It’s nearly 36 years to the day that Britain saw its deadliest terrorist atrocity, the bombing of Pan Am flight 103, when 270 people lost their lives.
On its way to New York’s JFK, the Boeing 747 exploded 31,000ft over the small Scottish town of Lockerbie, four days before Christmas 1988.
One of the worst air disasters in history, now the story of fractured geopolitics and a father’s fight for justice is being made into a five-part drama – Lockerbie: A Search for Truth.
Here are five things you need to know about the show.
‘Catch up and keep up’
The bedrock of the drama is Jim Swire, a GP who lost his 23-year-old daughter Flora in the attack. A medical student, she bought her ticket at the last-minute to fly to the US to spend Christmas with her boyfriend.
Convinced there was a cover-up following the tragedy, he becomes the nominated spokesperson for the UK victims’ families. Now 88, he has dedicated his life to finding out who was responsible for his daughter’s death.
Played by Colin Firth, the Oscar-winning actor says he met Jim at his home ahead of filming, and loved his “alertness and intellectual agility” quickly realising he would have to “catch up and keep up”.
Firth went on, “Then realising what a huge thing to live up to was this was going to be. You always feel a bit out of your depth when you start a new job, but this really felt way out.”
‘I’d count the wrinkles’
Catherine McCormack plays Jim’s wife Jane, a grieving mother, trying to keep her family together after the loss of one of their three children.
McCormack says it was “rare” to find a part that developed over the course of 30 years, but admitted the 12-week shoot across both Scotland and Morocco was a challenge as it was filmed out of chronological order.
For example, the cast might film a scene from 1991 in the morning, then move onto one set in 2011 in the afternoon.
McCormack says she developed her own “map” of her storyline to keep track of the timeline, while Firth joked that he would “count the wrinkles they put on me” to work out where he was timewise.
The production built a massive replica set of Camp Zeist – the Scottish court in the Netherlands set up to try the suspects – to the exact details of the original which was visited by Jim, Jane and their son and grandson during the shoot.
The 15 seconds scene
One powerful scene in the first episode, features Jane, talking about the horrific nightmares she suffers following the death of her daughter.
McCormack explains that during her research she found that Jane would read up about the disintegration of aircrafts and the last moments of a person’s life if they were conscious as they fell to the ground.
Incorporated into a single scene that takes place in a cabinet official’s office, she feared she’d “completely messed it up”.
Even writer David Harrower says after he wrote the script he had second thoughts, believing some of the lines to be “hokey” and nearly took it out completely.
Luckily, the scene remained, and is “one of the most amazing scenes” in the show according to the show’s creators.
‘A fresh perspective’
Director Otto Bathurst, who has previously directed Peaky Blinders and Criminal Justice, says he was inspired by Jim Swire’s “relentless search for the truth”.
Refusing to be contained by one genre, the show is at various points a family drama, a conspiracy thriller, a courtroom drama, and a study in grief.
Although based on a real-life event, it remains a fictionalisation of the story, so has creative licence to consolidate and re-create some elements to make it work on screen.
Bathurst explains: “Somehow, as drama people, you can find a fresh perspective on something no amount of journalism or brilliant documentaries can… Fictionalising it, with the characters played by actors, tells a story people can respond to.”
What is the truth?
The tragedy ripped apart the lives of the 270 individuals killed, and that of their friends and families.
But while a large part of the drama is told from one point of view – Jim’s – it strives to tell all sides of the story.
While Jim believed there was a miscarriage of justice, other families affected by the tragedy had a completely different opinion.
The story is told from his perspective, but the show never explicitly says whether his version of events is correct or not. It presents corroborating evidence with contradictory evidence, allowing the viewers to make up their own minds.
TV with the power to change the world
Earlier this year, ITV drama Mr Bates Vs The Post Office not only became a hit with viewers and critics alike, but also helped bring justice to the victims after raising public awareness of the scandal.
Executive producer Gareth Neame hopes Lockerbie could have a similar impact.
He explains: “We would like to feel that as a drama, we have shone a light on this murky, murky subject that has never been adequately done in factual television or any amount of journalism.
“Hopefully, we’re in a slot in the time of year where people have some space to watch and consider the story and the facts quite deeply. That would be our ambition”.
All five episodes of Lockerbie: A Search for Truth are available to watch on Sky Atlantic and NOW from 2 January 2025.
