More from Prisoners of War
Why Homeland Fans Should Watch Prisoners of War
Get to Know the Captivating Characters of the Thriller Prisoners of War
Interview: Gideon Raff on the Making of Prisoners of War
While Prisoners of War follows the return of three Israeli male soldiers after 17 years of captivity, the women in their lives are as central to shaping the narrative as the hostages themselves. Nurit, Talia, and Yael have spent 17 years living in a different kind of purgatory, wondering whether their loved ones were alive or dead. And though they all start off from this common point, they embark on very different journeys. The robust development of the female characters on Prisoners of War is one of the things that grounds audiences in the intimacy of the series and provides compelling universal themes of family, loss, and sorrow.
In flashbacks, Nurit and Uri are depicted as a young couple giddy in love, promising one another they're always going to be together. When we flash forward to current-day when Uri returns, the formerly smitten couple has devolved into a deep sadness. Nurit has committed the ultimate betrayal: marrying Uri's brother. And the entire country rejects this act with disdain.
In one particularly effective scene, Nurit tells Uri: We were also prisoners of war. This statement seems to be an inappropriate comparison when we consider the heinous treatment the captives endured. The metaphorical ripple, however, rings true: for 17 years, Nurit has tortured herself, and she's never stopped judging herself.
In contrast, Nimrode's wife Talia devotes every minute of her life advocating for her husband's return. In many eyes, she perhaps plays the role of the model wife in this unthinkable situation, continuously campaigning with a brave face and strong resolve. But we come to realize she's been caught in a time warp of sorts, lost in the shuffle of public appearances with world leaders and stiff upper lips, while her children feel alienated by her activism for a man they barely know. Ironically her tremendous strides in getting her family back together come at their expense.
--
--
Considering Nurit as traitorous allows Talia to feel better about everything that she has sacrificed, a sentiment that produces a brilliant source of drama in the series. As the families wait for the first glimpse of their loved ones in 17 years at the airport, Talia barely acknowledges Nurit as she reaches out to her and says she's the only one in the same situation. Talia snaps back dismissively, we're not in the same situation.
In episode 5, after the funeral of Amiel Ben Horin, the two have a confrontation that reveals the impossibility of their situation:
Nurit: You're angry because I wanted to live?
Talia: That's not a right we have, we're supposed to wait and fight not surrender.
Nurit: You're stronger than I am. I couldn't wait.
Talia: Maybe you're the strong one. What did I do with my life? I waited. You dared to live.
Yael
We see how two strong women have taken very different paths, and how the return of their loved ones allows them to realize that there's no perfect end game for either of them.
The third woman we meet in the series is Yael (or Lali, as her brother used to call her). She was a child when her brother Amiel went missing, thus she imagines him alive as a ghost born out of a little sister's love for the older brother she admired. She is crushed to find out that he will be returning in a body bag, though insists on greeting her brother's coffin at the airport, even as the other families will be happily reuniting with Uri and Nimrod. Someone needs to receive him too, she declares.
Her love for her brother seems uncomplicated and pure, and the scenes between Amiel and Lali are as effective as any, imbued with a deep sadness, especially in the moments when she seems to be most happy with him. We know it's not real, and we're heartbroken for the day when she realizes it too.
The plight of the female characters provides American audiences with emotional situations that transcend global boundaries and force us to ask an important question: how would others judge our actions in the wake of such as impossibly sad and tragic situation, and perhaps more importantly, how would we judge ourselves?
Comment
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
More from Prisoners of War 
