ABC picked up The Rookie: North to series Sunday night, ordering 10 episodes of the spinoff and putting the rookie north abc series on track for a midseason premiere. The network’s move came after it had already renewed all of its current scripted series for next season.
The new show stars Jay Ellis and comes from The Rookie creator Alexi Hawley, with Nathan Fillion appearing in the pilot as John Nolan. ABC is setting the project up as the second spinoff in the franchise after The Rookie: Feds, which aired for one season in 2022-23. It also arrives as ABC prepares to unveil its 2026-27 schedule on Tuesday.
The order matters because ABC is not treating this as a small side bet. A 10-episode run gives the network a real launch window for the rookie north abc series, and the timing points to a midseason rollout rather than a rushed fall debut. Fillion also executive produces both The Rookie and The Rookie: North, which keeps the new series tied closely to the original brand even as it moves to a different city and a different police department.
The Rookie: North introduces Alex Holland, who joins the Pierce County Police Department as a rookie after a violent home invasion. The series is set in the Pacific Northwest and films in Vancouver, while The Rookie remains anchored in Los Angeles, where it is both set and filmed. Hawley has said the geographic split makes broad crossover plans harder, noting, “It’s harder obviously, with the Vancouver or the Pacific Northwest of it all and L.A.,” while also saying he has worked through that kind of setup before and that there was a time when crossovers were built into a different franchise.
That tension sits at the center of ABC’s plan. Hawley has described crossover episodes as a possibility, but not an automatic one, saying the goal is more likely to be “maybe a couple episodes, or two or three episodes a season” rather than a heavy stream of guest turns. He also said of the earlier spinoff effort, “Feds was designed on purpose with a lot of crossovers.” The Rookie: Feds lasted only one season, so ABC now faces the same question with a new geography and a new lead: whether the franchise can keep its reach while avoiding the logistical strain that limited the last attempt.
ABC’s decision also fits a broader push to expand its scripted slate next season. The network renewed R.J. Decker on Friday, then followed with the The Rookie: North pickup two days later, a sequence that signals continued confidence in franchise storytelling. The Rookie itself is headed into its ninth season, with January expected to bring it back again. The new spinoff gives ABC another way to extend one of its most durable dramas, and this time the network has already made the answer to the open question plain: it is betting on the franchise again, but with a lighter crossover touch than before.
