---
title: "The Looming Tower"
year: 2018
kind: "series"
canonical: "https://film.one/tv/the-looming-tower"
fi1m_id: "the-looming-tower"
imdb_id: "tt6474236"
tmdb_id: 70721
wikidata_id: "Q47001863"
fi1m_score: 70
critics_score: 65
critics_reviews: 13
published: "2026-09-24T22:42:51.760400+00:00"
updated: "2026-09-24T22:42:52.224586+00:00"
region: "PA"
licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL."
---

# The Looming Tower (2018)

Created by Lawrence Wright, Dan Futterman, Alex Gibney · 50m · War & Politics, Drama

## Identity

The Looming Tower

- **Canonical:** https://film.one/tv/the-looming-tower
- **Type:** Series
- **Fi1m ID:** the-looming-tower
- **IMDb ID:** tt6474236
- **TMDB ID:** 70721
- **Wikidata ID:** Q47001863
- **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6474236/, https://www.themoviedb.org/tv/70721, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q47001863

**Fi1m score: 70** · Critics 65 from 13 reviews

*In a sentence:* Jeff Daniels shouts at the CIA for eight hours and, annoyingly for the CIA, history agrees with him

> A patient, well-acted account of how the FBI and the CIA failed to talk to each other in the years before 11 September 2001. Jeff Daniels and Tahar Rahim are excellent; the CIA is written as a pantomime, and the series is weaker for it.

## Synopsis

New York, 1998. John O’Neill (Jeff Daniels) runs the FBI’s counterterrorism squad and is convinced that Osama bin Laden means to strike the United States. Standing in his way is Martin Schmidt (Peter Sarsgaard), who runs the CIA’s bin Laden unit in Washington and will not share what his analysts, among them Diane Priest (Wrenn Schmidt), have found. Richard Clarke (Michael Stuhlbarg) at the White House tries to keep the two agencies in the same room. O’Neill’s young agent Ali Soufan (Tahar Rahim), an Arabic speaker, is sent to read the documents nobody else can. In August 1998, bombs go off at the American embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, and the FBI flies out. The story is told from a hearing room in 2004, where Soufan is asked what went wrong.

## Review

Lawrence Wright’s book *The Looming Tower* set out to explain how the United States had the pieces of the 11 September plot in front of it and never put them together. Wright, Dan Futterman and Alex Gibney have turned it into ten episodes of about fifty minutes, and their answer is simple: the CIA knew things, the FBI could have acted on them, and the two would not talk. It is a good series, patiently made and well acted, and worth your evenings if institutional failure is your idea of drama. Its weakness is the CIA, which it writes as a pantomime.

Jeff Daniels plays John O’Neill, who runs the FBI’s counterterrorism squad in New York, as a big, loud man in expensive suits who goes to Mass in the morning and to one of several women at night. Daniels lets him be a bully and a bore and still the cleverest man in most rooms, and he is good company for eight hours. Tahar Rahim’s Ali Soufan is the still point beside him, a young agent who speaks Arabic, reads the documents nobody else will read, and can sit across a table from a suspect and quote the Quran back at him. Rahim does most of his acting with his eyes, and the series is at its best when it stops and lets him listen.

The producers include Ali Soufan himself, and it shows in the shape of the thing. The FBI is never wrong. Peter Sarsgaard plays Martin Schmidt, a fictional composite standing in for the CIA’s bin Laden unit, as a soft-voiced man who withholds cables out of what looks like vanity, and Sarsgaard does the sneer well because the script gives him nothing else. The series does not ask why an intelligent man might believe the FBI would burn his sources; it simply has him refuse and lets us hiss. Michael Stuhlbarg’s Richard Clarke, the White House counterterrorism man caught between them, is the most believable of the three, exasperated in doorways, always one meeting short of authority.

Here is what we felt. Watching Schmidt sit on a piece of information the New York office needed, we were angry, properly so, hands tight on the arm of the sofa. A minute later we were slightly embarrassed, because the series had stacked the deck to get us there, and anger you have been handed is not worth as much as anger you have earned.

The craft is sober and mostly right. Lester Cohen designs the FBI’s New York office as beige partitions and stacked paper, and Schmidt’s unit as a windowless room of screens, so the contrast makes the argument without anyone stating it. Will Bates’s score stays low, a drone under the phone calls, and does not tell us when to be frightened. Real news footage of the period is cut in between scenes, Clinton at a podium, the impeachment hearings, so that the country’s attention is always shown to be elsewhere. The directors, Craig Zisk, Ali Selim, Michael Slovis, John Dahl and Gibney, keep the camera steady and the takes long, and the overseas episodes, in Nairobi and later in Yemen, are the strongest, because the agents are out of their depth and the series admits it.

The women are the other problem. Wrenn Schmidt’s Diane Priest, an analyst in Schmidt’s unit, is given a conscience and nothing to do with it. Virginia Kull’s Kathy Shaughnessy and Ella Rae Peck’s Heather exist to wait for O’Neill and Soufan to come home and to be lied to when they do. The scripts, by Futterman, Shannon Houston, Bathsheba Doran, Adam Rapp and Selim, also have a habit of making characters explain to each other things they both already know, so that we can overhear. Bill Camp’s Robert Chesney, across an interrogation table, is the exception: the series slows down, trusts two faces, and is briefly as good as anything in the genre.

