The Americans is more than a spy show. It explores how a hidden identity is hard to nourish—and an identity embodied in habit is harder to disavow.
On Media
Reviews of film, TV, and more
Galactic hopes
Star Trek has long been insistently nonreligious. But in the end it has not replaced religion, just repurposed it.
The Bluths’ school for virtue
Arrested Development is back, and family dysfunction is on display. But family may also be the characters' chance to break free from paralyzing narcissism.
Jane Austen in California
Diehards may not like Lizzie Bennet Diaries' changes to Austen. But the fun lies in considering the choices involved in cultural translation.
Miniseries midrash
The hardest review to write is the B- review. And the History Channel’s five-part miniseries The Bible is neither excellent nor miserable.
How can we imagine a world that counters the one that the Don Drapers helped create?
Power couple
St. Francis and St. Clare's witness was possible only in a world full of grace. Frank and Claire Underwood's story is plausible only in a world stripped of it.
The show Homeland puts viewers in a moral vice and squeezes.
Supernatural romance
The act of sacrifice central to Beautiful Creatures works only because the characters' story is not entirely their own.
Flood waters
Parents are committed to keeping children safe. But the reality is closer to Benh Zeitlin's vision of chaos than we care to admit.
We’re still family
I don't like family sitcoms, so I long avoided Modern Family. But the show catches the way family can be both loathsome and life-giving.
Django Unchained is an irreverent, profound and problematic exploration of America's original sin—and the power of a revenge fantasy.
When Peter Jackson plays up the theme of home, it's a loving riff on Tolkien. But why must he make war the driving engine of the The Hobbit?
Viewers don’t look to James Bond movies for profundity. Mostly they go to see buxom babes (now brainier and badder) and gravity-defying vehicle chases. But the most recent Bond installment offers some pertinent comments on technology.
Faith in 2-D
It's the golden era of TV, and many shows explore moral and psychological issues with great nuance. Why not take religion as seriously?
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