REVIEW: ‘The Night Agent’ Season 3 Is Far Better Than Last Season

The Night Agent Season 3 is something I was worried about. Created by Shawn Ryan (The Shield, S.W.A.T.) with MiddKid Productions, the second season of The Night Agent aimed for drama that left much of the overarching mystery convoluted at worst and messy at best. The third season of the Netflix Original espionage series rights the ship by doubling down on interpersonal drama and pushing Peter Sutherland out of his comfort zone. 

The Night Agent program is a clandestine operation that exists at the discretion of the president to carry out missions too dangerous or sensitive for the traditional service arms of the government. But in The Night Agent Season 2 it was revealed that the whole of America is being controlled by an information broker, and our protagonist, Agent Peter Sutherland, is right in the middle of it. 

Having been tapped to work for the broker, Peter alerted the authorities, forcing him into a double cross with widespread ramifications. Peter will work for the intelligence broker but will share his movements and plans to capture and stop it. 

The Night Agent Season 3 pulls the storyline back on track.

The primary mission in The Night Agent Season 3 is Peter’s assignment to track down a young Treasury Agent who fled to Istanbul with sensitive government intel after killing his boss. But of course, the broker knows, setting in motion a sequence of events in which Peter investigates a dark-money network while avoiding its paid assassins, putting him on a collision course with a relentless journalist, Isabel De Leon (Genesis Rodriguez).

While Peter is aiming to stop the broker and those who pay him for national security, Isabel is looking to break the story, following the dark money to unravel its tendrils across the government. Peter exists to solidify American trust and power, while Isabel is aiming to inform the American people that everything they know about their elected officials is a curated lie. 

While Peter and Isabel are working together, they uncover buried secrets and old grudges that threaten to bring the government to its knees, President Richard Hagan (Ward Horton) and his wife Jenny (Jennifer Morrison) are hiding something that makes Peter have to survive not just one threat but two. 

Peter Sutherland is pushed to new heights in The Night Agent Season 3, and it pays off.

Gabriel Basso’s Peter Sutherland remains the center of the series. His dry demeanor and physicality paint a protagonist who may barely crack a smile, yet whose relationships quickly take on greater meaning because of how deeply he wants to trust those around him. 

Peter’s status as a Night Agent may be in question, but his dedication to his country isn’t. But while audiences may latch onto Peter and expect all of the relationships last, the reality is that there is no plot armor in The Night Agent Season 3. This makes every relationship Peter forms a true liability, and as his safety points shrink, the intensity of the series increases. 

But outside of Basso’s performance, the other key highlight of the season is a hitman that we know as “The Father” (Stephen Moyer). Having grown up loving Moyer in True Blood, seeing him on screen as a father was interesting. However, as we’ve seen before, Moyer’s propensity to show dueling personalities takes center stage once again. 

Stephen Moyer is a welcome addition, showcasing a familiar duality that works for “The Father”.

On the one hand, The Father is a hitman, hired to kill threats to his boss, and they all keep putting him and Peter on the same path, barrelling toward each other (and when they meet, it pays off). The Father is cold and calculated, numb to violence, and, more importantly, not excited by it. He is ultimately a man heading to his job; he just so happens to kill people. 

During each hit, The Father leaves his son alone in a hotel room, with instructions for his school day, and a promise to return with dinner. His son (Callum Vinson) is your typical kid. He plays D&D with his dad, and he wants to eat junk food and play video games. The Father genuinely loves his son and wants to protect him, especially from his real job. 

As the son starts asking questions, The Father develops a cover story about being a spy and working for the government. It’s an example of how close the two are and how much he is capable of putting his own values above a job. It’s a compelling twist to a character that seems entirely undefeatable, and that Peter exploits in the season’s end. 

Relationships are finite in the world of a spy, and you can never really be close to anyone.

With so many deaths, it’s hard to fully grasp every one of Peter’s relationships, professional and otherwise. But that’s what makes Isabel’s presence so important. Through their partnership, we get glimpses of a normal Peter, even though all circumstances have made that fade away. 

The Night Agent Season 3 is a return to what made the series stand out in Season 1. The espionage and the resulting twists are excellently executed. The web of lies and selfishness invades even the people whom Peter plans to trust.

Ultimately, The Night Agent Season 3 is just good espionage, political plotting, and aggressive displays of power. And more importantly, the narrative never writes a check it can’t cash in one season, making this one of the best.  

The Night Agent Season 3 is streaming now, exclusively on Netflix.

Season 1 | Season 2