The Assets

Based on a true story, Sandy Grimes (Jodie Whittaker) is a CIA officer trying to cultivate assets in the Soviet Union. Little does she knows, there is a mole in her office she sees every day. Aldrich Ames (Paul Rhys) has been selling CIA secrets to the Soviets.

It's obvious that ABC had no confidence in this show/mini-series. They put it out at the end of the holiday seasons with little or no advertising. It's meant to be nothing more than cannon fodder going into the Winter Olympics. Nobody was paying attention, and nobody watched. It's not a surprise that they canceled it after 2 episodes especially considering the anemic ratings.

I did like the realistic (read not flashy) spy craft. But that's all I found interesting. I like Jodie Whittaker in some of her work. The problem is that we know from the start who the mole is. There isn't much mystery in any of this. Without any mystery, there isn't much driving this show. The audience is just waiting for the CIA to catch the guy. It's probably better as a shorter mini-series. It just doesn't have the flash bang whiz pow of modern TV.

I didn't know about mistakes in the visuals and I understood before I saw it that Aldrich Ames was the spy but I still thought this was well done. Just because you know the ending doesn't mean it can't be suspenseful. Anyway, I thought everybody was good in this show and I looked forward to the next episode. It beats the heck out of the junk on TV about amateur performers, morons getting dates, fat people losing weight and people falling off things. If you want something with a good story you usually end up on HBO or Showtime. I'd like to thank ABC for showing the remaining episodes. I appreciated that. Even if it was a weird time. You have to love timers.

Excellent portrayal of what happened and displayed in a realistic form. I found the show to be entertaining and informative. The actors did a great job of showing how the CIA works. It is one of the better spy shows on TV today and I hope it is picked up by one of the cable stations, where it would really be appreciated. The flow of the show was easy to follow with the back and forth of the flashbacks which gave the show a form of connecting the dots. There is not any blood and guts shown in the first two episodes but it keeps the audience interest with the intrigue. It is sad the show was canceled before it could get into the deeper espionage of what really happened. I will miss this show.

I am waiting for ABC to let the other 6 episodes be available for streaming. Many fictional mysteries start with the same premise of knowing who the culprit is. It can still be a great journey in solving the situation. My 16 year old was choosing to put down his electronic devices and and watch this with us. I also enjoy the non dramatic way that home life people with security clearance jobs are shown. My only confusion was why it was an almost all British cast for a very American show and topic. However they were doing the accents well. My husband and I were young enough when these real events happened that we really only read the headlines and it fascinating to get a more in depth look at the happenings.

ABC, just go on back to the mental junk food of half hour long strings of juvenile sexual innuendos peppered with near-continuous canned laughter. Based on a mere 2 episodes, I give The Assets an "8" for the potential of what might have been as compared to what the major networks are more comfortably determined to feed us. I was hopeful it would continue to hold my attention.

A couple of criticisms; the flashbacks seemed a little too frequent and hard to tell when they ended. And regarding Grimes' home life scenes; I didn't care for the stereotypical sullen teen, and Grimes' repeated line to her husband "you know I can't talk about that", I wondered how soon that would get tiresome. Those minor annoyances might have smoothed out in future episodes, BUT WE'LL NEVER KNOW! Hey Netflix, HBO, somebody, anybody!

The Ames spy scandal is worthy of quality dramatization, in spite of the fact that, yes, we know how it turned out (Titanic, Lincoln, any WWII movie - we knew in advance how those turned out). There are so many true stories out there so worthy of being dramatized; read about Douglas McKiernan, the first CIA agent killed in the line of duty - an incredible story!