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"The story of The Spy was really a story of loneliness…" My wife and I just finished watching all of The Americans on Hulu, and this really resonates with me.

"The story of The Spy was really a story of loneliness…" My wife and I just finished watching all of The Americans on Hulu, and this really resonates with me. Somehow, I managed to completely miss the show when it ran from 2013-2018, and was only reminded of its existence after watching and enjoying The Diplomat on Netflix, which also features Keri Russell in a starring role. The Americans is about pair of deep cover KGB agents living in the United States in the 1980s. It's very loosely based on real events, and it was created by a former CIA agent.

tptacek 3y ago
It's maybe one of the 3 best drama series of the last 20 years, and easily one of the 5 best. For a (nonfic) book in the same vein, try The Billion Dollar Spy.
- rg111 3y ago
  What are the other four in your best five list? I really liked The Americans, too.
- jpmoral 3y ago
  If you haven't seen it yet you might enjoy Le Bureau des Légendes.
  - isntbilly 3y ago
    Yep, fun series
    - awsation 3y ago
      Another spy series is Deutschland 83, 86, 89. Very good in my opinion.
- arethuza 3y ago
  I can recommend "The Spy and the Traitor" on Oleg Gordievsky, in particular the part about the exfiltration reads like a spy novel even though its all factual! Right down to the local ambassador (I think it was) who wanted to stop the operation but it was escalated all the way to Thatcher who was at Balmoral at the time and who was outraged at the idea that the UK wouldn't try and rescue him.
  - matthewdgreen 3y ago
    After reading that book I could not shake the feeling that Gordievsky’s defection was “too good to be true.” The intelligence he exfiltrated (with very few exceptions) was hugely beneficial in creating a back-channel between the USSR’s leadership and the West; his “arrest and interrogation” in Moscow was completely inept and even the use of truth drugs didn’t work, and the KGB somehow managed to leave him free to escape surveillance; the KGB was completely unable to detect and prevent his escape even though he got drunk and wandered around acting suspiciously; and the second KGB defector who “confirmed the legitimacy of” Gordievsky’s defection suspiciously re-defected right back to Moscow following his own interrogation. The whole thing felt extremely suspicious.
    - pvg 3y ago
      It's a lot harder to fake incompetence and failure and besides why would you? It would look, as you say, even more suspicious. At the time, Soviet intelligence services were counting how many windows were lit up after hours in US government buildings chasing signs of plans for an entirely imaginary first nuclear strike. A dude landed a plane in the middle of Red Square. The Soviets fucked up just like everyone else.
      - matthewdgreen 3y ago
        >It's a lot harder to fake incompetence and failure and besides why would you? Whether Gordievsky was a triple agent or not, it's clear that the KGB desperately needed a conduit to convey useful (true) information to the West in a form that Western intelligence agencies would find credible. Western intelligence (particularly the UK) also desperately needed an asset who could produce that sort of intelligence. Gordievsky just happened to be a perfect conduit for this communication, and may have helped avert a truly stupid nuclear war. If you assume this was an "op" then it would have to end somehow. Ideally it would end in a way that left Gordievsky alive and in the West, where he could continue to deliver his message to politicians. In order to keep Gordievsky's past information credible, he would either need to (1) be caught and tried/imprisoned, (2) defect. But I would imagine that the best case for his credibility