I feel like there's always SO MUCH to unpack in an episode of this show, and this episode went right for that. OMG. Even the previouslies were like, omg it's that guy WAIT WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN WITH THAT.
I love that Martha leaving isn't the finale. I mean, I am super sad about it because I really adore Martha, but I think having it all be about Martha's journey to leaving would have been too much a rehash of Nina. This was different. Martha got dignity, and the world's most awkwardly tragic goodbye in her own way, not a rehash of Nina. Both Martha and Philip trying to give the other the comfort they could was really well done.
I think it does look like Tatiana is going to be filling more of the space left by Martha, and I approve of that. But I am not at all sure what I reckon is going on with her. SOMETHING, yes. That it's definitely her brother, no. I mean, I guess it cooould be? (And if it isn't, playing on his grief for his own brother is NOT gonna go down well with Oleg.) My guess is it's set-up for more personal Tatiana things even if it turns out she wasn't literally telling the exact full truth there.
I am trying to work out if I think the David Copperfield thing is brilliant or just too on the nose in a Seriously We See It way. Like, omg, massive honking issues that represent everything about your perspective on the world can be made to look like they disappeared, but really they were there the whole time! And if you were sailing a boat you'd smack right into them! I hear you, DC! (Also, I did not know what he looked like until now and that was disconcerting. What a strange dude.)
And on that topic, oh god, the EST convo and the huuuge fight. I love that they CAN fight without breaking up, but ow that was painful to watch. That was literally all their beautifully illusioned away feelings being DRAMATICALLY REVEALED. They love each other, but this episode was all about the many many ways that does not actually negate all the many issues they had which meant it took them twenty years of marriage to get together in the first place. They DO have super different perspectives, and they have not managed all those years together without hurt. And Elizabeth's talking about Est was the absolute pinnacle of that. I really think she MEANT the first bit: she can see what Philip gets out of it, in her own way. I think she really does understand that this makes him talk about stuff he can't otherwise and that he sees it as helping with something he's struggling with. But she doesn't really understand WHY he wants that. She thinks he should be able to talk to her, because she also clearly thinks his problems with the job are HER problems with the job, at least mostly.
Like, when Philip talked about hockey, my instinctive reaction to Elizabeth's face then was "holy crap, I think Elizabeth thinks the hockey is a lie". And it wasn't. There was literal hockey. He literally misses a thing about the world he grew up in, a part of the none-spy world, and it's literally playing hockey with his family. I was really glad that the Jennings' got to have that at the end.
Even though, HOLY CRAPOLI is Paige miserable. That was telegraphed impressively well in that short bit we got with her. Wow. I was expecting her to turn at least sort of spy... unwilling spy, never. Wow. That is some serious powderkeg waiting to explode right there. She's obviously been shocked by Elizabeth yelling at her (which I also thought was understandable if harsh: this is literally the reason you shouldn't recruit KIDS, right there, omg) but I don't see that lasting forever. Huuummmmm.
I was pleased about the Gaad storyline, even if Stan telling Philip about Martha was just ohgod painful to watch. Interesting times await with The New Guy, I think.
Yeung Hee is clearly not long for this world and I hate that cause I like her too. I like her, and I like that Elizabeth likes her. But like lots of people have also commented, this episode is all about what happens to those 'agents', and it is Not Good. Your odds of surviving the game are not high when you don't really know the rules or even what game you're playing.
The other thing here was change. Philip wanted hockey: he got it, eventually. Paige is growing up and her relationship with her parents and with Pastor Tim has changed. (And I bet her relationship with church in general, actually, but I will have to wait to know more there.) Elizabeth never talked about Gregory: now she has, at least a bit. Philip's son apparently went back home. (Do we still think he doesn't actually exist? I'm still kind of on that train.) And Gabriel is getting them the closest he can to a HOLIDAY, even though they are visibly shocked and he is literally someone who went in and took his own friend to, presumably, that friend's death. All change, and all stuff that people have to deal with as we go along. It's inevitable, and I kind of love how the show dealt with that.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2016-05-05 07:12 pm (UTC)I love that Martha leaving isn't the finale. I mean, I am super sad about it because I really adore Martha, but I think having it all be about Martha's journey to leaving would have been too much a rehash of Nina. This was different. Martha got dignity, and the world's most awkwardly tragic goodbye in her own way, not a rehash of Nina. Both Martha and Philip trying to give the other the comfort they could was really well done.
