CIA drama series set in FBI world gets greenlight from CBS

CBS is expanding its FBI universe — but going beyond the agency's boundaries — 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 the FBI but, as the title suggests, focusing on the CIA. Lucifer actor Tom Ellis (pictured) will star in the series, which, like FBI, hails from Universal Television, Dick Wolf's Wolf Entertainment and CBS Studios.



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

CIA was originally intended to be a planned spin-off of FBI (with the working title FBI: CIA), with characters to be introduced in an episode of the main series toward the end of the current season. However, CBS and the show's producers opted not to go that route and instead pursued a straight-to-series order.

The series will center on "two unlikely partners — a smooth, rule-breaking CIA agent (Ellis) and a seasoned, smart FBI agent who plays by the book and believes in the rule of law," according to the series description. "When this odd couple is deployed to the CIA's New York station, they must learn to work together to investigate cases and criminals that pose a threat to American soil. They discover that their differences may be their strength."

FBI: Most Wanted showrunner David Hudgins will serve in that same role on CIA, as an executive producer alongside Wolf, Nicole Perlman, David Chasteen and Peter Jankowski of Wolf Entertainment.

CIA joins two other spinoffs, Boston Blue and Sheriff Country , on CBS’s 2025-2026 roster.