FX offices right now:
Someone needs to make a supercut of every time a character passive aggressively says "okay..." on this show.
The juxtaposition of domestic banality with covert, often erotic peril has never been more unsettling.
I'll say what we've all been thinking: can't wait for the new wigs.
This might be a philosophical season of The Americans, but like any good countercultural force, it still gets its thrills from sex and violence. B+
Not your average marital problems. Discover why Philip and Elizabeths relationship is like no other on TV.
DON'T MISS: "The Americans" -- The suspenseful adventures of Phillip and Elizabeth Jennings (Matthew Rhys, Keri Russell) resume as this Cold War-era thriller launches its third season. Now, the undercover Russian spies have differing opinions on how to handle orders from their bosses regarding their teenage daughter. "The Americans" continues to be one of TV's standout shows.
Subbed! Currently catching up with S2.
notreadinganythingherenotreadinganythingherenotreadinganythinghere
The ending of S2E3 with Here Comes the Flood was amazing.
The Americans returns for a third season packed with tension, raw-nerve melodrama and enough levels of ambiguity, moral and psychological, to satisfy the most gluttonous appetite for the stuff. With, in short, all that has distinguished this series from its beginning.
ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh so closeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
As he did for the first two seasons, Weisberg has crafted a scenario requiring a rapid reaction from all the characters involved, upping the stakes and elevating the repercussions, but one that does not diminish the possibility for bountiful returns. Too many series rely on twists so heavily their designs become disposable, resulting in a downgrade in quality after a just a season or two. Not here. "The Americans" is only getting better with age, answering its questions as it builds upon them even if the solutions don't come easy.
Grade: A
From its first season to its second, FXs The Americans went from being a very good drama to one of the very best things on television, a show I ultimately ranked #2 overall for 2014. Ive seen the first four episodes of the third season, which debuts tomorrow night at 10, and while there hasnt been a comparable huge leap in quality, the show also hasnt backslid at all. The start of the new season feels very much of a piece with season 2, pushing forward the storyline about Philip and Elizabeth being ordered by the KGB to recruit their daughter Paige to be an asset, and finding creative new ways to portray the brutality of the spy trade in the early 80s. (Theres a scene early in next weeks second episode that you may need to watch from behind the couch.)
On an unseasonably warm day early last month, I paid a visit to the Brooklyn soundstages that play home to the show, where controlled chaos was the order of the day. They were simultaneously filming scenes from four different episodes; when I spoke with Matthew Rhys, he wondered if they were perhaps setting a record for cable drama production. Over the course of the day, I got to interview Rhys, Keri Russell, Holly Taylor, the shows hair and makeup people, and showrunners Joe Weisberg and Joel Fields. Look for the Taylor interview tomorrow and Rhys, Russell and the hair and makeup people in later weeks, as some of what we discussed involves spoilers for upcoming episodes.
I had a good stretch of time to speak with Weisberg and Fields about the logistics of production including how the first two seasons were impacted by, respectively, Hurricane Sandy and the polar vortex(*) how they try to incorporate real events (and real TV footage) from the period into the show, why theyre yet another cable family drama where the teen daughter has a lot to do and the teen son doesnt, early thoughts on the series' endgame, and a lot more.
The Americans picks up pretty deftly from where last seasons cliffhanger left off, while advancing that storyline at a relatively slow pace. Mixing the micro and the macro, the FX series grapples with questions surrounding the central couples daughter, while finding the Soviets in near-panic mode over the Vietnam-like quagmire that Afghanistan threatens to become for them. Throw in the arrival of Frank Langella in a supporting role, and its a solid start to a show that, despite its flaws, has quickly grasped the mantle of being perhaps the networks most-heralded series.
Finished up season 2 Sunday night, so I'm all caught up. So, so excited for this new season. Show has really got its hooks in me. Also, this is a dumb thing that happened:
The Americans restraint never comes across as inertia, with a story so finely tuned the show feels neither like its burning too quickly nor holding its powder. Showrunners Joe Weisberg and Joel Fields manage this dazzling feat by putting as much attention and care into its people as its plot points. In The Americans, the character beats arent inconsequential lulls used to distract the audience while pieces are moved into place. The intimate conversations have as much importance and intensity as the action sequences. Its characters may wear laughably bad disguises, but The Americans is perfectly camouflageda patient, well-observed family drama dressed up as a four-on-the-floor spy thriller.
Grade: A
EST Men
Philip and Elizabeth disagree over handling orders from the Centre; Philip enlists Annelise on a mission with an unexpected outcome; Stan tries a new approach to mending his marriage with Sandra amidst learning tough news about Nina.
The Americans locates a stirring balance between the brooding, heated familial melodrama and the equally taut, often lethal procedures of its infectious spy drama in ways that often evade works set in the 1980s. For Weisberg and company, the attention is less on the characters donning Springsteen jeans or Cyndi Lauper hairdos than how they reconcile their individuality with their accepted national identity and "duties." 3.5/4 stars
What's best about "The Americans" is in fact what's strangest about it, for by jumbling these questions as if letters on a Scrabble board, you're left to reassemble them into coherent answers on your own. That's still not easily done: Elizabeth and Phillip remain deeply seductive characters who are loving, smart, resourceful and even outwardly kind. The reality: They're vicious killers inextricably bound to a dying and corrupt idea -- the Soviet Union -- which they barely even understand. Yet it's that very idea that may be ultimately forced on Paige.
BOTTOM LINE Good, strong start.
GRADE A-
The Americans is an unusually clever, subtle drama that uses the conventions of a Cold War thriller to paint a portrait of a complicated, evolving but not unhappy marriage. Its not a comedy, but there are hints of black humor behind all the subterfuge. There are no real villains or heroes on this series. Mostly, the misguided lead the misled; action devolves into misadventure; and every season gets more complicated, and is all the better for it.