Much to the chagrin of Danny Patrick, GSHQ’s Chief of Operations, the crisis is not yet over. The cyber-attack originating in Russia, compromised both British and American data. The “Special Relationship” was almost irreparably ruptured and the UK was nearly tricked into launched an attack against Russia that would have appeared unprovoked to the rest of the world. In foiling these plans, Saara Parvin, the intern who became Patrick’s trusted ally, created a secret back door into the Russian FSB’s system, scraping intel that partially regained the American government’s confidence.
Parvin also receives crucial information (and a plea for help) from her former friend, Vadim Trusov, a Russian hacker turned confidential informant. GSHQ assumed the FSB took Trusov into custody to imprison and interrogate him. Instead, they shipped him off to a secret Chinese facility to work on the next stage of the operation.
The next wave of malware from China initially only targets the Transportation and Trade Ministries, but it is only a matter of time before it jumps into national security systems. Consequently, Patrick makes the unprecedented decision to completely shut down both Ministries systems. That earns him the wrath of Richard Marston, the freshly appointed Foreign Minister, and Prime Minister Andrew Makinde (only appearing in recaps of the first season), who have staked their careers on a negotiating a blockbuster trade deal with the Mainland regime.
Suddenly, Patrick’s wife, Barbara Napier, is in the thick of the crisis. The former MI6 agent currently serves as the head of GSHQ’s China team. Awkwardly, someone in Napier’s division might be directly implicated in the malware attack.
The first season of Undeclared War convincingly dramatized the democratic Western world’s vulnerabilities to cyberterrorism and its political leaders’ inability to match the long-term strategic thinking of our adversaries. Frustratingly, it also wasted a good deal of time exploring Parvin’s sexuality and her conflicted relationships with Muslim family. Season two corrects those mistakes, jettisoning Parvin’s box-checking subplots, focusing instead on the espionage and geopolitics at-hand. The only personal lives meriting screentime this season are those of Patrick and Napier, whose marriage will be greatly strained by the secrets they must keep from each other.
Frankly, season two has a “ripped-from-the-headlines” urgency that makes it alarmingly timely and realistic. Makinde’s dogged pursuit of the trade deal mirrors Starmer’s recent record of capitulation to the CCP, especially his support for the proposed Chinese mega-embassy, which national security specialists identified as a danger to UK communications systems, given its location, perched above a crucial nexus of fiber optic cables. Indeed, season two unambiguously identifies the CCP regime as a threat to the democratic way of life, but also gives credit to free-thinking Chinese dissenters.
Ed Stoppard is also terrific as the pompous Marston. In contrast, Danny Sapani radiates acute world-weariness and hard-earned gravitas as GCHQ security chief Charlie Francis. Yet, season two truly excels beyond the first season because of the chillingly villainous Chinese spymaster, whose true nature and identity are among the big revelations this time around.
It is frustrating (and even rather silly) when international thrillers invent fictional countries to serve as the bad guys, out of a reluctance to offend Russia or China. Colin Teevan and his assorted co-writers certainly had no such fear while plotting season two. The resulting six episodes are extremely grounded in reality, all of which were tightly and tautly helmed by Paul McGuigan. Cerebral, but also grabbily suspenseful and accessible, season two of The Undeclared War is enthusiastically recommended for discerning thriller fans when it starts streaming tomorrow (8/27) on Peacock.
