Warning: Spoilers for The Night Agent season 2

We won’t be seeing CIA lawyer-turned-agent Owen Hendricks returning for season 3 of The Recruit, as Netflix has announced that it’s canceled the show. On the other hand, the streaming platform’s biggest secret service thriller series already has a third season on the way, giving fans of The Recruit something else to look forward to, despite the show’s cancellation. Filming for The Night Agent season 3 has already begun, and it’s expected that new episodes of the action series will drop on Netflix in early 2026.

Based on what we know so far about The Night Agent season 3, there’s plenty to be excited about. The show has several new and returning characters ing its main cast, and the ending of its second season leaves us with questions about the next mission of FBI agent Peter Sutherland, played by Gabriel Basso, as well as his relationship with Rose Larkin. We know that Sutherland will be working undercover to implicate the US President-elect Richard Hagan in a conspiracy. But it remains to be seen who he’ll be working with, besides his Night Action handler Catherine Weaver.

The Night Agent Is The Best Of Netflix’s Action Thriller Shows

Netflix’s Most Popular Action Series Is Also Its Most Thrilling

Among the record-breaking first season of The Night Agent was Netflix’s biggest release in the year it came out, wracking up over 812 million hours of viewing in total. Although season 2 of the show hasn’t done quite as well up to this point, The Night Agent still towers over its competitors in the action thriller genre.

The Night Agent's crowd-pleasing action sequences as gripping as they are stylish.

It’s no secret as to why the show has found such success, with its crowd-pleasing action sequences as gripping as they are stylish. No other Netflix show is able to bring the thrills on the same scale or with the same panache, whether it’s a contemporary take on a classic car chase or Sutherland’s unerring ability to cheat death at every turn. The Night Agent doesn’t try too hard to make its characters overly complex or multi-faceted, as excessive characterization would simply bring the spectacle and suspense down from a level with which other shows can’t compete.

Despite Their Similarities, The Recruit Was Never As Big As The Night Agent

The Recruit Has Only Wracked Up A Tiny Fraction Of The Night Agent’s Views

Unfortunately, those other shows include The Recruit, which has never quite been able to capture the kind of audience that The Night Agent has managed to pull in from its very first episode. The Recruit’s first season garnered 26.4 million views in the first four weeks following its release, while The Night Agent’s first season reached almost 500 million views in a similar period. A further drop-off in viewing figures for its second season explains why The Recruit has been canceled by Netflix, as the streaming giant has decided to divert more of its funds to unqualified success stories.

The Recruit offers up a similar premise to The Night Agent, as both shows center on an istrative intelligence agency worker who gets pulled into the thick of the action unexpectedly. The Recruit has compelling characters, too, particularly in the case of Max Meladze in its first season and Amelia Salazar in its second. Yet it can’t quite match the myriad misdirections of The Night Agent’s twisting plotlines, or the adrenaline rush of its full-throttle action.

What To Expect From The Night Agent Season 3 After Season 2’s Problems

The Night Agent Already Has Its Next Plotline And At Least 4 New Main Characters

Things haven’t been all smooth-sailing for The Night Agent, though, particularly following the release of its second season. Critics have highlighted a handful of key problems with The Night Agent season 2, which showrunners will be looking to fix going into the third season of the series.

For instance, there’s the replacement for Rose in The Night Agent, an actual agent to work alongside Peter, before killing her off at the end of its first episode. Moreover, there’s still a lack of clarity as to how Night Action actually works as an agency, and how its chain of command is enforced.

Nevertheless, with new cast member Genesis Rodriguez already confirmed in an unspecified starring role for season 3, and three existing Night Agent actors promoted to the regular cast, it seems that the show may be putting some of these problems right. There’s already the potential for a new romantic interest to appear in the season, as well as more antagonists for Sutherland to contend with.

In addition, the major plot thread of the show’s season has already been prepared by the end of The Night Agent’s season 2. Peter Sutherland has been forced to go undercover, in an attempt to implicate US President-elect Richard Hagan and his intelligence advisor Jacob Monroe in a conspiracy theory. It looks like the series is about to get even more thrilling, and its release in 2026 should turn Netflix’s unfortunate cancelation of The Recruit into a distant memory.