It’s 1982, Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev has died and the Cold War is getting hotter than ever on The Americans. That’s the backdrop as Season 3 of the FX series debuted last night to 1.9 million viewers and 796,000 among adults 18-49 at 10 PM last night, according to Nielsen.

That must be all good over at FX as Wednesday’s season premiere was even among total viewers with the Season 2 debut on February 26 last year with a 7% dip in the key demo. The S2 opener of the drama starring Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys as two sleeper KGB spies in suburbia drew 1.9 million total viewers and 863,000 among adults 18-49. That was a hard 41% and 45% from what the series debut had on January 30, 2013. The May 21, 2014 Season 2 finale of The Americans had an audience of 1.28 million.

FX being FX we won’t hear anything from them about the last night’s numbers for the Joe Weisberg-created show as they only like to talk about Live + 3. And you can see why – in DVR afterlife the Season 2 debut of The Americans was higher than that of its S1 premiere episode. It was also the highest Live+3 percentage increase for a S2 premiere of any FX drama series by a significant leap. In Live + 3 ratings, the DVR friendly Americans’ S2 opener went up 72% in total viewers (3.26 million) and 81% in the key demo (1.57 million). Now that’s some heat.