Spy Thriller The Recruit Is a Nifty Netflix Upgrade for Noah Centineo

How are all the Netflix pretty boys doing? Jacob Elordi made a clean jump from Kissing Booth to HBO prestige, and is now working with such big-name film talent as Emerald Fennell and Sofia Coppola (playing Elvis!) KJ Apa is edging out of the purgatory that is Riverdale, wrapping up its final season but with nothing tremendously exciting on the horizon. What about Noah Centineo? The break-out heartthrob of To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before starred in four subsequent teen rom coms for the streaming giant, and after putting in hard time for about five years, he has been rewarded with… another Netflix property. Thankfully, The Recruit plays a lot more to Centineo’s charismatic and comedic strengths, adding more flair, drama and—deep breath—sex to his Netflix portfolio. He confidently leads a spotty but overall impressive spy romp that’ll make for a suitable holiday season watch.

We start on bad footing, meeting Noah’s character on a snowy field mission that goes belly-up, before cutting back to his early days before he’s ever involved in anything dangerous. Jumping in media res before cutting back to where the story should begin rarely works as a structural tool, but it’s made especially egregious in this case, as there’s absolutely no contextual information for us to even appreciate the danger at play—and we won’t return to this scene until the last half hour of the season. Who is Noah’s character? Is he supposed to be here? Where is here, what are they doing? Who’s shooting guns at who? What is the jeopardy, what’s at stake? Once more, who is this man?!

This man is Owen Hendricks, a rookie lawyer for the General Consul at the CIA. He’s charming, quick-witted, and instantly in over his head, especially when he gets involved with a former agent (or, asset) who wants to reveal devastating state secrets (or, graymail). He has two smart, attractive roommates, Hannah (Fivel Stewart) and Terence (Daniel Quincy Annoh), a suitably stern boss, Nyland (Vondie Curtis-Hall), and a couple colleagues with the sole purpose of leaving Owen in their dust, Violet (Aarti Mann) and Lester (Colton Dunn). Over the course of 8 episodes (all of which were available for review), characters undercut each other, beg for favours, and deceive for their own benefit. A lot of research from show creator Alexi Hawley has gone into a variety of CIA lingo, procedures, and personalities; it really feels like you’re immersed in an authentically complex (sometimes laughably so) intelligence bureaucracy. As well as this, Owen’s newbie status means we get to learn a lot of this intel organically as he does, always at the quick, urgent pace that CIA field work demands.

Owen himself proves a handy asset in high-pressure negotiations, finding convoluted workarounds and loopholes in the heat of battle that are the lifeblood to intelligence work. Apart from testing out how much one man can sound like Mark Ruffalo, Centineo’s boundless charm is well suited to Owen’s assured confidence; his casting makes more and more sense every time Owen has to blag his way through tense encounters. The rest of the cast have seemingly gotten on Noah’s wavelength—no matter how dense the plotting becomes, no-one drops the smarmy irritation they regard every other character with.

And does the plot get dense. A clunky first episode drags Owen into deep waters with Max (Laura Haddock), a former asset now locked up in Phoenix, and the ins-and-outs of evading assassins and looming subpoenas snowball into episodes where every conceivable angle of attack on Owen manifests, generating confusion at regarding story momentum and character motivations. You’ll find the recaps playing at the top of every episode (Netflix does these now?!) have a focus and clarity that is sometimes lacking from the fast-paced episodes. Still, it’s better to be an overstuffed story than a threadbare one, and something admirable about The Recruit is its insistence on showing the physical and psychological toll of the complicated globetrotting lives we usually see in spy fiction, with our poor young star looking just as overworked and burnt-out as when he did three Netflix movies in one year.

What helps The Recruit go down smooth is its distinct visual style that differs it from the usual Netflix sludge. Spy-action pro Doug Liman (Mr & Mrs Smith, The Bourne Identity, American Made) directs a handful of episodes, and his shaky-cam dynamism contributes to the jagged, frenetic unease Owen experiences, as well as crafting really slick and impactful action sequences. What’s more, although the editing can occasionally feel choppy, it’s more of a feature than a bug; it doesn’t seem unintentional and can’t be called ineffective. That said, the series would pop a lot more if Doug Liman had stayed to direct the whole season—it’s getting tiresome watching shows that try to mimic the visual style of the interesting filmmakers they rope in for early episodes (The Calling and Tokyo Vice for two recent examples).

The main problem with The Recruit’s snippy, fun tone is, well, it’s about the CIA. A couple off-hand jabs at the agency’s tendency to destabilise nation states doesn’t get around from the fact that we’ve taken the cool, witty swagger that’s usually reserved for law shows and put it in a bureaucratic institution who uses its power to act in increasingly horrible ways—and while it’s not impossible to make a comedy about the oceans of paperwork and insecure agents that get field work done, putting a hot smirk on it feels a little manipulative. That said, the hot smirking goes a long way, with Doug Liman injecting the sweaty sexual tension his best work is known for into what could just be an exercise in pulpy action thrills. It’s clear Netflix are looking for a splashy and exciting hit this holiday season—after some hesitation, we’re happy giving this the stamp of approval.

The Recruit premieres Friday, December 16th on Netflix.

For all the latest TV news, reviews, lists and features, follow @Paste_TV.