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theamericansAired:
1 June 2016 in the U.S. and Canada
This is a discussion post for episode 412 of The Americans, intended for viewers who are watching the show on the U.S./Canadian schedule. (Feel free to dive in to the discussion even if you're coming in late--and you should also feel free to start a new thread if it seems too daunting to read through what's already been posted first. If you're reading this at a point where you've already seen subsequent episodes, though, please take care to keep comments spoiler-free of anything that comes after season four, episode twelve.)
Original promo trailer
Overnight reviews
From Vulture
From the AV Club
From Vox
From Hitfix
From Slant
From the Wall Street Journal
From the New York Times
From the Los Angeles Times
From the Houston Chronicle
From Entertainment Weekly
From Den of Geek
From TV Fanatic
From the Young Folks
From Indiewire
From People's World
From the Observer
From Inverse
From Hidden Remote
From Geeks of Doom
From Celebrity Dirty Laundry
1 June 2016 in the U.S. and Canada
This is a discussion post for episode 412 of The Americans, intended for viewers who are watching the show on the U.S./Canadian schedule. (Feel free to dive in to the discussion even if you're coming in late--and you should also feel free to start a new thread if it seems too daunting to read through what's already been posted first. If you're reading this at a point where you've already seen subsequent episodes, though, please take care to keep comments spoiler-free of anything that comes after season four, episode twelve.)
Original promo trailer
Overnight reviews
From Vulture
From the AV Club
From Vox
From Hitfix
From Slant
From the Wall Street Journal
From the New York Times
From the Los Angeles Times
From the Houston Chronicle
From Entertainment Weekly
From Den of Geek
From TV Fanatic
From the Young Folks
From Indiewire
From People's World
From the Observer
From Inverse
From Hidden Remote
From Geeks of Doom
From Celebrity Dirty Laundry
general comment
Date: 2016-06-02 07:28 am (UTC)Said in a somewhat sardonic tone.
That about sums it up.
Paige finally seems to realise what she's gotten herself into by accident and eventually more purposely. It was chilling to realise that she might have been trying her first steps of honeytrapping Matthew in those final scenes. How little integrity she has after all. But it's not surprising, given that she really hasn't understood the whole picture of what her parents are doing, and that she was never motivated by patriotism the way they are.
Which leads us on to people's motives, something that seemed to be a strong theme in this episode.
Gabriel finally admitting that he was still just alone after having sacrificed everything for his country. There was no reward for him. But he still tries to encourage William into one last act by promising him a return to "home".
We also saw Elizabeth trying to explain to Paige why she became an agent: "To fight back." But increasingly throughout this episode we see people questioning whether this is indeed what they are doing. Perhaps they're just contributing to things getting worse?
And so Oleg gives Stan a lead on William. His phone call home to his mother seemed to predict a sad ending for him and not just moving to Nairobi with Tatiana.
I'm still mulling over Paige's comment about the tv show to Elizabeth: "It's not logical, it's emotional." Because she knows her mother isn't emotional, even in the face of death she remains calm and...well, logical.
Interestingly, we also see Henry becoming more and more annoyed with all the secrecy going on in the house. He has definitely noticed something is up and Paige is getting some sort of "special treatment". He seems to be such a ticking time bomb. When he went to look for the antenna (?) in the garage I half expected him to come back with a wig.
Re: general comment
Date: 2016-06-02 10:44 pm (UTC)My review
Date: 2016-06-02 08:39 am (UTC)I mean, we knew the mailbot's days were numbered. But William outed, by Oleg, no less, that I didn't see coming.
It's interesting that we see all three male secret Russian spies this show features regularly - Philip, William and even Gabriel - admit to doubts about whether or not the latest super dangerous bio weapon should be given to their superiors. (And btw I like that in the doubts aren't founded in a belief that the US system is superior, but that US technology is, and the likelihood of an accidental outbreak is lesser. This being the decade of Chernobyl, accidental disaster is just around the corner, though not of a bio weapon. And they've laid the foundation with the submarine incident in season 2.) But nonetheless, they, who all have lived in the US for decades, all go through with their parts; instead, it's Oleg, the official KGB employee at the Washington Rezidentura, who's only been in the country for two or three years (depending on how show chronology works), who eventually does something about it.
