Designated Survivor

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Season 3
Season #: 3, 2, 1
User Score
4.8

Mixed or average reviews- based on 31 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 13 out of 31
  2. Mixed: 4 out of 31
  3. Negative: 14 out of 31
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User Reviews

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  1. SchroederRock
    Aug 7, 2019
    6
    Season 3 ends the entire series as Netflix chooses not to renew the political drama. Was it a good send off? I'm not certain of that and that irritates me. Designated Survivor had this soul to it that reflected our current political climate - the senseless bickering and division, the intentions to play to a base of voters instead of appealing to the interests of every American citizen andSeason 3 ends the entire series as Netflix chooses not to renew the political drama. Was it a good send off? I'm not certain of that and that irritates me. Designated Survivor had this soul to it that reflected our current political climate - the senseless bickering and division, the intentions to play to a base of voters instead of appealing to the interests of every American citizen and removing blockades that would stymie positive progress. Season 3 of Designated Survivor does continue that trend at times and reflects what is likely the real-world effect of politics on a president that aims to do the right thing at the right time without thinking of themselves. Tom Kirkman's character is profoundly necessary in a growing succession of American leadership that tends to under-deliver. His intention to do the right thing is exactly what a nation needs in its leadership and yet I constantly feel like we have so little of that. Mix in a superb cast that surrounds Kirkman and you have a show that can literally float on the people that make it alone. This is evidenced not only in Sutherland's performance as Kirkman but Italia Ricci's character Emily Rhodes who commands quite a lot of attention and really drives secondary plots in the show's third season at times. Season 3 gets high marks for character development and ending both the season and the series on a strong note but the way it gets there is problematic. Often I felt that the show took unnecessary steps to push an LGBT agenda and went to greater lengths to expose people gratuitously to what most would consider far-left ideologies. It's ridiculous - not the fact that the LGBT community is represented in the show and certainly not that it's horrible to be a member of that community, but that the series had to put such an emphasis when Designated Survivor had become such a centrist-aiming series ideologically and getting so deep by showing a rather uncomfortable gay sex scene in the first half of the series left me feeling off and every time the show hammered that ideology I couldn't help but feel like someone planted their own political ideology into the mix for **** & giggles, not because it fit the series well. A lot of uber-liberal ideologies make their way into the show and while some of them fit the bill properly as to what a Kirkman presidency would focus on (humanity, individuality, charity, among other things) others feel out of place and I couldn't help but be forced to deal with these off-putting themes for the sake of marching through the final season. In the end, I still ended up liking what I was watching. I was sad to learn that Netflix wouldn't continue Designated Survivor, especially with how things ended. I felt like the writers were finally shedding these unnecessary distractions and uninteresting character side-plots and focusing on better stories to tell. I won't spoil the ending but there were some great choices made in how things wrapped up but I felt like there would be enough material to either extend season 3 a couple more episodes with some legal matters following one of the storylines we experience or give the show one more season before putting it to bed - that's not what we seem to be getting here. Unless the most unlikely miracle occurs and Designated Survivor finds life beyond its second cancellation, it's over. Reviving it at this point wouldn't seem all that lucrative unless a network had a tough ratings issue that picking up this series might help bridge, but then you have to make it worth it by being willing to run not just one new season but likely a second or a third AND make it good enough that the show maintains interest. I don't feel like season 3 did the series justice and I'm sure many didn't finish the series because they felt the weird distractions and, frankly, bad side-stories early on diminished the appeal of a political drama. That being said, if you stick with it I felt the final 3 or 4 episodes focused up much better as the boring subplots fizzled out and the man we all came to see is dominantly the focus of the show and it's conclusion. Hang in there if you're just starting out - it does get better and the final episode is quite a thrill overall.… Expand
  2. Stargatemunky
    Mar 16, 2022
    6
    This show made me finish Season 3 out of spite, just so I could be done with it.

    Season 1 has a unique plot device that opens up all kinds of potential and it executed it perfectly, with obvious parallels to 24 with the cast and writing style, it highlights interesting angles of political subterfuge and backstabbing with enough stamina to last 22 episodes. Season 2 starts off weak,    This show made me finish Season 3 out of spite, just so I could be done with it.

    Season 1 has a unique plot device that opens up all kinds of potential and it executed it perfectly, with obvious parallels to 24 with the cast and writing style, it highlights interesting angles of political subterfuge and backstabbing with enough stamina to last 22 episodes.

    Season 2 starts off weak, with not much to really make use of now the big bad evil has been dealt with, it hides any interesting back story regarding the next big threat with really lame social issues that just seem vague and uninteresting. It picks up halfway through but there are lots of big budget sets that seem to be used for like 5 seconds with main characters being 'ended' with not much in the way of actual thought. Just filler for rushing back to the dumb 'social issue of the week'. Had ABC had it for another season they might have come up with something interesting

    Season 3...... ugh... whilst the plot points are more tight, you STILL have the main plot interest, the bio weapons, pushed the background until the penultimate episodes and then it's literally just dumped like it was nothing to begin with, thus sapping ANY real interest. The swearing and the in your face gay sex scenes are done just to sell to some non-existent mastabatory audience looking to get a fix, as if this show ever was pitched to that demographic. Season 1-2 you could sit with your parents or family and feel ok, Season 3 is full of f-bomb cringe with self-reference to the fact like Netflix is trying to be edgy and cool.... it's neither, it detracts from the plot, the feel of the show and overall competency of any writers worth a damn.

    S3 has some good emotional plot developments, again, it was only 10 episodes as opposed to 22 but still managed to drag on worse than Season 2 because of the pig headed lazy writing. I'm glad it's over, I can't recommend the show really beyond Season 1 because literally NOTHING beyond that is anything but cliché, predictable plots that you can copy paste from the playbook of any drama that's gone before it. They introduce characters out of the blue that you know will end up being the bad guy of the week.

    Season 1 kept you guessing for a while what everyone's motivations were... then then just dropped the ball. A waste of good actors and production budget.    … Expand

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
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No score yet - based on 3 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1 out of 3
  2. Mixed: 2 out of 3
  3. Negative: 0 out of 3
  1. The Telegraph
    Reviewed by: Ed Power
    Jan 3, 2020
    80
    As political drama Designated Survivor season three has the smoke-streaming-from-its-ears quality of a Donald Trump stump-speech. As bursting-at-the-seams pot-boiler it is magnificent.
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  2. TV Guide
    Reviewed by: Tim Surette
    Jun 7, 2019
    50
    Is it now good enough to be a must-see TV show? No! But fans of Designated Survivor's run on ABC who aren't afraid of a few changes should notice that the political drama is, for the most part, a better, more fully realized series, even if only incrementally.
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  3. The A.V. Club
    Reviewed by: Allison Shoemaker
    Jun 7, 2019
    42
    The third season is a marked improvement over the two that preceded it; this is still not a show that can manage to be three shows at once, but at least now some of those shows are marginally interesting.
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