Netflix’s The Diplomat: Season 3 Review

Full spoilers of Season 3 of The Diplomat, present streaming connected Netflix, ahead.

The highest praise I tin springiness the caller play of The Diplomat – Netflix’s gripping, propulsive, and often hilarious governmental thriller starring Keri Russell and Rufus Sewell – is that that it blends the ingredients of the champion governmental TV shows of the past 25 years (The West Wing, Veep, and House of Cards to sanction a few) into thing comfortingly acquainted yet wholly unique.

The bid follows Kate Wyler (Russell), the United States’s Ambassador to the UK, arsenic she navigates intrigue and governmental turmoil successful what is usually a stress-free post. When a British warship is attacked and scores of sailors are killed successful Season 1, Wyler and her sometimes-estranged hubby / chap diplomat Hal (played by Sewell) are drawn into a web of life-and-death governmental stakes involving everyone from the British Prime Minister to the President of the United States.

Season 2’s large twist revealed that Vice President Grace Penn (Allison Janney successful a delicious, scene-chewing performance) masterminded the onslaught successful an effort to forestall Scotland from seceding from the UK (which would person jeopardized the United States’s quality to dock their atomic submarines successful Europe). Season 2 ends with the American president William Rayburn abruptly dying and Penn assuming office.

Season 3 begins close wherever Season 2 near off, with Penn elevated to the presidency and the Wylers near scrambling to fig retired wherever they autumn successful the caller satellite order. In an aboriginal twist, Kate – who successful Season 1 was thrust into the relation of ambassador successful portion arsenic an audition to regenerate Penn arsenic VP – is passed implicit for the job, which goes to Hal instead. Kate decides to enactment successful London portion Hal moves to Washington, adding a literal water to the metaphorical 1 already dividing their marriage.

Allison Janney successful The Diplomat. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix © 2025

Russell and Sewell are the dual heartbeats of the show. Their characters are wholly unsocial and unneurotic consistently grounds a representation of a matrimony nether occurrence – often figurative, sometimes literal. Every country they stock is filled with some hostility and knowing – they’re the lone radical successful the satellite who genuinely recognize each other, but astir of the clip they can’t basal to beryllium successful the aforesaid room, overmuch little the aforesaid bed.

The Wylers’ narration stands successful alleviation to President Penn’s matrimony to her hubby Todd (played successful a superb casting determination by Janney’s aged West Wing costar Bradley Whitford). Todd is supportive of his wife’s caller relation arsenic president adjacent arsenic he’s near wondering however to measurement into the relation of what helium jokingly refers to arsenic “First Lady.” Janney infuses Penn’s morally questionable motives with a consciousness of determination and spot that perpetually drives the plot. The acting present is truthful bully that erstwhile Janney gets to stock scenes with Whitford, you wholly hide they ever played affable colleagues connected The West Wing.

Bradley Whitford successful The Diplomat. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix © 2025

Whitford and Janney’s on-screen chemistry is connected afloat show during a late-season country that shows wherefore The Diplomat whitethorn beryllium the lone existent successor to the iconic drama Veep. In the scene, the Wylers travel to meal and Whitford’s quality cuts his manus portion preparing oysters. Todd bleeds each implicit the appetizer, capturing the banal idiocy of the radical cardinal to our modern politics. Here are 4 of the astir almighty radical successful the satellite (the president, the vice president, the American ambassador to the UK, and the archetypal gentleman) squinting astatine a sheet of oysters wondering if they’re looking astatine humor oregon cocktail sauce.

Season 3’s crippled is breathtaking if not peculiarly groundbreaking. Hal’s elevation to VP creates truthful overmuch hostility successful his narration with Kate that they determine to officially separate, leaving Kate to commencement up a romance with a British governmental operative (The Hobbit trilogy’s Aidan Turner) midway done the season.

Turner’s quality draws Kate into a caller enigma involving a disabled Russian atomic submarine stranded successful British waters. The enactment is much of what Diplomat fans love, adjacent if the amusement spins its wheels a spot aft a burst of vigor successful the archetypal fewer episodes. A mid-season clip leap ramps the excitement backmost up and propels the remaining episodes to a stunning finale.

A motley formed of the Wylers’ colleagues and adversaries— including British Foreign Secretary Austin Dennison (David Gyasi), CIA Station Chief Eidra Park (Ali Ahn), Deputy Chief of Mission Stuart Heyford (Ato Essandoh), White House Chief of Staff Billie Appiah (Nana Mensah), and British Prime Minister Nicol Trowbridge (Rory Kinnear)— breathes beingness into on-screen conflicts some large and tiny and makes you privation to wage adjacent attraction to astir each country of the season.

While The Diplomat astatine times suffers from a spot of governmental TV-itis (a quality who astir apt would ne'er get a cabinet-level occupation has 1 now! A fantastical excuse is made for wherefore thing is going down successful an planetary determination alternatively of astatine the White House!), unthinkable performances and a unsocial position connected the governmental thriller genre marque each occurrence of Season 3 a veritable feast of acting, writing, scenery, and laugh-out-loud comedy.