House Of Cards: Every Season Ranked Worst To Best

Though it is blatantly obvious that he is the most thinly disguised take on Vladimir Putin the show could’ve had without incurring legal action, Lars Mikkelsen’s portrayal of Russian President Viktor Petrov was probably the single best thing about the show’s third season, giving Frank an adversary who was equal to if not superior to him at playing dirty politics.

His performance was greatly offset by the steep drop that the quality of storytelling took in comparison to the first two seasons. Doug’s season-long arc to recover from his injury at Rachel Posner's (Rachel Broshanan) hands, only to then kill her consequence-free, felt far too drawn out. Frank’s dogmatic sticking to his guns on the doomed America Works programme seemed very out of character, and Claire’s appointment as United Nations Ambassador was far too unrealistic to be plausible, having been put in seemingly just to give her something significant to do.

The third season of the original 1990s British version of House of Cards killed off Frank’s equivalent, Francis Urquhart, with his wife arranging for his assassination in order to ensure that he wouldn’t damage his legacy with poor leadership. Given how high the series was flying, it's obvious as to why Netflix chose to deviate from the source material, but given how flat the season felt after Frank had no higher position to scheme his ascension towards, it could’ve been an interesting idea to replicate in hindsight.