‘CIA’ Drama Set in ‘FBI’ World Lands Series Pickup at CBS for 2025-26

Rick Porter

Tue, April 22, 2025 at 2:47 PM UTC

2 min read

CBS has ordered a new drama series called CIA, set in the same fictional world as FBI but focusing on the Central Intelligence Agency and starring Tom Ellis.
The series was initially planned as a spinoff of FBI but was ultimately given a straight-to-series order by CBS, with the show centered on two partners investigating cases and criminals in the U.S.
CIA will be executive produced by David Hudgins, Dick Wolf, Nicole Perlman, and others, and joins two other spinoffs on CBS' roster for the 2025-26 season.

CBS is adding to its FBI universe — but going outside the bureau — with its latest drama series order.

The network has given a straight-to-series order to CIA , a series set in the same fictional world as FBI but centering on, as the title suggests, the Central Intelligence Agency. Tom Ellis ( Lucifer , Tell Me Lies ) will star in the series, which like FBI comes from Universal Television, Dick Wolf's Wolf Entertainment and CBS Studios.

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The series order for CIA means Wolf will continue to have multiple series at CBS in the 2025-26 season. FBI is one year into a three-season order that will carry it through 2026-27, but the network canceled spinoffs FBI: International and FBI: Most Wanted in March.

CIA was initially intended as a planted spinoff of FBI (with an alphabet-soup working title of FBI: CIA ), with characters set to be introduced in an episode of the parent series near the end of its current season. CBS and the show's producers opted not to go that route, however, and moved to trying to secure a straight-to-series pickup.

The series will center on "two unlikely partners — a fast-talking, rule-breaking loose cannon CIA case officer (Ellis), and a by-the-book, seasoned and smart FBI agent who believes in the rule of law," the show's logline reads. "When this odd couple are assigned to work out of CIA's New York Station, they must learn to work together to investigate cases and criminals posing threats on U.S. soil, finding that their differences may actually be their strength."

FBI: Most Wanted showrunner David Hudgins will fill that same role on CIA , executive producing with Wolf, Nicole Perlman, David Chasteen and Wolf Entertainment's Peter Jankowski.

Ellis is repped by CAA, Anonymous Content, Hamilton Hodell, Johnson Shapiro and Personal PR.

CIA joins two other spinoffs, Boston Blue and Sheriff Country , on CBS' roster for 2025-26. Keep track of all the network series orders, renewals and cancellations with THR' s broadcast scorecard .

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