Episode discussion post: "Tchaikovsky"

[jae]

Aired:
4 April 2018 in the U.S. and Canada

This is a discussion post for episode 602 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 six, episode two.)

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Comments

Re: Replacing family

[sistermagpie]

I disagree that Elizabeth is starting to replace her family with work. IMO, for Elizabeth, the family has always just been part of her work. That doesn't mean that she doesn't love them, but unlike Philip, I don't think that Elizabeth has ever drawn a line between the family and her job. The children were part of the job, meant to enhance their cover and breed the next generation of more perfect spies.

Absolutely, but I was specifically referring to the present situation where Elizabeth is not talking to Philip, Paige has become a trainee and Henry is gone (and she doesn't go to see his game). Her personal life is far more compromised than it was before, which I think fits the description of replacing her family with work in a new way. We've never seen her this alienated from everyone and everything not work related.

Elizabeth always felt she should put the ideology first and there was a balance between how she fit her family within that, but with Philip no longer her confidante, Paige a trainee, Henry not in the picture, and Claudia the handler being a grandmother, that's a huge change.

There is so little time left in this series for Elizabeth to finally learn that it's okay to live a life that is not devoted 100% to ideology. The show is dropping suicide pill shaped anvils on her head that if she doesn't wake up and choose life for herself (and now for her daughter), she is doomed (and so now is Paige). We're also coming right down to the wire about whether or not she will be able to separate her family from her ideology.

I agree--I think this extreme situation is part of that. Because it's not just that she's coming to the time where she needs to make the right choice as has been the case in the past, imo. At this point she has made more extreme choices in the direction of ideology--just as, tbf, Philip has made more extreme choices on the side of family. But Philip in this ep, imo, is already consciously thinking about needing to get more in balance. Elizabeth shows signs of the same thing, maybe, in bringing up Paige's training with Philip, but she's gotten herself tangled up in far more lies and secrets with her choices.

Even the secret that Philip is keeping seems like something he would have immediately told until Elizabeth's attitude and hostility put him off. Not that this makes it less of a secret, of course.

Re: Replacing family

[saraqael]

...but I was specifically referring to the present situation where Elizabeth is not talking to Philip, Paige has become a trainee and Henry is gone (and she doesn't go to see his game). Her personal life is far more compromised than it was before, which I think fits the description of replacing her family with work in a new way. We've never seen her this alienated from everyone and everything not work related.

Oh, I see. I misunderstood your comment the first time. I agree with what you've said here.

I think that Elizabeth would like to be more in harmony with Philip and I'm certain that he still wants to find a way to tell her that she's in danger even though he was quite flabbergasted at the way she snapped at him. Married couples do take out their frustrations on each other, but I'm sure that Elizabeth revealed some of her real feelings to him, too because she is so frayed. (Particularly when she said she didn't want to hear about his job or about Henry.) I hope that their love for each other draws them together again. I'm not sure it will be enough to save Elizabeth though. Even if she does have a breakthrough and realizes that she has a right to just live out a normal life like everyone else, there's no guarantee that will happen.

Re: Replacing family

[sistermagpie]

Even if she does have a breakthrough and realizes that she has a right to just live out a normal life like everyone else, there's no guarantee that will happen.

I wonder about Elizabeth's exact head space now. That is, is it that she doesn't think she has the right to live a normal life? Or that she doesn't value one? It seems like at the moment her justification isn't guilty at not doing this but the idea that it makes her life superior to others. (I mean this is what she's telling herself rather than necessarily what she really thinks.)

Of course we've seen that she can value normal life. It seems like maybe that's where she's gotten the real joy in her lie. But she's in a bad place now, probably doubling down on all the decisions she's made to get here, and that's the sort of thing that's coming out of her mouth. Like when she can't believe the artist would waste her life making art--though she seems almost afraid of the art.

It may seem like the difference doesn't matter but it makes a difference to how she works through it. Especially if, as was mentioned in the above comments, at the heart of it is the feeling she's not worthy of love if she lets go.

