Counterstrike

If there’s one thing TBS knows, it’s the made-for-TV movie teeming with washed-up stars from other failed TV projects. In this seldom-proud tradition, Counterstrike casts Rob Estes (Silk Stalkings, Melrose Place) and Joe Lando (Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman) as conflicted brothers charged with rescuing hijacked government officials attending a U.S.–China summit aboard a luxury liner. Even Atomic Twister had a more realistic premise. But you can’t fault Estes or Lando, who excrete every bit of their classically trained acting chops on the project—they’re simply hamstrung by a frail story and dubious heroic hijinks (parachuting unnoticed onto a cruise liner, using a fire extinguisher to defuse a bomb, and so on and so forth). One saving grace comes during a catfight between the hot good girl and hot bad girl. Other than that, this is just like every other looped, bland television movie devised to fill a weekend’s worth of programming.