Eve Polastri

Eve Polastri is a fictional agent working for British intelligence, and the titular character of the "Killing Eve" novel series, and its television adaptation.

British author Luke Jennings originally created Polastri's character in an e-book novella series whose segments were published from 2014 through 2016, the series being compiled into the 2018 novel Codename Villanelle, which was followed by a 2019 sequel, Killing Eve: No Tomorrow.

In the novel's BBC America television series adaptation Killing Eve (2018—2022), the character is portrayed by actress Sandra Oh.

Eve Polastri is a lead character in Luke Jennings' four-segment novella series (2014–2016), whose compilation forms his 2018 novel Codename Villanelle. The 2018—2022 television series Killing Eve, created by British writer-actor Phoebe Waller-Bridge, is based on Jennings' novellas. In the television series, Polastri was born in the U.K., allowing her to hold a British government job, but raised in the U.S., explaining her North American accent. Actress Maya Rudolph said in 2022 that she had been offered the part, but turned it down because filming was to take place in Europe.

Eve Polastri is an MI5 security operative whose job as "an intelligence agency grunt" once involved more paper pushing than intrigue, her intellectual curiosity going unrewarded and underemployed by her superiors. After being called into a meeting about a recent assassination, Polastri speculates that the killer is a woman, and, after a series of plot twists, the deskbound MI5 agent suddenly becomes an MI6 foreign intelligence operative tasked with finding the killer.

Polastri becomes involved in a cat-and-mouse game with the psychopathic hired assassin Villanelle (portrayed by Jodie Comer), the two women becoming mutually obsessed and sharing what has been called a "crackling chemistry... between bitter enemies and would-be lovers". Agent Polastri tracks assassin Villanelle across Europe, not as hero and villain but as "two broken women whose flaws bind them together in a twisted pas de deux."

     Gazing at the tiny image on the screen, Eve feels her certainties shifting. ... She is not as immune to luxury and the purely sensual things of life as she once thought. Venice at nightfall, the weightless caress of the Laura Fracci dress, the touch of a six-thousand-euro bracelet on her wrist. All so seductive, and all in some essential sense so corrupt, so cruel.

Polastri has been described as a competent professional going through "a bizarre, uncontrollable awakening" and as an "awkward, smart, not entirely self-aware woman with an impressive mass of curly hair". Though Polastri initially presents as if she were a comedic supporting character, her "steeliness" and other strengths manifest, even in situations in which Villanelle has the upper hand. Her "instincts and resolve have to make up for her inexperience and her tendency to scream like a terrified child in the face of danger". Polastri "remains bound to the notion of being right and doing right", and is much more down to earth and approachable than conventional crime-solver characters. Series creator Phoebe Waller-Bridge said that Polastri is an "Everywoman" to whom people can relate, wanting an easy life but craving an extraordinary one.