The Copenhagen Test Recap ‘False Flag’: Humans, Superspies

The Copenhagen Test Season 1 Episode 3

In the game of espionage, it was inevitable that sacrifices needed to be made at some point. Perhaps it was even predictable that its main character would grapple with having a direct hand in getting others killed, after we watched him struggle with panic attacks following the Belarus operation and the guilt of disobeying an order and leaving an American woman behind. Alexander Hale was a walking operational leak. Since he found out about the hack within him, every time he turned his eyes on anything, he was knowingly providing the unknown enemy information that could get the people on his side killed. What elevated the episode was in the small ways it dealt with the humanity of the other members of the team. Marlowe (Adina Porter) reminding Moira (Brian d’Arcy James) that they were out of eggs. St. George (Kathleen Chalfant) having a tender moment with her wife, who appeared to be suffering from Alzheimer’s. St. George writing Alexander’s name on the notebook she dug up from her garden, and later advising Samantha that those things she could not carry, write them down, then bury them, and giving her her own leather bound carrier of the soul’s heaviest loads. Even the beguiling Michelle had a moment of truth, sitting alone in a cemetery, a casually devastating demonstration that this woman of many faces and fluid personalities once told Alexander something real about her. When an episode is able to seamlessly combine moments big and small, it turns a casual watch into committed viewing. False Flag hit a couple of false notes, but it was overall a solid episode in what is turning out to be a fairly solid series.

Moira called it the blue dye test – leak the intel, follow where the intel goes, as it will hopefully lead to whoever did the biohack on Alexander. St. George picked the operation that was to be sacrificed, Poseidon, the one Cobb was promoted to lead. And here was one of the episode’s few false notes, when Alexander asked Moira if he was certain it would work. Would a military veteran and intelligence analyst really ask that of his boss? Was he not just reviewing failed programs in the first episode? It felt like a child wanting reassurance rather than a professional, and in a different context it would have been fine, but here it stuck out. Of course Moira was not certain, that was not how espionage worked; he lied to Alexander and tasked Samantha to make sure he went through with the operation.

Alexander of course knew that what he was seeing was being carefully controlled, for operational security, but I don’t think he suspected the extent to which he was being managed, outside of Michelle. He went to a military parade with his proud parents and Jack, and there met the father of a soldier who died. They spoke briefly, and the father talked of how he derived comfort in that his son’s death had a purpose. It was a gut punch to realise that the ‘father’ was a plant, just another actor in the play Samantha was writing for Alexander. It was her way of gently prodding Alexander into continuing to cooperate with an operation they all knew would end with multiple deaths of people on their side. 

The transition from Alexander talking to the ‘father’ to Samantha guiltily asking to incinerate the actor’s profile was done smoothly and very well. The conversation between Michelle and Alexander later on, however, could have been better. I get the intent of showing that Alexander was starting to trust Michelle – this is a really mild grumble – I just think the dialogue could have been more subtle.

The operation that the team purposely exposed via Alexander involved a Slovakian politician, Hugo Klovach, whose financier Ilana Lexmann indicated would be entering the upcoming Slovakian presidential election. He was sympathetic to US interests so it was important for the US for him to win. There was a CIA operation to bring Klovach back into Slovakia; the goal of Poseidon was to monitor the CIA mission and provide support if it appears the mission was compromised in any way.

Cobb was suspicious of Alexander and very very uncomfortable with looping him in regarding Poseidon, even when he was told that Claymore had oversight. Cobb went to Marlowe because his request for an internal review was denied within minutes after he filed it. He pointed out what we already knew – that Alexander was tied to the three assets they lost in North Korea, that his own post-action report exonerated him, that he failed a loyalty test in Belarus. Marlowe was more interested in how Cobb got Alexander’s personnel file. She declared that anyone in Operation Claymore was off limits for internal review.

After Kovach, his family (who were not supposed to be there) and his CIA security team were assassinated, Cobb again wondered why there was no internal review, on himself and everyone involved in the operation. This time, it was Moira who pointed out he and Alexander were briefed at the same time, then spent the next 12 hours on the same call right there in the office. There was no way Alexander could have leaked the information. Moira also said that they were watching because they thought the CIA and the locals couldn’t be trusted, and it turned out the leak came from Kovach’s people. 

Cobb’s Uncle Henry, who was the one monitoring the feed from Alexander, advised his nephew to put aside his concerns about Alexander for now. Later, he spoke to an unseen figure and said that though Alexander was no longer under suspicion at The Orphanage, he would figure out he was compromised eventually. They needed to prepare to use someone as leverage, someone he loved. As with that conversation between Alexander and Michelle, this dialogue is a bit too on the nose for me. 

I liked False Flag very much, my minor quibbles notwithstanding. Three episodes in, and I feel that it is a show that is hitting its stride, getting more comfortable with the story it wants to tell. After two episodes of making a point of underlining St. George's near mythical status amongst the junior agents, it was an interesting decision to begin the episode with a scene that greatly humanised her. She wrote down Alexander's name on her notebook. What was it about him that this veteran intelligence operative found particularly tough to carry?

Rating: B+

Strays

🕵️Whilst they were playacting boyfriend-girlfriend, Michelle told Alexander she went to cemeteries to feel centred. Later, she told him she lied, she actually went to old churches, as she showed him a part of the church with signal interference so they could talk. Later, when Michelle called Samantha to tell her Alexander now trusted her, we saw her at a cemetery, which meant that she told him one truth. 

🕵️Samatha told Michelle that Alexander would hide his doubts from her, she needed to be a safe place for him. Samantha was brilliant with guiding Michelle, but Michelle had good instincts, too. When Alexander figured out she was staying on not just as his pretend girlfriend, but to take him out if necessary, Michelle confirmed this. The frankness and honesty over something Alexander already knew anyway only gave her credence. 

🕵️The signal specialist told Moira and Marlowe that the one used on Alexander was a new version of the Cassandra technology. They tried to track the signal but it split.

🕵️Marlowe had already cleared Alexander’s family, friends, and military buddies of the hack. His mentor Victor Simonek was capable of doing it, but he was missing a motive. She was not yet ready to clear his ex-fiance, who was still under surveillance.

🕵️Cobb tried to bury fresh intel on Poseidon, but Ellie was way ahead of him; she had already cloned their printer and got the intel anyway. It led to Alexander temporarily switching Ilana Lexmann’s phone so they could get the updated timing of Kovach’s move. The new safe house location, they got Clarissa (from the previous episode) to retrieve.

🕵️Jack met with Henry at a cultural show rehearsal and not at his restaurant in which we have already seen Henry go to twice. Hmm. Jack asked if Henry’s nephew Cobb would be able to look into Alexander, whom he worried was too trusting. Henry claimed that they never talk about The Orphanage, that it would not be proper given his role at the National Intelligence Office. Hmm.

🕵️Moira and St. George figured out that the person or entity that hacked Alexander was an independent non-state actor who sold intel to whoever wanted it.

Episode Title: False Flag

Episode Writer: Jamie Chan

Episode Director: Kevin Tancharoen

Original Release Date: December 27, 2025