Episode discussion post: "START"

[jae]

Aired:
30 May 2018 in the U.S. and Canada

This is a discussion post for episode 610 of The Americans (the season and series finale), 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.)

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Treon's thoughts

[treonb]

I had to watch it the moment I got up...

It was an amazing episode. I loved the direction they took, but the execution sometimes less, particularly for the scene where Stan lets them go. Though it did give all the characters a chance to speak out.

Paige's "You think we can trust him?" question was about Stan. I did not see that coming.

Her decision to stay back was logical, her decision to go back to her old life was not. When she sat there, I was half expecting her to take out the cyanide pill which she somehow stole. She had another identity in her hand, she could have just disappeared, like Philip thought to do.

P&E have a lot of faith in the Americans, but I cannot see Henry being allowed to have a normal life at this point.

They also have a lot of faith in the Russians. Going back was understandable, but very risky.

One of the things I liked best about this episode was Stan and Renee and the "with or without you" sequence. At first I thought they were going with the "Renee is a KGB spy" story, which I still hope isn't true. It took me a while to realize they chose something way better - Stan has no idea whether she is or isn't (just like us), and he has to live with it.

The last words were Elizabeth's, in Russian, which reflects back on the end of S1. "Come home", and they did.

Jae's comments on Treon's thoughts

[jae]

I loved it, too. I've only watched it the once so far, but I'll watch it again this morning.

Her decision to stay back was logical, her decision to go back to her old life was not.

I can see why you'd say that, but I don't know. I think the main reason why she stayed behind was that someone from the family had to be there for Henry--if not to finish raising him (as I'm sure Stan will do), then at least to be able to explain things to him. Which meant she kind of had to go back to her life. Plus, she's a novice spy and not a very good one at that. She doesn't really have the skills she'd need to live out a life under a totally different identity without the help of her parents.

I imagine she'll go to prison once the dust settles and the FBI finishes investigating them. Which, awful. But maybe not any worse than having to start over again in the Soviet Union.

I cannot see Henry being allowed to have a normal life at this point.

He will be poked and prodded by the various intelligence services, but they will quickly realize that his use to them is limited. It's Paige who's going to get the brunt of this.

They also have a lot of faith in the Russians. Going back was understandable, but very risky.

I thought a lot about this! I mean, if they'd gone back before all of the disobedience of this past season, they'd both have been universally lauded as heroes, but as things are, I'm sure there are a lot of their fellow countrymen who would rather they had died (and may still want them dead). And I'm not sure Arkady will be able to protect them, as those same people may now be coming for HIM (as came out in the conversation with Oleg's father).

It took me a while to realize they chose something way better - Stan has no idea whether she is or isn't (just like us), and he has to live with it.

I'm still stunned (in a good way) by this. Like many other people in this group, I didn't see a good way of ending the Renee storyline. I figured they'd have to either reveal her as a spy (in which case it would have been rushed and annoying) or else reveal her as not-a-spy (in which case, why all the teasing?). But this? Perfection. I love that every viewer will get to figure out for themselves what they think about Renee, and the show simply isn't taking a stance on it.

-J

Re: Treon's thoughts

[saraqael]

I don't see Paige's decision to return to DC as her returning to her 'old' life. I see it as her returning to her 'own' genuine life for the first time. She's been motivated all of her life by an intense need to connect with her family and in particular with her mother. She finally left them and that version of herself behind. What she does now is anybody's guess, but she's finally making independent decisions that aren't motivated by trying to bond with her parents.

general review

[theplatonicnonyeah]

I don't have much time for a lengthy review right now, so I can basically just summarise it into one big question:

Was it all worth it?

Discuss, lol.

Was it all worth it?

[treonb]

I think so

For P&E: We don't know what would have happened if they wouldn't have been sent to the US. Elizabeth said she and Philip might have met on a bus, but most chances are that they would have never met. Why would they even be in the same city?

For Oleg: his actions changed history. I'm still not sure it would have been so horrible for him to tell the FBI what he knows, but if he wouldn't have come and risked everything, the anti-Gorbachev people at the KGB would have succeeded with their plan

Was it worth it?

[jae]

For us, you mean? Hell yes. Best show ever. :)

-J

Re: general review

[lovingboth]

Who are you asking: the characters or us the viewers? :)

In both cases, I think the answer is yes.

To have only one really bad episode in six seasons is more than most series manage, for example.

