12 12 12 Shakes Up the Tired Heist Formula with One Great Idea

“A high-asset robbery, professionally conceived, is twelve months in planning, twelve hours in execution,” says Anthony Mackie’s character, FBI special agent Jack Strickland, at the start of the new Apple TV crime drama, 12 12 12. “A bank robber who is not caught within twelve days is not caught at all.”It’s an amazing premise—honestly, one of the best I’ve heard in a long time. The first episode takes the viewer one month into planning the heist, one day into pulling off the heist, and one hour into their attempted escape. Then, episode 2 will move along to two months, two days, and two hours. Neat, right? But the big question for cocreators Jim Keeble and Dudi Appleton’s time-shifting heist series remains the same as any seemingly impossible bank job: Do they have the right team to pull it off?From the two-episode premiere—now available to stream on Apple TV—I’d say we’re off to a very strong start. 12 12 12’s opening scene pays homage to Ocean’s 11’s Shaobo Qin when a contortionist unfolds his body and climbs out of a large safety deposit box. It’s one of the most genius ideas I’ve seen in a heist story of the last few years—I mean, talk about a man on the inside—especially in an overcrowded field of complex heist series. Remember Netflix’s Kaleidoscope, which allowed viewers to watch the story starting on any episode in the series? Well, 12 12 12 is far more than just a gimmick.Adrienn SzaboJamie Dornan may be fifty shades freed, but he’s trapped into pulling off a dangerous heist in Apple TV’s 12 12 12. The story follows FBI special agent Jack Strickland (Mackie), who has tracked down one of the world’s best bank robbers, Paul Galvin (Jamie Dornan), to Zurich, Switzerland. Galvin and his unruly brother Bobby (Jack Kesy, who was last seen playing Robbie Pedergrast’s late brother on Task), made an enemy of Strickland when the FBI agent’s partner was killed as she attempted to arrest them during a major heist in Newark, New Jersey.Now, Strickland has a personal vendetta against the man. He throws his philosophy that you’ll never catch a bank robber after twelve days of the robbery out the window—which is fine because the creators fabricated the whole “12 12 12” FBI rule anyway just to provide episodic framing for the series. (Maybe it resets now that Galvin is planning another heist?) Either way, 12 12 12 does a great job of making sure you never get lost in the three timelines.Strickland’s white whale is also far from a one-note character himself. He’s a man following in his father’s footsteps to get out of a life of poverty, which would be easier if his brother Bobby wasn’t such of a wild card who can’t be trusted unattended for a single second.Adrienn SzaboKali Reis costars as a member of the heist team.As it turns out, Bobby gambled away all their money from the Newark heist, including Paul’s half. So his brother’s debtors force Paul back into a life of crime under threat of violence to his new lady love in France, his father-in-law, and their unborn child. It’s also quickly revealed that our contortionist is just one of the interesting members of Paul’s team, who are all tasked by Bobby’s mysterious benefactors with robbing a Zurich bank of 800,000 Swiss francs all owned by the Russian mafia.From the first two episodes released so far, the 12 12 12 team seems like it has the right men for the job. The timeline-shifting format allows the series to do much more than simply break the action to provide a little backstory. As we move from months ahead to days after, and vice-versa, we also switch perspectives that allow for Paul and Jack to trade who is the hero and who is the villain.Jack can be both the righteous FBI agent pursuing the bank robbers in the present and a man clearly far too hellbent on revenge in the past. The same goes for Paul, whose team blackmails, honeypots, and occasionally murders throughout the heist, while his backstory paints him as a good man who was forced down a dark road.Adrienn SzaboA heartbreaking reveal early in 12 12 12? When Paul (Dornan) ropes his father-in-law into his life of crime.Where 12 12 12 falls short, at least so far, is in the script. Kari Skogland (who previously worked with Mackie on The Falcon and the Winter Soldier) directs the two-part premiere handily enough, but Keeble and Appleton’s writing is very formulaic. Scripts don’t always matter when you’re working with amazing characters like the contortionist lockpick. True Detective: Night Country’s Kali Reis is also on the team. Her mission is to hack into the subway system so that they can make their escape on public transit, which, of course, goes wrong. But when you have so much dialogue doubling as exposition in between the action, it feels like everyone’s conversations are more for the viewer than they are for each other.For now, I’m hopeful that all the kinks are worked out once we move past the who, what, and why of 12 12 12’s opening episodes. Given the gimmick, and the fact that the series is only eight episodes instead of twelve, I’m excited to see just what throws the entire concept of the series into chaos.