Netflix’s breathless new spy thriller betrays its country to hit #1 in 70 nations

Cr. Dan Power/Netflix © 2023

As much as Netflix loves to cancel popular fantasy shows well before their time, sometimes audiences can become just as caught up in a good old-fashioned espionage adventure that doesn’t require mountains of lore and magical powers, with The Night Agent becoming the streaming service’s biggest episodic success story overnight.

In the 24 hours since premiering, the adaptation of Matthew Quirk’s novel has rocketed right to the very top of the viewership charts in a jaw-dropping 70 countries around the world per FlixPatrol, reinforcing that at-home audiences are never going to tire of a genre capable of delivering top-tier content on the proviso that it’s handled with stye and panache.

Reviews across the board have been solid enough to indicate that’s the case here, with subscribers instantly powering their way through the story of Gabriel Basso’s Peter Sutherland, a low-level FBI agent who embarks on a dangerous hunt for a traitor working inside the United States government that threatens to destabilize the entire geopolitical sphere.

Fast-paced, frantic, and completely breathless throughout its 10 installments, The Night Agent wasn’t expected to take off in quite the way that it has, but at least it marks a departure from the usual tales of mass murder, mayhem, and serial killings that tend to rule the roost more often than not.

Sometimes, it’s hard to beat a classic, and a fairly straightforward story about corruption and conspiracy has once more underlined the fact that it’s never going to go out of fashion, even in the age of blockbuster-sized TV.