More like exasperated. I can enjoy shows about dumb people who are supposed to be dumb, like Homer Simpson, but I hate shows about people who are supposed to be smart, and then have major subplots hinge on them acting dumb.
Look, I understand that smart people can do dumb things when something unexpected happens, but as I said in my last post, it is beyond belief (at least to me) that they would have been totally unprepared for Paige’s questions. YMMV.
Just as a meta-comment, I thought this was a thread for all kinds of discussion about the show. If it’s only for enthusiastic fans, let me know, and I’ll stop posting.
I don’t think your criticism is without merit. If we had in fact seen scenes of Philip and Elizabeth planning for such an eventuality, or discussing it with Gabriel, I wouldn’t have said “how ridiculous, they would never do that”.
But I also think that one advantage this show has is that the situation is portrays is SO far removed from anything any of us have ever faced. How would you REALLY act if you had been living all of your life as a spy in a foreign country and were raising a daughter? Would you plan rationally for if she found out? Or would you be in massive denial? Or would you plan rationally and then when the person you loved most in the world looked you in the eye and said “be honest with me”, your plans would fall apart and you’d be honest?
I’m not saying that that scene, and plotline, is perfect and 100% plausible and rock-solid in all ways. But I’m saying that a purely-logical-what-would-be-the-most-efficacious-move-in-the-lie-vs-truth-game-that-Philip-and-Elizabeth-are-so-good-at-playing analysis is not really fully telling.
Brilliant. “He doesn’t agree with everything I say, therefore he must have reported me for posting links to a blog.”
If that’s an example of your insight and deductive skills, then I can only imagine how great your blog must be. But as far as I’m concerned, you’re welcome to sell vacuum cleaners here. I’ve never reported anybody for anything, even when I’ve been personally attacked. It’s just a stupid message board, not life and death.
ETA: Just to be clear, I don’t agree with most of **Tony’s **complaints, but I don’t think it’s cricket to hurl accusations like that. Besides, you were in fact in violation of a rule–one I hadn’t been aware of, but which makes perfect sense in hindsight.
Up_the_junction’s blog is uncommonly excellent. For anyone who is interested in this show and appreciates excellence in writing, it is truly a thing of beauty.
Many excellent writers may not have been Saints. One thing often has nothing to do with the other.
I just hope the fans of this show will continue to be fortunate enough to be entertained by many excellent reviews and blogs of this show next season.
I’m not sure how much more steam the thread has since we are now a week after the finale. There was good news for fans of the show on the ratings front however, as the finale drew over 1 million live viewers.
In reading one of the comments section on the article about ratings, one person put forth the idea that Pastor Tim is in fact Russian, and that he is playing Paige.
I’m not sure whether we agreed this was likely the case or not, so I will pose the question about the plausibility of Tim being in cahoots with The Centre. If it’s been discussed before, I hope you’ll indulge me regardless. I ask because I thought I saw something about the writers saying not to get too hooked on the idea of Pastor Tim being anything more than he is…a pastor.
From what the showrunners have said we’re pretty much in a new era now with cable and rating are really just an indicator, sometimes not even that accurate. FX think they’re over 4 million an epi this season, taking into account time-shifting, streaming/Netflix, box sets, etc. Time shifting on The Americans is huge apparently, into the unknown.
The guy who runs FX has committed to S4 and S5 - it’s not contractual yet but he personally wants it.
I think we’ve been pretty well told Tim is a straight man of the church. It’s certainly more interesting this way. Seems to me Time/Alice and Misha/Nadz have a huge amount in common, politically and socially - Reagan was, of course way out on the edge.
I think it wolks really well as it is.
Fwiw, in my fan fiction fantasy world I have Hans playing a big role in chilling out Paige - stories from his homeland, not sexual.
The only way it wouldn’t be so highly implausible as to be laughable would be if Pastor Tim (or an associate) was responsible for Paige having the idea to join the church all along. That is to say, for example, this is how the Centre planned it from the beginning- illegals have kids who the Centre wants, but it would be too suspicious for illegals to indoctrinate their children from the get go, so a second group of illegals befriends the kids and slowly begins to turn them.
And even that is laughably implausible for all the time and energy it would take, but it is less implausible than Paige just miraculously chooses the one church in Virginia happened to be run by yet another KGB illegal. But it does have the added benefit of being thoughtfully planned out, and as we all know from watching The Hunt for Red October, Russians don’t take a dump without a plan. Also, this longterm strategy by the Centre would obviate Philip and Elizabeth’s uncharacteristic lack of a plan for Paige.
I can’t remember how Paige got turned on to religion in the first place, but it would be funny to go back to that episode and see that she, in fact, didn’t really choose it, it chose her. It would be cool and subtle planning (Russianesque) on the part of the writers if it happened, but I doubt it did.
Sounds as if you’re blowing off the high live rating as if it didn’t matter. I’m also not sure box sets are relevant. Do advertisers care if I walk into a Best Buy and purchase a Season Two Box Set?
I have no doubt time shifting is a factor and gives the show a bump. I often work on Wednesday nights, and have to watch the show later on DVR myself.
However, 4 million per episode? I have no doubt you heard that, but I find that a little difficult to believe.
For example, according to tvbythenumbers.com, the highest percentage increase from DVR viewing for a TV show on a US broadcast network (ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX) during the week of April 6-12 was the FOX show The Following, which had a 91 increase in viewership from DVR viewing, taking its audience from 2.947 million to 5.623 million…and that’s a broadcast network.
Since FX is a cable network, even if it pulled that high percentage–which I doubt—that would have bumped the season finale viewership from 1.220 to 2.33 million. And that’s for one of the highest rated episodes of the season. During the middle part of the season, there were episodes of TA that did not even rank among the Top 100 cable shows of the week. Considering live plus same day viewership for those eps were well under 1 million, I find the 4 million per episode figure tough to swallow.
