ZeroZeroZero lands as a crime drama about a shipment of cocaine and the people who move it, but the show’s real subject is distance. Created by Stefano Sollima, Leonardo Fasoli and Mauricio Katz for Sky Atlantic, Canal+ and Amazon Prime Video, the eight-episode first season follows one load from Monterrey, Mexico to Gioia Tauro, Italy, and finds trouble at every handoff.
Trailer, via Sky TV.
The Lynwoods and the Broker in the Middle
The series takes its name from the whitest, finest-milled wheat flour, 000, which the source material calls “the nickname among narcotraffickers for the purest cocaine on the market.” That is the cargo, and the Lynwoods are the ones carrying it. Andrea Riseborough and Dane DeHaan play Emma and Chris Lynwood, members of an American family from New Orleans whose shipping company acts as broker between Mexican and Italian organized crime. Gabriel Byrne plays the family patriarch.
The arrangement sounds clean. It is not. The Lynwoods are not buyers or sellers. They are the pipe, and a pipe has no friends.
Two Buyers, Two Problems
The sellers are Mexican drug lords Enrique and Jacinto Leyra, working with Manuel Quinteras and his group of corrupt soldiers. Harold Torres plays Manuel Quinteras. The buyer is Don Minu La Piana, a boss of the ‘Ndrangheta, played by Adriano Chiaramida. His position is challenged by his ambitious grandson Stefano, played by Giuseppe De Domenico, and by the Curtiga family.
That infighting is the engine of the season. It reroutes the shipment to Morocco, and the delay does damage to everyone waiting on it. The show is smart about what a delay actually costs: not just money, but standing, and the trust that keeps a criminal network from eating itself.
A Shipment That Keeps Moving Away
| Episode | First aired |
|---|---|
| Season 1 premiere | 2020-02-14 |
| Season 1 finale | 2020-03-06 |
Eight episodes, three weeks, one season. ZeroZeroZero premiered on television on 14 February 2020 on Sky Atlantic in Italy, after a world premiere at the 76th Venice International Film Festival on 5 September 2019, where the first two episodes screened out of competition.
The structure is a relay race with no baton. Mexico to Italy, Italy to Morocco, with each leg introducing new people who want a cut. The cast list alone tells you how spread out this gets: Nika Perrone as Lucia La Piana, Erick Israel Consuelo as Moko, Mauricio Mendez as Anchorman.
What the Show Gets Right
ZeroZeroZero is based on Roberto Saviano’s non-fiction book of the same name, a study of the cocaine business across continents. The series keeps that reportorial spine. It is less interested in the glamour of the trade than in the logistics, and the logistics are where the dread lives.
the nickname among narcotraffickers for the purest cocaine on the market
That line, from the source material, is the whole thesis. Purity is the brand, and the brand is what everyone is willing to kill over.
Where the Season Slows Down
The problem is that a relay race has no center. The Lynwoods are the closest thing to protagonists, but the show keeps handing the story to the Leyras, to Don Minu, to Stefano, to the corrupt soldiers, and each handoff costs momentum. By the time the shipment reaches Morocco, the season has spent so much time establishing the machinery that the people inside it start to blur.
The show received generally favorable reviews, and that tracks. It is a well-made, well-acted, genuinely ambitious piece of television. It is also, at eight episodes, a little too in love with its own map.
The Verdict on ZeroZeroZero
ZeroZeroZero earns its 7.5. The scope is real, the performances are strong, and the decision to treat cocaine as a supply chain rather than a temptation is the right one. What holds it back is the same thing that makes it interesting: it is a story about a network, and networks do not have heroes. The Lynwoods are the most compelling thread, and the season keeps cutting away from them just as they get interesting.
This is a show worth watching for the craft and the ambition. It is not a show that will make you love anyone in it. That may be the point, and it may also be the limit.
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