"Training Day" was produced at Floyd County Productions and animated at Radical Axis studio in Atlanta, over the course of approximately one month.

FX had initially planned on airing the series alongside the fifth season of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia in 2009, but production constraints led to it being pushed back to January 2010.

The episode features cultural references to the films Rain Man and James Bond, and stand-up comedian and actor Dane Cook.

After Archer recklessly foils an Irish terrorist's attempt to assassinate a British nobleman, Malory begins to suspect that Lana's feelings for her son are resurfacing.

Seeing this as an opportunity to help themselves, secretary Cheryl and human resources representative Pam hack into the ISIS computer mainframe from Malory's office and alter their files, allowing them better health care and other perks they can not afford themselves.

"Training Day" was written by Archer creator and co-executive producer Adam Reed, while the series' animation director Mack Williams directed it.

[5] FX originally planned on pairing Archer with the fifth season of the network's situation comedy It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia on Thursday nights in the Fall.

[3][7] FX instead decided to release a sneak airing of the pilot episode "Mole Hunt" on September 17, 2009, without any promotion or announcement,[3][7][8] and began broadcast of the first season with "Training Day" on January 14, 2010.

[10][11] Archer explains that ISIS agents get trained by a former member of Mossad to use Krav Maga,[10] an eclectic hand-to-hand combat system developed in Israel.

Zoromski called the voice cast "absolutely excellent," writing that H. Jon Benjamin's delivery as Archer was "brilliantly over-the-top, from his drunken outburst and almost-accidental stopping of a terrorist, to his education of all things spy-related," and noted that both the series satirical themes and character development were "alternately obvious and subtle" and "Archer's biggest strength.

"[9] Salon.com's Heather Havrilesky called the exchange between Archer and Cyril concerning the latter's martial arts training a "[zinger that flies] by pretty quickly.