As 2025 has been coming to an end, fans of The Rookie have had many different topics pertaining to the hit ABC police procedural series they could discuss. Fans of the cop drama could look to the show's future because a new Season 8 trailer that showed way too much premiered near the end of the year. Either that, or viewers could look back and try to gauge what the best The Rookie moments that first aired in 2025 were.
Of course, fans who want to look back at where The Rookie has been in the past don't have to cut off their retroactive perspective to the beginning of 2025. Instead, people who enjoy the show can still learn more pivotal facts about how the cop drama became what it is today. One perfect example of that is that it is still fascinating to learn why Nathan Fillion agreed to star in The Rookie before there was even a script for the show.
Nathan Fillion agreed to star in The Rookie because of the team involved and his love of acting
While Nathan Fillion has never become a full-fledged movie star, he has been an incredibly successful actor throughout his wildly impressive career. Most notably, the actor has starred in the shows Two Guys and a Girl, Firefly, Castle, and The Rookie. Given how many roles Fillion has been successful in, he likely would have been in high demand when Castle ended after he starred in that show from 2009 until 2016. Despite that, Fillion quickly agreed to headline The Rookie.
In September 2018, Entertainment Weekly published an article that detailed the behind-the-scenes story about what led to Fillion agreeing to star in The Rookie. That article stated that The Rookie's creator, Alexi Hawley, was executive producing Castle when that show ended. As a result, Hawley approached Fillion about the possibility of starring in The Rookie when it was still just a concept without any scripts. Hawley told the outlet that he expected Fillion to turn The Rookie down because it was set to have a taxing filming process.
“I thought, ‘Uh, I don’t know that he wants to work that hard right now.’ Nathan had gotten to a place where he didn’t have to do a lot of work.”
Much to Hawley's surprise, Fillion wound up agreeing to the project despite how gruelling the behind-the-scenes process would be and even though there wasn't a script he could read. While talking to Entertainment Weekly for the aforementioned article, Fillion explained that he agreed to the role because he loves acting, and many people he'd worked with on Castle had signed on to The Rookie.
“On my worst day, there’s no place I’d rather be. I saw the pieces of this puzzle coming together, and it had the people I wanted to work with involved again, so why would I say no?”