[beer_good_foamy]

OK, that was... not what I was expecting, but I liked it? A few unprocessed thoughts:

Everyone survives, at least for the time being. Nothing is given one firm THE END, which I like.

Oleg's pretty much screwed, at least for the next few years. Pawns get sacrificed. I loved the two scenes of his dad - that little choice of sitting down in frustration, immediately standing up again, spreading his arms in the international sign of "what kind of fucked up cosmic joke is this" and walking home to inform his family that Somehow, Things Got Worse.

Paige, ditto. Depending on how well Stan keeps his mouth shut she may or may not get to claim she knew nothing and stay out of jail, but when a character's last scene is of them sitting down with a bottle and begin drinking, that's usually not TV writer speak for "...and then she lived happily ever after."

And Stan. Jesus. Philip actually broke him. And I love, love, love, that they leave Renee's identity open. He repeats that he doesn't care who's running Russia; as long as he's known, they've been the enemy, period. The idea that Philip actually is his friend and a Russian spy, and that he wants to believe them when they say they've never killed anyone, probably does as much to break him as the Renee bit.

Elizabeth buries the cyanide pill along with everything else. That's not her responsibility anymore. So it got a payoff after all.

The mandatory music montages: "Brothers In Arms" (suitable for glasnost, though West Wing owns that song as far as I'm concerned), "With Or Without You" (and someone in the editor's room really likes Bono's howl), and a classical piece I didn't recognize over the final scene in Moscow?

Close but no cigar: At the Russian border crossing, P&E are driving a Volvo with Swedish plates... but headlights that were only available on US models. (I'm Swedish, OK, Volvo details matter to me.)

The final scene reminds me of the final scene of The Wire - Jimmy McNulty looking out over Baltimore before getting back in the car. Philip starts the conversation with "Colonel Ican'tevenrememberhisname told me it would be a hard life, that it wouldn't be some big adventure." Elizabeth ends it with "We'll get used to it" - in (to my ears, at least) heavily accented Russian. I almost wanted to name her Nadezhda there, but let's face it, that's not who she is anymore. They're about to start from zero in a new country again, except with a lot more baggage.

And the irony, of course: we know that Gorbachov's plan will go horribly right and 2-3 years later, the borders will open. And they won't be able to go home.

Again, you might argue that P&E didn't deserve this much of a "good" ending. And again, I'd paraphrase David Chase before the last season of The Sopranos: If you're going to cheer for the bad guys for six seasons, you don't get to demand that they get punished in the finale. (Yes, of course it's more complicated than that.)

Classical piece

[treonb]

Shazaam says Tchaikovsky's 6 Romances Op. 6 No. 3

or rather: "None but the lonely hearts" (op6 no 6)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PtIHBCuR-Q

[alley_skywalker]

Sad that the show is over, though of course, it's always good to see a show end on its own terms instead of starting to suffer from being stretched too thin. And an ending that's probably one of the better ways it could have ended, at least for Philip and Elizabeth (and Stan, I guess - I was afraid he might end up dead), but still rather sad, given everything.

And it’s very right, tonally and thematically for this show, that the costs are enormous. There was no realistic way for them not to be. Paige and Henry – from the moment Phillip and Elizabeth had them – were basically sacrifices to the Cause. Because it was extremely unlikely that there would have been a scenario where Phillip and Elizabeth just never had to leave the US and Paige and Henry would have never known/been pulled into their spy-life.

I don’t know how I feel about Stan letting them go. It’s treasonous, but then, Stan has, of course, already showed willingness to cross that line for people he cares about deeply so it’s not OOC. “I would have done anything do you Phillip” –except it should have been present tense, because he really does more for them than he ever had any kind of duty to. And it’s incredible the weight of what he has to live with – the lie(-or-maybe-not) of his friendship with Phillip, the suspicion cast on Renee, knowing he betrayed his duty as an FBI agent/American by letting the Jennings go…

The scene where Phillip and Elizabeth were discussing whether or not to tell Henry/take him with them was so heartbreaking. Because there was no good option for Henry. Even assuming they had enough time to pick him up, tell him, and give him even the tiniest window of opportunity to decide…even forgetting that there was no way he could make a well-processed choice in the given timeframe…His choices are shit. He’s an American and his entire life is there and basically forced immigration to Russia would suck ass, especially since he’s in his late teens already, not a little kid, not to mention that consumer products aren’t everything but that would be a rather starting drop in the quality of life for him. On the other hand, being separated from his parents and sister, who are his only family, really. Is fucking awful. I get the logic behind not telling him, but he’s robbed of a choice and a real chance to say goodbye. Extra shitty for him.

