by Jon Gorga
NBC’s streaming service Peacock has done zero publicity for their upcoming live-action show, The Copenhagen Test, starring Simu Liu. That is, until now! At New York Comic Con 2025, co-showrunners Thomas Brandon and Jennifer Yale as well as executive producer and star Liu spoke with reporters about what we can expect from this original series.
Inspired by real bleeding-edge science, American history, and geo-politics, Brandon and Yale have crafted a shocking “five minutes into the future” prestige espionage drama. The Copenhagen Test follows loyal intelligence analyst Alexander Hale, a first-generation Asian American, who finds himself at the center of a clandestine plot with other people’s lives in the balance as well as his own.
Though primarily a twisty and exciting spy thriller, a strain of hard science fiction DNA runs deep here. Hale is not in danger of being compromised by the enemy— at least not in any traditional way. He’s already being hacked directly through his brain: Nanomachines in his brain have turned his eyes into cameras and his ears into microphones. Series creator and executive producer Brandon was excited to make sure we know
“One of the things I thought about, being a lover of the genre of sci-fi, is that this is the prequel to a lot of sci-fi stories you love. This is the technology they would have to perfect in order to do a memory transfer or a consciousness transfer or any of those— like telepathy.”
At the con this past weekend, Brandon quoted the old great adage about sci-fi often attributed to writer Frederik Pohl that he rephrased as “It’s the job of the science fiction writer not to envision the future car, but the future traffic jam.” That might give us the best view possible into the duo’s thinking about the futuristic elements of the story. Yale added that they “made a point to make sure that our sci-fi was almost grounded so that we could escalate and elevate the espionage.”
During their time with journalists, before holding their public panel all about the show, the two showrunners were asked how they view the art of the twist and Brandon offered, “There’s a lot of television which is, like, somebody gets shot and the question that takes you to the next episode is who shot them? And we knew we weren’t that show. We knew we were the show that we were going to show you who shot them and you wouldn’t know why. Because that, to me, is more terrifying.”
It seems a bit of a different and exciting approach is at work here. A whydunit instead of a whodunit. In a crowded marketplace of police procedurals and superhero entertainment this might help the new television tale really stand out. Showrunner Yale stressed, “You can catch the one who may have actually pulled the trigger but it’s all the other people behind him that have their guns ready that you have to be able to figure out why to get.”
Liu himself, who our readers know best as the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s martial arts master Shang-Chi, surprised reporters by joining a scheduled interview at the last moment and spoke to the tricky problem of representation in entertainment declaring, “I think before we talk about the politics of the world or what the decisions are that are beyond our control— what is inside our control is making sure that the character is resonant with as many people as possible.”
Superfans of Liu will no doubt be delighted to learn that he’s not a star turned laidback financier just putting his name on something as an executive producer. Yale and Brandon were happy to tell journalists that Liu was deeply involved. While interviewed, Yale explained, “He came into the room for the first two weeks and really helped us in breaking character arcs as well as tentpoles not just for his character but for other characters.” and effused, “His input was pretty unbelievable.”
A teaser trailer for The Copenhagen Test was released on Sunday, the final day of this year’s NYCC. A wild collection of twists await viewers when it debuts on Peacock December 27, 2025.
Some quotes from the NYCC Roundtable:
Jennifer Yale: “Make sure that we were constantly creating an element of making the audience unsettled but still not exhausting them. So, answering the question after it’s asked— but almost right away– so that you’re not spending too long waiting for an answer and feeling like you’re never going to get that satisfying answer.”
Thomas Brandon: “One of the things that we talked about early on is there’s a lot of television which is like somebody gets shot and the question that takes you to the next episode is who shot them? And we know we weren’t that show. We knew we were the show that we were going to show you who shot them and you wouldn’t know why because that, to me, is more terrifying.”
Yale: “Because in this kind of spycraft world it’s the whys. You have to figure that out to be able to figure out how to stop them because usually what’s behind one is many others. And so you can catch the one who may have actually pulled the trigger but it’s all the other people behind him that have their guns ready that you have to be able to figure out why to get all of them.”
Brandon: “one of the quotes I try to live by is… ‘it’s the job of the science fiction writer not to envision the future car, but the future traffic jam’ ”
Yale: “We also made a point to make sure that our sci-fi was almost grounded so that we could escalate and almost elevate the espionage.”
Brandon: “One of the things I thought about, being a lover of the genre of sci-fi, is that this is the prequel to a lot of sci-fi stories you love. This is the technology they would have to perfect in order to do a memory transfer or a consciousness transfer or any of those like telepathy.”
Yale: “In this show, he had a lot to do. He was really hands-on with us. Which was fantastic. He came into the room for the first two weeks and really helped us in breaking character arcs as well as tentpoles not just for his character but for other characters. As an executive producer but also just he had been a writer on a TV show before and so he does come from a very creative, and making sure that we were always moving story forward. And even down into the editing. It was incredibly helpful when there were action sequences and he knows so much about them with such an expertise. … The notes that he gave and his input was pretty unbelievable. We were really lucky to have such a great actor.”
Brandon: “Yeah, it’s always a really good sign when an actor signs on as executive producer and you can tell they’re trying to make the show better instead of trying to make themselves look good. So I thought he was really working towards: he wanted the show to be good, he wanted the show to work.”
Simu Liu: “I think before we talk about the politics of the world or what the decisions are that are beyond our control… What is inside our control is making sure that the character is resonant with as many people as possible— our story is compelling that the audience will follow us through this kind of impossible tightrope of this kind of “Truman Show” espionage, thrilling performance.”
Check out more NYCC ’25 coverage from the Beat here.
