Peter Faces a Deal with the Devil in ‘The Night Agent’ Trailer; Jennifer Morrison Introduced
On January 23, a full year will have passed since we last saw the driven, desperate FBI Agent Peter Sutherland (Gabriel Basso) fighting to save the United States on Netflix’s “The Night Agent.” In just under a month, we’ll see him again in the same capacity – like all onscreen cops, he can’t catch a break. Indeed, the recently released trailer for Season 3 of the series reveals that one of the alliances he made in the previous season is seriously haunting him now.
Moral Quandaries and a Tormented Conscience
“The Night Agent”‘s Season 3 trailer, which Netflix dropped on YouTube on January 21, emphasizes how Peter Sutherland is very troubled by the consequences of the deal he made with Jacob Monroe (Louis Herthum), an unscrupulous intelligence broker to whom he divulged classified secrets of the United Nations in exchange for the information he needed to stop a terrorist plot and save his close partner, Rose (Luciane Buchanan, who will not be returning for this season). “I made a deal with the devil,” Peter says in the trailer, “It saved a lot of lives, but now, every time something goes wrong, I gotta wonder if I’m responsible.”
By this point in the trailer, we’ve already seen something go very wrong: a passenger jet explodes in flames after a terrorist missile intercepts it. “We will not allow the loss of innocent lives to go unanswered,” proclaims Secret Service Director Ben Almora (Enrique Murciano) in a televised address where his voice sounds bizarrely, inexplicably robotic. (It’s hard to say whether this detail is incidental or significant). It goes without saying that the President has “initiated Night Action,” sending a certain Night Agent out into the trenches once again.
The trailer discloses very little about the nature of the upcoming terrorist plot, to which the exploded plane was presumably a mere prelude. But we do know that, as the Night Agent himself says, “they’re [?] planning something big.” The advertisement abounds with other, similarly pat terrorist-thriller phrases from him and other characters: “We are running out of time,” “there’s no telling who could be compromised,” “you’re the only person I can trust,” “sometimes, the right thing isn’t easy,” and so forth. Of course, this last observation comes from Peter, establishing his guilt and moral conflict as a throughline for the season.
Season 3 will also see the Night Agent taking on a new ally, Isabel, played by Genesis Rodriguez. “I know you have no reason to trust me,” he tells her, “But I need your help to figure out who’s behind this.” She’s evidently some sort of journalist – “When we find the truth, I’m publishing all of it,” she tells him – which makes her an ace researcher.
Unrelenting Action, Of Course
The trailer is also about as heavy on action as any terrorist-thriller aficionado could hope for. The first third contains the setup, and then the rest of it hurtles headlong into various edge-of-your-seat stunts involving vehicles. We see the Night Agent fleeing from armed motorcyclists, whom he shucks off by using his car to topple a scaffolding onto them (an excuse for an evidently less field-seasoned ally played by Suraj Sharma to ask incredulously, “This normal for you?”), crashing into a wall of boulders after learning that his car’s brakes have been cut, and running after a moving delivery truck just in time to jump onto the back and fling some baddies out of its partially open cargo hold.
And these are just the vehicular set pieces. Overall, it’s clear that Season 3 of “The Night Agent” will not skimp on either the ethical and political intrigue or the scenes of high-octane peril that its audience has come to expect. If its trailer looks a bit generic for a series of its ilk, that may simply be a function of how the marketing is at pains not to reveal the most interesting and shocking stuff. We have until February 19 to find out. (On this day, all 10 of the season’s episodes will air on Netflix).
