By India McCarty
Get ready for a new ROOKIE spin-off! ABC just ordered THE ROOKIE: NORTH to series.
THE ROOKIE: NORTH follows Alex Holland, who “believed his mid-life wasn’t worthy of a crisis,” per the show’s official logline. “But after a violent home invasion ignites a dormant purpose, Alex battles a lifetime of failed commitments by joining the Pierce County Police Department as its oldest rookie.”
The synopsis continues, “Policing from the urban coast to the rural forest where backup isn’t just 5-minutes away, Alex must prove to his skeptical training officer, his fellow rookies, and himself, that he’s finally found something worthy of the fight.”
Related: THE ROOKIE: NORTH Just Got More Exciting
Jay Ellis stars as Alex, with Chris Sullivan, Karen Fukuhara, Froy Gutierrez, Janet Montgomery, Mya Lowe and Malik Watson rounding out the cast.
“Jay is a no-brainer. He’s such a TV star. He’s so talented,” ROOKIE creator Alexi Hawley told TV Insider of the cast. “The rest of the cast was equally great. It was one of those things where it felt like we’d been working together forever, even with the pilot. There was an ease. I did put them through some police training. We sort of separated them into the rookies train together and the TOs and Chris Sullivan trained together. So you already start to do those lines, the differences between them.”
NORTH is the second ROOKIE spinoff. THE ROOKIE: FEDS, starring Niecy Nash-Betts, was canceled after just one season in 2023.
Hawley directed NORTH’s pilot and also serves as an executive producer on the spin-off, alongside ROOKIE star Nathan Fillion, Mark Gordon, Bill Norcross and Michelle Chapman, with Ellis as a producer.
“I have seen the pilot twice. I think it’s great,” Ellis told Deadline. “I think you’re gonna fall in love with all these characters.”
The actor said he thinks ROOKIE fans will “love” ROOKIE: NORTH but made it clear the show is “not gonna make it competitive against Nathan Fillion.”
In fact, Fillion is set to appear in the pilot as his ROOKIE character, John Nolan.
Hawley also spoke to Deadline about THE ROOKIE: NORTH, sharing, “The pilot came out great. The network seems super happy with it.”
“You never know until you know but we have a really amazing cast, led by Jay Ellis who’s a star; it was a joy to make that with him and the rest of them,” he continued. “You know me, I’m just an optimistic person in general, so I’m hopeful and optimistic that we could be talking about that in the near future.”
Hawley added that the spin-off’s rural setting “really does feel different than LA, it really does change the dynamic of the show, even though the setup is the same, patrol officers running around.”
An official premiere date for THE ROOKIE: NORTH has not been set yet, but fans can’t wait to see what this spin-off has in store!
Read Next: Will THE ROOKIE: NORTH Will Have THE ROOKIE Crossover Episodes?
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