Man, Oleg gets screwed. I really didn’t expect his storyline to end this way.

Paige…I didn’t expect her to stay, though I get why she decided to try and go back to her old life instead of using her new identify – this way she can openly be close to Henry. (Stan may or may not tell him that she knew, but I’m willing to bet that she can get him to forgive her). After all, Henry was her biggest hang-up about the entire thing. And because, without being able to be close to Henry I don’t see why she’d stay. Obviously, the adjustment to Russia would have been a bitch, but Paige didn’t seem to have that much attachment to anything outside her family. I feel like, unlike Henry, the emotional costs of being split from her parents/family would have been greater than the emotional costs of the “forced immigration” lets call it. Interestingly, though, I never thought Paige and Henry to be so close…

(I did roll my eyes at Phillip’s line in the last scene about how Paige and Henry were fine cause they weren’t little kids anymore. I mean, yea, they need to tell themselves that to get through it and it’s technically true, but I honestly don’t think those emotional costs are really much lower just because they’re older. I really don’t.)

The last scene was very bittersweet. A return home, but they’d spend almost their entire adult lives living somewhere else, being somebody else. I’m sure it feels incredibly strange. Elizabeth speculating on wheat her/their life/lives would have been like if they had living in Russia and in a way it’s a double whammy of lives lost – the normal Russian lives they forewent and now the lives they’d build as psudo-Americans (but very real ones as parents).

And, of course, in a few years the Soviet Union will fall and the borders will open and everything will change dramatically and I do wonder what everyone will think about that.

The emotional costs for the kids / The fall of the Soviet Union

[jae]

I honestly don’t think those emotional costs are really much lower just because they’re older. I really don’t.

I don't, either. I do think that's what they have to tell themselves to get through this, though.

And, of course, in a few years the Soviet Union will fall and the borders will open and everything will change dramatically and I do wonder what everyone will think about that.

Throughout the whole show, I've cringed whenever I've thought about how Elizabeth especially would react to that, if she survived the show (I figured Philip would be fine--he'd roll with it). But given the very real changes in her character this season, I don't worry about that anymore. I think she's less naive now, and more willing to see things in shades of grey. She's already had some of those shocks, too, so watching the rest of that happen will really just be a continuation of the road she's already on. She'll be dismayed by what happens next, but not destroyed by it.

-J

[shapinglight]

More later, but for now, damn I knew I was right to be worried about Oleg. The scenes with his father and wife were heartbreaking.

The Grey Havens

[selenak]

In which we get to the Scouring of the Shire, so to speak, or to the Grey Havens. I'm so going to miss this show, but this was a worthy finale, and it ended at the right time, neither overstaying its welcome or being cancelled before it could fly.

Of all the endings I speculated about, Phiip and Elizabeth both making it back to Russia, alive, and with each other wasn't one. And yet this feels right, as it comes with a heavy price. They've lost both of their children, and if they've managed to save their country and world peace for a few years, they'll also soon see said country first fall apart and then reconstitute itself in the image of the people they just fought against. And that's leaving aside they haven't lived in Russia for decades, will have to relearn everything, strangers again in a strange country as they were when young and arriving in the US. And that they'll have to live with the knowledge that all they did the intervening years, the murders and betrayals, in the end made no difference (other than to the people they were done to).

And yet, despite all the serious disagreements and enstrangements, their ups and downs, they have each other. Which answers Claudia's question from last episode - what does Elizabeth have left? What Philip has got left. In is a bittersweet ending, and in a way, The Americans was the ultimate take on the "Arranged Marriage" trope; it'll make not just many a fanfiction but a lot of pro fiction dealing with the same subject look second-rate by comparison. Philip and Elizabeth were such rich, complicated characters and their relationship so intense, layered and, among many other things, proof that the old notion of couples not being interesting anymore once they've had sex and gotten committed to each other is wrong - if you can write and act the way the show's team could.

