actress who plays martha is incredible

I've watched all of the seasons, and I never said I hated the show. I think this is the most overrated show on TV since Homeland clearly stopped being a good show after season 1. It's been top 15 or so throughout its run, but top 5? lol

I think it's a classic example of a show that was loaded with potential, and has blown all of that at every step of the way. There have been good episodes throughout the run, and times where it looked like it might hit its potential, but it always trips over itself. Sorry if you can't see that. My problem with the show is that it's extremely disappointing, not that it's a terrible show. Technically and acting wise, I typically enjoy the show very much. It's just a bad story with a lot of clumsy writing and terrible decision making, in my opinion.

It's on the verge of entering terrible show territory because it's wasting gobs and gobs of time when it should have none left (its ratings are legit awful, and the show 100 percent *should* be canceled after this season). They've just given us a 7 episode arc of something that any capable show would not have drawn out longer than two episodes (and the very first part of a third episode). It's like they don't know what to do anymore. You can constantly add new storylines into the show, yet it's acting like it's stuck with what it set up in season 1.

Having a bunch of open threads is what makes a slow moving show interesting. Every story is at critical mass, and they just avoid it. At the point they're at in the show, it's the year of WarGames. We just passed the point of Prince's 1999, a truly terrifying song at the time, and we're nearing the height of the Cold War (though there is plenty left to come). Yet at absolutely zero point has there been any nuclear tension in this show. It was probably close to constant from 82-85. They're talking about biological weapons, not nuclear codes. It's just weird...weird.

As an episode, that was a good episode, the one that should have aired about 5 weeks ago. Still, I shouldn't have been shocked that something would almost happen that episode. After all, something has almost happened all season.

Pretty sure William was a run American, recruited because of his job. His wife's cover was apparently blown, and she had to go back to Russia. They never said exactly what happened, just that she was sent back.

I thought Gabrial said in regards to William "he's been here for a long time" implying he wasn't American?

It's been too long since that episode, is it possible his language could have been "with us a long time"?

The only two scenes where anything is referred to (if I remember correctly) is that one and the scene where he's talking with Philip about Martha. Keep in mind that guy is about 20 years older than Philip and Elizabeth. They were inserted in the 60s, which means he would have been inserted in the 40s, so something wouldn't be right for him to be a first generation in the Americans program.

Last two episodes have been great IMO.

This is the longest delayed climax in history. I liked the Martha scenes but was really expecting some kind of shocking payoff.

felt like a season finale. had to check afterwards and realized there are a few more left still.

Yeah agreed. The review I read said it felt like a series finale which I actually think would have made more sense.

I thought the scene with Elizabeth and that woman was the closest (and most predictable) we'd get to the Sopranos. Elizabeth IS Tony Soprano, and Philip is starting to act like Christopher during his crisis days. She got fed up with all of the beta behavior and insubordination to the Cause, and just released a ton of pent-up energy on yet another person who could ruin the whole thing. You knew Elizabeth was killing her, and it was a great scene... no need for any details, just her smoking a cigarette back in the safe house.

Real-life story of an "Americans" couple & their two children: http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...tim-alex-foley

Interesting read. Thanks for posting

Just came to post the same thing. Long but very worthwhile read. For all we remark on long stretches where "not much happens" the real spy world probably is much more mundane than our russian protagonists on the show.

I'm truly amazed anyone thought that was a good episode. Martha's gone, they killed an agent we hadn't seen in a year (and reminded us that Philip's still running 15 year old Kimmy), and Gaad got gaat...hooray for something happening. There was lots of anger, EST, Margo Martindale walking in trying to get an Emmy nom (Langella was so angry at this blatant Emmy grab that he talked over her the WHOLE scene, since he hasn't got a nod yet...lol), and then a really terrible fast forward, skipping almost the entire scariest (?) year in that era of The Cold War. This show is genius or something. I feel like this show has brainwashed you who think it's amazing. It's just a soap drama using some spy program as a backdrop.

They managed to skip WarGames and the Korean Air Lines disaster. The good news (I hope) is that they're smack dab at the date (a few weeks before if we believe the timeline) of The Day After. If they skip that, this show is pathetic. The date of the show after this most recent episode will be right around November 8, 1983. The Day After aired November 20, 1983. All of the pop culture moments in the show are just straight dumb. I don't get it at all. There was plenty of evidence to put the episode's start in the week of April 8, 1983 (the Copperfield special aired that day). They saw Tender Mercies and The Outsiders, and there were posters for The Entity and Without a Trace.

Just to make this hit home a little harder, here are notable things from wikipedia that happened in 1983, and I don't think any were touched on so far.

1. January-Soviet Spy arrested in New York
2. March 8-Reagan calls Soviet Union an "Evil Empire".
3. March 23-Reagan proposes Strategic Defense Initiative aka Star Wars
4. September 1-Korean Air Lines Flight 007 shot down by Soviets
5. September 26-Real life WarGames played out when Soviets thought they were being attacked. An Officer of the Soviet Union correctly identified this as a false alarm.
6. October 25-U.S. invades Grenada.
7. November 2-Able Archer 83 exercise that put Soviet nuclear forces on high alert. This is considered to be the closest we came to nuclear war since the Cuban Missile Crisis by many people to that date.

But again, if we're lucky, they'll at least reference The Day After. If not, this is just some alternate universe soap drama that thinks we should be scared of biological weapons when nuclear war was a legitimately scary potential phenomenon in the exact era they're in. GJGE.

I've dropped back in on this show. Last episode was the best episode of the season by a factor of at least 4.

Really glad Martha is gone, but I did feel for her.

Nunnehi you should probably just put yourself out of your misery and stop watching.

Plot committed bruh...

