7 ms·

I had initially ignored the show because they had cast Keri Russell which I had assumed to be a total light weight. So I missed it the first few years and then

by eej71 2y ago

I had initially ignored the show because they had cast Keri Russell which I had assumed to be a total light weight. So I missed it the first few years and then I realized after its fourth renewal - gee maybe its good - and well - I was completely wrong. She was amazing. The show was terrific. But I'm a sucker for 80s cold war dramatics.

vlovich123 2y ago
Keri Russell a lightweight? I’m curious what gave you that impression as I’ve always thought of her as an excellent actress. Probably missing out on The Diplomat too if you like political intrigue at all.
- foobarian 2y ago
  Well on that topic, the French series "The Bureau" [1] was fantastic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bureau_(TV_series) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bureau_(TV_series)
  - foobarqux 2y ago
    I don't understand why people like these shows, there isn't a proper story just things that happen that are essentially discarded at the beginning of the next season. There is never any real 3rd-act/resolution.
    - cess11 2y ago
      Are you sure you aren't confusing The Bureau with something else?
      - indigodaddy 2y ago
        Don’t think he can be talking about The Bureau either. It’s in my top ten all time TV shows.
      - foobarqux 2y ago
        No. Every season ends on a cliffhanger that seems critical to the story and then is quickly resolved as if it were some minor point in the first episode of the subsequent season. This is the nature of this type of episodic television that runs for an indeterminate time and therefore has no real overarching story (but pretends to) like soap operas do. I only know of a few examples where writers escape this. The first is to have the episodes be essentially disconnected from one another (e.g. Star Trek). The other is what "The Wire" did by having each season have its own plot that is properly resolved at the end of each season.
        squigz 2y ago
        I think you're confused about what episodic TV is. Star Trek is (or was) (generally) episodic. The Wire is serialized, as is most TV these days. Some people like episodic TV, some people prefer serialized.
        smolder 2y ago
        I don't think they're confused about episodic vs. serialized shows; they're talking about the plot structure of serialized shows often having a change of direction at every season boundary instead of resolution of the existing plot threads. That sort of meandering never-concluding plot can be annoying. One way to avoid that pitfall is by staying episodic, (Old Trek,) another is to wrap up each season and start from a relatively blank slate on the next, as if the seasons are episodes. (The Wire.) I think a third is to have all the story structure written in advance, as with a book adaptation, so there is a real through-line.
        foobarqux 2y ago
        Yes I shouldn't have used the word episodic. The problem with your third solution is that it seems to be difficult to do with the current way TV series are financed and produced: You can't commit to multiple seasons at the outset and you also want to have an arbitrary number of episodes depending on how well the show is doing (milk more episodes if the show is doing well). There is also incentive to create cliffhangers so that subsequent seasons can be produced. There are lots of mini-series which do book adaptations but it's hard to come up with examples that span multiple seasons: "My Brilliant Friend" did it I think and maybe you could argue early "Game of Thrones" but the story was never finished in book form either so it couldn't be said to be telling a complete story. I don;t think "The Wire" gets enough credit for creating a format that conformed to the constraints of TV production while still being able to tell stories that spanned many episodes. You could have ended the series at any season (had it been cancelled) and it wouldn't have felt incomplete and yet the final season did feel like it completed an even larger story arc.
  - brnt 2y ago
    Apparently it's the actual spies favorite.
  - mayd 2y ago
    A.k.a. "Le bureau des légendes": criminally underrated. Was available to view in Australia on SBS On Demand, where I serendipitously encountered it. It is right up there with the best of John LeCarré's film and television adaptations: "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy", "Smiley's People", "The Little Drummer Girl", etc.
  - donavanm 2y ago
    As another semi-obscure “spy” series check out the british production _The Sandbaggers_. Very lecarre-esque story that reflected the inanity and stakes of the cold war, written by a RN officer.
- simonbarker87 2y ago
  Th Diplomat is excellent and she plays the role perfectly.
- pohl 2y ago
  I can understand the reflex. To me she was "that actress from that show Felicity that I never watched". The Diplomat turned me around real quick.
  - nwatson 2y ago
    The Americans was awesome, especially that last "showdown" climax. Best TV ever, along with parts of Breaking Bad. I watched a couple episodes of The Diplomat and couldn't get into it. I'll give it another try.
    - tunesmith 2y ago
      Episode 3 is the one that kicked it up into the stratosphere for us.
  - filmgirlcw 2y ago
    Incidentally, and I realize the appeal for the show is significantly less if you aren’t a teenage girl (as I was when I watched it), but Felicity is excellent and she’s excellent in it. Like, beyond excellent. Like, there was the acting all the other WB actresses were doing in the late 90s/early 2000s and then there was what she was doing. If that show had aired on a real broadcast network (as JJ Abrams' next shows were) and not on The WB, she would have been nominated for Emmys out the wazoo. As it was, she won the Golden Globe for that first season, but she should have at least been nominated for the Emmy for her work on that show, because she was every bit as good or better than her peers on cable or network.
- Reason077 2y ago
  > "Keri Russell a lightweight? ... Probably missing out on The Diplomat too if you like political intrigue at all." I have a running theory that The Americans and The Diplomat are in fact set in the same universe. Keri Russell is still playing the same character, a deep-cover Russian agent, and now she has infiltrated the upper echelons of the US government...
  - rasz 2y ago
    Reminds me of The Double (2011)
- barfingclouds 2y ago
  Everything I see her in, her acting style to me resembles a lifeless cardboard cutout. I get that that’s “the point” of the Americans, but if that’s all she’s bringing, something’s not working here. And in the diplomat it seemed exactly the same. Lifeless acting, and it seemed a lot of her personality was expressed by other characters because she wasn’t doing it herself.
DyslexicAtheist 2y ago
you might also be thrilled by her performance in "The Diplomat". She is absolutely no light weight.