would be some amazing combination of (1) and (2), especially a situation that would force the West to commit resources to a heroic escape that took him right out from under the KGB's nose in Moscow. This would make his handlers look brilliant, and it would make Gordievsky the kind of hero that politicians would take seriously. It would also be politically almost impossible for anyone in US/UK intelligence to ever (publicly) voice skepticism about Gordievsky. Gordievsky's escape from Russia also seems extremely bizarre. Remember this is a man who has miraculously survived chemical interrogation, is liable to be shot at any moment, but has somehow slipped his KGB tail and traveled halfway across Russia to a border town. Whatever doubts the KGB had before, he is now a dead man if they catch him. Yet instead of hiding in the woods waiting for his rescue, he heads into town, gets drunk, falls asleep in a restaurant and nearly misses the appointment to escape to the West? I guess people behave strangely under stress, but there's strange and there's "death wish." Perfectly reasonable, though, if the whole thing was fake. Finally there's the fact that Gordievsky's arrest story was almost immediately verified by Vitaly Yurchenko, whose "defection" is utterly bizarre. Yurchenko just happened to be an expert in "special drugs" who defected right after Gordievsky escaped, basically for the sole purpose of solidifying Gordievsky's story and drawing attention away from Aldrich Ames. Then, literally weeks after delivering his confirmation to US intelligence, Yurchenko walks out of a Washington, DC restaurant and heads straight back to the USSR where he is awarded the Order of the Red Star for "a successful infiltration operation."
- aaronbrethorst 3y ago
  I assume The Wire and Breaking Bad are on your top 5 list. What else is on there?
  - tptacek 3y ago
    If I gave my actual ordered top 5 I'd be begging for a tangent thread here, but: Saul, and then I'd have to think about Leftovers vs. Mad Men for 5.
    - aaronbrethorst 3y ago
      Right on. I somehow just skipped over Better Call Saul. Figure I'll have to pull an 'Americans' on it.
  - rg111 3y ago
    For me: 1. The Wire 2. Breaking Bad 3. DarK (German) 4. Halt and Catch Fire 5. Bosch Others- True Detective S01, S03, Westworld S01, Generation War (German), Happy Valley, Mindhunter, Mad Men, Silicon Valley, The Sopranos, The Fall, Band of Brothers, Rick and Morty, Veep, Babylon Berlin (German), Arrested Developtment, The Americans, Narcos (Spanish), Fauda (Hebrew-Arabic), Black Mirror, Bojack Horseman, Vinland Saga (Japanese, Anime), Fargo S01, S03, Kleo (German), Freaks and Geeks, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Mozart in the Jungle, Tales from the Loop, Panchayat (Hindi), Paatal Lok (Hindi), Broadchurch, Yellowstone, Tales from the Loop, and Charite (German).
appplication 3y ago
Tangent: is anyone familiar with a good app to help make a note of what shows you want to watch later? I know Letterboxd sort of does this for movies, but ( last I checked) they ignore the existence of TV. Each platform has its own short implementation of watch lists but they’re all pretty half baked. Is there good 3rd party app?
- mensetmanusman 3y ago
  Notepad
- kej 3y ago
  I like justwatch.com for this. You get cross-service watchlists and it tells you when a show or movie becomes available on a service you have.
- joeblubaugh 3y ago
  I use Sofa for books, movies, shows
- instagib 3y ago
  AddToTheList Emails for new episode reminders of shows you think may or may not be cancelled. Top 10 show/movies list for networks.
- aaronbrethorst 3y ago
  The Notes app on my Mac and iPhone.
- woleium 3y ago
  Trakt.com and then the Kodi integration with Seren
- rg111 3y ago
  Showly. Syncs automatically to trakt.tv. There's also Letterboxd. I am thinking of just moving to a G-Sheets document.

