Netflix’s Crew Girl follows a teenage sculler who takes the cox seat in a boys’ eight, its a YA (young adult) drama set on the water and portraying a twisting, turning a rowing-based love triangle. The eight-part series premiered on 10 September 2026, entered the Netflix English TV Top 10 and was renewed within a fortnight. The reviews, however, have been far from flattering.
Regardless, rarely does rowing receive much love or mainstream attention. Netflix has people who have never been near a boathouse asking what a coxswain actually does. But the newly-converted need not worry: rowers have been asking themselves the very same question for years.
To the questions, then. Let’s go!
What is the plot of Crew Girl?
Teagan Tao, 16, is a promising single sculler in Los Angeles until her father, David, disappears amid a financial fraud scandal and the FBI seizes the family’s money. She and her mother, Ella, move to Ella’s hometown of Eagle’s Cove on the East Coast. There Teagan enrols at Easton Prep, where eye-watering tuition fees are comparable to those at a college.
Easton has no girls’ rowing team. Teagan’s only route onto the water is the cox seat of the boys’ varsity eight, a divided crew that isn’t very good, and she has never coxed. She has to earn the rowers’ trust and turn them into contenders for the Haverford Cup. Off the water she deals with her family’s fallout and her feelings for two of her own rowers.
The series was created by showrunner Vivian Lin, developed by Lin and Morwyn Brebner, and produced by Blue Ant Studios.
Who is in the cast of Crew Girl?
The principal cast:
- Miku Martineau as Teagan Tao
- Jessica Paré as Ella Tao-Emerson, Teagan’s mother
- Sam Braun as Josh Regis, the old-money captain
- Kyle Clark as Cam Dillinger, the financial-aid local who works at his family’s mechanic shop
- Thomas Cadrot as Coach Matt Hayden
The rest of the Easton crew:
- Connor Paton as Ryder Regis
- Jude Wilson as Bronson “Baloo” Garner
- Vincent Muller as Damon Quaid
- Riley Davis as Noah Bainbridge
- Connor Wong as Perry Chou
- Jarrett Carlington as Chris “Crab Catcher” Padmore
Others in the cast:
- Sage Linder as Britney
- Olga Petsa as Juliet
- Byron Lawson as Teagan’s father, David
- Niall Matter as Josh’s father, Richard Regis
Josh and Ryder are cousins as well as rivals for the stroke seat. Netflix’s cast guide maps out who is related to whom, which takes some doing in Eagle’s Cove.
Who plays Teagan Tao?
Teagan is played by Miku Martineau, a 22-year-old Canadian from The Beaches in Toronto. Her parents run a family restaurant called The Beacher. Her earlier credits include Bet, Kate and Star Trek: Section 31. She recognised some of the creators’ names on the Crew Girl audition from Bet.
Figure skating, hockey and gymnastics were part of her childhood. She switched to volleyball after a broken leg made her miss hockey tryouts.
“Sports are great. There’s so much emotion involved in them, and it really teaches you resilience and a lot of mind over matter, which is a huge concept involved in rowing,” she told WWD.
What rowing training did Miku Martineau do for Crew Girl?
Martineau learned to scull in a single while shooting a sci-fi film in Ithaca, New York. She then joined the rest of the cast at a rowing boot camp in Victoria, British Columbia.
“We had a three-week bootcamp to learn how to row. All of the actors, my castmates and myself,” she told The Hollywood Reporter. “We wanted to do our best to portray the sport accurately with what we were given and the time that we were given.”
In Victoria she continued practising in her single scull while learning to cox. “When I got to Victoria, I was learning all the terminology, how an eights-boat works and how to become a coxswain, just as Teagan is also learning throughout the show,” she told THR.
It was a big step for someone who used to avoid the erg at the gym because it “felt like I was doing this wrong”. Kyle Clark, who plays Cam, had even less rowing knowledge to draw on before he started boot-camp training. His exposure to crew was “literally just The Social Network”, he told Netflix.
The boot camp wasn’t just for Easton’s young rowers. Thomas Cadrot, who plays Coach Hayden, also trained for his character’s appearance in an alumni race involving Easton Prep’s former students.
Sam Braun, a former national-level diver, found the move from an individual sport the biggest adjustment. “I’m used to individual sports. Being in a boat with lots of people, there’s so much coordination. If one of you is off, it can throw off the balance and rhythm,” he said. “That was such great team bonding for the cast.”
“We did so much research about what is a good time for a single guy to erg in our indoor rowing competition,” Lin told Netflix. “If you see that board with everyone’s times, they’re accurate to where we felt the characters should be.”
For more details on the actors’ training and filming, including weekend lake sessions fitted around night shoots, cold autumn filming, drones, rain and long waits on the water, check out our behind-the-scenes piece.
What is a coxswain?
The coxswain, or cox, is the crew member who doesn’t row. The cox steers, keeps a lookout, gives the commands and runs the race plan. The cox is responsible for the crew on the water, including safety, technique and motivation.
In an eight, the cox sits in the stern facing the stroke, so the boat carries eight rowers plus a cox. The stroke sets the pace and rhythm. As Teagan does in the show, the cox talks to her crew through a headset wired to a cox box, which amplifies her calls.