by eej71 2y ago

vlovich123 2y ago

Keri Russell a lightweight? I’m curious what gave you that impression as I’ve always thought of her as an excellent actress. Probably missing out on The Diplomat too if you like political intrigue at all.

foobarian 2y ago
Well on that topic, the French series "The Bureau" [1] was fantastic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bureau_(TV_series) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bureau_(TV_series)
- foobarqux 2y ago
  I don't understand why people like these shows, there isn't a proper story just things that happen that are essentially discarded at the beginning of the next season. There is never any real 3rd-act/resolution.
  - cess11 2y ago
    Are you sure you aren't confusing The Bureau with something else?
    - indigodaddy 2y ago
      Don’t think he can be talking about The Bureau either. It’s in my top ten all time TV shows.
    - foobarqux 2y ago
      No. Every season ends on a cliffhanger that seems critical to the story and then is quickly resolved as if it were some minor point in the first episode of the subsequent season. This is the nature of this type of episodic television that runs for an indeterminate time and therefore has no real overarching story (but pretends to) like soap operas do. I only know of a few examples where writers escape this. The first is to have the episodes be essentially disconnected from one another (e.g. Star Trek). The other is what "The Wire" did by having each season have its own plot that is properly resolved at the end of each season.
      - squigz 2y ago
        I think you're confused about what episodic TV is. Star Trek is (or was) (generally) episodic. The Wire is serialized, as is most TV these days. Some people like episodic TV, some people prefer serialized.
        smolder 2y ago
        I don't think they're confused about episodic vs. serialized shows; they're talking about the plot structure of serialized shows often having a change of direction at every season boundary instead of resolution of the existing plot threads. That sort of meandering never-concluding plot can be annoying. One way to avoid that pitfall is by staying episodic, (Old Trek,) another is to wrap up each season and start from a relatively blank slate on the next, as if the seasons are episodes. (The Wire.) I think a third is to have all the story structure written in advance, as with a book adaptation, so there is a real through-line.
        foobarqux 2y ago
        Yes I shouldn't have used the word episodic. The problem with your third solution is that it seems to be difficult to do with the current way TV series are financed and produced: You can't commit to multiple seasons at the outset and you also want to have an arbitrary number of episodes depending on how well the show is doing (milk more episodes if the show is doing well). There is also incentive to create cliffhangers so that subsequent seasons can be produced. There are lots of mini-series which do book adaptations but it's hard to come up with examples that span multiple seasons: "My Brilliant Friend" did it I think and maybe you could argue early "Game of Thrones" but the story was never finished in book form either so it couldn't be said to be telling a complete story. I don;t think "The Wire" gets enough credit for creating a format that conformed to the constraints of TV production while still being able to tell stories that spanned many episodes. You could have ended the series at any season (had it been cancelled) and it wouldn't have felt incomplete and yet the final season did feel like it completed an even larger story arc.
- brnt 2y ago
  Apparently it's the actual spies favorite.
- mayd 2y ago
  A.k.a. "Le bureau des légendes": criminally underrated. Was available to view in Australia on SBS On Demand, where I serendipitously encountered it. It is right up there with the best of John LeCarré's film and television adaptations: "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy", "Smiley's People", "The Little Drummer Girl", etc.
- donavanm 2y ago
  As another semi-obscure “spy” series check out the british production _The Sandbaggers_. Very lecarre-esque story that reflected the inanity and stakes of the cold war, written by a RN officer.
simonbarker87 2y ago
Th Diplomat is excellent and she plays the role perfectly.
pohl 2y ago
I can understand the reflex. To me she was "that actress from that show Felicity that I never watched". The Diplomat turned me around real quick.
- nwatson 2y ago
  The Americans was awesome, especially that last "showdown" climax. Best TV ever, along with parts of Breaking Bad. I watched a couple episodes of The Diplomat and couldn't get into it. I'll give it another try.
  - tunesmith 2y ago
    Episode 3 is the one that kicked it up into the stratosphere for us.
- filmgirlcw 2y ago
  Incidentally, and I realize the appeal for the show is significantly less if you aren’t a teenage girl (as I was when I watched it), but Felicity is excellent and she’s excellent in it. Like, beyond excellent. Like, there was the acting all the other WB actresses were doing in the late 90s/early 2000s and then there was what she was doing. If that show had aired on a real broadcast network (as JJ Abrams' next shows were) and not on The WB, she would have been nominated for Emmys out the wazoo. As it was, she won the Golden Globe for that first season, but she should have at least been nominated for the Emmy for her work on that show, because she was every bit as good or better than her peers on cable or network.
Reason077 2y ago
> "Keri Russell a lightweight? ... Probably missing out on The Diplomat too if you like political intrigue at all." I have a running theory that The Americans and The Diplomat are in fact set in the same universe. Keri Russell is still playing the same character, a deep-cover Russian agent, and now she has infiltrated the upper echelons of the US government...
- rasz 2y ago
  Reminds me of The Double (2011)
barfingclouds 2y ago
Everything I see her in, her acting style to me resembles a lifeless cardboard cutout. I get that that’s “the point” of the Americans, but if that’s all she’s bringing, something’s not working here. And in the diplomat it seemed exactly the same. Lifeless acting, and it seemed a lot of her personality was expressed by other characters because she wasn’t doing it herself.

DyslexicAtheist 2y ago

you might also be thrilled by her performance in "The Diplomat". She is absolutely no light weight.