One of the more anticipated 2025 Netflix originals was arguably the marquee TV debut when it hit the streaming service in late January, though The Night Agent’s second season hasn’t exactly earned the same positive viewer feedback as the first season. (More on that lower.) Still, I expected it to be a mainstay atop Netflix’s Top 10 rankings long enough to justify the early Season 3 order, and yet it’s already been replaced at #1 for the second time.
O.J. Simpson And The WWE Have Taken The Night Agent Down
Less than a week after The Night Agent‘s Peter Sutherland returned to fans’ lives — with Rose questionably still along for the ride — the four-part docuseries American Manhunt: O.J. Simpson hit the 2025 TV schedule and put audiences right back in the midst of the early ’90s when the former NFL star and his mega-trial was go-to headline fodder.
Quite a lot of people have apparently been content with diving back into that tragedy-fueled media circus. (At least those who were actually alive when the murder trial took place.) The limited series took over the #1 spot to kick off the first weekend of February, and Gabriel Basso’s high-stakes drama fell back down to #2.
Here’s a full rundown for the day’s rankings:
Netflix’s Top 10 TV Shows – February 2, 2025
- 1. American Manhunt: O.J. Simpson
- 2. The Night Agent
- 3. The Recruit
- 4. American Primeval
- 5. Sakamoto Days
- 6. Younger
- 7. Squid Game
- 8. Mo
- 9. XO, Kitty
- 10. The Seven Deadly Sins: Four Knights of the Apocalypse
Shawn Ryan’s adaptation of Matthew Quirk’s novel held the top ranking in Netflix’s Top 10 soon after it debuted on January 23, but was rather quickly replaced by WWE’s latest Monday Night Raw episode less than a week later. Given how huge it was when the streaming platform took over rights for Raw, it wasn’t so surprising that the pre-Royal Rumble installment was watched by a slew of people.
But I’m not sure how many people would have expected yet another look at the notorious O.J. Simpson trial to become Netflix’s most watched original programming, much less for more than one day.
The Night Agent’s Netflix Rankings May Be Tied To Audience Criticisms
Interestingly enough, critical reactions to The Night Agent largely matched up with what was said about Season 1, and Season 2 even managed to land a higher score on Rotten Tomatoes: 83% S2 approval vs. 74% for S1. But seasonal comparisons stand out quite a bit more when it comes to the viewers themselves.
The government thriller’s Audience Score on Rotten Tomatoes currently sits at 40% for Season 2, which is a fairly shocking drop from the 78% score earned by Season 1. More than 500 fans’ thoughts were tallied for that score, so this isn’t just a case of a minority opinion being magnified.
The complaints logged ranged from disinterest in Rose’s continued presence, the writing, the dialogue, the actors, and somehow even more. The comment below, shared by “Amanda B,” hits a lot of the points that others made about the changes made.
Now I know why Gabriel Basso wants to quit acting… how many great concepts have to be ruined by a horrendous sequel before showrunners/scriptwriters/directors realize it is, in fact, NOT the smartest move to deviate from everything that made your first outing a success? I was expecting a drastically different vibe from this second season – it had to be, thanks to the specific premise of season one and all logical evolutions of Peter’s story from there – but I never thought I’d find myself probing every second of these ten episodes, trying to find proof of life for anything that had made the first iteration so great.
Not that there weren’t still plenty of relatively positive opinions shared, and not that this limited group of opinions can legitimately explain why the show isn’t maintaining an audience big enough to stay at #1. But it wouldn’t take the formation of a clandestine government agency to unofficially put two and two together.
No matter what its eventual viewership ends up being, The NIght Agent Season 3 is on the way to give us more from a big Season 1 character, as well as many more badass fight scenes, at least hopefully.
