Television series

TURN: Washington's Spies

Name: TURN: Washington's Spies
Genre: Drama, War
Released: 2014
Cast: Jamie Bell, Heather Lind, Seth Numrich, Daniel Henshall, Samuel Roukin

A tense espionage drama set during the American Revolution, following a Long Island farmer drawn into running America's first spy ring. Intimate and claustrophobic despite its historical scale—more about the paranoia of double lives than battlefield heroics. For people who love spy craft, moral ambiguity, and the human cost of secrets.

TVMaze rating

4.0

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you want slow-burn espionage built on quiet loyalty and moral compromise, where a single overheard conversation carries real dread.

Skip it if you need fast, action-led plotting, since most of the tension comes from waiting, whispered meetings and the slow grind of covert logistics.

What it asks of you: Four seasons and forty hour-long episodes, so this is a long commitment that rewards patience; scenes linger, and the mood stays sober and grey rather than bright.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

The Americans2013

Soviet KGB officers posing as an American couple navigate Cold War espionage with devastating emotional depth. Like TURN, it finds tragedy in the gap between public identity and private loyalty.

But Slow-burn tension means long stretches of dread. The 1980s setting and dated aesthetics won't appeal to everyone.

Slow Horses2022

British intelligence misfits navigate bureaucratic intrigue and real danger. Shares TURN's gift for making tradecraft feel genuinely dangerous and characters feel genuinely trapped.

But Very dry British humour. If you need constant action or big emotional beats, this is patient to the point of frustration.

Halt and Catch Fire2014

A lesser-known gem about ambition and obsession in the early computer era. Like TURN, it's a character study wrapped around a specific historical moment, with the same sense of people building something that will outlast them.

But Tech-world jargon can feel impenetrable. Early episodes are uneven before it finds its footing.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from TURN: Washington's Spies

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Barry Lyndon1975

Both are character studies buried inside historical war stories, fascinated by how ordinary people become instruments of larger powers, told without patriotic mythmaking.

Kubrick's painterly 1975 epic follows an Irish rogue through the Seven Years' War. No spy ring, but the same portrait of a man caught between survival and conscience, shot like candlelit portraiture. Visually unlike anything else made.

But Nearly three hours of 18th-century realpolitik and betrayal. No concessions to plot momentum; you're watching a man's slow moral deterioration in real time.

The Terror2018

A crew on a doomed Arctic expedition faces external threats and internal betrayal. Matches TURN's atmosphere of claustrophobia and paranoia, though with supernatural dread layered underneath.

But Genuinely grim and hopeless. Not for viewers who need their darkness leavened with humour.

Mad Men2007

Advertising executives in 1960s New York navigate ambition, deception, and fractured identities. The same meticulous period detail and moral complexity as TURN, with the same slow accumulation of damage.

But Minimalist storytelling means episodes can feel like nothing happens. The lead character is often insufferable by design.

Tyrant2014

An exiled doctor returns to his Middle Eastern homeland to work as a spy. Direct parallel to TURN's structure: ordinary person pulled into espionage, forced to betray personal ties for the greater good.

But Cancelled after three seasons on a cliffhanger. Uneven writing and heavy-handed political allegory.

Alias2001

A CIA operative balances her cover life against her real one. Earlier spy drama that shares TURN's core idea of fractured identity and the exhaustion of maintaining lies.

But Leans heavily into action and melodrama. Tonally inconsistent, especially later seasons.

Patriot2015

A cover identity as a folk musician masks a man's life as an industrial spy. Darkly funny and genuinely strange, it finds the absurdity hiding in TURN's world of double lives.

But Deliberately weird and uneven. Not polished—some viewers will find it awkward instead of clever.

The Spy2019

Sacha Baron Cohen as an Israeli agent embedded in Syria during the Cold War. Based on a true story, like TURN, with the same cost-accounting of what loyalty really means.

But Tonal whiplash between comedy and trauma. Cohen's range is interesting but not always comfortable to watch.

The Lives of Others2006

Both ask whether a spy can maintain a conscience. Both answer: not without destroying yourself.

A Stasi informant in Cold War East Berlin begins to question his work as he spies on a playwright and his lover. A single two-hour story that captures everything TURN sprawls across four seasons: the moral rot of surveillance, the humanity of targets, the isolation of the spy.

But Subtitled. Deliberately paced and quiet—this is not a thriller with reversals, it's a tragedy with one slow realization.

A Tale of Two Cities1935

Both understand that spy networks work because people are willing to die for each other, not for ideology—and that makes the moral complexity real.

Dickens's French Revolution novel, adapted as a sweeping melodrama. Ronald Colman as a man who sacrifices everything for love and principle. Different era, same architecture: resurrection through secret work, the bonds that hold spy networks together, the price of coded communication.

But A 1935 melodrama in full costume. If you need contemporary filmmaking or irony, this sincere romanticism will feel stale.