# Operation Buffalo (TV series)

Operation Buffalo is an Australian television comedy-drama series written and directed by Peter Duncan that screened on ABC TV from 31 May 2020.

## Synopsis

The series is inspired by true events of British nuclear bomb tests in the 1950s at remote Maralinga, in outback South Australia, specifically the four tests codenamed Operation Buffalo. It follows Major Leo Carmichael as he deals with various pressures and problems during nuclear weapons testing.

## Cast

* Ewen Leslie as Major Leo Carmichael
* Jessica De Gouw as meteorologist Eva Lloyd-George
* James Cromwell as Commanding Officer General "Cranky" Crankford
* Tony Martin as Attorney-General Richard Wilcox
* Alan Dukes as Philip Lachlan MP
* Sam Parsonson as Hilly
* Alexander Bertrand as Murphy
* Brendan Lovett as Dr William
* Benedict Wall as Jones
* Adrienne Pickering as camp nurse Corinne Syddell
* Frances Djulibing as Ruby
* Shantae Barnes-Cowan as Peggy
* Shaka Cook as Sam
* Bojana Novakovic as Molly
* Harry Greenwood as Baxter
* Matthew Backer as Dr Myer
* Natasha Bassett as Nurse Alice
* Nicholas Hope as Dr Breston
* Lucy Velik as Yvonne
* Philip Quast as Prof Quentin Ratchett
* Julian Garner as St. John Moore
* Angus McLaren as Dalgleish
* Sean O'Shea as Dr Lewis
* Roland Powell as News Narrator
* Christina Sankari as Lydia
* Mackenzie Thomas as Emma Carmichael
* John Gaden as Swanny
* Sibylla Budd as Lorraine Carmichael
* Jack Runwald as Harry Carmichael
* Ryan Johnson as Agent Martin
* Andrew Ryan as Agent Cartwright
* Michael Denkha as Doug
* Wakarra Gondarra as Tom
* Brandon Walters as Billy
* Socrates Otto as Terry Ryan MP
* William Zappa as Sir Rupert Edgely, British High Commissioner
* Mackenzie Fearnley as Dave
* Erroll Shand as Lenny
* Heather Mitchell as Caroline Syddell
* Olga Miller as Holly
* Kevin MacIsaac as Bernie
* Dean Gould as Driver
* Luke Pegler as Nick
* Nicholas Boshier as Colone Barry
* Tiriel Mora as Hugh Blackett
* Roy Billing as Mungo
* Victoria Haralabidou as Maria
* Henry Nixon as Agent Whicker
* Michael Denkha as Doug

## Episodes

| No. | Title | Directed by | Written by | Original release date | Australia viewers |
| 1 | "Episode 1" | Peter Duncan | Peter Duncan | 31 May 2020 (2020-05-31) | 688,000 |
| 2 | "Episode 2" | Peter Duncan | Peter Duncan | 7 June 2020 (2020-06-07) | 595,000 |
| 3 | "Episode 3" | Peter Duncan | Peter Duncan | 14 June 2020 (2020-06-14) | 608,000 |
| 4 | "Episode 4" | Peter Duncan | Peter Duncan | 21 June 2020 (2020-06-21) | 591,000 |
| 5 | "Episode 5" | Peter Duncan | Peter Duncan | 28 June 2020 (2020-06-28) | 573,000 |
| 6 | "Episode 6" | Peter Duncan | Peter Duncan | 5 July 2020 (2020-07-05) | 593,000 |

## Production

The six-part series was filmed in New South Wales with additional filming for desert locations in South Australia. French distributor and production company APC Studios helped fund the project and provided worldwide distribution.

## Critical reception

The series received mixed reviews, attaining a score of 5.0 on IMDb. Luke Buckmaster from The Guardian gave the series three stars out of five and described the series as, "much more fickle: sometimes funny as a comedy, sometimes effective as a drama, but rarely satisfying as a combination of both". Wenlei Ma from News.com.au thought much better of the series, writing: "as much as sombre images of death and destruction can evoke emotional reactions, nothing hits the point as hard as the glaring judgment of satire done well – which is exactly what Operation Buffalo is".