''The Recruit'' is an American

spy Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information (intelligence) from non-disclosed sources or divulging of the same without the permission of the holder of the information for a tangib ...

adventure An adventure is an exciting experience or undertaking that is typically bold, sometimes risky. Adventures may be activities with danger such as traveling, exploring, skydiving, mountain climbing, scuba diving, river rafting, or other extreme spo ...

television series created by Alexi Hawley for

Netflix Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fil ...

. The series follows Owen Hendricks (

Noah Centineo Noah Gregory Centineo ( ; born May 9, 1996) is an American actor. He began his career performing on television and had a main role in the television series '' The Fosters'' from 2015 to 2018. He achieved wider recognition by starring in the Net ...

), a CIA lawyer who becomes involved in massive international conflicts with dangerous parties because an

asset In financial accountancy, financial accounting, an asset is any resource owned or controlled by a business or an economic entity. It is anything (tangible or intangible) that can be used to produce positive economic value. Assets represent value ...

tried to expose her relationship to the agency. The series was released on Netflix on December 16, 2022.

Plot

Fledgling lawyer Owen Hendricks, who has just started working for the

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...

, has his life turned upside down when he encounters an asset who demands

exoneration Exoneration occurs when the conviction for a crime is reversed, either through demonstration of innocence, a flaw in the conviction, or otherwise. Attempts to exonerate convicts are particularly controversial in death penalty cases, especially wh ...

from the agency. Once she tries to expose her long-term relationship with the agency, he becomes entangled in convoluted international politics. As Hendricks negotiates with the asset, he finds himself at odds with menacing individuals and groups, risking his life as he tries to fulfill his duties.

Cast

Main

as Owen Hendricks, a newly-hired CIA lawyer *

Laura Haddock Laura Jane Haddock (born 21 August 1985) is an English actress. She is known for portraying Zoë Walker in ''White Lines (TV series), White Lines'', Kacie Carter in ''Honest (TV series), Honest'', Lucrezia in ''Da Vinci's Demons'', Meredith Quil ...

as Max Meladze, a former CIA asset who is in prison for beating a shady trucker to death *

Aarti Mann Aarti Majumdar (born March 3, 1978), better known by her stage name Aarti Mann, is an American actress. She has starred in several television programs, including a part in the sci-fi drama ''Heroes'' following the show ''Never Have I Ever''. She ...

as Violet, Owen's co-worker who messes with Owen *

Colton Dunn Colton Dunn (born June 30, 1977) is an American comedian, actor, writer, and producer. He is perhaps best known for his role as Garrett McNeil on the NBC workplace comedy '' Superstore'' (2015–2021) and for his work on Comedy Central sketch co ...

as Lester, another co-worker of Owen's and Violet's partner in crime *

Fivel Stewart Trente Heavyn "Fivel" Stewart (born November 4, 1996) is an American actress and singer who first came to attention in her main cast role as Izzie in three seasons of the Netflix series ''Atypical'' (2018–2021). , she is in the main cast of th ...

as Hannah, Owen's roommate and ex-girlfriend * Daniel Quincy Annoh as Terence, Owen's other roommate and friend *

Kristian Bruun Charles Kristian Bonnycastle Bruun (born October 25, 1979) is a Canadian actor. He is best known for his roles in ''Orphan Black'' and ''Murdoch Mysteries''. Life and career Bruun was born on October 25, 1979, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, where ...

as Janus Ferber, Owen's overstressed colleague who reluctantly helps Owen out *

Vondie Curtis-Hall Vondie Curtis-Hall is an American actor, screenwriter, film director, and television director. As an actor, he is known for his role as Dr. Dennis Hancock on the CBS medical drama '' Chicago Hope'' created by David E. Kelley and as Ben Urich in ...

as Walter Nyland, Owen's boss and the CIA's general counsel

Recurring

Angel Parker Angel Parker is an American actress. Since 2000 she has appeared in numerous films, TV series and has done voice acting on video games. Her most notable credits include ''Criminal Minds'' (2008), '' ER'' (2008-2009), Marvel’s ''Runaways'' (2017 ...

as Dawn, CIA operative doing a black op in Yemen * Victor Andres Trelles Turgeon as Talco *

Byron Mann Byron Mann is a Hong Kong-American actor of film and television. His best-known roles include Ryu in ''Street Fighter'', Silver Lion in ''The Man with the Iron Fists'', Wing Chau in ''The Big Short'', Admiral Augusto Nguyen on ''The Expanse'', ...

as Xander, a senior case officer * Kaylah Zander as Amelia, another colleague of Owen's who is interested in Owen romantically

Episodes

Each episode of ''The Recruit'' bears

-like initials in their title. The codes, which are not unlike the multitude of acronyms for different divisions and projects that Owen Hendricks must understand in his role within the agency (codes Owen acknowledges at one point he has trouble keeping up with), represent a line of dialogue from their respective episodes.