While there was suspense - notably early on until the confrontation with Stan, and then in the train until the Paige reveal - this was not an action-heavy finale but a character driven one, which feels exactly right. The confrontation wiht Stan was something the entire show had been building up to since the pilot, and in retrospect, its fallout was dependent on not one but three relationships - Stan's with Philip, with Oleg, and with Henry. Maybe even his past with Nina, a little. It all felt interwoven - if Oleg hadn't told Stan about the plot against Gorbachev, which he wouldn't have if they'd had a different kind of relationship, then the Jenningses mentioning it would not have affirmed their credibility at a key point in the middle of the ultimate proof that they'd been lying to Stan for the past six years. If Stan hadn't come to know them well enough to figure out they'd come for Paige, and kept this to himself instead of alerting Aderholt, they wouldn't have been able to talk without other FBI agents present. If Stan hadn't felt as strongly about Philip - and Henry - the way he did, none of that might have mattered, in the end.

Or if it had been anyone but Philip on the other side. Elizabeth came to care about some of her assets in varying degrees - most of all Gregory, who in the finale gets a cameo as part of Elizabeth's dream - , but I can't imagine her making herself vulnerable the way Philip did had such a confrontation arisen with any of them, or gambling all their lives on Stan neither shooting nor calling for backup. Incidentally, while I do think Philip was sincere in all he said to Stan after "we had a job to do", I also note he's editing somewhat with the aim of defusing and convincing Stan. ("Only" friend leaves out fellow illegals Robert and Emmet, for example, both of whom Philip classified as friends in situations where one didn't have the impression he was lying, but that's neither here nor there if you have to convince the other guy you did not pretend to feel friendship for him.) There's also the ambiguity of the Renee remark - it's true, Philip has the suspicion without the confirmation, but telling Stan is both cruel and kind at the same time. If it's true, he'll have been warned, if it isn't, that relationship, too, is poisoned from now on. But then, the intermingling of lies and truths, of emotions faked becoming real emotions and the impossibility of having anything clear-cut if you're living as an agent (either Russian or American) has been a theme from the start.

Philip deciding early they should leave Henry because Henry is utterly American and to drag him to the USSR (should they manage to escape) would be terrible for him wasn't entirely unexpected, and that's one of the reasons why I'm glad the emphasis in the fnale was on character over action - we got to see the impact this had on Elizabeth and then on Paige, and continued to have on Philip himself, before, at the moment of border crossing by train, both Elizabeth, Philip and the audience discovered they had lost their daughter, too. Paige electing to stay in the US over staying with her parents made perfect character sense, too. Russia wasn't real to her, a country she'd never seen other than in movies, the reality of spying versus playing at being a spy, which was what she'd been doing, got increasingly difficult to reconcile even in a state of wilful self delusion, and if she'd been trying to live her idea of her mother's life, then last episode's confrontation ended that desire. I'm not sure what to make of her return to the DC area instad of living under her new identity elsewhere, but I suppose unless she's already applied for a job at the CIA, which would in retrospect affirm to all and sunder she had been not just aware of her parents' true identies for the past few years but part of the KGB as well, she's in the clear in that no one can prove she's done anything other than keeping quiet about the truth. Which she could excuse with the extreme emotional pressure that comes with being a daughter. Even Stan doesn't know any better (and can't mention anyway that Paige said "they told me when I was 16", because then he'd have to admit he saw the Jenningses and let them go). She could also declare Philip and Elizabeth basically kidnapped her on their flight and she got away as soon as she could.

Arkady Ivanovich, most sympathetic KGB authority figure to grace fiction: glad we saw you in the finale again, though having to tell Oleg's father about his arrest was not a little heartbreaking as scenes went. (I do hope that Gorbachev will now intervene for Oleg anyway, btw, though as has been said, given the future of Russia Oleg might be safer in an American cell than he'd be there.) Otoh, Arkady welcoming Philip and Elizabeth in Russia as part of the near silent final sequence was basically the stoic Russian equivalent of a direly needed hug, emotionally speaking. (And told us even if we didn't know through world history that their message in the end did arrive in time and with the right person.) I do hope the three of them stay in touch, and help each other through the difficult times ahead.

Lastly: while I'm not on board with all the creative choices (too much time on the travel agency's woes, show), I find I'm okay with never knowing whether or not Renee is a spy. Either revealing her as one or confirming she wasn't one would have felt anticlimactic, whereas Stan having to live with the uncertainty just like the audience feels like an show-appropriate ambiguous note.