In retrospect, Oleg's decision has been well prepared. It's Oleg who shares the conversation with Arkady in season 2 about how possibly the submarine disaster wasn't due to cunning US sabotage but Russian eagerness to use untested technology. It's Oleg who due to his father has learned about the recent near World War III due to a computer glitch (sun reflections!), only prevented by a then unknown officer Petrov making the call to not act. And it's Oleg who has head of the science division knows about the problematic situation back home. Not to mention that Oleg has already outed one Russian spy (Svetlana) when he thought the reason was important enough (Nina). Nonetheless, this is big. He may or may not have prevented a terrible disaster, but no one is going to thank him for it; it was treason, so if he's discovered, he'll more likely than not die, and if he's not, then even if Stan meant it last week as opposed to employing reverse psychology, he's now given the FBI such leverage that they'll never let him go. Oleg might bet on not being in the country anymore if he accepts Tatiana's offer and goes to Kenya with her, but given Tatiana's comment of her promotion depending on this last operation, I bet Oleg just cost her that new Rezident job in Kenya as well.
In terms of follow-up to Paige witnessing her mother dispatching the wannabe mugger-and-worse, it goes more or less as I expected: Paige, smart girl that she is, realises what Elizabeth's quick action implies: that this is hardly the first time Elizabeth has killed someone. And while the "Dad, too?" Question in her follow up conversation with Elizabeth re: their parents having been trained is a bit naive, I think she knew the answer already. Elizabeth is still sugar-coating the truth for Paige by saying they were trained to defend themselves, and that yes, she's killed people "in defense", but I think it's now only a matter of time until Paige arrives at the conclusion it can't have been all self defense with her parents.
For now, she's more focused on the danger her parents are in regularly, if her conversation with Matthew re: Stan is anything to go by. Speaking of said conversation, Elizabeth did of course register that Paige just before the mugging reported to her about Matthew, and what this implies. Which leads us to the final conversation between Paige and her parents in this episode. They want her to have the relationship with Matthew (or not) for its own sake, not for the possible use, but it's too late for that, and this time, it's Paige who sees it, not her parents. She can't interact with the Beemans (either Stan or Matthew) neutrally, without awareness of how everything they say might have implications for her parents. And thus another part of the spy life has Paige in its grip; it's worth noting that despite last season's push on her part to recruit Paige, Elizabeth is just as appalled by this as Philip. (And notices the implication first.)
One professional deformation of being a spy is the inability to give a straight answer: I don't think Elizabeth means to deflect when Paige asks her whether or not she, Elizabeth, had been afraid when first joining the KGB regarding the need to fight and kill, but nonetheless, she keeps doing it, even when Paige points it out to her. In a way, she can't not, because she's trying to establish context for Paige by telling her about growing up in Smolensk after the war: Nadezhda's childhood and youth were so different from Paige's that the question "were you afraid of killing people?" Was as alien as Paige's question to Philip last episode about whether or not his mother had been a good cook.
Minor matter: Paige telling Elizabeth who tells Philip about Stan's meeting with Martha's father means Philip has Gabriel call the man to reassure him about Martha's well being. For a second, I wondered why Philip didn't do this himself since everything Gabriel says is something Philip could have as well, but then I realised Philip of course would be aware that the FBI must still be tapping Martha's parents' phone, and wants to avoid them recording his voice. (Which Martha's parents could identify as that of "Clark".) Whereas Gabriel's voice is that of a stranger. Also, Gabriel making the phone call in front of Philip is a reassurance that it's actually made. In a demonstration of the improved Gabriel-Philip relationship, Philip later confesses that he shared William's doubts and opinion the Lhassa virus intel should not be transmitted, and Gabriel returns the favor by confessing he's not sure it should, either, and adds that he was wrong to work alone, without a partner, all those years. After they all survived the last virus scare together, Gabriel has been letting Philip see his vulnerabilities.
