CBS has been going strong in the spring of the 2026 TV schedule when it comes to freshman dramas, with both CIA and Marshals earning early renewals for Season 2. While CIA has settled into its post-FBI time slot on Monday nights, the new drama is taking the week off on April 6. That doesn’t mean fans can’t start digging into the big mystery of Season 1, however, and comments from Necar Zadegan to CinemaBlend have me rethinking what we’ve seen so far.
CIA’s next new episode will air on Monday, April 13 in the usual 10 p.m. ET time slot, although it won't be a usual episode of the drama. Shortly after Necar Zadegan’s Nikki helped out the Bureau on FBI, Missy Peregrym’s Maggie and Alana De La Garza’s Isobel will be pitching in with the CIA team. Jeremy Sisto’s Jubal has been the one with the closest ties to Bill Goodman (Nick Gehlfuss), and he was the one to hear Bill’s statement at the end of the latest episode:
Someone in the CIA told [the criminal]. I’m convinced there is a mole, is what I’m saying. Someone inside is leaking.
Of course, Bill couldn’t say with certainty who was the mole, and finding out if there was a leak was part of his mission from the jump anyway. But as he bonded with Colin (Tom Ellis), Gina (Natalee Linez), and Nikki (Zadegan) and realized how much they could accomplish as a team, he seemed to doubt the possibility of a leaker. Now… well, I decided that it was worth looking back at earlier episodes for clues about the mole via a Paramount+ subscription.
That is, until I recalled what Zadegan said when we spoke about how “trust is everything” for Nikki’s dangerous episode and feeling “bored” by projects without female characters. I'd also asked the NCIS: New Orleans cast alum if she’d been told the identity of the mole as a CIA series regular, even though she couldn't tell anybody else yet. She shared:
No, no, not at all! I thought it might be fun if Nikki was the mole. [laughs] I don't think it is going to be Nikki... I don't believe it is, but it's like this game of Clue. It's very fun to explore that within the dynamics of this spectacular story of spy craft.
When we spoke back in early March, Necar Zadegan shared that she thought it would be “fun” if her character was a double agent, but even she seemingly could only speculate. It’s entirely possible that Nikki will be the mole, regardless what Zadegan believed at the time. She didn’t spoil anything about who it is, but her comment did make me wonder: are there any Easter eggs to pick up about the mole in earlier episodes courtesy of the writers, if even the actors didn’t know? Or would it be pointless to go back and see what we can find, because there aren't any clues to find?
There are certainly candidates for who it could be based on the first half of the season so far, and I think the only CIA agent we can rule out is Colin, as it’s a safe bet that Tom Ellis will return in Season 2 as the co-lead opposite Nick Gehlfuss. Nikki and Gina are possibilities as other series regulars, but there are also characters in the background who could be betraying the team without series regular status. It’s just not certain that there are any clues to be found in the performances, if the secret was being kept from the cast.
Whether or not that’s the case, Zadegan only had good things to say about the mostly procedural CIA including the serialized storyline of Bill looking for a mole, and she drew on her experience on another show to make the point. She told me:
I think it makes it even more exciting for sure. I work on another show which is very serialized, which is Mayor of Kingstown. It's very character-focused in that way, and so the characters go through a life, and you carry each event as a backstory and it becomes a through line, like a play or a movie or something like that when it's serialized, so it gives depth to the otherwise procedural quality of the story. I think it's wonderful.
So, assuming Bill is right that there’s a mole in the CIA, who is it? I’d originally assumed that the mystery would be solved by the end of Season 1 or at least treated as the cliffhanger, but the early Season 2 renewal makes me wonder if the “game of Clue” could be extended to next season. If that’s the case, I know one thing for sure: I hope that CIA joins FBI as a fall premiere rather than only return in early 2027 as a midseason premiere, like this year.
For now, you can look forward to the next new episode of CIA on Monday, April 13 at 10 p.m. ET on CBS, followed the next week by an episode that sends Gina into the field on an undercover op opposite a Gotham alum.
