How to Succeed in the FBI According to 'Quantico'

By Brenden Gallagher

How do you go from being a wet behind the ears, green as can be FBI recruit to a hardened agent ready to do anything -- and we mean anything -- for your country? You'd think that it would be all about sharpening your mind and strengthening your body. According to ABC's Quantico, you would be wrong. On Quantico, a new class of potential FBI operatives is just as concerned with being steamy and sexy as they are with, like, firing guns or whatever.

Do you have what it takes to make it in Quantico's FBI? Are your showers steamy enough? Are your abs chiseled enough? Do your relationsips with friends and enemies alike have just the right amount of sexual tension? It's time to find out if you're FBI material. Here's How to Succeed in the FBI According Quantico.

Keep That Shirt Off As Long As Possible

Everyone knows that FBI trainees work out. What you may not know is that it is absolutely essential that you strut around with your shirt off between workouts. The nation's safety depends on it. If you work hard for those six pack abs, why not leave your door slightly ajar so that your fellow recruits can gawk at the fruits of your labor? Why not do a few extra laps in the Quantico pool? Hell, why not really take your time when putting your shirt on or taking it off?

A true top recruit knows one essential truth: if you've got it, flaunt it.

Find the Most Formfitting Gym Clothing on the Market

If you must wear clothes for brief periods during the day, you'd better make sure they are formfitting. Loose shirts sink ships people. Men, you can sport your standard crew neck tee as long as its at least one and a half sizes too small. Women, you're going to have to get more creative. This is Quantico damn it! If you're neck line doesn't plunge deep enough to show off that perfectly supported rack, then you aren't really sacrificing everything for your country are you?

Hell, if you're just hanging out doing research, make sure you wear a thin henley with the buttons undone. Out in the field you'll expose assets. At Quantico, you'll be expected to expose a different kind of asset, and if you want to stand out, you need to seize opportunities to show some cleavage taht others wouldn't.

Have A Dark Secret Somehow Left Undiscovered By Rigorous Background Checks

You might think that FBI agents need to be squeaky clean. Wrong. You need to be ALMOST squeaky clean. There has to be one glaring thing in your past: like a love child, an affair with a powerful man, or a fake identity. This tidbit needs to inexplicably slip through during the screening process. It has to be something you never tell anyone ... except people you sleep with.

If there are no skeletons in your closet, you'd best quit now. You'll never last in Quantico.

Deliver Exposition While Fighting

Quantico honors the storied American television tradition of delivering boring yet essential story information during moments of action. Whenever characters start sparring or visiting the shooting range, listen carefully, because they are going to discuss the tedious details of their lives that will come back into play later on in the form of inexplicable plot turns.

When Anyone Leaves the Room, Reach After Them and Beg Them to "Wait!"

While the men and women of the FBI are tough as nails, their hearts are incredibly breakable. With all of the secrets flying around, egos tend to shatter on a weekly basis. Whether it's revealed that you have been spying on your roommate or that you've been operating with a secret identity, the only way to respond when they run out of the room with tears in their eyes is to reach after them and yell "Wait!"

Of course, it's already too late, but your friend/frenemy/colleague/lover will appreciate the effort.

Have Daddy Issues

In 2015, women can pursue a career in high-profile patriotic law enforcement. However, you'd better believe that these badass women are there for one reason and one reason alone: their dad. Alex (Priyanka Chopra) and Shelby (Johanna Braddy) both ended up at Quantico thanks psychological hangups involving their fathers. Points to this show for a nod towards gender equality though: Caleb's (Graham Rodgers) career ambitions are all about living up to his dad's expectations. That's almost kind of like gender equality, right?

Speak in Facebook Worthy Patriotic Platitudes

If you don't hear lines like: "The greatest the threat this country faces is the enemy within," and "Life is full of hard choices. But we make them. That's why we get to protect our country," then you're not watching a show about sexy red-blooded Americans laying it all on the line for the U.S. of A. If it it doesn't sound just like memes on your uncle's Facebook wall, then its not good television.

When Outdoors, Make Sure Your Hair Looks Windswept

The women of Quantico prove that a true aspiring FBI agent needs to have Beyoncé hair 24/7. Alex's hair is so buoyant that it looks like a legion of assistants follows her with fans, ready to give her the windswept look any time she so much as moves a muscle.

When Undevercover, Use A Shitty Southern Accent

In episode 5, all of the recruits go undercover. You really can't do an FBI or CIA show without at least one episode of undercover action. For some reason, when actors play an undercover role, they tend to throw on a Southern accent no matter where their cover is from. Ryan (Jake McLoughlin) is supposed to be assuming the role of a Tom Brady loving Masshole. But, for some reason, puts on an accent you would hear at a movie gas station after the heroine's car breaks down in the middle of nowhere, and she's not from around these parts.

Pick A Fellow Recruit With Whom the Sexual Tension Will Be Palpable

Now comes the most important part of being a five-star recruit: sleeping with your fellow agents.

When you first get to Quantico, there are a few things you have to take care of. You get your gun. You get your various uniforms. And you have to pair up with an eventual friend with benefits. Now, you can't sleep together immediately (unless you meet as strangers, because then you get a delightfully awkward moment later when you realize that you're both FBI). Otherwise, you have to let the sexual tension build up over the course of a number of episodes. That makes it all the more fun when you inevitably give into your baser desires when you are assigned to the same mission or end up in the same hotel room after a night "undercover."

The most important part of going undercover is getting under the covers. It's all in a night's work for the agents of Quantico.