Re: Gabriel's phone call
Date: 2016-06-02 06:57 pm (UTC)Re: Gabriel's phone call
Date: 2016-06-03 05:45 am (UTC)Re: Gabriel's phone call
From:Re: My review
Date: 2016-06-02 10:47 pm (UTC)Re: My review
From:no subject
Date: 2016-06-02 01:38 pm (UTC)What Oleg's done is huge, and came as quite a shock to me. I haven't really seen him up to now as the self-sacrificing type, but that's exactly what he's done here. If William's caught, the trail leads inexorably back to Oleg (or to Tatiana, of course, which I only just realised), and he could well end up sharing Nina's fate. Maybe that phonecall to his mother was his way of saying goodbye?
Something tells me the show is going to look rather different next season.
Who will take the fall?
Date: 2016-06-02 03:59 pm (UTC)The phonecall to his mother could have been a goodbye occasion, but I still doubt Oleg intends to admit to his guilt, either way, not least because it would inevitably drag his parents down as well, but also because of the pain his mother just went through for losing his brother.
Doylist reason why I think Oleg won't end up dead: he's providing a perspective none of the other Russian characters have, due to his privileged background. I mean, they could in theory have Arkady be the one with access to intel like the one about Petrov, I suppose, due to being the Rezident, but whom would Arkady tell if Oleg is gone? He doesn't seem to be close to anyone else.
Otoh, wild guess, based on Gaad dying: not Tatiana but ARKADY takes the fall for Oleg's treason, and we start the next season with a new Rezident (possibly Tatiana, who'd get the job in lieu of Kenya if she's the one to "expose" Arkady, just like Arkady got the job after "exposing" Vassily.
Re: Who will take the fall?
From:Re: Who will take the fall?
From:Re: Who will take the fall?
From:Re: Gabriel's health
From:Re: Gabriel's health
From:no subject
Date: 2016-06-02 08:35 pm (UTC)I do NOT think Paige kissed Matthew back thinking that she'd honeytrap him, I think their attraction to each other has been pretty clearly set up, but I do think that the possibilities of that are gonna kill the relationship stone dead. It doesn't actually matter whether Paige MEANS to honeytrap anyone, if every conversation is potentially relevant to her parents' spying anyway. Paige can't back out now even if she wants to, and she's only just getting that.
Elizabeth getting that is also beautifully done. But my favourite parenting moment of the episode was Philip apologising to Paige for having to leave. That was such a beautifully human moment, and I don't believe we've ever seen them apologise for the emotional cost to their children before.
Oleg made a blooody huge decision here. I really wish I knew what his perspective on his own life was here: does he hope to run with Tatiana and then leg it for real? Does he just not care about that because the cost to the world is what he's thinking about? He surely does get what a big thing he did there.
The FBI are making roads. They surely have to get to William eventually going the way they are. And William leads to Philip. Stan might not have lots, but he has a pointer and he has dedication to his search and he's got a team. Eeep.a
I do think that the conversation about Elizabeth being steadfast is potentially set up for Elizabeth making a different choice by the end of the saeries. Elizabeth grew up wanting to fight back, and i think it makes sense for her arc to be about realising that that's not always healthy, nor necessarily possible or effective if you want to really change things. Things are changing for everyone.... and I also think Gabriel's not gonna be around much longer.
no subject
Date: 2016-06-02 11:58 pm (UTC)(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2016-06-03 11:12 am (UTC)I agree. I'm actually beginning to wonder if the last two series might be totally different in many ways, with the Jenningses on the run from both the FBI and the KGB.
But maybe not. That just seems too melodramatic for this show.
