Early this morning, Hulu kicked off the new drama The Looming Tower. The series is based on the Pulitzer-Prize winning book by Lawrence Wright. It is set in the late 1990s, and is inspired by the real people and events that led to the rising threat of Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda. The series also explores how various federal government agencies’ refusal to cooperate may have helped to pave the way for the tragic events that took place on 9/11.

Martin Schmidt (Peter Sarsgaard, Wormwood), the head of the CIA’s Al-Qaeda unit at Alec Station, believes his organization is the only one prepared to handle potential terrorist threats. This sentiment is also shared by CIA analyst Diane Priest (Wrenn Schmidt, Outcast, Person of Interest), who helps her boss to conceal the CIA’s intelligence on Al Qaeda from other government agencies. This infuriates the head of FBI’s counter-terrorism unit, John O’Neill (Jeff Daniels, Godless, The Newsroom), who strongly believes the U.S. is being targeted by Al Qaeda. He tries to get assistance from Richard Clarke (Michael Stuhlbarg, Fargo), the chief counter-terrorism adviser on the United States National Security Council, but still finds the flow of information to be blocked. So instead of cooperation, it becomes a race between the agencies to get the information first.

O’Neill mobilizes the members of his I-49 counter-terrorism squad to follow Al Qaeda, in hopes of exposing their plans before it’s too late, but the situation grows increasingly more serious and deadlier each day. O’Neill’s team includes Agent Ali Soufan (Tahar Rahim, The Last Panthers), a Muslim Lebanese-American who’s tired of seeing his religion being perverted in the name of terrorism; Floyd Bennet (Sullivan Jones), a former NYPD SWAT Team member; Agent Kathy Shaughnessy (Virginia Kull, Sneaky Pete, Big Little Lies); Agent Vince Stuart (Louis Cancelmi, Billions), who’s assigned to be an unwelcome presence at the CIA’s Alec Station; and veteran New York FBI agent/interrogation expert Robert Chesney (Bill Camp, The Leftovers).

I checked out the first episode, and was delighted to see that the series waste no time before jumping right into the action.The series is an interesting and exciting look at how these two federal agencies—the CIA and the FBI—went about trying to gather intel on Al Qaeda’s deadly activities around the globe, and how their lack of communication and refusal to share information might have ultimately allowed this terrorist organization to thrive and carry out its plans. I look forward to checking out more of the show, even though we ultimately know how it ends. The cast is great, especially Jeff Daniels—it’s hard to believe that he was once known for playing an idiot on Dumb and Dumber! With The Newsroom and now this series, Daniels now really embodies the idea of a serious, well-educated and influential man.

Today Hulu released the first 3 episodes of the 10-episode limited series, and will release the rest of the episodes one per week each Wednesday.

Tonight I’ll also be watching/recording The Goldbergs, Modern Family, American Housewife, Designated Survivor, Survivor, The Blacklist, The X-Files, 9-1-1, The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story, Schitt’s Creek, Let’s Get Physical, and The Magicians.