History Series / CovertAffairs

* RippedFromTheHeadlines: The Polonium poisoning of a Chinese defector mirrors the FSB execution of Alexander Litvinenko in London in 2006.

* ArtisticLicense: There's always going to be a few in shows like this, but a somewhat glaring one is Auggie being given Landsat TM data and asking instead of ASTER data. ASTER data is 15 meter resolution, and is obtainable by almost anyone. Google Maps, however, has Digital Globe imagery, which is a commercial company that sells 50 ''centimeter'' resolution imagery, and DG has been selling imagery of that quality for years. For those Tropers not familiar with satellite imagery, that's ''900 times'' better resolution. It's a pretty safe assumption that Augie could access better than ASTER data, much less need it delivered on a hard drive.

* ArtisticLicense: There's always going to be a few in shows like this, but a somewhat glaring one is Auggie being given Landsat TM data and asking instead of ASTER data. ASTER data is 15 meter resolution, and is obtainable by almost anyone. Google Maps, however, has Digital Globe imagery, which is a commercial company that sells 50 ''centimeter'' resolution imagery, and DG has been selling imagery of that quality for years. It's a pretty safe assumption that Augie could access better than ASTER data, much less need it delivered on a hard drive.

* [[TheSpymaster Spymaster]] [[SpyCouple Couple]] : The Campbells. Arthur heads the CIA itself, Joan's the head of the DPD. This is probably lifted directly from the Foleys of Clancy's Jack Ryan universe

* PrivateMilitaryContractors: Topaz Security.

* EloquentInMyNativeTongue: In "Letter Never Sent" Annie and Danielle's Swedish is almost impenetrable. Of course, they only spent one year in the country as kids. Contrast with the tall Finn in the heavy sweater for a BilingualBonus, he's swearing and complaining about having to "climb like a monkey" to fix his lamp.

* CunningLinguist: Annie speaks, well, at least 6+ languages fluently: English, Russian, German, Spanish, Hebrew, and Portuguese, and she knows enough Turkish "to get by." (Her French may or may not be in this category, as the only time she's used it, her cover was an American expatriate.) It's one of the reasons she was recruited into the CIA. She also apparently knows at least some Italian as well, because in one episode she has to trade an Italian journalist for an American spy and she completely understands his ranting and even responds in Italian. She also understands Arabic, but she can only speak the cuss words. Estonian is her only weakness as she knows only the cuss words and not much else. Also, her "Swedish" is ''rather hard!'' to decipher.

** Season three's AdventuresInComaland features a dance between Annie and Auggie. When she wants to keep dancing, he says they'll dance again when the music is right. Fast forward to 4x02 when they're on a mission and waiting for their contact. Annie hears a street performer and suggests they dance. This time it's Auggie who wishes the dance could go on.

* BadassIsraeli: Eyal Levin, Annie's contact in the fourth episode, who has been described by the creative team as "the Israeli Film/JamesBond".

* {{Adorkable}}: Eric Barber.

Covert Affairs has four seasons aired in the past. A fifth season is currently in production and the first episode is set to air in 2014 in North America.

* BrokenBird: Annie spent most of her life putting up emotional barriers, and when she finally let them down and fell in love, her paramour left in the middle of the night with nothing more than a note. And so, she explains, she keeps her guard up.

** Add in the late season four insistence of pronouncing Copenhagen with the "a" you'd use in the word "car", somehow thinking that turns it into the actual name of the Danish capital, spelled ''København''?. Nope. It's actually pronounced closer to "cuh-ben-houn".

* [[spoiler:OffTheWagon]]: Joan in the second half of season 3.

* RealitySubtext: Several hikers have historically been arrested as spies. When Riva and Annie are arrested, they actually ''are'' spies.

* TheSpock: Riva, with shades of StrawVulcan.

* FalseFlag: [[spoiler:Henry Wilcox uses one in Denmark when he gets one of his moles in the CIA's SOG to stage the shooting of a chopper with a Stinger MANPAD to frame Teo and Annie for being terrorists. And it worked.]]

** The latest episode continues this by having Auggie change his shirt in his office, showing Christopher Gorham's amazingly well-developed chest and torso.

* AdventuresInComaLand: "Suffragette City" has [[spoiler: Annie]] go through this.

** In the Pilot, Annie asks Auggie to wish her luck, and he replies that she doesn't seem the type to need it, but wishes her luck all the same. It becomes a RunningGag between them.
** Annie's AdventuresInComaland features a dance between Auggie and herself. When she wants to keep dancing, he says they'll dance again when the music is right. Fast forward to 4x02 when they're on a mission and waiting for their contact. Annie hears a street performer and suggests they dance. This time it's Auggie who wishes the dance could go on.

* CunningLinguist: Annie speaks, well, at least 6+ languages fluently: English, Russian, German, Spanish, Hebrew, and Portuguese, and she knows enough Turkish "to get by." (Her French may or may not be in this category, as the only time she's used it, her cover was an American expatriate.) It's one of the reasons she was recruited into the CIA. She also apparently knows at least some Italian as well, because in one episode she has to trade an Italian journalist for an American spy and shcompletely understands his ranting and even responds in Italian. She also understands Arabic, but she can only speak the cuss words. Estonian is her only weakness as she knows only the cuss words and not much else. Also, her "Swedish" is ''rather hard!'' to decipher.

** Annie's AdventuresinComaland features a dance between Auggie and herself. When she wants to keep dancing, he says they'll dance again when the music is right. Fast forward to 4x02 when they're on a mission and waiting for their contact. Annie hears a street performer and suggests they dance. This time it's Auggie who wishes the dance could go on.

--> '''Auggie''': And leave me all alone?\\
'''Annie''': Oh please, there'll be a pretty woman next to you before I even cross the bar.\\

* ChekhovsGun: In the pilot, Auggie refers to a phone filled with outdated intel as a "nice samsonite" and explains that samsonite is an old spy term for a suitcase stuffed with paper to make it seem like there might be something valuable in it. Fast forward to episode 1x05, where Jai and Annie are robbed by a rogue agent who [[spoiler: swaps the bundles of bills in their suitcase for two New York phonebooks...]]