A thread for The Americans on FX

xp oh, I'd missed that!

Man, what a crazy but weirdly subtle and eerie way to end a season. So much we don't know. We don't exactly what Paige told Tim, or how he took it. We don't know if Martha is still alive. Phillip may be heading for a breakdown, but we don't know what sort, or how it will bear out; he definitely seems to be sick of murdering innocent people and being ordered to sleep with underage kids. And most striking to me, we learn (for the first time?) that it was the son who murdered his entire spy family last season, after they tried to turn him. So many ways this can turn. Paige spying on her family for the gov (irony). Phillip going rogue. Stan unleashed dedicating himself obsessively to the pursuit of the illegals.

I love this show and can't wait until the next season starts (or becomes available on Amazon, 'cause I don't get FX).

yeah, i think the best thing about s3's ending, which seemed like it would have to draw a number of plotlines to a close, is how it left more questions than answers. literally cannot wait to see how it pans out.

How many more seasons is it pegged in for? Its just the pace at which things started to get over complex/fall apart picked up so much I cant see it going more than one more season without complete implosion.

I think at least two more?

iirc they've talked about wanting five, but I don't think they've gotten more than a one season renewal for now, and the numbers are really low. But FX supports the show fully, and is aware that they need to allow the creators to really finish the show when they agree to stop it, otherwise it would destroy all the goodwill they get out of it, which is really the only thing they are getting out of it... So if we don't hear that next season will be last one soon, then expect one more.

I could imagine it playing out like gold standard The Shield, which is to the say the story (as such) concluding and then several episodes basically spent on the run or tying loose ends. But then, the timeline of the show has always been pretty unclear. Sometimes it feels like each episode is really only one day, and certainly S3 seemed to be winter every episode. So depending on how micro they go they can stretch it or slow it as much as they want. Ignoring of course that the story right now is basically a powderkeg with the fuse sparking toward it at fast clip.

I've been really wanting them to do a Mad Men and run it right up to the fall of the Berlin Wall, but it seems pretty implausible that Philip and Elizabeth can carry on like this for that long. They could at least make it as far as 85 and the ascension of Gorbachev.

And was I right that it's only at the end of S3 that we learn that other kid killed his whole Russian family? It's only sort of mentioned in passing in that diner scene, so I wasn't sure if it was supposed to be a bombshell or not.

No that was revealed at the end of S2.

Huh. I remember him going all rogue, but I don't remember that at all! I guess it's been a while.

would like next season's last ep ending music to be "You Dropped a Bomb On Me"

do we know when the next season starts?

no date announced but 2 of the 3 seasons have premiered in the last week of january, so thats my guess

said it upthread somewhere but I am stoked at the possibility of inclusion of Able Archer 83 into the storyline, could see some interesting plot developments there

Just a little over 2 months until S4 (starts in March this time, though the exact date hasn't been announced).

good

Yeah looking forward to how this is gonna pan out now that Paige has blabbed.

This ad art is great

http://i.imgur.com/m8vfbem.jpg

A lot to parse in this brief 30 seconds

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ld1dDuUVqZo

eeee cant wait.

Is that Philip that Stan is shoving against the wall?

Oh man I'm thinking about watching a few of the old episodes just to warm up.

Trailer not available in my country :(

Hi TV networks, this is why we pirate all your shows btw!

on the show and Christianity

(spoilers)

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2016/february-web-only/christians-soviets-and-bible.html

Shit! I just saw an interview with Alison Wright (Martha) and I had NO IDEA she's English IRL.

back on Wednesday!

xpost This show has the best American accents ever.

I knew she was English but I didn't knaaa she was a Mackem.

This feels like the only series left where I have very high expectations, i am mostly whelmed or going through the motions with everything else on tv.

I definitely feel like I've been spinning wheels waiting for this (and Better Call Saul). Helpfully, my wife and I have just started finding Broad City insufferable again, which happens about halfway through each short, short season, so Americans arrives just in time. Heard good things about Fargo, fwiw.

i make allowances for other shows because the things they do well hit my personal spots and outweigh things they do less well (that i care about less), but this frequently amazes me in being even more amazing than i expect

Heard good things about Fargo, fwiw.

It's fitfully fun and entertaining, but don't expect anything anywhere near Americans-level.

I have to disagree heartily there! Fargo is quite on the level with Americans, though obv a diff feel.

That was a respectable premiere episode. I was especially enamored with Martha in the pre-credits scene.

But yoooooooooooo...the preview teaser for the rest of this season is BANANAS!

Typically quiet opener - loved the closing shot and Philip's incredible weariness, though.

Anyone where/when this is on UK TV?

The violence in the scene with young Phillip beating the kid to death was very... impactful. You really felt every blow.

The Nina storyline is really boring at the moment, she used to be the best character hands-down but it feels like her role in the show is being artificially prolonged at this stage.

It does feel that way, but I figure it will pay off somehow (and probably soon—they wouldn't just have her shadowing that engineer guy for another complete season would they?).

I am way more invested in what happens with Martha right now than I am about anything else. Although if I were a Russian spy I'd be worried about an FBI agent thinking I was banging his wife.

We just found out in the premiere that Nina is married, so maybe her husband will prove to be a significant character.

i'm almost exactly 2 years behind

i did lol at the discovery that the leads are now a RL couple

We just found out in the premiere that Nina is married,

Oh thank god I thought I was going mad at that bit... I was like "wait, what husband.. whatd I miss!?"

Finally caught up with the first two episodes of this season. Good to have it back, but I worry it's on the verge of collapse. Or maybe that's what makes it great? I haven't seen any teasers for things to come. Right now it's pretty melodramatic, and almost every character seems deeply depressed or at least seriously messed up.

Didn't like the bus sequence of episode 2, though, which was fine as far as suspense goes, but seemed contrived and deeply dumb, even for a show whose death count remains ridiculous.

More than ever has a constant feeling that something really really awful is about to happen. But when something awful DOES happen (the bus guy getting strangled), it somehow does nothing to relieve that tension. This is maybe the murkiest TV show ever.

On a sillier note, I had a dream that the most recent season had ended with the shock twist of Russia actually winning the Cold War, and that this time it had changed into a kind of alternate reality thing with Phillip and Elizabeth set up as officials in the new American Communist regime! Was a bit disappointed when I woke up.

Something's got to happen, hasn't it? Did I read somewhere they've planned it for five seasons? I just don't feel they can keep up the pretence much longer, if they still have the taste for it. I wonder if something will happen to their daughter (I hope not, as she is a great actor)? I wonder if the show will end with one hunting down the other?

And this show is great, but also gruelling.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

(no spoiler, but you'll probably agree with me when you see)

Holy shit! that was a major jolt and like the character, I didn't see it coming at all.

Well, of all the bad things that could have happened to any number of characters in any number of episodes but particularly this one, I suppose this was the least surprising. The character had been a dead end for several episodes now, and there was no real way out of their situation. I like the actor and the character a lot, actually, but I'd been commenting to my wife that the show didn't quite know what to do with them.

Great show, but seriously dark stuff. Like, emotionally dark, and in a really bleak, methodical sort of way.