Manhattan

Los Alamos is a place where work cannot be discussed freely even with the person sharing your home. Manhattan uses the development of the atomic bomb as the setting for a drama about scientists, their families and the secrecy organising their daily lives.

The principal characters are fictional, allowing the series to explore the pressures of the project without pretending to reproduce every private conversation from history. Rival research groups compete for resources and belief, while spouses have to live with decisions they are not permitted to understand fully.

John Benjamin Hickey and the ensemble give the professional arguments personal consequences. The science is not simply a route to a spectacular result; it changes status, relationships and what people are willing to tolerate.

The pace is measured, and the domestic material matters as much as the research. Viewers who enjoy workplace identity in Mad Men or institutional pressure in Chernobyl should find a worthwhile connection here. The unusual setting gives familiar ambitions and resentments much larger potential consequences.