The Agency, based on the Eric Rochant’s popular French show Le Bureau des Légendes, is a spiritual sibling of The Day of the Jackal. It is all deception and ‘legends’. Unlike James Bond — never mind what cover story M and the gang come up with — these intelligence operatives work in the shadows, immersing themselves in their cover stories, because not doing so could easily result in capture, torture and death for them and loss of many more lives in the bigger picture.
There are four storylines running through The Agency, underlining the fact that unlike James Bond’s MI6, which only has one agent running in the field, here the CIA has multiple, equally important assets in different theatres of the world. There is Martian (Michael Fassbender), who was abruptly asked to return to the London station from Ethiopia, where he had been working undercover as an English teacher for six years under the name of Paul Lewis. There are protocols in place for an agent’s return, which include mandatory sessions with the psychiatrist Dr. Rachel Blake (Harriet Sansom Harris) and being followed, in Martian’s case, by grandpa (Andrew Brooke) and grandma (Adam Nagaitis).
In Addis Ababa, Martian was involved with a Sudanese anthropology professor, Samia Zahir (Jodie Turner-Smith). We learn that Martian is not above twisting the truth when he tells his handler, Naomi (Katherine Waterston), that the break up was ugly when in fact it was a tender ‘till we meet again’. While Martian started off doing what his boss, CIA London Deputy Station Chief Henry (Jeffrey Wright), wanted him to do, including reconnecting with his daughter, Poppy (India Fowler), meeting Samia in London derails all those good intentions.
Other spinning plates in the play include an agent called Coyote (Alex Reznik) going missing in Belarus, Danny (Saura Lightfoot-Leon) being groomed to go undercover in Tehran to find out Iran’s nuclear secrets and Charlie Remy (Edward Holcroft), a Delta force operative deep undercover in Ukraine, who is also Henry’s brother-in-law.
The butterfly effect is in play in these events — for instance, Coyote being in the hands of enemies might compromise operations like Remy’s in Ukraine. Or, Martian’s love for Samia might cloud his judgment, especially since he might not know the whole story and thus jeopardise negotiations between Sudan and China that Samia is involved in.
Danny needs to be chosen for Iranian seismologist Reza Mortazevi’s (Reza Brojerdi) exchange program for a legitimate cover. MI6 in the person of Jim (Hugh Bonneville) seem all crumpets and tea, mate and quid, but is ruthless to a fault. Alexei (Marcin Zarzeczny), the CIA asset in Belarus, is reluctantly co-opted into the rescue of Coyote. When it is learned that Coyote has fallen into the hands of a Russian strongman, General Volchok (Juris Zagars), things become increasingly difficult.
While 10 episodes might seem a tad long to tell the labyrinthine, blood-soaked ways of intelligence networks world over, The Agency is so beautifully shot, acted and written that one is willing to look the other way at the small indulgences. The episode titled “Hawk from a Handsaw” is a masterclass in smart writing.
A still from ‘The Agency’
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The phrase, as all Shakespeare nerds know, is from Hamlet. The moody Danish prince uses it to say he can distinguish between imagination and truth. It is significant that the episode features Martian’s first psychological evaluation with Dr. Blake. Later on in the episode, Samia meets Martian at a movie theatre. The movie she buys a ticket for is Catch-22, in which Yossarian, the protagonist in Joseph Heller’s savage war satire, also has a convoluted relationship with sanity and madness.
Fassbender is mesmeric as Martian, at once coldly analytical and hotly passionate. The others including Wright and Dominic West as the CIA Director admirably step up while Bonneville is a revelation as he drops all the graciousness of Lord Crawley (Downton Abbey) to be the smoothly ruthless Jim even as Richard Gere as CIA London Station Chief calmly says, “Nothing has a price, nothing is extremely expensive.”
While Samia’s jewel-toned outfits might be a surveiller’s dream and do nothing to help her blend in, they do look striking. The Agency, which counts George Clooney among its roster of executive producers, is replete with thrills (the motorcycle ride ending with a shocking crash is just one example), sudden outbursts of incredible violence, love and anger. With the second season greenlit, we can look at more maneuvering with global repercussions as well as rendezvous in the janitor’s closet for operatives Owen (John Magaro) and Blair (Ambreen Razia). Whether the second season will prove as gripping as the first, only time will tell.
The Agency is currently streaming on Jio Hotstar
Published – March 29, 2025 03:55 pm IST
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