You seriously don't have a problem that they skipped every single important Cold War event (a year where we were at the highest nuclear tension in that era) of 1983? If this show were done "right", that tension would be the backdrop of the show, and the fraying of relationships would play into that just like the fraying of the already awful relationships of the two countries. There is inherent "production value" in what was actually going on at the time, and it's as if it never exists (we have a rat in a jar as an example of the "stakes" of the show). This show and The Goldbergs very much have that in common, but even The Goldbergs showed how much of an impact The Berlin Wall falling had in one of the episodes. The Goldbergs can largely be forgiven because it's just a nostalgic 80s sitcom not trying to tackle deep themes. The Americans cannot be forgiven. It would be like if The Wonder Years tried to tell its story without including the Vietnam War. It's just bad storytelling as far as I'm concerned.

When reality helps your storyline have more dramatic tension, you can't ignore it. Suspense is inherent in this genre, and there is almost none. It's like season 1. The way they wrote the show was as if we knew who won The Cold War, and they were thumbing their nose at the outcome. They were telling it from the "winner's" perspective. That is the nut low of dramatic storytelling, and there are hundreds of movies/TV shows that have been able to take known outcomes and make them feel like you don't know the outcome as it's unfolding.

If you're looking for a show that takes an outcome that is widely known, uses the time as a backdrop, and captures the feel of the era in the city almost exactly perfectly watch American Crime Story: The People vs. O.J. Simpson. That's how a period piece should be done in relation to using the "production value" of the era it was set in and the inherent tensions underlying the entire show. This show is a joke in that vein, sorry. It does make me curious to know whether you were even alive in the era the show takes place in. If not, or you were too young to remember, it makes more sense why it wouldn't bother you. For someone like kioshk, this should be really aggravating, but for some reason he can get past it.

And to fill in a tiny bit of backstory, I lived in a 1st target zone in 1983. We had General Dynamics and Carswell Air Force Base (housed the F-16s and B52s) within 2 miles (Carswell) and 5 miles (GD) of where I lived. It was a real concern.

i'm firmly in #teamnunnehi on this one. show has so much potential, awesome concept and decent leads but they just dont manage to deliver. It's ok if one or two story lines go nowhere to simulate some realism, but a show like this cant just live with constant tension if things never escalate. Given that they could just look at real world events and write a half-decent story arc around those makes it more frustrating. and they wouldnt even have to limit themselves to the things nunnehi mentioned earlier, you can pretty much take every other thing on this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_i..._States#Events and write a decent cold war spy plot around it.

To underline the idea of real life (or realistic, meaning timely) events as "production value", here are some examples for movies and TV.

1. Casablanca (shot with real life people who had fled Nazi Germany that took place during WWII, putting it into top tier movies because of this)

2. Sicario (drug wars)

3. Better Call Saul and Breaking Bad (drug cartels)

4. Mr. Robot (corporate malfeasance and financial collapse)

5. American Crime Story (powder keg of L.A. not terribly long after the L.A. riots of 1992)

6. Fargo Season 2 (inclusion of Reagan's campaign for timeliness)

7. The Bridge (Juarez and border tension)

8. Person of Interest (big brother)

9. WarGames (Mutually Assured Destruction and the automation of the decision of worldwide destruction)

10. The Day After (aftermath of a nuclear holocaust)

11. Mission: Impossible TV show (The Cold War)

12. The Americans (The Cold War or something)

You can also include dozens of movies that had the holocaust or WWII as backdrops, as well as various other wars. War and spying have always been some of the best backdrops in adding natural production values. The Americans is terribly misusing both almost to the point where it doesn't seem like it even exists in the right era. The show plays closer to the idea of Mission: Impossible's version of The Cold War without any of the intrigue or suspense. It has a good amount of very good elements, but the most important are not. The writing is extremely subpar, and the decision making on the show has made this one of the most disappointing things I've ever seen in the genre. Suspense is a key component of the genre (everything is against a ticking clock or an unseen danger), and it just doesn't exist in this show. The fact that they needed to spend 3 episodes (not even including last season's ones featuring her) dealing with Martha shows all you need to know about what this show knows about suspense.

That was easily the best episode of the season, even with the extreme focus on butts and driver's ed. At least they finally gave us five minutes of nuclear tension with the inclusion of The Day After and the mention of September 26th event. I never understand why this show always waits a bunch of episodes before they start propelling each season forward.

Pastor Tim and his preggo wife are gonna buy it in Ethiopia, baby. No getting around it, their goose is cooked. Future plot points will involve how suspicious Page gets etc.

Btw, the whole idea that's taken root these days that everybody in the 70s and 80s was walking around scared to death of imminent nuclear war is complete and utter bull****. Nobody gave 2 ****s about that stuff back then, I remember! Sure we generally hated the Communists and the USSR, and rightly so. But we sure as **** weren't shaking in our boots expecting a mushroom cloud.

Try being 11 years old at that time (and living in a hot target zone). It was very scary for kids (I've said that 1999 was a terrifying song for me based on the conditions of the time). It wouldn't have been scary for someone who had lived through the Cuban Missile Crisis, but movies like WarGames and The Day After were very effective for what they were. There weren't any super major events I could see in The Cold War (tension wise) after 1983. There were about 6 incidents that were huge in 1983, and when you combine that with those movies, yeah, it had an impact on people younger than you. It's also very likely that those movies among other events at least made people stop and think about what was going on to try to stop the escalation.

lol, you're just a big baby.

Yeah, okay, whatever...

You're just a guy who romanticizes everything inside your worldview...

really tired of paige's perma-constipated facial expressions even though that's probably how the role should be played

plot committed so I'll stick through this season but can't see sticking around after. I don't even mind being spoiled itt. Sad!