This post contains spoilers for the fourth season of The Diplomat, which is now streaming on Netflix.
Kate Wyler, the heroine of Netflix's The Diplomat, has devoted her adult life to public service. She has spent much of that time trying to curb the worst impulses of her narcissistic husband Hal. And she has had to make one ethical compromise after another since being appointed America's ambassador to the United Kingdom. Throughout all of this time, though, the story Kate told herself about herself was that of a person who meant well, and who always tried to do the right thing, but was often foiled by forces beyond her control.
This season, though, feels a bit like Kate is posting her way through her problems over on the Am I The Asshole? subreddit. Maybe, she begins to wonder, Hal wasn't the only one to blame — or even the primary one to blame — for the problems in their marriage. And maybe the ends long ago stopped justifying the means of what she's been doing since she arrived in England.
Alan Sepinwall