Sistermagpie's thoughts on first watch - A Roy Rodgers in Franconia
Date: 2016-06-02 09:24 pm (UTC)But Oleg, unlike those Illegals, isn't face to face with his victim. I don't know if he expects this stuff to get back to him. I think he might be a bit like Paige here. He's the son of the Minister of Railways, has always been held above the struggles of a lot of other people. He got away with getting Zinaida turned in. He's terrified of what he's doing, but I don't know that his terror is about getting caught.
Elizabeth's talk of Smolensk was a nice cultural disconnect moment with Paige like Philip's "We didn't think like that?" of last week. When Paige accused her mother of not answering the question I got that she was answering it. She just doesn't have the same frame of reference that Paige still seems to not quite understand. It's hard to understand someone literally thinking differently than you do.
I felt like the last scene was a little frustrating in that it was one of those moments where people argue and one person demands answers and refuses to listen to them while the other person looks caught out by saying, "But that's...different!" When in fact it clearly is different. It's not that hard to understand why Paige having to stick with the Tims does not translate into her parents ordering her to spy on Matthew.
Frankly, I think Paige is just into it now the way Elizabeth was as a kid. She wants to be doing stuff, but more on her choice and with things she can handle, wants an excuse to do something with Matthew so she's not just wanting to go out with him. Her parents are rightly horrified, but also right to tell her to just stop trying to play amateur spy here. And I buy that as her unfocused, not wholly understood reaction to what she experienced with Elizabeth. It's not just that she's realized they hurt people, but it made her shift how she sees them again and how cool they are. I like how legitimately appealing the show makes wanting to belong in your family.
What I really loved in the ep was the little hints that Henry's finally coming into play. Paige has always had an overly dismissive attitude towards Henry as his older sister and her talk about Matthew had a little of that. She feels like she needs to watch over the Beeman situation because "who knows what Henry could be saying?" as if Henry is her with Pastor Tim and can't be expected to not blow it. It seems fitting that she'd sort of fit this, too, into the usual family dynamic.
But Henry, meanwhile, seems to have become suspicious due to Paige. They made a point of showing Henry watching his parents take Paige inside that first montage after the time jump, and here he's moved to not only watch them walk away with her but go upstairs and ask his father for details. I think they're definitely setting him up to wonder what is going on with Paige and his parents and why he suddenly feels like something's going on he doesn't know about. Paige would get a heads up about that from Matthew, or not.
More importantly, I loved that it was Elizabeth and Paige's story of a near-mugging that got Henry's attention. When Philip talked about his life growing up he noted not his city trying to rebuild and fight back after/during an invasion but hard work and "protecting your family." That seemed to be what Henry was motivated by when he attacked the guy that picked them up in S1 and it's what he's motivated here, needing assurance that his mother and sister weren't mugged. When Philip walks him to his room he even hesitates a moment like he wants to ask more. That's new for Henry, not having something else he's interested more than his parents and even thinking of pushing himself into that trio again.
It also occurs to me that Henry had a line in S2, when Philip first said he was going to be traveling more often, about wanting to help him working. Hee.
Interesting conversation with Betty's son. I liked how she sounded like such a different woman when described by her grown son (elderly, liking to feel useful by coming into work) than she did when talking to Elizabeth (complicated love life, stubborn, brave, lived through a war). Great little reflection of the Jennings family there.
Also I really loved Matthew's lines about Stan who was off getting info from Oleg and letting the Mail Robot hand off go on. (Also hee on Aderholdt's "Maybe we can shoot him" about whoever was serving the machine!)
Last season Matthew barely appeared except for that one scene where he connected with Stan being honest about his work. This season Stan's hanging out with the easier and younger Henry (causing many people to call him Henry's "real father" now and basically suggest that he's a stable 9-5 guy that Henry's using to replace Philip). Philip's manipulations and Sandra's good intentions get Matthew back into his life. When Matthew shows up he clearly notes being replaced by the younger kid. Stan immediately leaves until the next morning on the first night Matthew's returned.
