The Americans finale: 5 unresolved questions we still have

The Americans finale left more questions than answers about TV’s favorite spies. Here are our unresolved questions about The Americans series finale.

Wednesday’s The Americans finale has kept TV fans talking as they debate how the FX series ended its six-season run. The truth is, while “START” answered a few long-simmering questions in the lives of Philip and Elizabeth Jennings, it also gave rise to a lot more.

Philip (Matthew Rhys) and Elizabeth (Keri Russell) wound up back in Russia, starting new lives after thwarting their country’s plans. But the specifics of their future were left open-ended, as were the fates of most of The Americans‘ main characters.

That means it’s up to us to fill in the blanks — unless FX somehow orders a spin-off series about the lives of Paige (Holly Taylor) and Henry (Keidrich Sellati) — so we’re breaking down the biggest unresolved points from “START” and trying to decode how TV fans should feel about the final episode.

Here’s what we’re still questioning about The Americans‘ series finale:

5. Is Renee a Russian spy?

The most frustrating part of “START” was a subplot or lack thereof: The episode re-raised the question of Stan’s wife Renee (Laurie Holden) being a Russian agent, but didn’t give an answer.

In one of numerous post-finale interviews, show co-creator Joel Fields said they chose to leave that big question hanging, in part because the truth wasn’t something any of the main characters would know (although apparently Holden does). That makes sense logically, but from a viewer standpoint, it’s a disappointment.

There’s nothing more frustrating to TV audiences than a question you realize the writers never planned to answer. Renee was introduced in The Americans season 5, so there should’ve been time to build her storyline to a place where we could get an answer, even if it was just a sign to the fans, and not the characters.

Instead, we come away feeling like Renee is just walking untapped potential. Why even pose the question if you’re not going to take advantage of it, especially when she’s played by Laurie Holden, who such a talented actress capable of complex roles (she portrayed Marita Covarrubias on The X-Files, and we still wonder what she would’ve done on Chicago Med).

Plus, leaving Stan with that doubt over his head is just kicking him when he’s down — again. In six seasons, this man has gotten bad break after bad break in his personal life, and now he has to live with the fear his wife is lying to him just like his best friend did? He deserved better.

4. What’s next for Paige?

The Americans shocked audiences — and Philip and Elizabeth —when Paige bailed on her parents’ plan to leave the country. Without telling them, she stepped off their escape train and went back to New York, where she was last seen getting herself a stiff drink back at the apartment formerly inhabited by their handler Claudia (Margo Martindale).

Fans have debated whether or not that means Paige is headed to jail, since the FBI doesn’t seem to have anything tying her to her parents’ espionage activities. (One of the strange things about the finale was how the Bureau had surveillance on seemingly every aspect of the Jennings family’s life except Paige’s dorm, until Stan called an audible.)

It would seem that she’s in the clear for now, but it’s hard to figure out what she does next and what motivates her now. This is a girl who was so devoted to her family/cause at one point that she even turned on her former BFF, Pastor Tim. She pretty well picked her side, so even though she had a huge fight with Elizabeth the week before, it’s still a shock to see Paige cut ties; for all she knows, that’s a permanent decision.

The problem is that it also leaves her empty-handed. The KGB’s not coming back for her, so she can’t continue down that path. She could (and as fans we hope she would) find Henry, but how does she handle that? She’s lied to him just like Philip and Elizabeth did. And she will always have to live with the possibility that the FBI does catch on to her. She’s really dug herself into a hole, and we’re not sure how she climbs out of it.

3. How screwed is Oleg?

Did anyone else feel incredibly sorry for Oleg Burov (Costa Ronin)? The Americans gave him the bleakest ending, as Oleg wound up behind bars in the penultimate episode. “START” only made it worse by confirming that he had been charged by the FBI with espionage, with his father having to break the news to Oleg’s wife and young son.

2. What’s in Henry’s future?

Henry Jennings was, by far, The Americans‘ most underused character. With entire episodes in which he’d have one or two scenes or not show up at all, it became clear in the middle seasons that the show didn’t know what to do with him, and that wound up becoming his final story arc, as he went away to college and tried to find his own life.

He was also not a large presence in The Americans finale; Elizabeth and Philip phoned him before they left the country, and then one of the final scenes involved Stan finding Henry after his hockey game. We didn’t even get to hear what was said, so we’re left to guess as to how much Stan told Henry about his parents’ escape.

Henry’s always gotten the short end of the character-development stick, and the last episode was no exception. He had little screen time, with the whole “away at college” plot point leaving a lot of his storyline unexplored (or left for the eventual therapist he should probably see).

Paige is still around, but considering she’s also harboring the spy secret, we’re not sure she’s the best person for Henry to see right now — if she even tries. So it was appropriate that “START” had Henry’s last scene ever be with Stan.

One could argue that Stan had a better connection to him than either Philip or Elizabeth; we still remember all those scenes The Americans gave us of Henry hanging out at Stan’s house. And considering Stan is in desperate need of a relationship with someone he knows isn’t lying to him, maybe he can take that surrogate dad role on again and be there for Henry.

The dynamic between Noah Emmerich and Keidrich Sellati has always been great to watch, even if it never quite got enough screen time, and their characters are dealing with the same feelings of confusion and betrayal anyway. But we just hope that Henry’s able to make a clean break from the spy drama. He doesn’t need to get dragged down by something he just now figured out.

1. What was that last scene?

The Americans left itself open-ended, with the final scene of the finale showing Elizabeth and Philip looking out over Russia while contemplating what their lives would have been like if they had never left. As reviewers have noted, there’s a lot to unpack in that dialogue, with all kinds of ways to look at it. Like most of the episode, the final scene is really open to interpretation.

It’s a happy ending in the sense that neither Philip nor Elizabeth Jennings are dead or behind bars. They have their freedom and their spy mission is finally, definitively done. But underneath that. it’s a sad ending: They’re divorced from their children and their friends, coming back to a country that they haven’t seen in a long time, and that, as we saw from the saga of Martha (Alison Wright), is a very different place from America.

That seems to be the message: that they technically “won” by doing the right thing and getting out alive, but they’ve also lost a lot. Elizabeth talking about how she would’ve worked in a factory and maybe she might’ve met Philip on a bus suggests she’s aware of how much harder their lives would’ve been in Russia — how they wouldn’t have the same opportunities and comforts that they have enjoyed, a theme that’s been brought up a lot of times in the series before.

And how it’s America, not Russia, that really brought them together and turned their fake marriage into a real relationship. Without this mission, they might not even have each other, and we know it wasn’t until they had to build a life together that they became together.

That’s an interesting sentiment for The Americans to end on, too. The idea that these two characters served their country but also came back with an appreciation of and respect for ours. That Elizabeth, after years of watching Philip integrate into America (and consider defecting), now somewhat understands that feeling herself. That both sides have strengths, much like the START treaty that the episode was named after.

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That is the most frustrating and yet most interesting aspect of The Americans series finale: that after six seasons of searching for answers and truths, this last episode amounted to a “choose your own adventure” conclusion, letting TV viewers decide what they thought it meant and what would happen next. We have just as many questions as answers, but so do all the characters that we spent the last six years with.

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