tptacek 3y ago

It's maybe one of the 3 best drama series of the last 20 years, and easily one of the 5 best. For a (nonfic) book in the same vein, try The Billion Dollar Spy.

rg111 3y ago
What are the other four in your best five list? I really liked The Americans, too.
jpmoral 3y ago
If you haven't seen it yet you might enjoy Le Bureau des Légendes.
- isntbilly 3y ago
  Yep, fun series
  - awsation 3y ago
    Another spy series is Deutschland 83, 86, 89. Very good in my opinion.
arethuza 3y ago
I can recommend "The Spy and the Traitor" on Oleg Gordievsky, in particular the part about the exfiltration reads like a spy novel even though its all factual! Right down to the local ambassador (I think it was) who wanted to stop the operation but it was escalated all the way to Thatcher who was at Balmoral at the time and who was outraged at the idea that the UK wouldn't try and rescue him.
- matthewdgreen 3y ago
  After reading that book I could not shake the feeling that Gordievsky’s defection was “too good to be true.” The intelligence he exfiltrated (with very few exceptions) was hugely beneficial in creating a back-channel between the USSR’s leadership and the West; his “arrest and interrogation” in Moscow was completely inept and even the use of truth drugs didn’t work, and the KGB somehow managed to leave him free to escape surveillance; the KGB was completely unable to detect and prevent his escape even though he got drunk and wandered around acting suspiciously; and the second KGB defector who “confirmed the legitimacy of” Gordievsky’s defection suspiciously re-defected right back to Moscow following his own interrogation. The whole thing felt extremely suspicious.
  - pvg 3y ago
    It's a lot harder to fake incompetence and failure and besides why would you? It would look, as you say, even more suspicious. At the time, Soviet intelligence services were counting how many windows were lit up after hours in US government buildings chasing signs of plans for an entirely imaginary first nuclear strike. A dude landed a plane in the middle of Red Square. The Soviets fucked up just like everyone else.
    - matthewdgreen 3y ago
      >It's a lot harder to fake incompetence and failure and besides why would you? Whether Gordievsky was a triple agent or not, it's clear that the KGB desperately needed a conduit to convey useful (true) information to the West in a form that Western intelligence agencies would find credible. Western intelligence (particularly the UK) also desperately needed an asset who could produce that sort of intelligence. Gordievsky just happened to be a perfect conduit for this communication, and may have helped avert a truly stupid nuclear war. If you assume this was an "op" then it would have to end somehow. Ideally it would end in a way that left Gordievsky alive and in the West, where he could continue to deliver his message to politicians. In order to keep Gordievsky's past information credible, he would either need to (1) be caught and tried/imprisoned, (2) defect. But I would imagine that the best case for his credibility would be some amazing combination of (1) and (2), especially a situation that would force the West to commit resources to a heroic escape that took him right out from under the KGB's nose in Moscow. This would make his handlers look brilliant, and it would make Gordievsky the kind of hero that politicians would take seriously. It would also be politically almost impossible for anyone in US/UK intelligence to ever (publicly) voice skepticism about Gordievsky. Gordievsky's escape from Russia also seems extremely bizarre. Remember this is a man who has miraculously survived chemical interrogation, is liable to be shot at any moment, but has somehow slipped his KGB tail and traveled halfway across Russia to a border town. Whatever doubts the KGB had before, he is now a dead man if they catch him. Yet instead of hiding in the woods waiting for his rescue, he heads into town, gets drunk, falls asleep in a restaurant and nearly misses the appointment to escape to the West? I guess people behave strangely under stress, but there's strange and there's "death wish." Perfectly reasonable, though, if the whole thing was fake. Finally there's the fact that Gordievsky's arrest story was almost immediately verified by Vitaly Yurchenko, whose "defection" is utterly bizarre. Yurchenko just happened to be an expert in "special drugs" who defected right after Gordievsky escaped, basically for the sole purpose of solidifying Gordievsky's story and drawing attention away from Aldrich Ames. Then, literally weeks after delivering his confirmation to US intelligence, Yurchenko walks out of a Washington, DC restaurant and heads straight back to the USSR where he is awarded the Order of the Red Star for "a successful infiltration operation."
aaronbrethorst 3y ago
I assume The Wire and Breaking Bad are on your top 5 list. What else is on there?
- tptacek 3y ago
  If I gave my actual ordered top 5 I'd be begging for a tangent thread here, but: Saul, and then I'd have to think about Leftovers vs. Mad Men for 5.
  - aaronbrethorst 3y ago
    Right on. I somehow just skipped over Better Call Saul. Figure I'll have to pull an 'Americans' on it.
- rg111 3y ago
  For me: 1. The Wire 2. Breaking Bad 3. DarK (German) 4. Halt and Catch Fire 5. Bosch Others- True Detective S01, S03, Westworld S01, Generation War (German), Happy Valley, Mindhunter, Mad Men, Silicon Valley, The Sopranos, The Fall, Band of Brothers, Rick and Morty, Veep, Babylon Berlin (German), Arrested Developtment, The Americans, Narcos (Spanish), Fauda (Hebrew-Arabic), Black Mirror, Bojack Horseman, Vinland Saga (Japanese, Anime), Fargo S01, S03, Kleo (German), Freaks and Geeks, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Mozart in the Jungle, Tales from the Loop, Panchayat (Hindi), Paatal Lok (Hindi), Broadchurch, Yellowstone, Tales from the Loop, and Charite (German).

appplication 3y ago

Tangent: is anyone familiar with a good app to help make a note of what shows you want to watch later? I know Letterboxd sort of does this for movies, but ( last I checked) they ignore the existence of TV. Each platform has its own short implementation of watch lists but they’re all pretty half baked. Is there good 3rd party app?

mensetmanusman 3y ago
Notepad
kej 3y ago
I like justwatch.com for this. You get cross-service watchlists and it tells you when a show or movie becomes available on a service you have.
joeblubaugh 3y ago
I use Sofa for books, movies, shows
instagib 3y ago
AddToTheList Emails for new episode reminders of shows you think may or may not be cancelled. Top 10 show/movies list for networks.
aaronbrethorst 3y ago
The Notes app on my Mac and iPhone.
woleium 3y ago
Trakt.com and then the Kodi integration with Seren
rg111 3y ago
Showly. Syncs automatically to trakt.tv. There's also Letterboxd. I am thinking of just moving to a G-Sheets document.