We have them hanging out all 3 together. Then Matthew has the scene with Paige where Matthew is yet again alone, but says that his father's been telling him stuff about work to show him he's glad he's there. This on one hand is a parallel to Paige and underlining that usual difference in the parents. Matthew and Paige are both now being read into their parents work, but the different parents are still doing what they've always done. Stan's replaced bootleg videos with work stuff as the thing that he hopes will work with Matthew, maybe working off that first good bonding moment.
Here, we have Paige being self-consciously adult/condescending in praising Stan for being so good with Henry just as Matthew is. Matthew says he's good with "little kids," affirming that Stan has taken this new chance with Matthew and just validated the previous impressions Matthew had, even if Matthew reacts to it differently now. Stan himself said that things were easier when Matthew was younger and Matthew himself has now seemed to make the same connection, seeing Stan as someone who just good with him before because he was little but can't connect with him as an adult.
Matthew then flat-out says that Stan wanted him back a couple of nights a week but then is never there (he's been gone FOR DAYS) so Matthew might as well be at his mom's but just doesn't care where he sleeps.
It's just interesting because this was a problem that Stan had since the start of the show (in large part due to his time undercover) and the beginning of the season for many people seemed to set up that Philip now had that problem with Stan replacing him. The Jennings last minute overnight quarantine stood out as something really unusual and something Stan would note as bad. But now it seems maybe if Stan might take more notice of that trip as a sign that Philip isn't so perfect, that he does that too. Disappearing for days is actually normal to Stan. (Granted he has an older kid, but he wasn't the one making arrangements for Matthew when he was younger either.)
Anyway, by the end of the season Matthew is at the Jennings house talking about his father never being home. He seems to spend a lot of his time in Falls Church with Henry and Paige. Stan and Henry are still hanging out, but it's Matthew reporting that his dad is never around while Henry started the ep playing with Philip. Perhaps because of that change Henry has noted his parents' focus on his sister and started to wonder about it, turning his attention even more toward his family.
This could of course be bad if he talks about it with Stan, but then, focus on a teenager isn't immediately suspicious. There's the Pastor Tim the leftie protester angle that could be a problem with that I guess.
But in general I honestly don't get the feeling that Stan is so very obsessed with Henry. I think he likes hanging out with him for the same reasons Matthew stated, but Henry, too, is probably now a teenager (albeit one without the issues with Stan Matthew had). Henry would have more access to him than Matthew since he lives nearby and is happy to just catch him when he's there, but it would make sense for him to be absent-minded about Henry too.
Basically I think I was just excited for that little father/son exchange with Philip about whether Paige and Elizabeth were okay. It's been so so long since there's been any Matthew/Henry scene where Philip or Henry wasn't distracted. Remember that first season when they split up and Henry's so despondent at losing Philip, but his most memorable scene about it is with Elizabeth for good reasons.
Oh, and btw, Paige and Elizabeth were watching Grant and Celia on General Hospital. Grant by this point had been outed as a Russian Illegal but defected because he fell in love with the woman he married for cover.
Not sure what Elizabeth would have trouble understanding there. Even if she didn't relate it to herself (Celia was a dupe) you'd think she'd remember being terrified that this is what happened to Philip and Martha!
Re: Sistermagpie's thoughts on first watch - A Roy Rodgers in Franconia
Date: 2016-06-03 12:18 am (UTC)I'm amused that the General Hospital clip involved a Russian illegal. I almost never watched soaps because they annoyed me, but I can understand why Elizabeth would be perplexed by them. The stories are preposterous and overwrought to a hilarious degree. Plus, she may simply been puzzling over how a show like this could be using a Russian illegal as a character.
Re: Sistermagpie's thoughts on first watch - A Roy Rodgers in Franconia
From:Re: Sistermagpie's thoughts on first watch - A Roy Rodgers in Franconia
Date: 2016-06-03 11:22 am (UTC)I liked that scene very much too. It played up very well the difficulties someone like Paige would have trying (and still largely failing because she can't really conceive of it) to understand the very different circumstances in which Elizabeth grew up. And tricky for Elizabeth too to explain it in a way that Paige might understand.