Production

Development

It was announced that Netflix acquired an unnamed espionage drama on April 28, 2021, with

Entertainment One Entertainment One Ltd., trading as eOne, is an American-owned Canadian multinational entertainment company. Based in Toronto, Ontario, the company is primarily involved in the acquisition, distribution, and production of films and television se ...

backing the production. Dubbed ''Graymail'', the project was created by Alexi Hawley, executive producer of several popular

procedural drama A procedural or procedural drama is a cross-genre type of literature, film, or television program involving a sequence of technical detail. A documentary film may also be written in a procedural style to heighten narrative interest. Television pro ...

series, such as ''

Castle A castle is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars debate the scope of the word ''castle'', but usually consider it to be the private fortified r ...

'', ''The Rookie'' and its spin-off. Alexi, in turn, served as its

executive producer Executive producer (EP) is one of the top positions in the making of a commercial entertainment product. Depending on the medium, the executive producer may be concerned with management accounting or associated with legal issues (like copyrights o ...

and

showrunner A showrunner (or colloquially a helmer) is the top-level executive producer of a television series production who has creative and management authority through combining the responsibilities of employer and, in comedy or dramas, typically also th ...

. Alongside Hawley, Noah Centineo;

Doug Liman Douglas Eric Liman (; born July 24, 1965) is an American film director and producer. He is known for directing the films '' Swingers'' (1996), '' Go'' (1999), '' The Bourne Identity'' (2002), '' Mr. & Mrs. Smith'' (2005), ''Jumper'' (2008), ''Edg ...

, Gene Klein and

David Bartis David Bartis (born in Providence, Rhode Island, Providence, Rhode Island) is an American film and television producer best known for Suits_(American_TV_series), Suits, ''The O.C.'', and Edge of Tomorrow. Early life He is a graduate of McLean Hig ...

Hypnotic Hypnotic (from Greek ''Hypnos'', sleep), or soporific drugs, commonly known as sleeping pills, are a class of (and umbrella term for) psychoactive drugs whose primary function is to induce sleep (or surgical anesthesiaWhen used in anesthesia ...

;

Adam Ciralsky Adam Ciralsky (born September 22, 1971) is an American journalist, television and film producer and attorney. Many of his original reports have been optioned and adapted for film and television through his production company P3 Media. In 2018, Cir ...

and

Charlie Ebersol Charles Duncan Ebersol (born December 30, 1982) is an American television and film producer and director. Ebersol is best known as the co-founder of The Company with Justin Hochberg, executive producer of USA Network's ''NFL Characters Unite'' a ...

of P3 Media also joined the project as executive producers. The project was set as eight part one-hour television series. It was unveiled on September 28, 2022, that Alexi Hawley, George Ghanem, Amelia Roper, Hadi Deeb, Niceole Levy, and Maya Goldsmith served as the series writers; meanwhile, Doug Liman,

Alex Kalymnios Alex Kalymnios is an English director, producer and screenwriter. Early life During school Kalymnios wanted to become an actress. When she directed her first school play, she decided that she wanted to become a director. In 2002 she graduated f ...

, Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour Jr., and Julian Holmes directed the episodes.

Casting

When the production was announced on April 28, 2021, Noah Centineo was unveiled as the lead character of the television series. More castings were revealed on November 12, 2021, with Aarti Mann, Daniel Quincy Annoh, Vondie Curtis Hall, Kristian Bruun, Laura Haddock, Colton Dunn and Fivel Stewart joining the main cast alongside Centineo. In addition, Byron Mann, Angel Parker, and Kaylah Zander were also announced in recurring capacities for the series.

Filming

Principal photography Principal photography is the phase of producing a film or television show in which the bulk of shooting takes place, as distinct from the phases of pre-production and post-production. Personnel Besides the main film personnel, such as actor ...

for the series reportedly took place in

Montreal, Quebec Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple-pea ...

, and

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

, on October 25, 2021. The filming had reportedly wrapped on March 28, 2022.

Release

''The Recruit'' premiered globally on Netflix on December 16, 2022.

Marketing

The series was promoted during Netflix TUDUM Global event on September 24, 2022, on

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

. Additional info, including its release date and official title, were unveiled at the official website of the event. First official trailer for the series was released on YouTube on November 16, 2022.

Reception

The

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

reported a 70% approval rating with an average rating of 7.1/10, based on 23 critic reviews. The website's critics consensus reads, "''The Recruit'' may not be the freshest chip off the old block, but it employs

's considerable charms to highly watchable effect."

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, which uses a weighted average, assigned a score of 60 out of 100 based on 12 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

Richard Roeper Richard E. Roeper (born October 17, 1959) is an American columnist and film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times''. He co-hosted the television series '' At the Movies'' with Roger Ebert from 2000 to 2008, serving as the late Gene Siskel's success ...

of ''

Chicago Sun-Times The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the ''Chicago T ...

'' gave the series 3 out of 4 stars and said, "Noah Centineo makes a likable lead on the flashy, funny series."

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Recruit, The 2020s American drama television series 2022 American television series debuts American adventure television series American spy drama television series English-language Netflix original programming Espionage television series Television series about the Central Intelligence Agency Television series by Entertainment One Television shows filmed in Los Angeles Television shows filmed in Montreal