In conclusion: I wasn't kidding with the LotR comparison. This was an elegic finale - our antiheroes return to their homeland, which has changed so much, as have they, that it can never be the return they dreamed of when they started their journey. They expected to die but did not; their emotional losses, however, will never be undone. They themselves are anything but innocent and have in fact fallen. But they also returned from this. And they have each other, there, at the end of things.

Re: The Grey Havens

[maidenjedi]

Such a great comparison.

[saraqael]

This show has always been a tragedy and it had a fittingly melancholy, tragic ending. The Jennings lost their home, their children, and the mission that they dedicated their lives too since they were teenagers. They return home to a Russia they haven’t seen for decades, to god only knows what new roles and lives. We viewers know that the August Coup against Gorbachev doesn’t take place until 1991, but all of the hardliner forces against him in the KGB and elsewhere are still in play for the Jennings to deal with now. Since Elizabeth betrayed them, I can’t help but feel that the next few years in Russia for the Jennings are going to be fraught with tension and danger. And then the whole government collapses and things get even worse. How long will the Jennings survive now that they’ve gone home? We’ll never know. The last we see of them, Philip looks lost and speaks to Elizabeth in English. She replies in Russian that they’ll adjust and work it out. But will they? When she gazed out over the nighttime skyline of Moscow, she could imagine an alternate life for herself there, but not one for Philip.

Oleg will likely rot in a US jail for an unknown number of years and may never see his family again. Arkady fears for his own future. Stan had his entire world turned upside down. As he said to Philip, the Jennings turned his entire life into a joke. Renee? We’ll never know if she’s another illegal, and we’ll never know what will happen between her and Stan. Claudia? Who knows. She probably got back to Moscow about the same time as the Jennings, but we’ll never know. Henry has to live with the fact that his parents were Soviet spies and that they and his sister fled the country and abandoned him into the care of their next door neighbor. Appropriately enough for the ignored/neglected Jennings kid, we only got a glimpse of Stan talking to him, so there will be no emotional reckoning or payout for the audience to see how he deals with the devastating news that Stan delivered. Our last real glimpse of Henry is of him impatiently blowing off his parents’ farewell call because he had to get back to a game of ping pong. And Paige finally took her first true independent step and stayed behind all alone to face an unknown future in the US.

It was such a perfect ending for this show. It was always a show about a marriage and a family but also about what happens to people who dedicate their lives to an ideology. We saw in Elizabeth’s dream flashback that when she was with the first true love of her life (Gregory, not Philip), that she never wanted children. But the reality of truly losing her children was so unbearable that it left her speechless with grief and shock. Henry probably will hate them for a while at least. Paige left them while she was still herself roiling with a sense of anger and betrayal. Philip and Elizabeth have to carry that emotional pain with them for the rest of their lives. At the end, all they have left is each other. Will they make it as a couple? I honestly don’t know. When Philip suggested to Elizabeth that he might stay behind in the US a couple of years to monitor the kids, that was a quietly momentous acknowledgement that he was willing to choose the kids over her since there was no real guarantee that he’d ever be able to get back to Russia if they split up now. And who knows? He might have wanted to stay in the US just for himself.

I’m saddened beyond belief that our last glimpse of Oleg is of him hunched on the floor in an FBI holding cell. I’d like think that Stan eventually gets over himself just long enough to help arrange some sort of reduced sentence or spy trade or whatever else sort of deal to get Oleg released, but we’ll never, ever know.

The only thing in the finale episode that truly surprised me was Paige getting off the train and leaving her parents forever. Her whole life has been wracked and ruined by her quest to make sense of her family and win her mother’s love and approval. It took right to the end of the show for her to realize that she never knew them and that she didn’t belong in their world no matter how much she tried to fit in. She has no one and nothing now. We can all speculate forever about what she’ll do next, but we’ll never know. That’s very sad but also very liberating to me as a viewer. All of these characters have internal lives and fates that we’ll never see, but that happens in the real world all the time, too. People come and go from our lives and we often never know what happened to them. Sure, social media now has made it easier to stay superficially in touch with people if we chose to, but it’s not the same.

I’m going to miss the hell out of this show but I love this ambiguous, heartbreaking ending more than I can say.

[I'm also going to miss reading all of the thoughtful commentary by everyone in this community every week. I've gained so much insight into this show from everyone here. So thank you everybody for all of your great posts over the years.]

Future for P&E

[sistermagpie]

The last we see of them, Philip looks lost and speaks to Elizabeth in English. She replies in Russian that they’ll adjust and work it out. But will they? When she gazed out over the nighttime skyline of Moscow, she could imagine an alternate life for herself there, but not one for Philip.