Do you have any sort of link to that information?
I also wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss the live audience numbers. Any TV executive who ignored them would be foolish to do so.
Posters have speculated that Gaad is KGB, that the black FBI is KGB, that Callie Thorne’s short-lived character was KGB. If the KGB was that sophisticated, if they had that much spy ability, they’d have won the cold war.
I agree, particularly when the showrunners have been so insistent about this (and things like Philip’s subsequent confrontations with him don’t make sense any other way). However, in all honesty the question the way you phrase it does remind me of why one might think otherwise. This is how Paige got into the church:
Philip and Elizabeth were freaked out in the wake of the murder of their friends (Jared’s family). They got assurances from the Centre that their people would be surreptitiously watching Paige and Henry to assure their safety. We were never explicitly shown who these guardians were, but this was the same episode* when Paige made her covert trip to go visit Great-Aunt Whatsername.
While she was riding the bus, a girl her age named Kelly happened to be sitting across the aisle from her, and chatted Paige up. They bonded over frustration with their parents. At the end of the episode, Paige pulled Kelly’s number out of her pocket and called her, asking if she wanted to hang out sometime. I don’t recall ever actually seeing Kelly again (which was weird), but maybe we did just long enough to establish that she was Paige’s link to the church (that much was definitely clear).
So at that point, it did look very plausible, probable even, that Kelly was a KGB plant who had purposely steered Paige to the church. But at this point I think this was either an unintentional implication (like the thing with Martha and the “de-wigging” in the penultimate episode of this season), or an idea they toyed with and dropped.
Landgraf does seem really into it, although he has intimated that it would make it easier for him if the Emmy and Golden Globe voters would start giving the show a little love, not just the critics.
It’s interesting to think of being in a position like his, and personally loving a show that does not have the kind of audience numbers that actually demand it stay on the air. If it’s a borderline decision, then he can decide to keep it–not just because he thinks it’s quality, deserves a chance, etc., but even just because he wants to keep watching it and see what future twists and turns the story holds. What power!
It’s even more interesting (though not a scenario I’d wish for) to think of what he’d do if the numbers did not make it a coin flip, but argued strongly for cancellation. Might he feel that as long as he had lots of other successes on the air, he could get away with not being fired for keeping a personal favorite in production a couple more seasons on a tight budget? (Which also raises a tangential question I’ve wondered many times: why have we never seen a billionaire fund the continuation of a favorite show that got cancelled?)
Advertisers are not the only factor in the modern media landscape. They are just one source of revenue for a TV show. If a show has a higher than typical rate of selling box sets, this can be another factor to throw in the mix, that can offset somewhat low Nielsen ratings (this is a big reason why Family Guy came back, for instance). Sometimes, networks fully own a show, in which case the DVD sales go straight into their bottom line, along with ad revenue. Other times, it’s an independent production company who owns it, and sells it to the network at a negotiated rate per episode. I’m not sure which is the case for The Americans, but if it is the latter, the DVD/Amazon revenue can still come into play indirectly: the studio who makes it can offer FX a discount rate for the show, but still have it make sense for them financially because they can recoup from those other revenue streams.
And especially after Breaking Bad’s example, there is one more factor: certain shows can build “buzz” over time and people can catch up via DVD or streaming, and make later seasons of the show very attractive to advertisers as well. Breaking Bad’s ratings were quite low for most of its run; but thanks to that buzz, and Netflix binge watching, they got supercharged for its final season.
*2.3, “The Walk In”, available for free on Amazon Prime–which is where I’m refreshing my memory of the details now.
I am aware of the article, since I believe I origianlly posted it to this thread.
Again, my question here in in regards to the 4 million per episode claim. I skimmed through that article quickly, and it doesn’t mention 4 million…anywhere…and it appears that the 104 per cent figure bumped the audience to 2.77 million…for the episode referenced in the story.
Problem is, the show in S3 had some terribly low rated episodes, so even with a large addition of the time shifted audience, I don’'t see any validity to the claim that the show had an audience of “4 million per episode.”
Ha! That’s interesting that there is some actual vague evidence. And it happened so early in season 2 that I for one couldn’t even remember how it happened (but I remember now and I remember thinking “Don’t tell me she’s KGB” when it happened). In that light, it makes it more ambiguous, at least. I guess the wildcard is if the writers/producers are really on the up and up. I don’t imagine its a good thing to lie to your fans, especially when your ratings aren’t the best. But I hadn’t read they explicitly said anything on the matter till this thread, so I don’t know.
For many who are enthusiastic fans of the show, the ‘Philip and Elizabeth blurted out that they’re Russians’ plot development was annoying because it violated what had already been established about the characters: that they are intelligent, efficient, prudent, and in the habit of exercising good judgment.
It’s certainly not a fatal flaw in what I see as a superb and notable show. But I think it was a lapse–if a rare one–on the part of the showrunners. I hope (and trust) that they will devote a high level of time and care when constructing the episodes of Season 4.
“Well-said” to you, as well.
That really IS good news for the show. Putting aside all questions of time-shifting and boxed-set purchases, live viewership is a very closely-watched metric in the biz. If the finale nearly doubled what earlier episodes scored, that’s bound to be encouraging to all who work on The Americans.
Apropos of not much, as I don’t participate in the The Americans threads on the SMDB as much as I used to, because reasons, but… Thirteen episodes have generated 22 pages of discussion here. It’s just a recommendation, and a recommendation, as said, from a guy who doesn’t participate as much in the threads as he used to, but next season, if anyone remembers, possibly consider doing individual episode threads.