Oleg's treason
Date: 2016-06-03 02:13 pm (UTC)I admit, though, that I can't see what's the upside of William getting caught.
Re: Oleg's treason
Date: 2016-06-03 09:02 pm (UTC)I'm surprised at how dismayed I was at this. Many people seem to just take it as a straight heroic moment for Oleg in putting a stop to that stuff getting out and while I get that part of it it's just impossible for me to not think of William first. :-)
I'm hoping there's fallout from it for Oleg not in terms of him being caught or punished (though if they do that that's fine) but in the unforeseen consequences of handing over Illegal (possibly Illegals) to the FBI. Particularly if William handles it heroically himself.
Oleg's always been a character who would say when he thought what the country was doing was stupid (remember him saying they should just pull out of Afghanistan) and put blame on them when he sees it (like about the propeller plans) but he seems like he respected the Illegals, even if he doesn't agree with this mission.
Re: Oleg's treason
From:Re: Oleg's treason
From:Re: Oleg's treason
From:Re: Oleg's treason
From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2016-06-04 01:55 pm (UTC) - ExpandRe: Oleg's treason
From:Re: Oleg's treason
From:no subject
Date: 2016-06-04 01:23 pm (UTC)I wonder how much of Elizabeth’s description of Smolensk really sunk in on Paige. Poor Paige continues to ask questions that she’s not entirely mature enough to comprehend. She now knows that her parents are not the fuzzy, international social justice warriors that Philip and Elizabeth had initially portrayed themselves to be. They are murderers who steal deadly weapons and ship them back to Russia, the ‘Evil Empire.’ Her parents have described growing up in a broken, harsh world that she can maybe understand on the surface, but which she has never actually experienced for herself. The worst thing that pampered, suburban American girl Paige has ever seen has been poor, inner-city US neighborhoods. Can she really comprehend what it must have been like to grow up in cities that have been blown apart by bombs, where people had no food or no shelter? It’s going to be interesting to see if Paige will be able to balance her growing distress over learning the truth about what her parents do with her compassion for why they are doing it.
I’ve been thinking a lot about why Oleg chose to tell Stan about the illegal embedded in the US bioweapons program. Oleg obviously knows he put his life at risk. His stealthy call to his mother just to say hi could just as easily be a last call to say goodbye. I don’t think he thought he was being a hero. I think he knew that the Soviets were simply not technologically capable of handling weaponized Lassa. The Russians had already experienced serious accidents with their bioweapons programs in which hundreds (possibly thousands) of civilians had died, and these were from much less lethal weapons. I think Oleg thought that the likelihood of an accident was too high and the repercussions would be too severe. If he had to sacrifice one illegal to prevent this catastrophe, he would. Given the FBI comments about how they were going to escalate this up the political food chain, I think that some heads are going to roll at the Rezidentura.
Last thought: Henry continues to be a wildcard. He clearly notices that something is up, and reacted to the fact that Elizabeth and Philip hustled Paige out of the room to have a private talk with her. Where is this leading, and what will Henry do when he finally finds out what’s really going on?
Oleg's sacrifice and Henry
Date: 2016-06-04 02:07 pm (UTC)I could be totally wrong about this but it just seems like a juicy way to get complications dramatically for Oleg.
When Henry first came up to Philip in the hallway to ask about details and said, "So they *weren't* mugged?" and then him obviously thinking of following Philip for more info, I took it as Henry just needing reassurance they were okay. But now I wonder if that was him showing that he'd picked up on their reactions not fitting that. Like Paige said early on where she always felt like there was something going on she didn't know about. Philip himself was kind of speaking to this when he said no, they weren't mugged but it was very scary to explain why he, Paige and Elizabeth were clearly acting like something traumatic had occurred rather than been narrowly averted.
Henry, after all, knows that Paige was threatened by that guy who picked them up hitchhiking and seemed okay even after Henry hit the guy.