I think they will. They always play devil's advocate with each other. If Philip says it feels strange, Elizabeth will say they'll adjust. Like I said in my comment I don't think her not being able to imagine a life for him there was about him not having any hope there, he just never had a chance to be anything.

Also she probably imagined him married with kids which was too painful to imagine because of course he would have been. I don't think she really wanted to imagine a life for him because she couldn't imagine her really being with him except as himself.

When Philip suggested to Elizabeth that he might stay behind in the US a couple of years to monitor the kids, that was a quietly momentous acknowledgement that he was willing to choose the kids over her since there was no real guarantee that he’d ever be able to get back to Russia if they split up now. And who knows? He might have wanted to stay in the US just for himself.

I had my heart in my throat he'd do that. I don't think it had anything to do with wanting to stay in the US, though. I think he just really couldn't bear to leave the kids and was fantasizing. Sort of like wanting to hug them one more time. Just a couple of years...figure out how to contact them. And Elizabeth gave him her blessing if he wanted to try, said she'd also want to stay if they could be together, didn't she? So yeah, I think it was more just him expressing the thought because he needed to imagine it but he never actually did a thing about it. Maybe he just needed to know she felt the same way.

Not so much a review, just a bunch of random thoughts on watching the finale

[maidenjedi]

Not one of us guessed exactly what would happen, and I think that's a huge win for the writers (and whoever edits the episode trailers).

Seeing a lot of "Stan would never let them go" reactions elsewhere, and I completely disagree with all of those. Is he kind of an idiot for doing it? Probably. But we're all idiots in love, and yeah, Philip and Stan were best friends. Easy enough to see how the Stan we grew to know over the years would eventually be unable to pull the trigger on the man he loved better than either of his wives (YMMV). Even assuming Stan couldn't get past his personal feelings, the double whammy of Oleg and Philip/Elizabeth pressing on Stan the immediacy of stopping Gorbachev's enemies worked. (I would love to see/read an epilogue, set years later, when it is brought home just how important it is who leads Russia - and any world power, really - and Stan comes to appreciate the warnings he received. If Stan is standing in for America proper, that's even more poignant)

I just believe there was A LOT going on with Stan at that moment, and it was totally in keeping with the Stan that we knew all along.

I really appreciated the super high stakes of this season - the very future of world peace. Watching this show with the last thirty years to think about was intense; you know how it really ends, but you have to come to grips with how it all came together, and what was sacrificed along the way. And Philip's ultimate "what was it all for" contrasted with his own desire to not see his country fall apart - *long whistle* - that was the best of the character arcs for me. So many of you were talking about how his death was telegraphed over the last few episodes - the funeral suit and so on - as was Elizabeth's, and if they are Russia to Stan's America, what a statement it all makes.

(With that in mind - Elizabeth burying, but not destroying, the suicide necklace almost reads as metaphor to me as well. Just not enough for it to be a blinking neon sign)

There wasn't the total ambiguity of The Sopranos ending, but the scent of it was still present. The David Chase line about not getting to root for morally corrupt characters and see them punished for their crimes seems to have been an influence, but also, in the context of the show, we know they are punished. Stan has to live with his betrayal, has the spectre of a possible spy in his household, has the obligation to be there for Henry. Oleg had more nobility in his pinkie than half the rest of the characters, and may never see his family again (there's a parallel between him and Philip, too - neither will see his son again, and each has willingly entered a prison of sorts). We know that ultimately Elizabeth will have to see the Russia of her memory strive to become more American in too many ways (I LOVED that they went to McDonald's, and that at that moment they are probably having a bit of a "last time," and the audience knows the whole time that the first McDonald's in Russia opens only three years after this episode takes place; I remember when that was headline news).

I was certain P&E would be shot on entering the Soviet Union. I was tense and upset for the entire ending montage, positive that someone would have followed Arkady and done them all in. Now, looking back at the episode in total, and the one before it, I'm more convinced that may have actually happened to Claudia. It all depends on whether the message reached Gorbachev's loyalists in time or not.