Against [*Zero Dark Thirty*](https://film.one/film/zero-dark-thirty), which followed the same enemy with fewer heroes, this is the more comfortable work. It ends where everybody knows it ends, and the last episode has the sense not to stage what we all watched on television. Watch it two episodes at a time and it holds. Do not expect it to argue with you; it decided who was to blame before the first cable was sent.

*Fi1m score 70, published 24 September 2026.*

## What the critics say

Most critics find The Looming Tower gripping and worth the time, a thorough and accessible account of the intelligence failures before 11 September that avoids flag-waving. The praise settles on the cast. Tahar Rahim’s Ali Soufan is the performance named most often, admired for its warmth and steadiness, with Jeff Daniels and Peter Sarsgaard commended for the hostility between their FBI and CIA men. Several reviews single out a long interrogation scene as the series at its best, and the restrained handling of the attack itself is repeatedly noted.

The reservations are consistent even among admirers: the female characters are thin, the romantic subplots feel routine, and the CIA figures shade towards caricature. The spread is wide. Four reviews are outright negative, with The Ringer calling it a comprehensive failure, Collider arguing it mistakes research for insight, and Vulture faulting it for flattening the ideological conflicts it sets out to explain.

## Straight answers

**Is The Looming Tower worth watching?**

*The Looming Tower* is worth watching if institutional failure is your idea of drama, and we scored it 70. Jeff Daniels and Tahar Rahim are excellent as the FBI men who saw the 11 September plot coming, but the CIA is written as a pantomime villain, so the series never argues with itself. Watch it two episodes at a time and it holds.

**How long is The Looming Tower, and what is it rated?**

*The Looming Tower* has episodes of about 50m. It is a war & politics and drama series.

**Where can I watch The Looming Tower in Panama?**

*The Looming Tower* is not on any streaming or rental service in Panama at the moment. It is available in 6 other countries; change your country at the top of the page to see where. Availability is checked daily.

**How violent or frightening is The Looming Tower, and is it suitable for children?**

*The Looming Tower* is not suitable for children: it carries an American TV-MA rating and has no UK certificate, and its subject is the run-up to the 11 September attacks. The embassy bombings in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam are shown, interrogations run long, and the hero keeps several women he lies to. Older teenagers with an interest in the history will manage it.

**How does The Looming Tower compare to Zero Dark Thirty?**

*The Looming Tower* tells the same hunt for bin Laden as [*Zero Dark Thirty*](https://film.one/film/zero-dark-thirty), but from the FBI side, over eight hours, and with far more certainty about who was to blame. Kathryn Bigelow's film is the colder and harder of the two, less sure anyone deserves credit, and it makes the better argument. The series is the warmer company, with Jeff Daniels a bigger presence than anyone Bigelow allows.

**What should I watch after The Looming Tower?**

After *The Looming Tower*, try [*Zero Dark Thirty*](https://film.one/film/zero-dark-thirty) (2012, Fi1m 80): The same hunt from the other agency, colder, and less sure anyone deserves credit. Then [*The Battle of Algiers*](https://film.one/film/the-battle-of-algiers) (1966, Fi1m 93): Sixty years old and still the sharpest film about how insurgencies are found and fought.

