Special Ops: Lioness — news, coverage & facts — IJR

Critical response

For the first season, the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 56% approval rating and an average rating of 6.1/10, based on 36 reviews. As of Apr 2025, the show has an overall Rotten Tomatoes rating of 73%. The website's critics consensus reads, "Zoe Saldaña provides the energy of a Lioness, but these Special Ops are largely derivative and unconvincing." On Metacritic, it has a weighted average score of 56 out of 100 based on 19 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

Despite praising the performances of Laysla De Oliveira and Zoe Saldaña, Anita Singh of The Daily Telegraph criticized "the one thing that lets the show down is Nicole Kidman as a CIA boss, whose frozen face these days is a total distraction".

Tania Hussain of Collider praised the performance of the cast but criticized the show as "flawed story" and found Taylor Sheridan was struggling to write about women. Another writer from Collider, Michael John Petty, said the series "might work best as a one-and-done story," though later noted in his Season 2 review that the show that "Sheridan and company have managed to extend the narrative as organically as possible, offering hope for the future of this series." Angie Han of The Hollywood Reporter criticized the script as "seems to be constructed with the assumption that most of the audience will only be half-watching while scrolling Facebook on their phones anyway" but couldn't deny the fact that "there is one aspect of Special Ops: Lioness that shines through clear as day no matter how much or how little of your focus you've directed toward it, and that is its reverence for the U.S. Marine Corps".

Jim Hemphill of IndieWire praised the cinematography work of Paul Cameron as it "breaks all the cinematography rules" and "in Cameron's hands, even a standard dialogue scene between two actors has extra dynamism and energy that come simply from looking for unorthodox angles or alternating focal lengths in a manner that might seem counterintuitive".

Reviewer Mike Hale, writing for The New York Times, wrote that the show "turned out to be a moody, suspenseful, textured genre piece with characters you cared about," and that "Sheridan found a form, the action thriller, that suits him better than the western soap operas and contemporary crime dramas that he has produced up to now." Initially, when only screening the first episode, Hale wrote the show "looks like an awful lot of other counterterrorism thrillers, with a visceral punch to its action and a ticky-tacky, backlot feel." Also based on the first episode, Variety criticized it as "cliché" and "shameless military propaganda".

On Rotten Tomatoes, the second season has a 90% approval rating based on 10 critic reviews, with an average rating of 7.3/10.

On Rotten Tomatoes, the third season has a 85% approval rating based on 13 critic reviews, with an average rating of 7.3/10. On Metacritic, it has a weighted average score of 76 out of 100 based on 5 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

Audience viewership

The first season achieved a milestone by becoming the streamer's most-watched worldwide series premiere on launch day at the time, drawing nearly 6 million total viewers in its first week across Paramount+ globally and during a linear preview on the Paramount Network. This record was later surpassed by Lawmen: Bass Reeves, another series produced by Taylor Sheridan for Paramount+. Special Ops: Lioness emerged as one of the most-watched global series premieres on Paramount+ in 2023.

The second season garnered three million views within its first seven days. It placed #4 Paramount+ originals with the biggest domestic household premieres. It was reported a total of 12.4 million viewers globally across all platforms until the week of November 10 and an increase of average households from 4.8 million to 5.4 million. The second season reached 8.3 million domestic households, a 10% increase compared to its season 1 of 7.6 million, and secured #3 in the most-watched global series premieres on Paramount+ in 2024.

According to Nielsen's latest data, measuring only U.S. views on TV sets, the second season was placed #8 and #5 position in the original series chart during the week of October 28–November 3 and November 4–10, respectively. It placed #6 and #7 for November 11–17 and November 18–24, respectively. It maintained its #6 position for the week of November 25 – December 1. During December 2–8 and December 9–15, the series continued its strong hold by placing #4 and #6 in the original series chart, especially the first time securing the #7 position overall chart for the week of December 2–8. During the week of December 16–22 and December 23–29, the series ranked at No. 10 and #9, respectively. It went up to No. 6 during the week of December 30 – January 5. According to Luminate Film & TV Streaming Viewership, the second and first season ranked as the no. 4 and no. 8 most-watched streaming original series in the U.S. for the week of November 29 – December 5.

Special Ops: Lioness

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Special Ops: Lioness

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