Kill Jackie's Debut: Catherine Zeta-Jones Carries Prime Video's Divisive Assassin Thriller

Catherine Zeta-Jones is officially back in action mode. Kill Jackie, the eight-episode assassin thriller that premiered October 2 on Prime Video and AMC+, gives the Oscar winner a role built for her particular brand of steel and glamour — and critics are in rare agreement that she is the best thing in it. Beyond that consensus, the show itself has split reviewers down the middle.

Based on Nick Harkaway's novel The Price You Pay, the series follows Jackie Price, a former cocaine smuggler turned art dealer who finds herself hunted by The Seven Demons, an elite hit squad with a very professional interest in her survival. The show comes from creatives behind Killing Eve and Gangs of London, with scripts by Tom Butterworth, Conor Keane, Peter Lawson, and Damon Thomas — a pedigree that raised expectations for something sharp, stylish, and vicious.

One standout, one problem

Zeta-Jones plays Jackie as a woman who has spent years trying to outrun her past and is now forced to outgun it. Co-starring Daniel Ings as panicky lawyer Sam and Hattie Hook as her assistant Charlie, the series leans on its lead's charisma to paper over plotting that several critics found thin. Radio Times was the harshest, calling the show dead on arrival. CBR praised the performances while arguing the series fails to build real emotional depth. But Why Tho landed somewhere in between, describing it as a stylishly bumpy action ride — flawed, but never boring.

That split is familiar territory for the assassin-thriller genre, where star power often has to do the heavy lifting. Zeta-Jones, who has always excelled at playing formidable women with secrets, seems to understand exactly what kind of show she is in. Her Jackie is poised, dangerous, and clearly enjoying the chaos around her, even when the story mechanics creak.

The dual-platform launch on Prime Video and AMC+ gives the series a wide runway, and the eight-episode structure suggests a complete arc rather than a franchise tease. For viewers who come for the action and stay for a magnetic lead performance, Kill Jackie delivers its headline promise. For those hoping the Killing Eve pedigree would produce another genre-defining hit, the early reviews suggest a more modest achievement — carried, above all, by its star.