I think it does look like Tatiana is going to be filling more of the space left by Martha, and I approve of that. But I am not at all sure what I reckon is going on with her. SOMETHING, yes. That it's definitely her brother, no. I mean, I guess it cooould be? (And if it isn't, playing on his grief for his own brother is NOT gonna go down well with Oleg.) My guess is it's set-up for more personal Tatiana things even if it turns out she wasn't literally telling the exact full truth there.
I am trying to work out if I think the David Copperfield thing is brilliant or just too on the nose in a Seriously We See It way. Like, omg, massive honking issues that represent everything about your perspective on the world can be made to look like they disappeared, but really they were there the whole time! And if you were sailing a boat you'd smack right into them! I hear you, DC! (Also, I did not know what he looked like until now and that was disconcerting. What a strange dude.)
And on that topic, oh god, the EST convo and the huuuge fight. I love that they CAN fight without breaking up, but ow that was painful to watch. That was literally all their beautifully illusioned away feelings being DRAMATICALLY REVEALED. They love each other, but this episode was all about the many many ways that does not actually negate all the many issues they had which meant it took them twenty years of marriage to get together in the first place. They DO have super different perspectives, and they have not managed all those years together without hurt. And Elizabeth's talking about Est was the absolute pinnacle of that. I really think she MEANT the first bit: she can see what Philip gets out of it, in her own way. I think she really does understand that this makes him talk about stuff he can't otherwise and that he sees it as helping with something he's struggling with. But she doesn't really understand WHY he wants that. She thinks he should be able to talk to her, because she also clearly thinks his problems with the job are HER problems with the job, at least mostly.
Like, when Philip talked about hockey, my instinctive reaction to Elizabeth's face then was "holy crap, I think Elizabeth thinks the hockey is a lie". And it wasn't. There was literal hockey. He literally misses a thing about the world he grew up in, a part of the none-spy world, and it's literally playing hockey with his family. I was really glad that the Jennings' got to have that at the end.
Even though, HOLY CRAPOLI is Paige miserable. That was telegraphed impressively well in that short bit we got with her. Wow. I was expecting her to turn at least sort of spy... unwilling spy, never. Wow. That is some serious powderkeg waiting to explode right there. She's obviously been shocked by Elizabeth yelling at her (which I also thought was understandable if harsh: this is literally the reason you shouldn't recruit KIDS, right there, omg) but I don't see that lasting forever. Huuummmmm.
I was pleased about the Gaad storyline, even if Stan telling Philip about Martha was just ohgod painful to watch. Interesting times await with The New Guy, I think.
Yeung Hee is clearly not long for this world and I hate that cause I like her too. I like her, and I like that Elizabeth likes her. But like lots of people have also commented, this episode is all about what happens to those 'agents', and it is Not Good. Your odds of surviving the game are not high when you don't really know the rules or even what game you're playing.
The other thing here was change. Philip wanted hockey: he got it, eventually. Paige is growing up and her relationship with her parents and with Pastor Tim has changed. (And I bet her relationship with church in general, actually, but I will have to wait to know more there.) Elizabeth never talked about Gregory: now she has, at least a bit. Philip's son apparently went back home. (Do we still think he doesn't actually exist? I'm still kind of on that train.) And Gabriel is getting them the closest he can to a HOLIDAY, even though they are visibly shocked and he is literally someone who went in and took his own friend to, presumably, that friend's death. All change, and all stuff that people have to deal with as we go along. It's inevitable, and I kind of love how the show dealt with that.