The Copenhagen Test arrives without the usual genre fanfare. There are no grandiose set pieces or relentless action beats demanding attention (at least not initially), with the series instead drawing viewers in quietly, building tension through atmosphere, psychology, and a creeping sense of dread. It’s a sci-fi espionage thriller that understands restraint can be more powerful than spectacle.
The story unfolds inside The Orphanage – the show’s opening scroll detailing its creation off the notion that President George H.W. Bush believed the U.S. Intelligence Community needed a watcher, and thus The Orphanage was created – a clandestine intelligence division so deeply buried that much of the aforementioned Intelligence Community are unaware of its existence. This isn’t a team focused on stopping outside attacks, but monitoring internal fractures on the belief that the most catastrophic threats come from within. In this world, danger isn’t just hidden in code or classified protocols; it’s embedded in habits, systems, and the human mind itself.
This philosophy becomes painfully real through Simu Liu‘s Alexander Hale, a brilliant intelligence analyst who discovers that his thoughts, senses, and perceptions are being transmitted to an unseen adversary. His mind has been compromised in the most literal sense, with every interaction becoming a performance and every reaction a potential reveal. Rather than shutting the breach down, The Orphanage make a colder calculation – keep the channel open and use Alexander as bait.
The series, which echoes familiar genre touchstones as Minority Report, The Truman Show, and The Bourne Identity, thrives on the contradiction that Alexander must live as though nothing has changed while being wholly aware that he’s being monitored. The tension created here feels less about physical survival and more about psychological endurance, with Thomas Brandon creating a focus on what a prolonged observation can do to a person who no longer trusts their own reality. Brandon leans heavily into a classic type of storytelling, embracing the idea that information is often more valuable when left exposed. Here, surveillance isn’t a tool of protection, it’s an experiment. The Copenhagen Test exists in a world where everyone is listening and all may be complicit.
The show itself works as much as it does because it has a talent like Liu grounding Alexander’s complexity, the actor keeping the character from slipping into abstraction. He’s an undeniably capable character and deeply intelligent, but it’s the simmering dissatisfaction beneath the surface that allows his compliance to work as much as it does. He’s done everything asked of him, but advancement and recognition continually passed him by long before the central conspiracy unfolds, and it’s that which makes the hack feel less like an inciting incident and more a brutal amplification of wounds that already existed.
One of The Copenhagen Test‘s most unsettling choices is how far The Orphanage is willing to go in shaping Alexander’s personal life. Surveillance bleeds into manipulation, especially when it comes to his relationships, with Melissa Barrera‘s Michelle proving more than just a romantic presence, but a liability. It’s in this emotional intrusion where the show finds its sharpest edge, utilising Michelle’s intimacy as observable, weaponized, and dangerous. It becomes about more than being watched, but about what happens when your emotions are engineered and your connections are no longer yours to protect. The series – which Liu also serves as Executive Producer on, alongside James Wan (The Conjuring), Michael Clear (M3GAN) and Rob Hackett (I Know What You Did Last Summer) – poses uncomfortable questions about consent, autonomy, and whether institutions built for security can ever truly value the individuals inside them; of course, all done in a highly entertaining fashion.
As an opening statement, The Copenhagen Test is confident in its patience and unsettling in its implications. It favours tension over easy thrills, turning surveillance inwards and proving both easily digestible from a genre point of view and eerily relevant in the current media landscape.
THREE AND A HALF STARS (OUT OF FIVE)
All eight episodes of The Copenhagen Test will be available to stream on Peacock in the United States from December 27th, 2025, before arriving on Binge in Australia on February 16th, 2026. The Copenhagen Test will also be available On Demand with episodes premiering on Showcase.