(Another quick thing on this - I find it difficult to believe that the attempts to subvert Gorbachev via the summit would have been the only way his opponents were seeking to get rid of him at that particular moment, especially since we know what's coming in 1991. I think it likely there was enough going on that he would have been able to marshal his own resources to out his more violent detractors. Hence my belief that Claudia may have been captured and maybe executed on return. Also, there's no way, after Elizabeth shot and killed Tatiana, that some of the conspiracy came to light as Tatiana's own weapon was right there with the body).

Okay, now, to go plot out the Americans/X-Files crossover I've been dying to see written, in which Renee is Marita Covarrubias. :-D

Re: Not so much a review, just a bunch of random thoughts on watching the finale

[selenak]

Easy enough to see how the Stan we grew to know over the years would eventually be unable to pull the trigger on the man he loved better than either of his wives (YMMV).

Oh, agreed, both on the strength of Stan's feelings for Philip and the in characterness. And then, also, he's been there before, in a way, and chose differently, with Nina. And she died as a result. Only Nina was someone whom he'd known for little more than a year. With Philip, it's been six years. Not to say that Stan would never; if Philip had acted differently, had played it defiantly or engineered a stand-off, Stan would have shot, but Philip pushed every right button.

[shapinglight]

Had time to mull over things a bit longer now, and despite my upset over Oleg -awful for our last sight of him to be him alone in that cell -I think this was the perfect ending for the series.

All the way through I was tense, waiting for something violent and terrible to happen (I also thought the Jenningses, and Arkady would be shot in that final scene, am so glad the show eschewed such melodramatics) and it didn't, but there was still terrible violence done - emotional violence, that is. All through the series, Philip and Elizabeth have been wreaking it on others, now they're suffering it themselves, losing their children in this way. Yet they still have each other, so at least - unlike Paige, unlike Oleg - they're not alone. Maybe Philip will re-connect with his brother and finally might Mischa Jnr. Maybe Philip and Elizabeth will meet Gabriel again. They're not completely alone and without resources in Moscow at least (though here's hoping they never bump into Martha).

I'm glad Henry and Stan have each other, but poor Paige! What will become of her? I do understand why she made the choice she did, but her future looks pretty bleak to me.

Loved that the Renee affair was left ambiguous, though undecided whether it was cruel of Philip to tell Stan about his suspicions.

Damn, I'm going to miss this show. And I'm going to miss talking about it afterwards on this community. It's been such a pleasure over the years. Thank you, all.

Paige's life

[sistermagpie]

I'm glad Henry and Stan have each other, but poor Paige! What will become of her? I do understand why she made the choice she did, but her future looks pretty bleak to me.

I actually thought Paige staying meant she would be Henry's family. Stan too, of course, but Paige is his actual family and knows about their parents. She told him he had to take care of Henry but then came back herself. Henry doesn't need real taking care of like a child, and I really think he and Paige would get more out of talking about the whole thing than Henry and Stan.

While watching thoughts

[lovingboth]

The 'previously' is all from the previous episode! That doesn't happen very often.

I'd expected Philip to have a Plan for when it all wreng that didn't involve hanging around in a cellar somewhere.

Ha for Stan doing something like ringing their work. And home.

(He's going to love being able to track mobile phones in real time, isn't he?)

Ah, it was a meeting place.

And obviously Philip isn't going to take Henry.

He's been networking at the school, so he's not going to be alone.

I still think this is a) a conversation that they should have had ages ago and b) while on the move now.

How interesting that it's this that gets Elizabeth to tear up.

As soon as they went out into that bright light, I knew it'd be cut to credits.

'K G what?'

Good call to just steal something new (and change the plates) rather than go to a possibly compromised location.

He'd be more likely to ask who Stan is going off to have sex with!

No answer to "What were you supposed to do?"

I still think Oleg's father is right and the big G will fix this.

I like the very short time he sits down. No time for self-pity.

"I have to let down people who trust me all the time" is not necessarily the best thing to say to someone who you're asking to trust you.

Even I thought that was them.

WTF are you asking her in person, rather than giving her a call?

How fascinating that Paige is (wasting time) worrying about Henry rather than the rest of the family.

Right, somoeone is going to get shot, aren't they?

Elizabeth is turning on the charm.

I'd say that she's pregnant...

'What's all over?' vs "We have a job to do".

Given all the emotional contact between Philip and Stan, why isn't Elizabeth going for a gun?

You still can do it, Stan.

Is this where Philip goes for him?

I do like the way Philip doesn't say how many years he's been in the USA.

"You should probably shoot me" is not necessarily the best thing to say to someone who's pointing a gun at you.

