The Rookie is a franchise again. Spinoff pilot The Rookie: North, starring Jay Ellis, has been picked up to series by ABC just hours before the network is set to unveil its 2026-27 schedule on Tuesday, May 11. I hear the order is for 10 episodes, with the series, from The Rookie creator Alexi Hawley and lead studio Lionsgate Television, expected to premiere in midseason.
That will set up crossover opportunities with the mothership series, starring Nathan Fillion, which has a full-season order and will once again premiere in January, I hear. As Deadline revealed last week, that will kick off right off the bat as The Rookie: North pilot features an appearance by Fillion as his Rookie character John Nolan. Fillion also executive produces both series.
While the deal between ABC and indie studio Lionsgate TV did not close until Sunday night, a series order for The Rookie: North had looked likely for weeks. (Pickup and renewal negotiations between networks and outside studios going down to the wire are a storied upfront tradition.)
With The Rookie: North ordered, ABC officially is expanding its scripted portfolio next season as it already had renewed all of its current scripted series, including R.J. Decker, whose Season 2 pickup came on Friday.
As Deadline has reported, it came down to the freshman series starring Scott Speedman and The Rookie: North, with a pickup for both possible, likely with small concessions on episode orders for some ABC series.
The Rookie: North introduces Alex Holland (Ellis) who believed his midlife wasn’t worthy of a crisis. 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 a rookie. Policing from the urban coast to the rural forest where backup isn’t just five 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.
Ellis stars alongside Chris Sullivan, Karen Fukuhara, Froy Gutierrez, Janet Montgomery, Mya Lowe and Malik Watson.
Like the mothership series, The Rookie: North is produced by Lionsgate Television in partnership with 20th Television. Hawley serves as executive producer and writer, with Fillion, Mark Gordon, Bill Norcross and Michelle Chapman also executive producing. Ellis is a producer.
‘The Rookie: North’ (L-R): jay Ellis, Mya Lowe, Froy Gutierrez
Disney/Darko Sikman
This is the second spinoff in The Rookie franchise, following The Rookie: Feds, starring Niecy Nash, which aired for one season in 2022-23.
Crossovers continue to do well as marketing stunts that drive up viewership. On ABC, 9-1-1 and 9-1-1: Nashville did one this season; Grey’s Anatomy and spinoff Station 19 as well as The Rookie and The Rookie: Feds also staged multiple crossovers during their joint runs.
Hawley teased to Deadline that he is looking at “maybe a couple episodes, or two or three episodes a season” for stories that cross over between The Rookie and The Rookie: North.
“It’s harder obviously, with the Vancouver or the Pacific Northwest of it all and LA,” he said. “Feds was designed on purpose with a lot of crossovers.”
The Rookie is set and films in Los Angeles. The Rookie: North is set in the Pacific Northwest and films in Vancouver. Like The Rookie, The Rookie: Feds was based in Los Angeles.
‘The Rookie: North’ (L-R): Jay Ellis, Chris Sullivan
Disney/Darko Sikman
Like he did with The Rookie and The Rookie: Feds, Hawley will serve as showrunner on both The Rookie, headed into its ninth season, and The Rookie: North.
“I have done it before; there was a period where I was doing Rookie and Feds and The Recruit at the same time,” he told Deadline last month, referencing his Netflix series The Recruit, which was also shot in Vancouver. “It’s a lot but I have a really good team.”
Throughout the pilot process, Hawley had been hopeful about The Rookie: North getting a series order.
“The pilot came out great,” he told Deadline last month. “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.”
Ellis also gave the pilot his stamp of approval.
“I have seen the pilot twice, I think it’s great,” he recently told Deadline. “I think you’re gonna fall in love with all these characters.”