The Americans (FX, 2013–)

The Americans is a period drama that takes its time to build characters and relationships, benefits from production design that silently and completely builds worlds, and is founded on writing that is just awesome in its understatement.

For a show that is set in the 1980s and begins with the almost risible situation of an FBI agent innocently moving his family into the same street where deep-cover Soviet agents are already well established, this is — according to an entry in my viewing diary — gut-churningly awesome.


Like any reasonably successful television show, it uses the ideas of family, relationships, and character to tell good stories. Where it differs from most others is — aside from its engine and setting — in how it uses those same ideas for its own ends: family —the Soviet agents' teen children are unaware they are part of their parents' cover; relationships —when the FBI agent turns a Russian embassy employee by having an affair with them, is he working an asset or is he being unfaithful to his wife? and character —how does each Soviet agent hold onto his or her core values after years of living in a democratic and capitalist environment?

Heavy stuff, I know — there's guns, sex, and spy stuff if you really only want that kind of stuff — but there's so much more to savour and enjoy.

The best drama really is on the box these days.

Essential viewing.