Re: Replacing family

[saraqael]

That is, is it that she doesn't think she has the right to live a normal life? Or that she doesn't value one?
Maybe her entire self-image is so centered on being an ideological warrior that she simply can't see any point to just being herself. It's not that she doesn't value a normal life. Perhaps she doesn't value herself living a normal life. She sees no value or purpose in just living a normal, ideologically uniformed life. She cannot figure out why the artist wasted her life making art but respects the husband who is actively supporting his political agenda (even if it is opposing her agenda).

Perhaps 'mere' human love isn't as important to her as her love of the Cause. I'm sure she feels like she is worthy of being loved, but perhaps love isn't enough for her. Her job demands that she put the Cause ahead of her family, always.

Philip is being put in an ideologically driven spot, too. He's being asked to put his love for Russia ahead of his love for his wife.

Re: Replacing family

[sistermagpie]

Wow, this sent me down a whole new rabbithole wondering exactly how Philip sees it. Because I see what you meant about love for Russia over love for his wife because by spying on her he's lying to her. But that also makes me wonder if he equates love for his wife with allowing her to do something that he saw as hurting the country? Especially since it kind of seems as if he's already losing her by not being engaged in spying at all.

I almost feel like she'd be more relieved at Philip being involved because at least he's not just living that ideologically uninformed life. It would certainly give her an excuse to talk to him!

Re: Replacing family

[saraqael]

Of course, Philip's first instinct was to tell Elizabeth, not to lie to her or to spy on her. I'm sure he thought that if he could only warn her that she was mixed up in something very bad, that she would see reason and then together they'd figure out what to do. And by 'see reason' I don't mean she'd defect or suddenly decide to join him and work with Oleg. I mean she would recognize that being contacted outside of the normal Directorate S channels was a clue that something was very, very wrong with her assignment and she should go over Claudia's head to get confirmation that her task was authorized.

Right now, she's too exhausted and too vested in doing a good job for her to hear anything he has to say. That doesn't mean that Philip will just give up and turn on her though. I think he'll keep tabs on her for her own good as well as for the good of Russia. (And she'll try to push him away for exactly the same reason.)

Re: Replacing family

[jae]

Maybe her entire self-image is so centered on being an ideological warrior that she simply can't see any point to just being herself. It's not that she doesn't value a normal life. Perhaps she doesn't value herself living a normal life. She sees no value or purpose in just living a normal, ideologically uniformed life.

In the story I wrote about Elizabeth, I took her back to the time (which we know about from Gregory) that she left Philip briefly when she was heavily pregnant with Paige, and this was pretty much exactly my take on how she would have felt then. A huge part of her really, really WANTED that normal life, more than she ever had before, but she had such huge self-loathing about that desire and felt like it made her weak and less of the great ideological warrior she thought she had to be. (Which is, of course, why she would have gone right back to Philip the next day.)

-J

Re: Replacing family

[saraqael]

Is your story online?

What's so interesting about Elizabeth is that on these hugely important but incredibly intimate details, she is still a cypher. We're back to puzzling out her reaction to watching the 'normal' Moscow women in that movie. "Huh."

Elizabeth, what does that mean??? Huh.

She's so mute about her own desires for herself. Or maybe she isn't. At the end of last season, when Philip said that they deserved to have a life, she said, "I can't." That might end up being true. It is possible that Elizabeth cherishes being a warrior for what she perceives to be the greater good so much that she is content to put herself and her family second, and she would be content to die for the cause. As much as I, the viewer, want her to survive and be happy in a non-spy life, Elizabeth might not want that at all. I don't think she's motivated by hatred of the West so much as she is by love for an impossible ideal. If she goes down in flames in pursuit of that ideal, would that be a bad fate for her? Not for her.

Re: Replacing family

[sistermagpie]

But then, that's where the children complicate things. Because Elizabeth herself has obviously chosen the ideological life long ago. She'd immediately say she chooses that over a normal life--likewise, if Philip has to choose between Elizabeth and a normal life he'll always choose Elizabeth.

But now there's the question of the kids. Does she really want them to have this life too? Because that's not exactly the same thing.

Elizabeth and happiness

[jae]

I personally think she absolutely has desires for herself, but she doesn't think she should have them. And so she could almost certainly be happy outside of being a spy, she'd need an awful lot of therapy first. ;)

-J

P.S. My story is called "Five Points Down", and it's here.