It was created by Beau Willimon and stars an ensemble cast including Sean Penn, Natascha McElhone, LisaGay Hamilton, Hannah Ware, Keiko Agena, Rey Lucas, James Ransone, Anna Jacoby-Heron, Brian Lee Franklin, Oded Fehr, Norbert Leo Butz, Annie Parisse, Melissa George, Jeannie Berlin, and Bill Camp.

[7][8] In October 2017, it was reported that LisaGay Hamilton, Oded Fehr, James Ransone, and Hannah Ware had also joined the main cast.

The website's critical consensus reads, "Sean Penn gives an intensely poignant performance as the driven but conflicted Tom Hagerty in The First's rather slow-moving first season.

"[18] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the series a score of 61 out of 100 based on 28 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

[19] John Anderson of the Wall Street Journal wrote: "This is not a space show, or at least it won't be till the end of the season.

But gives the series a positive review saying "it weaves a spell that's somewhere between a '90s John Wells drama (think ER or The West Wing) and a slowed-down TV answer to Terrence Malick (The Tree of Life especially).

Its first two episodes treat inevitabilities as questions, and unfold with the zip of a DVR-ed sporting event for which you already read the box score.

"[22] Alan Sepinwall of Rolling Stone wrote: "The First is under no burden to be as quippy or feel-good as The Martian, as awestruck as The Right Stuff, as gee-whiz as Apollo 13 or From the Earth to the Moon.