’s going on in her computer). But there are also little moments that ring totally false. Cyberattacks are a very contemporary but widely under-acknowledged real-world danger; the idea of a series shedding light on our country’s response to them is intriguing. The acting is stilted and unconvincing; the cast are not helped by a witless, clunky script. Against the backdrop of this we have an unsteady political landscape: in the world of The Undeclared War, Boris Johnson has been usurped by Andrew Makinde (Adrian Lester) – the country’s first Black PM, and a Tory – who fears the electoral ramifications a cyberattack could have. It’s a shame, therefore, that the end product doesn’t have anything worthwhile to say about pretty much any of them.

The Undeclared War – the gripping new cyber thriller from Peter Kosminsky, starring Oscar-winner Mark Rylance and Mission Impossible's Simon Pegg, ...

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Hannah Khalique-Brown - who plays Saara in the Channel 4 cyber thriller - has discussed the season premiere's "too good to be true" ending.

"My heart was racing all the time, because it's so intense... The Undeclared War is airing on Channel 4. I think there was a line [in the script], 'She's never been more alone', or something like that.

'The Undeclared War' star on learning to code, coping with anxiety, and her deep appreciation of Derren Brown.

I was going to say Hey Ya! by Outkast because I did that with my friends on a camping trip once, but we actually got booed. Bit rogue, but my celeb idol is Derren Brown. I love that man and all of his work and writing. I have too many acting idols to list them all, but music-wise it would be Lana Del Rey, whose music and writing has been a huge part of my life for about a decade. Strictly Come Dancing. I think dancing is one of the most joyous things in the world. You can kind of just forget all of your troubles when you have a problem in front of you and you’re just trying to solve it,” she tells. But honestly, I am constantly watching films and series. “I’m a sucker for magic, I’m like a little kid. It’s been such a source of companionship to me.” “I decided to teach myself how to code,” she tells me via Zoom. “I learnt two programming languages. “Just because it’s so unlikely to go your way.” A humble confession, especially for a rising star. me. “It feels like all your problems float into this outer bubble, and you’re in this inner bubble. Watching the tense series now, it is hard to imagine anyone but Khalique-Brown in the role of Parvin, but it wasn’t a given.

The Channel 4/Peacock drama series stars Simon Pegg and newcomer Hannah Khalique-Brown, who plays a genius hacker on work experience at GCHQ.

Enter Saara, whose first day on the job coincides with the attack. When Britain is the victim of a targeted cyberattack, she's ideally placed to prove herself. Of course, Saara isn't really defying gravity - at least not in the physical world.