ASeason 6The Americans ends as it lived: Tense, affecting, and one of the greatsErik Adams5/30/18 10:32pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkThe end was written in the history books. Philip and Elizabeth Jennings were on the losing side of The Cold War, and …
ASeason 6With one episode left, The Americans prepares to make the ultimate sacrificeAlex McLevy5/23/18 10:10pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalink“I thought I knew you.”
A-Season 6Between two conversations, The Americans do battle and seek absolutionAllison Shoemaker5/16/18 10:52pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalink“The Summit” is driven by moments of incredible tension, but somewhat uniquely for The Americans, those moments center…
A-Season 6An Americans “Harvest” goes wrong in all the right waysErik Adams5/09/18 10:13pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkBy traditional metrics, tonight’s episode of The Americans extends the series’ recent hot streak. But scored by a count…
A-Season 6The Americans begins reaping what it sowed in another stellar episodeErik Adams5/02/18 10:04pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkYears before Joe Weisberg created The Americans and ran the show alongside Joel Fields, he was a case officer for the…
ASeason 6The Americans can be a great horror movie, tooErik Adams4/25/18 10:23pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkI did it without thinking. When Jim Baxter leaned in to kiss Kimmy Breeland, I instinctively mashed the following into…
B+Season 6On The Americans, you can’t go your own wayErik Adams4/18/18 10:11pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkElizabeth and Philip Jennings are failing. It’s a reality often acknowledged by The Americans: Not every objective in…
B+Season 6Can you come into the kitchen? The Americans would like a wordErik Adams4/11/18 10:07pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkThree episodes of The Americans’ final season down, three deaths at the hands of Elizabeth Jennings. I’m no FBI agent,…
BSeason 6The gravity of Elizabeth’s new mission pulls more slippery people into The Americans’ orbitErik Adams4/04/18 10:05pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkIs there a more quintessentially Americans scene than the one between Stan and Gennadi in “Tchaikovsky”? Summoned to a…
ASeason 6The Americans’ final season begins with the realization of its greatest fearErik Adams3/28/18 10:17pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkThe queasy fear at the heart of The Americans is that it was always going to come down to this: Spy versus spy, husband…
ASeason 5The Americans spent a season as TV’s best drama, but it’s ready for spy stuff againErik Adams5/30/17 10:14pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkIn “The Soviet Division,” the final episode of season five of the FX series The Americans, married travel agents Philip…
B+Season 5The kids aren’t all right as The Americans heads toward the end of its seasonErik Adams5/23/17 10:12pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkPaige Jennings is TV’s opposite teenager. It’s a trick in The Americans’ storytelling repertoire that the show uses…
ASeason 5A simmering season of The Americans reaches the boiling pointErik Adams5/16/17 10:01pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkThe slow burn was always going to be a challenge as The Americans entered its end game. When so much time and so much…
ASeason 5There are heartwarming and troubling developments in The Americans’ “Darkroom”Erik Adams5/09/17 10:10pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkWhen The Americans plucks at the heartstrings, it sure finds a unique way of doing so. Or, to quote the showrunners, a “…
ASeason 5Encores abound in an Americans tearjerkerErik Adams5/02/17 10:11pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkHow many times has this happened to you: You’re watching taut basic-cable drama The Americans, and a long-running…
A-Season 5The Americans shows that table-setting is as riveting as any car chaseDennis Perkins4/25/17 10:10pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkThe Americans’ showrunners Joe Weisberg and Joel Fields promised that season five would have fewer of the energizing…
A-Season 5A major character bids farewell as The Americans ponders the nature of sacrificeDennis Perkins4/18/17 10:00pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkAs Gabriel leaves America (and, it appears, The Americans), everyone talks of sacrifice. Picking up from the wordless,…
A-Season 5An acting showcase for The Americans is enhanced by shocking family secretsErik Adams4/11/17 10:02pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalink“Crossbreed” is the type of Americans episode that makes you want to grab an Emmy voter by the lapels and scream, “What…
ASeason 5Find someone who looks at you the way The Americans look at each otherErik Adams4/04/17 10:10pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkPhilip and Elizabeth Jennings didn’t have to fall in love. It wasn’t in the assignment. In fact, it’s arguable that the…
A-Season 5The Americans is a lotErik Adams3/28/17 10:03pmSaveEditEmbiggenSend to EditorsPromoteGo to permalinkThe Americans still knows how to pull off a surprise. For example, I never would’ve pegged Stan Beeman as the first of…
