You’ve probably seen the provocative TV ads touting FX’s new series, The Americans.
Spooky. You can go either way with teasers like that. It turns out, the way the producers went is to hope audiences back some of history’s worst bad guys.
“It might be a little different to believe and get used to, but we want you to root for the KGB,” said EP Joel Fields. “They’re going to try to get the Soviets to win the Cold War.”
History knows they’re fighting a losing battle, but the creative team behind the high-profile launch expressed a confidence that more than enough time has passed for American audiences to not hold a grudge.
“If you tried to tell a story like this about al-Qaeda now, it would be impossible; no one would want to hear it,” Fields continued. “I feel even the same could have been said up to 10 years after the cold war ended.”
The Soviets’ enslaved roughly half a continent, murdered millions of their own people and helped spawn the scourge of international terrorism. They threatened to destroy our values and way of life. They banned God and repressed every idea that disagreed with theirs. That’s quite a record. But now isn’t too soon to hope that the USSR buries the USA? And hey, maybe in another five years we really will see Real Housewives of Abbottabad, the madcap, zany life of and times of women who love their bad boy on the run. American audiences will stand up and cheer each time he does a reverse Gilligan and barely slips the grip of shadowy special operations forces. Tune in Tuesdays on FX.
Hollywood really can be a source of wretched scum sometimes.
I understand reverse Gilligans take skill.
Did your headline writer read by any chance that first comment over at The Corner? Make Room for Mao
lol
link for that, pls
I thought the central theme of this show was that the agents begin to adapt to the American lifestyle and turn against the Russian way of life.
I refuse to subscribe to any cable service. Even if someone doesn’t watch the crap that passes for cable entertainment they still are paying for it (someone calculated that each cable channel can get around 12 cents per subscriber). I will not watch MTV (even though I was around when it started) or VH1. I sure as heck will not watch LOGO. Any of you PJMedia viewers who are disgusted by the stuff on Cable (anti-America, anti-values, anti-Christian/Semitic, violence, soft portn, etc.) you are helping to support it. Until cable allows “a la carte” subscriptions you support the channels that broadcast the material that you find objectionable.
“If you tried to tell a story like this about al-Qaeda now, it would be impossible; no one would want to hear it,”
Do Hollywood types keep up on current events much? Libya? Syria?
Here’s your working title for the pilot: Obama’s Heroes.
Well, if nothing else we’ll get to see what the teenage Barack Obama fantasized about being….
Seen the ads. I root for outlaw bikers while watching “Sons of Anarchy,” but that’s as far as I’m willing to go, which is why I never watched “Breaking Bad” or “The Sopranos.” At least “Justified” is about a lawman.
See this is what I like about American. They are free to lose as much money as they like on this foolishness and no one will stop them.
Hollywood STILL can’t get over the fact that they lost the Cold War.
Are they going for two out of three?
I saw the trailer and thought it was stupid, my first reaction was to be reminded of the NK kidnappings from Japan. I follow “Sons” and “Horror Story” though, but they both start to get boring and there’s no much time for tv anyways.
We give Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson their props, even though standing for slavery is uniformly reviled today. Likewise, Rommel and the Red Baron get respect even when they were on the wrong side (Rommel gets extra props for trying to oust Hitler, but he was Patton’s glorious bastard before even that).
Might we be to a point where “good” guys on the Soviet team get that kind of respect? The show seems to be gambling on that being the case, but it will be harder to swallow for those of us who lived through the Cold War.