Wait... what just happened in 'The Diplomat' finale?
What had been the Netflix political drama's best season took a bizarre left turn at the end
Thoughts on The Diplomat Season Three – with spoilers for the whole season — coming up just as soon as you get me an adult-sized Bible, written by Jesus...
Alan Sepinwall
Earlier this week, I attended a screening of the season premiere at the Metrograph, followed by a panel discussion with the cast, Debora Cahn, and Jane Hartley, aka the former U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom and the real-life inspiration for Kate Wyler. As much as I enjoy watching The Diplomat from the comfort of my own home, this is a show that really plays with a live audience, particularly in its comedic moments. The crowd went nuts for various gags in the premiere, particularly whenever newly-elevated President Grace Penn expressed her frustration with one or both of the Wylers. And they gasped when the episode ended with Grace declaring that she had chosen a Wyler to be her new VP — but that it would be Hal, not Kate.
Admittedly, the theater was full of friends and family predisposed to loving the show. But their reactions mirrored mine and lots of other people's to the first two seasons of The Diplomat. It's a real crowd pleaser, deftly mixing comedy, suspense, politics, romance, psychological drama, etc., on top of being a spectacular star vehicle for Keri Russell. And for most of this third season, I felt more pleased than usual by the series. Cahn made one smart move after another. She brought Allison Janney into a bigger role as Grace. She reunited Janney with West Wing costar Bradley Whitford as Todd, the extremely reluctant first First Gentleman. She made Hal the vice-president and had Kate privately end their marriage, shaking up both work and professional dynamics that were at risk of grown stale. She and/or Netflix decided to go back to an eight-episode season, which kept any of the stories from feeling rushed. She inserted a midseason time jump, to give relationships room to breathe after all the prior events took place over a manner of a few months at most. And she sprinkled in just enough of what worked in previous seasons — Nicol being a pompous twit, Dennison and Kate having scorching but unfulfilled chemistry, gags about Kate's grooming(*) — to make everything feel sharper and more entertaining than before.
(*) A nice touch: post-time jump Kate's hair is far more tamed, her clothes more stylish (and she's more often seen in skirts or dresses outside of formal occasions), as a sign that she's accepted the optics of being Second Lady in a way she refused to when she was just an ambassador. (That, or seeing the nest of hair on her Secret Service double made her reexamine her tonsorial choices.)
As I began the finale, I felt that this was clearly the best season of the show, possibly by a wide margin.
And then...
