Joel Kinnaman wants to break down Saddam Hussein in TNT’s upcoming limited series High Value Target: The Hunt for Saddam, and the official trailer sets up an intense battle of wills behind one of the most consequential captures of the Iraq War. Watch the trailer above and read on for what to know.
Joel Kinnaman Goes Hunting for Saddam Hussein
Kinnaman plays real-life CIA analyst John Nixon, who pushes to join the team hunting Hussein despite having no field training. “Nobody knows this guy better than me,” he argues in the trailer.
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The manhunt eventually leads to Hussein’s capture by U.S. forces in December 2003, after which Nixon becomes the first CIA officer to interrogate him. The trailer then shifts gears, turning the hunt into a tense psychological confrontation as Nixon attempts to extract answers from a former president who has little interest in cooperating.
“Where’s the WMDs?” Nixon demands at one point.
“Who are you?” Hussein fires back. “You are nothing.”
Pressure is also mounting outside the interrogation room. Nixon’s superiors want answers about Iraq’s alleged weapons of mass destruction, while Hussein appears increasingly interested in reading the man questioning him. As Nixon tries to determine what is true, what is calculated and what the U.S. may have misunderstood, Hussein offers a prediction: “I see a war that will never end.”
The Real Story Behind High Value Target
The series arrives more than two decades after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, with the country’s alleged weapons of mass destruction having been a central justification presented for military action. No WMD stockpiles matching those pre-war claims were ultimately found, casting a lasting shadow over one of the principal arguments for the invasion.
“TNT has always been home to bold, character-driven drama, and High Value Target: The Hunt for Saddam is exactly that,” Turner Networks president Jason Sarlanis said in a statement.
“John Nixon found himself in a singular position at a pivotal moment in modern history – face-to-face with Saddam Hussein as the world sought answers about a war that would reshape the Middle East. More than two decades later, the consequences of that moment still reverberate through global geopolitics, and in Joel Kinnaman, we found the perfect actor to bring this extraordinary story to life.”
Who’s Behind High Value Target?
The limited series is based on Nixon’s book and comes from creators Daniel Stiepleman and Jonathan Wakeham. Leslie Greif serves as a writer and director on the series.
When Does High Value Target Premiere?
High Value Target: The Hunt for Saddam premieres on TNT in the U.S. on September 13 with its first two episodes. Episode three follows on September 14, with subsequent episodes airing across Sunday and Monday nights before the finale on October 4.
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