Week eight linkspam, take two

[jae]

The official renewal for season three has come! Here is the official press release from FX and here is some insight from critic Alan Sepinwall as to why they've opted for renewal.

The New York Times talks about how Oliver North became a consultant for the show (and eventually even got a co-writer's credit on next week's episode).

Foreign Policy talks with a former spy about the things that are and aren't realistic about the show's spycraft.

An interview with Noah Emmerich (Stan) from the New York Observer, another from Entertainment Weekly, and yet another in critic Andy Greenwald's podcast this week (audio, ~55 minutes).

Costa Ronin (Oleg) gave an interview to Fox LA (video, ~4 minutes).

The New York Daily News reports on the shows filming in Brooklyn, and The Americans is among them.

The Washington Post talks about a piece of local pop culture history that led this past week's episode.

Wales Online has Matthew Rhys' top five moments from the show.

The official description for episode twelve has been released.

FX has released a featurette on the show's spy gear (only viewable to viewers inside the U.S.).

More news on international broadcasts! Season two begins airing in Poland on April 25th. It has also been airing in France (episode 207 debuts there on April 19th), in Ireland (episode 206 debuts there on April 19th), and in Spain (episode 203 debuted there last Tuesday).

Comments

[wendelah1]

The Foreign Policy article requires registration, unfortunately.

I'm so glad the show got renewed.

[jae]

Huh, it didn't need registration for me--bizarre! Here's an alternate link for the same piece.

-J

[wendelah1]

Thanks, that worked. It's a relief that in real life, the Jennings family would in effect just be travel agents with two kids living in the 'burbs, you know?

[quantumreality]

Interesting FP article! and that thing about Oliver North? I'm trying to find a rather relevant clip from Sliders :P When I find it I'll post it :D

[quantumreality]

http://youtu.be/oiDxur3jGw4

Enjoy. :P Rembrandt's reaction pretty much nails it. XD

Reading the show

[lovingboth]

The NYT piece is interesting, even if it is a somewhat shallow 'by the numbers' piece. It doesn't say what he was paid, for example.

What did "detail and color" did he give that would deserve a 'story' co-credit? That the Contras were crap, but the executive illegally helped them anyway?

One of the good things about the show's intelligence is how little of the episode was directly about the title mission itself, rather than on its consequences.

‘It will probably bring in people that haven’t watched before.’

Well if it did, they're going to be seriously confused if they haven't at least watched the second series from the start...

It is fascinating to see North's reading of the show as very accurate from a pro-Reagan point of view, and as a pro-Reagan work. Erm, the KGB have a bug in FBI counter-terrorism's office, had another in a Secretary of State's home, have had people telling them that - contrary to what Americans were being told - the SDI was an expensive fantasy, plus a pile of Americans helping them for a variety of good reasons... and the FBI have managed to illegally execute someone.

Perhaps that was North's contribution: you do what you think is the right thing, and the pinkos in Congress get all upset at you.

(Saying there's no clash between FX and Fox News) “I look at history and at narrative fictional storytelling as different things,” (Fox executive) Mr. Landgraf said.

.. because they're doing history, and our 'news' channel is narrative fictional storytelling...

Re: Reading the show

[jae]

What did "detail and color" did he give that would deserve a 'story' co-credit?

I speculated a little bit about what North's specific contributions likely were in the thread about the episode. But there really was some good atmospheric stuff--especially in terms of dialogue--in the camp scene at the beginning.

As I understand it, there are Writers' Guild regulations about how much a consultant can do before the main writer is required to give them a co-writing credit. Apparently North's consulting crossed into that territory here.

Well if it did, they're going to be seriously confused if they haven't at least watched the second series from the start...

You'd think! But someone on Twitter was talking about how this was his first episode, and he really liked it, and plans to watch more. So...*throws up hands in disbelief*

It is fascinating to see North's reading of the show as very accurate from a pro-Reagan point of view, and as a pro-Reagan work.

I don't think it's likely that he's stupid enough to think the show is actually ideologically pro-Reagan (or ideologically anything, really). But as I said to wendelah1 when we discussed this over in my journal, there are certainly characters on the show--sympathetic ones--who probably share his perspective on Reagan and would do the exact same thing he did with respect to the Contras if given the chance.

My feeling is that since it's not a show that has an ideology, really, so it's easy for the kind of viewer it sounds like he is to align himself with whichever characters he's most ideologically sympatico with. In any case, he's not the first U.S. conservative I've heard express unconditional approval of the show on ideological grounds, so it didn't really surprise me to hear it from him.

-J