Via: Tuned In
You would think that by now prestige cable dramas would have exhausted every variation on the “…but the protagonist has a secret!” theme. A suburban waste management businessman is actually a mob boss. A chemistry teacher is actually a drug dealer. A successful ad executive actually stole the identity of a dead man. A war hero is actually a terrorist. At first blush, FX’s The Americans, about two Soviet spies undercover as a Virginia couple in 1981, seems to share elements of each of these antihero shows, along with less celebrated series like The Riches. But maybe the greatest success of the show so far is that, after three increasingly strong episodes, it has a voice and a (secret) identity of its own. One thing that distinguishes this Cold War story from its predecessors is that there are two protagonists perpetuating a fiction, against another country, against their neighbors, against their own children–even, to an extent, against each other. So as much as The Americans is the thriller you’d expect–tense, well-paced and laced with well-curated period detail–it’s also an intriguing study of marriage as partnership. Reversing the common order of things, The Americans asks whether marital routine can develop into actual love. Certainly the relationship of Elizabeth (Keri Russell) and Philip Jennings (Matthew Rhys) is more complicated than that of the average husband and wife who happen to be co-workers. The two were paired as young KGB agents in the 1960s, taught immaculate English (and hand-to-hand combat) and sent to the U.S. to live as husband and wife. They’ve put down roots, blended in to the suburbs and are raising two very American children. (When their son describes a school project about the moon landing, Elizabeth answers defensively, “You know, the moon isn’t everything. Just getting into space is a remarkable accomplishment.”) Their cover story is that they run a travel agency. Their actual work involves the occasional night of violence or seducing strategically placed government employees. (In a gesture of egalitarianism, both Philip and Elizabeth get a chance to
Read full story at: Tuned In
Posted: January 30th, 2013
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