Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Spy/Master’ On HBO Max, A Cold War Story About A Romanian Double Agent Looking To Defect To The U.S.

One of the things that the classic 2010s series The Americans proved is that late-stage Cold War espionage dramas are fascinating, simply because the good guys and bad guys aren’t so well-defined. Every side has their own agenda, and the people doing the dirty work on the ground for these governments are constantly questioning their loyalty. In a new series on HBO Max, a Romanian intelligence officer tries to save himself and his family while making sure he’s not found out by both his own country and the Russians.

SPY/MASTER: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: “1978. Bucharest, Romania.” A man says goodbye to his daughter at the train station.

The Gist: Victor Godeanu (Alec Secăreanu) isn’t just any Romanian going on a business trip; he’s the right-hand man to Romanian president Nicolae Ceausescu (Claudiu Bleont); at this point in the Cold War Ceausescu has broken from most of the Eastern Bloc countries and started diplomatic relations with countries like West Germany. Godeanu’s assignment is to go to Bonn and negotiate the return of Romanian political exiles.

But when he gets to Bonn, he goes directly to the American embassy and asks for a CIA officer named Frank Jackson (Parker Sawyers). Jackson can’t believe a high-up Romanian official is waiting for him, but the Godeanu is gone by the time Jackson gets to the reception desk.

Flashing back a week, Godeanu, who has been feeding Romanian secrets to the KGB for 15 years, gets a report from his Russian contact that Romanian intelligence is on to him. He says he knows what he’s doing and isn’t being sloppy, but the contact thinks it might be time to extract him to Moscow.

He doesn’t want that, of course, but he also knows that Ceausescu has become more paranoid lately, giving him names of close associates who he thinks are traitors and asking him to eliminate them. If he doesn’t act fast, not only will he be in danger, but his family will be, too.

We go back the American embassy, and see that Godeanu leaves when he recognizes someone there, who sees him sitting in the lobby. When he does the negotiations with the Germans, that turns out to be Ingrid (Svenja Jung), who is assisting the West Germans, but he also knows from other dealings — personal and otherwise. Still, he gets word from the Americans that they’re willing to talk. He and Jackson meet in secret, and Jackson lobbies the higher-ups in the Carter administration, currently busy with the Camp David accords, that getting Godeanu to the U.S. should be a top priority. Yet, he’s told that Godeanu has to wait.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Spy/Master is definitely in the same late-Cold War category as The Americans, where the two sides are not nearly as well-defined in the late ’70s and through the ’80s as they were in the ’50s and ’60s.

Our Take: Creators Adina Sădeanu and Kirsten Peters have already infused Spy/Master with a dizzying narrative in the first episode, simply by juggling the week or so of Godeanu’s life into smaller segments. It’s not like we jump back and forth between months or years; the story jumps back and forth between days within the same week. But there’s so much going on with him in this week that it feels like months have passed.

He’s trying to evade being extracted to Moscow by the KGB, which will likely not bode well for him, while attempting to defect to the U.S. At the same time, he’s trying to stay in Ceausescu’s good graces, because he knows he and his family are dead if his double dealing with Russia is exposed.

It’s a lot to juggle, and we suspect that Secăreanu’s performance will become more frantic as all of these factors exert more pressure on him. He will get help, though we don’t know that at the end of the first episode, and there’s going to be a series of people after him, including Romanian intelligence agent named Carmen (Ana Ularu), who is likely as resourceful as Godeanu is.

Will things feel confusing at times, where we don’t know who is on what side? We’re almost sure of it. But that’s just the nature of how things were back then, and as the tension ratchets up, it’ll be fun to see if and how Godeanu can extricate himself from this vice-grip of danger he’s put himself in.

Sex and Skin: Nothing in the first episode, but we’re thinking there may be more as the series goes on.

Parting Shot: Godeanu goes to his hotel room and sees the paper he put in the door jam has been disturbed. As he carefully looks around, Ingrid comes out and points a gun at him.

Sleeper Star: We’ll give this to Svenja Jung as Ingrid, because her connection to Godeanu is going to be a strong one, and it seems that she’s there to help him, not take him out.

Most Pilot-y Line: When Godeanu’s daughter Ileana (Alexandra Bob) shows him a picture of Ceausescu she’s drawing for a project, he calls it a caricature, takes it and burns it. Wow. Tough crowd.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Spy/Master is a well-written Cold War espionage potboiler that promises to build tension as the danger to its main character increases.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.