### Reviews we read (13)

- **IndieWire**, Ben Travers (A-): Travers gives the series an enthusiastic verdict, calling it a gripping and indispensable telling of the 9/11 story. He praises the grounded performances, especially Jeff Daniels and Tahar Rahim, alongside the careful direction and period detail. [Read](https://www.indiewire.com/criticism/shows/the-looming-tower-review-hulu-tahar-rahim-1201932474/)
- **The i Paper**, Jeff Robson (*****): Robson calls the finale devastating and the series a superbly acted, well-scripted, tautly directed drama. He especially praises how the attack and its aftermath are conveyed through restrained scenes and poignant footage rather than CGI. [Read](https://inews.co.uk/culture/the-looming-tower-finale-bbc2-review-307544)
- **The AV Club**, Allison Shoemaker (B): Shoemaker finds the episode gripping despite predictable scenes, an unnecessary Alec Baldwin appearance, and underdeveloped female characters. She particularly praises the engrossing interrogation-room face-off between Bill Camp and Youssef Berouain. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/the-looming-tower-makes-a-few-mistakes-in-the-still-sol-1823401173)
- **The Guardian**, Jake Nevins (75/100, inferred): The critic finds the series compelling and thorough, with its familiar ending made gripping by the careful build-up of tension. Daniels and Sarsgaard’s performances, especially their characters’ simmering hostility, stand out, though the women’s storylines feel underdeveloped. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2018/feb/27/the-looming-tower-review-thorough-thrilling-drama-retells-the-road-to-911)
- **The Hollywood Reporter**, Daniel Fienberg (75/100, inferred): Fienberg finds the limited series gripping and historically illuminating, though some of its romantic subplots feel rote and its female characters underdeveloped. He particularly praises Tahar Rahim’s empathetic portrayal of Ali Soufan and the ensemble’s balance. [Read](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-reviews/looming-tower-review-1085595/)
- **Variety**, Maureen Ryan (75/100, inferred): Ryan finds the series accessible and illuminating, handling its complicated history without triumphalism or oversimplification. She especially praises the human texture of the characters and the cast’s performances, while noting that Soufan’s personal life falls flat. [Read](https://variety.com/2018/tv/reviews/looming-tower-hulu-review-9-11-alex-gibney-lawrence-wright-1202712522/)
- **Radio Times**, Ben Allen (40/100, inferred): The critic suggests the series struggles to make its strong ingredients add up to a satisfying whole. They praise the combination of Peter Sarsgaard, Jeff Daniels and Michael Stuhlbarg, but say something feels missing. [Read](https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/the-looming-tower-amazon-review/)
- **Vulture**, Matt Zoller Seitz (35/100, inferred): The critic finds the series engaging at times but ultimately frustrating and not fully realized. He singles out a tense interrogation scene for its performances and emotional complexity, while faulting the series for flattening ideological conflicts and its CIA character. [Read](https://www.vulture.com/2018/02/the-looming-tower-hulu-review.html)
- **/Film**, Chris Evangelista (90/100, inferred): The critic calls the series engrossing and possibly the first truly great new TV series of 2018. They single out its relentless pacing and strong performances, especially Jeff Daniels and Peter Sarsgaard, while noting its lack of female representation. [Read](https://www.slashfilm.com/556393/the-looming-tower-review/)
- **Paste**, Matt Brennan (80/100, inferred): Brennan finds the series an imperfect but vital corrective to familiar counterterrorism dramas. He especially praises Tahar Rahim’s performance and the series’ focus on the consequences of CIA-FBI rivalry. [Read](https://www.pastemagazine.com/tv/the-looming-tower/the-road-not-taken-how-the-looming-tower-reinvents)
- **Den of Geek**, Alec Bojalad (3/5): The review finds the series watchable but familiar and overly sympathetic to the FBI, with its storytelling undermined by cartoonish CIA antagonists. It praises Tahar Rahim’s performance as Ali Soufan and calls his overseas scenes the show’s standout moments. [Read](https://www.denofgeek.com/tv/the-looming-tower-review-spoiler-free/)
- **Collider**, Chris Cabin (★★): Cabin finds the series a middling, overly didactic drama that mistakes research for insight. He praises the cast’s flashes of complexity but faults the writing for reducing characters to information-delivery devices. [Read](https://collider.com/the-looming-tower-review-hulu/)
- **The Ringer**, Michael Baumann (10/100, inferred): Baumann finds the series a comprehensive failure, arguing that it mistakes vulgar dialogue for intelligence and offers no meaningful message. He criticizes its shallow character writing and says the strong cast and consequential subject matter cannot rescue it. [Read](https://www.theringer.com/2018/02/28/tv/looming-tower-hulu-miniseries-review)

## Details

- **Created by:** Lawrence Wright, Dan Futterman, Alex Gibney
- **Creator:** Lawrence Wright, Dan Futterman, Alex Gibney
- **Director:** Craig Zisk, Ali Selim, Michael Slovis, John Dahl, Alex Gibney
- **Writer:** Ali Selim, Dan Futterman, Bathsheba Doran, Adam Rapp, Shannon Houston
- **Story:** Lawrence Wright, Dan Futterman, Alex Gibney
- **Teleplay:** Dan Futterman
- **Music:** Will Bates
- **Production design:** Lester Cohen
- **Producer:** Lauren Whitney, Peter Feldman, Ali Soufan
- **Cast:** Jeff Daniels as John O'Neill; Tahar Rahim as Ali Soufan; Wrenn Schmidt as Diane Priest; Bill Camp as Robert Chesney; Louis Cancelmi as Vince Stuart; Virginia Kull as Kathy Shaughnessy; Ella Rae Peck as Heather; Sullivan Jones as Floyd Bennet
- **Runtime:** 50m
- **Release (Panama):** 28 February 2018
- **Genres:** War & Politics, Drama
- **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALAGG_eEA38

## Where to watch in Panama

Not streaming, renting or buying in Panama at the last check.

Also available in: AT, AU, CA, DE, GB, US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country.

## If you liked this

- *Carlos* (2010): Assayas follows a terrorist for five hours and never once tells you what to think.
- *Zero Dark Thirty* (2012), Fi1m 80: The same hunt from the other agency, colder, and less sure anyone deserves credit. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/zero-dark-thirty.md)
- *The Report* (2019): One Senate staffer, a basement and a decade of CIA paperwork; drier and angrier.
- *A Most Wanted Man* (2014): Hoffman’s last lead, a Hamburg spy watching the Americans arrive to ruin his patient work.
- *The Battle of Algiers* (1966), Fi1m 93: Sixty years old and still the sharpest film about how insurgencies are found and fought. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/the-battle-of-algiers.md)

---
© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/tv/the-looming-tower