4 out of 5

Created by: Debora Cahn

covers season 1

I am not a very politically informed person. My awareness of what’s happening comes from whatever I glean from newsletter headlines, or passing mentions on podcasts. For various reasons – including, certainly, my privilege of not necessarily having to pay strong attention to politics, as I’m all white-male unaffected and live in an area mostly aligned with my lifestyle – I’ve also never been too interested in the topic, and shows and media directly dealing with it don’t appeal. Of course, stuff like The Diplomat is structured as entertainment, with character drama and intrigue worked in to the more comparatively “dry” day-to-day dealings it covers, but all the same: stuff in this genre doesn’t often go on my to-watch list. I’ll dabble in the scene, and have my negative biases fulfilled; but from the opening scenes, I knew The Diplomat was not only going to be my next binge watch, but would likely be one of the strongest written series of the year.

This remained true.

I was admittedly interested thanks to Keri Russell; The Americans became an amazing show over its run, and besides being excellently scripted and shot, was catapulted that much further by Russell’s and Matthew Rhys’ performances. Simply mind-blowing stuff. The Americans was certainly politics-adjacent, but obviously it was there; so putting Russell front and center in another dialogue-, topic-heavy show just sold me.

The Diplomat concerns government worker Kate Wyler (Russell), who’s preparing for an overseas role that’s more aligned with her activist beliefs, and gets her in the mix on matters that are important to her; instead, she’s suddenly called off that detail and told she’ll be the US ambassador to the UK, a generally fluffy position which is of no interest. She’s given enough details to indicate it’ll be maybe a temporary gig, and basically told she has no choice, and off she goes.

Wyler is a no-nonsense type. She’s married to an all-nonsense type: Hal (Rufus Sewell), a now retired ambassador who’s good-ol’-boys pals with everyone, and who manages to overshadow Kate without, seemingly trying; but this casual attitude hides a master manipulator, who barreled heads first into many situations and perhaps got something done, but often while leaving a very messy political wake, and maybe also one in which Kate got caught. Kate and Hal are also planning on getting divorced, but he’ll play the nice husband during the UK appointment.

The easier out here would be two-fold: make Kate the fish-out-of-water, outspoken US-er who charms and frustrates the fussy Brits; make Kate and Hal hate-lovers who bicker and then fuck and everything comes together cleanly. The Diplomat takes notes from these two things… but does not do them at all, and does not try to full you as such.

Kate is outspoken, but is just as manipulative as Hal, with the added layer of knowing how to play her husband’s traits for her favor (or knowing when to be suspicious of him), and the two are clearly still in love, with the comfortable habits of familiarity peppering their interactions, and happily enjoying physical time together as well. …It’s just not working, and Kate knows, all manipulations aside, she will never be able to escape the mighty Hal shadow.

Meanwhile: maybe this UK appointment isn’t a cushy job, and it’s actually training for something much larger. And maybe Hal does have something running in the background, dealing with that. The Diplomat also plays this out in the open, pretty much – it’s explained within the first couple episodes – but what’s appreciated is how Kate still kicks ass at her job regardless. She molds the position into something affecting and is effective at it; she is the catalyst of some major moves. This is, to me, the show’s highlight: despite my talking background up above, the bulk of the hour long episodes are talking heads, going fairly inside baseball on political dealings – maintaining face; saying one thing and meaning another – and the writers are not afraid to go deep on 2022 / 2023 topics. You can definitely follow the gist, but the details are also heavier than the norm: this is not West Wing or Madam Secretary; it’s the less glamorous (in a good way) version of that.

…Except when it’s not.

While Kate and Hal’s relationship is absolutely relevant to how the storyline builds – Kate’s “training” running parallel to a bigger and bigger UK / US / Russia conflict, when the latter surreptitiously attacks the former, and the US plays wishy-washy middleman – The Diplomat occasionally lingers on this too long, in a way that undermines the tension of the politics. Another romance option is throw into the mix for Kate – UK Foreign Secretary Austin Dennison (David Gyasi) – and this is along those same lines: it’s interesting, and well-written in a vacuum, but feels like it’s a season 2 type plotline. Every time we start going into the weeds on some really compelling, dense stuff, we pause for relationships. It’s important; the balance is just slightly off.

Thankfully, the performances are not. Russell and Seward kill it, and Gyasi and Rory Kinnear as the UK prime minister are both amazing foils for Kate – Gyasi is all buttoned up; Kinnear is an even more boisterous source of bravado than Hal.

Streaming series do have to do more heavy lifting an a shorter span nowadays, so I understand trying to mix in some sexy soapy stuff to the politics. It’s a shame that such a strongly written series has to play this juggling game, as, even when individual scenes are strong, the combination can throw things off, but the good news might be that it clears off some stepping stones for, hopefully, even more impressive things to come.