Hostage: Why did the French President, Vivienne Toussaint, suddenly abort the rescue mission? Reason explained

Hostage premiered on Netflix on August 21, 2025, and the five-episode British political thriller has been performing well both among viewers and critics. Following a tight storyline, Hostage follows British Prime Minister Abigail Dalton and French President Vivienne Toussaint as the former’s husband, Alex, is kidnapped, and Dalton needs Toussaint’s husband to free him.

However simple it sounds, given that Hostage deals in the world of politics, nothing is what it appears, and therefore, despite promising Dalton that she would help her, Toussaint pulls back from her words at the last moment and abandons Alex with the kidnappers.

The reason that Toussaint had to take this decision was because Alex’s kidnappers got aware of the fact that Toussaint was going to help Dalton and thus started blackmailing her over a scandalous secret.

Vivienne Toussaint aborted Alex’s rescue mission in Hostage

After Dalton had a meeting with Toussaint and came to know about her husband’s kidnapping, she was initially hesitant to ask for help from Toussaint, as she thought that it would give the French president some leverage and she might not fulfil her demands.

However, it became clear after a point that Dalton absolutely needed Toussaint’s help if she wanted to save Alex. Dalton and Toussaint had another meeting and Dalton told her that though the kidnappers want her to resign to free Alex, she would not do it and asked Toussaint for help.

Toussaint agreed but also put forward a condition. She said that she would help Dalton if French troops were allowed to patrol the borders of the UK. After the two reached an agreement, Toussaint greenlitthe rescue mission. They were already aware of the location Alex was held and preparations began to rescue him.

Unfortunately, a mole informed the kidnappers about Toussaint’s decision to help Dalton. This is when Toussaint received video footage of her and Matheo in bed, which clearly showed that they were in a relationship.

The sender of the video started blackmailing Toussaint and mentioned that if she did not stop the rescue mission, that video would be made public and it was needless to say what kind of an impact it would have on Toussaint and her family.

Given the severity of the threat, Toussaint decided to do what was best for herself and thus ordered to stop the mission. She abandoned Alex and informed Dalton that if she wanted her husband safe, then she should quit her position as the British PM. Needless to say, Toussaint did not let Dalton know the real reason that prompted her to take this decision.

Toussaint had an affair with her stepson Matheo and the kidnappers told her that if she did not abort Alex’s rescue mission, the whole world would come to know about that affair. Keeping her political career and her personal life before anything else, Toussaint decided that the best decision would be to pull the plug on the Alex situation.

Hostage can be streamed on Netflix.

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