If Season 1 was all about introducing Peter to the world of moles, conspiracies, and heavy action, The Night Agent Season 2 is about him figuring out the moral compromises he must make in his new role. If you wondered why our hero Peter Sutherland doesn’t always wreak more havoc on the baddies in the show, apparently it’s a conscientious decision from creator Shawn Ryan. And it’s one series lead Gabriel Basso doesn’t always wholeheartedly agree with.
Speaking in a recent interview about the latest series of episodes to hit the Netflix schedule (and I’m avoiding spoilers, here),Basso opened up about having to actually talk the decisions Peter is making through with Ryan (who also created big shows like The Shield and S.W.A.T.) It’s a tightrope they are walking in order to show that Peter is a capable force of action and a machine out in the field but is also a capable moral force, as Basso admitted to THR.
I think now is the first time I’m thinking about it. (Laughs) That’s a Shawn Ryan [decision in the writing], and then my job is to act out that turmoil and choreograph the desperation and brutality. But he could also be way more brutal. I mean, they were having to pump the brakes on me a bit on the fight side when I was like, ‘Why don’t I just kill this guy? He’s tried to kill me three times, and I’m knocking him out? [I should] put a couple rounds in him.’ And they were like, ‘No, no, no. Peter’s a hero.’ So I think my bad tendency started to show there, especially with bad people.
While he called it a “bad tendency,” the actor also explained why it’s just so hard to have to rein it in while playing Peter. Basso’s doing a lot of his own stunts for the show, and he sees the character as extremely “capable.”
It’s difficult because physically, he’s very capable. But what motivates the body is that decision, the higher calling of what you’re doing. I thought about Peter showing desperation, but also hesitancy in the action, in being thrown into a fight, fighting for his life, but then also recognizing, ‘I’m choosing to do this and put myself in these positions.’
Intriguingly, this need to be the hero often puts Peter in danger, and Basso has been candid that at some point The Night Agent may no longer be referring to his character: the implication being that Peter Sutherland might eventually be killed off. Without giving away any major Season 2 spoilers, the The Night Agent has already been renewed for Season 3 with Basso on board, so we’ll expect him back then.
Basso also spoke in the interview about not wanting to come off like a superhero with perfectly coiffed “hair” and un-mussed stage makeup. He also said he’s constantly pushing to keep things real and gritty and give Peter injuries noting he “constantly” is pushing “for that kind of reality where he gets injured and is not always at 100 percent.”
There may be a little bit of back-and-forth about the character, but it’s paid off, as The Night Agent Season 2 landed in Netflix’s coveted #1 slot in the Top 10 list after release. Meanwhile, if you are needing to catch up with the latest batch of episodes, they just dropped into our laps on January 23 and can be viewed with a Netflix subscription.