In Crew Girl the stroke seat is also a plot device. Josh, Cam and Ryder all compete for it. “Stroke seat can be a bit of a symbol; whoever is in the leadership role is with Teagan,” Clark said. “They’re competing to be in front of her. They’re competing for her attention.”
Because Teagan has never coxed, viewers learn the job as she does. “The best coxswains learn how to be the best communicators, make decisions, have great relationships with their teammates, and motivate their team. It’s a huge leadership role, and Teagan is ready to take that on,” Martineau said.
She also had to steer for real. “When I was learning how to become a coxswain, I needed to make some decisions on the spot,” she said. “I needed to make sure that the boat was going in the right direction because there were a lot of other boats on the water.”
Is Eagle’s Cove a real place?
No. Eagle’s Cove is a fictional New England coastal town, presented in the show as being in Massachusetts. Netflix’s locations guide names Gilmore Girls’ Stars Hollow as one of its inspirations.
Season 1 was filmed in and around Victoria on Vancouver Island. Hatley Castle, a 40-room mansion built in 1908, plays the Easton Prep campus.
The regatta scenes put as many as five boats on the water at once, and the crew worked from a production barge with the eight lashed alongside. “We built this huge barge that holds our entire crew and gear, and we strapped the 67-foot boat to it,” Lin said. “Luckily, none of the crew fell off.”
Where can I watch Crew Girl?
All eight episodes of Season 1 are streaming on Netflix, and episodes run 40–55 minutes. The show is an original screenplay, not a book adaptation. A tie-in novel by Sheila McClure came out on 11 September, the day after the premiere.
Is Crew Girl good, and is it worth watching?
- The Hollywood Reporter found it watchable for YA fans and welcomed how central the sport is. It criticised thin characters, little sense of life beyond rowing and a love triangle it didn’t buy.
- Variety was harsher, calling the dialogue and plotting contrived. It praised the bond between Teagan and Ella and the chemistry of the ensemble.
- Common Sense Media was the warmest of the three. It called Martineau an engaging lead and said the mix of rowing ambition, romance and teamwork holds the attention. It rates the show 14+ for romance, drinking and drug use.
For rowers, the draw is seeing the cox seat, stroke-seat politics and an erg leaderboard at the centre of a show in Netflix’s Top 10. The reviews suggest the teen drama around them follows familiar lines.
What is the deal with the love triangle?
Spoilers for Season 1 follow.
Teagan falls for two of her rowers.
- Cam is the financially stretched local who shares her drive.
- Josh is the privileged captain whose arrogance hides family pressure and a serious heart condition, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.
She dates Cam first, but his insecurity about money breaks them up. She then has a secret fling with Josh.
Lin told TV Guide what each boy brings out in Teagan. “With Josh, it’s very much like enemies to lovers. They don’t like each other. They have nothing in common. But the thing that Josh brings out of Teagan is that she is completely honest with him from the get-go,” she said. On Cam: “Cam loves rowing in the same way that Teagan does. They have a spiritual connection to it. It is how they’re defined, and you immediately pick that up between them.”
By the finale, Josh has:
- hidden his diagnosis
- bribed a doctor for medication so he could keep racing
- sawn through an oar so he wouldn’t risk a cardiac event mid-race
- crashed his car during an attack of chest pain
He hands the stroke seat to Cam. Easton take silver at the Haverford Cup, their first podium in years. Afterwards Josh asks Teagan for another chance once he has had heart surgery. Moments later, Cam kisses her in the boathouse.
Teagan ends the season without choosing either of them, and the writers’ room hasn’t settled it either. “There’s a Team Josh contingency and there’s a Team Cam contingency, so they just fight all the time,” Lin told TV Guide.
Martineau won’t pick a side. “I’m Team Teagan. Girl power,” she told Netflix. “We all have those moments where we feel like the underdog or underestimated, especially as women in male-dominated environments. So I’m Team Teagan because she’s a pretty powerful young lady.”
I liked Crew Girl. What else should I watch?
Netflix’s own sports-romance picks are mostly on ice:
- Finding Her Edge: an ice dancer’s new partnership and sponsorship deal complicate her feelings for her first love.
- Spinning Out: a singles skater rebuilds her career in pairs after an injury while living with bipolar disorder.
- Zero Chill: a figure skater has to start again after her family relocates for her twin brother’s hockey career.
For a larger elite-sport ensemble, try Olympo, set among young athletes at a Spanish high-performance centre. If it was the small-town setting you enjoyed, go back to Gilmore Girls.
Is Crew Girl coming back for Season 2?
Yes. Netflix renewed Crew Girl on 22 September 2026, twelve days after the premiere.
“I am beyond excited for Crew Girl Season 2!” Martineau said in Netflix’s renewal announcement. “There’s so much left to explore with the characters, the romances, and the rowing team — it’s going to be a ride for sure!”
The finale left several storylines open:
- Britney, Josh’s ex, has organised a girls’ team backed by her family’s foundation. Teagan has to decide whether to leave the boys’ eight to race again herself.
- Coach Hayden has been fired for letting Teagan back in the boat.
- Josh faces surgery without his grandfather’s money.
The cast have their own wish lists. “We really want to step it up. I would love to try single sculling,” Clark said. Braun pitched a summer break on the lake.
When is Season 2 coming out, and where is it being filmed?
Netflix hasn’t announced a release date. It also hasn’t said when production will start or where Season 2 will be filmed.
