‘CIA’ Season 2 Premiere Episode 1 Recap: Bill’s Father’s Secret Past and the Assassin Who Got Away Explained

When CBS launched ‘CIA‘ in February, it paired a rule-breaking CIA case officer with a by-the-book FBI agent and sent them after domestic threats in New York. Tom Ellis plays the roguish Colin Glass, Nick Gehlfuss plays the buttoned-up Bill Goodman, and the pairing quickly became the show’s engine.

The numbers made CBS confident. The series drew 8.4 million multiplatform viewers within a week of its debut, and it was renewed just 5 episodes into the run. The sophomore season is also bigger, with 22 episodes planned, up from the first season’s 12.

The season premiere, titled “The Deep,” was written by showrunner Mike Weiss and directed by Ken Girotti. It picks up 3 weeks after the death of Bill’s father, and it ends with a reveal that could change how Bill sees his own family.

Bill returns to work looking tense. After a boxing session with FBI Special Agent Stuart Scola, played by John Boyd in a crossover from ‘FBI’, Colin surprises him in the back of his car again, saying he wishes he had been there during the loss. A new face joins New York Station as well, Teddy Marsh, who just transferred in from Berlin.

Nikki then briefs the team on Eduardo “Lalo” Cabrella, a cartel fixer for the Ortega cartel who is wanted in a dozen countries. The team loses him after some squabbling, but tracking powder leads them to the home of former Navy SEAL Mitch Selby, where they find Lalo standing over his body and an empty safe hidden behind a painting.

The case widens with the murder of Kip Paul, who is killed on his yacht in the cold open. The team learns that Selby, Paul and an undercover agent named Keith Truman were DEA agents, and that someone seems to be coming after them. Gina’s research points to an assassin named Felix, who has killed 3 CIA operatives in the past, and the new theory is that he is stealing money the DEA agents took from the cartel.

The danger becomes real when Bill and Colin search a garage for Felix’s car and barely escape an exploding bomb. Surveillance footage places Truman in the garage the night before, which makes him look like Felix’s partner.

Gary Martin, another former DEA agent, explains the group’s dirty history. During a heist they ran into an unexpected guard, a 15-year-old boy, and Kip shot him dead. Gary quit the DEA over it, and he agrees to go to prison once he pays his respects at the funeral, but Colin sees an opportunity to use him as bait.

Felix strikes after the funeral by T-boning Colin’s car, and just as he is about to shoot Bill and Gary, Colin fires and sends him running. Bill chases him onto a bridge, where Felix dives into the water below. The team then finds Truman with a van full of cash, and Bill cuffs him.

The real story of the hour runs underneath all of this. While going through his father’s things, Bill finds a 1998 airline ticket to Tbilisi, Georgia, and his mother, played by Becky Ann Baker, has no idea what it means. Bill tells Colin, who digs through old files and finds that Bill’s father, Robert Goodman, worked for the CIA.

Bill never knew. The files link Robert to Project Palomar, and when Colin brings it to Nikki, she reveals almost nothing except that it is a dark stain on everyone involved. Colin promises Bill they will find out the truth together, which Weiss told TV Insider is the most important beat of the finale.

The assassin is not just a loose thread, either. Weiss told Give Me My Remote that Felix connects to Bill’s dad through a professional relationship from his CIA days, and that Robert apparently did some very dark things overseas for the agency. It also adds irony to the moment Lalo mistakes Bill for CIA.

Colin has his own unfinished business. The first season ended with him learning that his former partner and lover, Toni Napier, played by Angela Sarafyan, had not died in an explosion a year earlier. The premiere hints that Nikki may be planning to bring her back into the field, which sets up a slow-burning conflict.

Weiss has also said the first season was only 12 episodes, so the longer run leaves room for the Bill mystery to unfold alongside weekly cases. The next episode is titled “Dead Drop.”

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