Re: Oleg's sacrifice and Henry
From:Re: Oleg's sacrifice and Henry
From:Mai-robot fallout
Date: 2016-06-04 06:07 pm (UTC)Tatiana's leaving for Kenya or about to get axed too once William gets arrested and the whole mission falls through.
They could bring in somebody new, but life would be so much more interesting if Oleg becomes Rezident.
Re: Mai-robot fallout
From:Treon's thoughts
Date: 2016-06-04 07:07 pm (UTC)1. I remember playing that airplane game, but it was later in the 80s. Looks like "the KGB gave them a computer" is not going to become a plot point
2. Martha's gun didn't fire in the end, but the mail-robot did
3. The FBI is moving forward in the investigations this season. I'm hoping they won't end up with nothing again.
4. I already wrote that I found it hard to believe Oleg really turned in William, but I guess there's no other way to look at it. I feel that the show could have given us a bit more insight into what he was thinking.
5. I thought Paige came through as a brat in that scene where she was sitting on her bed, complainig to/about her mother. She's safe and sound, she has so much material wealth, and she has complaints about it.
6. Is Paige still a believing Christian? She's only in touch with Tim & Alice because her parents force her, and we never see her refer to anything Christian or read the bible anymore, but she still wears that cross.
While watching thoughts
Date: 2016-06-04 10:56 pm (UTC).. who is very shaken.
Henry accepts what he's told a lot more than Paige ever did.
On one level asking how Elizabeth knew how to do that is a really silly question, but on another it gets talking.
If Elizabeth is sensible, she'll talk about delayed reactions..
.. and only having done it once before. Like sex, where one previous partner is ok, but being honest about rather more than that can be difficult, depending on who's asking.
Argh, 'so many, I've forgotten' - which is what that is going to be received as - is not a good answer.
Mutiny! To the point of wanting Gabriel to be told the truth.
No way does he want to be her deputy in Kenya, even if we suspect she's going to discover her operation is not going as well as everyone except Philip thinks.
It'd help if Elizabeth sounded a little less pleased that Paige is 'reporting' to her.
Oooh, they've found the mail robot bug and obviously that's the right thing to do. Pointedly showing the FBI as just as frustrated as some of the KGB are.
Yes, Paige, parents sometimes lie to their children. And yes, Elizabeth doesn't answer your questions fully.
I like that Elizabeth mentions which war she's talking about.
Elizabeth is going to get to take Paige to Smolensk by the end of the show.
The KGB had bored people listening to the tapes, and now there are bored FBI people waiting for the tape to be retrieved. Not that they had to wait very long.
Gabriel having to leave messages with Martha's parents - that was one of those looks he gave Philip at the end.
Pointed cut to another phone call to parents...
'It's not logical, it's emotional'
Way to get shot, Oleg! It's certainly going to hurt your girlfriend.
Obviously this 'one last thing' is going to go wrong, and even Gabriel is tired of what he's doing.
Paige's first work kiss...
... and a more interesting dating discussion than most of her school friends will ever have.
Oooh, they've found William.
Least credible 'great' in a while to have at the edge of the cliffhanger!
Given that Philip has to survive, I wonder if it will be Gabriel who is caught with William.
New technology
Date: 2016-06-05 07:29 am (UTC)On the other hand,Elizabeth is not your normal parent and I assume she's just pretending not to have any idea what they're talking about.
Re: New technology
Date: 2016-06-05 10:58 am (UTC)Re: New technology
From:Re: New technology
Date: 2016-06-05 02:42 pm (UTC)I'd actually think that Elizabeth is the least tech savvy in the family simply because she hasn't been given a specific reason to find out about it yet. She's the only person in the family to never play the game--I wonder if that'll be in the finale.
Re: New technology
From:Re: New technology
From:Re: New technology
From:Re: New technology
From:Red herrings
From:Martha's Gun Did Go Off, in a way...
From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2016-06-06 09:14 pm (UTC) - ExpandRe: Martha's Gun Did Go Off, in a way...
From:Re: New technology
From:Weaponising Challenger
Date: 2016-06-06 08:57 pm (UTC)