Zero Day is a fast-paced political thriller in the mold of The Parallax View and The Manchurian Candidate. The new Netflix six-part series dares to wonder how the American people, and even more pertinently its politicians, would handle a huge cyber attack across the country.
It launches in mid-February and promises to trigger anyone who still remembers their panicky Y2K projects or generally worries about not owning a transistor radio. Here’s what you need to know about it – and its real-world setting.
What is Zero Day about?
After every piece of technology in America is turned off for a minute, thousands of people die, as planes fall out of the sky, trains collide, and cars crash. Former President George Mullen (Robert De Niro) is pulled out of retirement by current POTUS Evelyn Mitchell (Angela Bassett) to oversee the so-called Zero Day commission. With unprecedented access to technology and given free rein to break civil liberties, Mullen tries to find the people or even country responsible.
But as he dives deeper into the search, Mullen finds a vast web of lies and conspiracies, while he also struggles mentally with the pressure, especially as another cyber attack could result in the deaths of thousands more.
While Zero Day unfolds in a thought-provoking fashion – covering topics such as government oversight, the rise of conspiracy theorists, and how much we can truly trust our politicians – there are also some delightfully melodramatic aspects to its plot and characters that will keep viewers binging through each episode.
Where is Zero Day filmed?
Set primary in New York and Washington DC, Netflix spared no expense making sure that Zero Day feels as genuine as possible. How – and where – exactly did Zero Day achieve this? Take a look below to find out.
Manhattan locations
Robert De Niro has previously joked that he looks for projects that will film in New York, ‘so [I] can stay at home’. And Zero Day granted the great man’s wish, because most of the heart-stoppingly tense thriller show indeed shot across the Big Apple.
In Manhattan, the Lincoln Center’s Leon Lowenstein Center on the Upper West was turned into the CIA headquarters. The legendary Eleven Madison Park restaurant, meanwhile, was used for a meeting between George’s trusted right-hand man Roger Carlson (Jesse Plemons) and the shady Robert Lyndon (Clark Gregg).
Production also took place on Wall Street. It’s here that George shoots back into public consciousness after calming down a scared crowd in the wake of the cyber attack. Other locations include The New York Public Library – hello Ghostbusters! – on Fifth Avenue; Fordham University campus; North Cove Marina; The New York County Courthouse in Foley Square; and the Wall Street Helipad, all of which bring a level of authenticity to the six episodes.
Brooklyn locations
The neighbouring borough of Brooklyn was another key filming spot for Zero Day. The Red Hook Marine terminal is a key location towards the end of the second episode, when one of the suspects finds himself trying to escape the commission’s agents and an assassin aiming to keep him silent. And the soundstage space at Brooklyn Navy Yard’s Steiner Studios provided many of the show’s interiors too.
Located within the Brooklyn Navy Yard neighborhood of the borough, Steiner Studios is the largest production studio complex in America, located outside of Hollywood. This is most likely where the crew were able to set up the interior of the Zero Day commission headquarters, and all of its state of the art surveillance technology that Mullen and his team use to try and find the hackers.
Upstate New York locations
When Zero Day begins Mullen has long retired and is contemplating turning his excessive notes into a memoir. He also lives in Hudson, New York, away from the bustle of Manhattan, but with quick access to the city when required. When it came time to film George and his wife Sheila’s (Joan Allen) huge home, production took place on a private estate in Sleepy Hollow, New York.
Filming also took place at the Hilltop Hanover Farm in Yorktown, where officers search for some of the hackers. Nyack Fresh Market also appears on screen, as well as Nyack’s YMCA and a laundromat in the town.
Washington DC locations
Any political thriller worth its mustard needs to shoot some scenes in the US capital. Zero Day has establishing sequences outside the White House, the United States Capitol building, and of George and Roger being driven over Arlington Memorial Bridge. These led to various road closures across the city for a few days in the middle of June 2024.
When does Zero Day launch on Netflix?
All six episodes of the show launch globally on February 20.
What are the reviews like for the show?
‘Preposterously entertaining’ is The Guardian’s verdict. ‘It’s as fine a piece of hokum as you could wish to see – not least as it stars an on-form Robert De Niro in his first big small-screen outing.’
‘It’s a fun techno-thriller, and while it won’t feature prominently in De Niro’s list of accomplishments, the mystery of who is orchestrating the Zero Day sabotage of the world’s IT infrastructure is spun out with pulpy good cheer,’ writes The Irish Times.
Empire points to some saggy pacing in the middle episodes, but writes that ‘once the truth starts unravelling, the show kicks back up a notch, and the last two instalments are truly nail-biting’.
The Wrap is not as impressed. ‘[It’s] an entire season of repetitive dead-end plotting and muted performances that don’t do much to elevate the script beyond clichés,’ grumbles its critic. ‘The look of Zero Day is about as dim and sludgy as the story,’ agrees Variety.
The Slant damns the show for not taking a line on the themes it explores. ‘The series is so stacked with asterisks and caveats meant to neutralise any point of view,’ it writes, ]that it stands for nothing’.
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