Sam Fisher Is Back: Splinter Cell: Deathwatch Is a White-Knuckle Slow Burn From John Wick Creator Derek Kolstad

Sam Fisher is back. Not in a new game, but in an animated series from Derek Kolstad, the guy who created John Wick. Twelve years after Blacklist, this is the first-ever adaptation of the Splinter Cell franchise, and it is absolutely not shy about how sharp, loud, and bloody it wants to be.

The setup

The series is called Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Deathwatch, and it runs eight episodes. The hook is classic Fisher: a young operative, injured and desperate, finds Sam and pulls him out of his quiet life. From there, Sam teams up with Zinnia McKenna, a fellow spy whose ex happens to hold the key to stopping a fast-approaching crisis tied to the global fight over energy and power.

The vibe

Kolstad goes for a slow-burn spy thriller that keeps puncturing the silence with brutal, precision hits of action. Co-directors Guillaume Dousse and Félicien Colmet-Daage stage this world with a slick, big-canvas feel and layer it in shadow. Emphasis on shadow. It looks great, but there are stretches where the lighting is so murky I bumped my brightness just to track who was where. Maybe intentional. Maybe I need a new monitor.

The players

• Sam Fisher (voice: Liev Schreiber) — The legend himself: retired, highly decorated Navy SEAL and former CIA paramilitary/clandestine operator. Schreiber gives him a weary, haunted edge that fits the years.
• Zinnia McKenna (voice: Kirby Howell-Baptiste) — A razor-edged partner with a personal score to settle. She carries herself like a soldier who has swallowed a lot of injustice and is done asking nicely. Her dynamic with Sam is a highlight: old-school ghost meets new-school sledgehammer, both adjusting to each other.
• Diana — One of the primary antagonists: intelligent, manipulative, and hungry for power, fueled by a revenge fixation over her father’s death. She’s a convincing performer in her own right but misreads her half-brother’s place in the plan.
• Charlie — Diana’s half-brother: more like her than either will admit, except he’d rather light the world on fire than help fix it. Their motivations will feel familiar if you’ve met your share of megalomaniacs on screen, and I wanted more time inside their family mess.
• Animation: Sun Creature and Fost — The action beats are startlingly tactile for animation: fluid, realistic movement over stylized shorthand. You feel the whip of a bullet’s path and the sickening punch of impact. Knife work had me wincing. It’s that visceral.

Action, craft, and Kolstad-isms

If you’re hoping for that John Wick DNA, it’s here: clever gun work, frantic hand-to-hand bursts, and surgical strikes that hit before you can blink. The show’s rhythm is very much quiet, stalk, explode, then breathe. It gives the set pieces real pop without turning everything into noise.

Where it stumbles (a little)

The overarching plot is solid, but the villains could use more oxygen. Diana and Charlie have clear, clean motives, but they play like riffs you’ve heard before, and their scenes hint at deeper drama the show doesn’t fully tap. Also, again, some sequences are so dark you might start guessing at silhouettes.

Odds and ends

Keep an ear out for some choice needle drops. And yeah, this is a grown-up ride. Put the kids to bed before you press play.

The bottom line

Splinter Cell: Deathwatch delivers a stylish, punchy dose of espionage with a mean streak and a confident slow-burn engine. Even when the story hits familiar beats, the characters and action keep it locked in.

Score: 7/10