Well done Elizabeth for turning her back on Stan.

Oh, calling out Renee is not necessarily the wisest thing either.

(I was still expecting Philip to have gone for Stan to buy enough seconds for Elizabeth to get something.)

(Hmm. that can't be the most dramatic bit of the episode, can it?)

Paige doubly naive, as ever.

Step one, leave the country. Step two, consider talking to Henry.

Typically nice no dialogue sequence, with the music budget is put to good use.

Saying goodbye to the suicide pill is a lovely way to show the shift in Elizabeth's emotional state.

'Please reassure me that you're not alone, Henry.'

"I lpve you" is one way to get a teenage boy to want to end the call!

'Hi Stan, these look like your neighbours, don't they?'

If he had listened, it have saved Stan from a huge ethical dilemma.

Wasn't that a stop line? It'd be funny if they got caught because of a minor traffic violation.

More music budget, more wordless scenes. I still think telling Stan about any suspicions about Renee is a bad idea - who does it help? 'Hey, someone betrayed you even more that we did!'

Separate, but still on the same train?

We didnt see Paige.. ha, there she is! (This is the only reason she's on the same train: so they can both see her having got off it.)

But not in custody. (Be interesting to know why no-one's asking her what she's doing.)

Who thought it was a good idea to send Stan alone?

Hello flashback! Compete with subtle abortion reference.

I like the pointed 'it's the 80s' shot of someone smoking on the plane.

Where else would Paige go? Except that she's gone.

It is only Stan who knows that Paige is a traitor. Unless she's caught in a safe house.

Eyes on the road, eyes on the road..

Is this where they all get shot for knowing too much?

That's a very valuable car they're leaving behind.

"We'll get used to it".

....

Hmmm, what a good ending episode, avoiding the obvious. The triumph of the series was to make that confrontation between Philip and Elizabeth with Stan end so believably.

I still think Paige is way too naive to survive, mind.

....

Is "keep comments spoiler-free of anything that comes after season six, episode ten" a spoiler? :)

Re: While watching thoughts

[jae]

Is "keep comments spoiler-free of anything that comes after season six, episode ten" a spoiler? :)

AHAHA. No. And fixed. :)

-J

[soupytwist]

Daaaamn, that was what finales SHOULD be. Even though the show has consistently been great at doing things right, I was a bit wondering whether they really could pull all those strings together in the right way and remain solid but also true to the spirit of the show. And I think they really, really did.

I love the comments above about how that scene with Stan confronting the Jennings involved basically everything about the past six years. it really did: change almost anything about the last six years and that scene would never have happened, or never happened the way it did. That was so impressive. And I love that like everything else about the show, it's bitter sweet and even more complicated than it seems on the surface. I love that Stan had many, many options throughout the episode and he chose... the path that seemed the least awful at the time. The Jennings make it back to Russia, and that's more than most of us ever thought they would, but they're not the heroes they might have been last season and we the viewers know their country will soon not exist anyway.

And oh those final shots. Damnnnnnnn.

Sistermagpie's Thoughts on START

[sistermagpie]

Scattered thoughts--everyone else's comments are so great.

I think my favorite image of the whole show will forever be Philip and Elizabeth asleep in the back of Arkady's car as he drives, like two kids being driven home by dad. That's basically what they were in a way. Children of the motherland when they were sent out and now they're just exhausted and can feel safe because it's Arkady--who's somehow always been like an unknown protector to them--who's at the wheel. And they can finally snuggle together like they couldn't do on the train or the plane.

Elizabeth's dream was also fantastic. Not just seeing Gregory again, but the way she had herself smoking (a final note on what that means to her and a nod to her smoking like a chimney with him) and when he motioned to her being pregnant saying, "I don't want kids anyway." Then that painting and the similar picture of Henry and Paige. Of course she never said such a thing, but she remembers not wanting kids and how they got to her like the painting did.

Also someone else pointed out that that picture is almost recreated in Elizabeth putting her hand up to the window to watch Paige disappearing into the distance.

Like I said above I spent a lot of the ep feeling just sad--and not in a good way--for Paige trailing after her parents to the USSR. When she got off the train it was like the healthiest thing she'd done in years. She was finally a person. The whole "Paige as junior spy" was like Elizabeth going to the church group, only Paige tried to get it.

Philip telling Henry to be himself was also the one thing he told Paige to be after her baptism, praising her for doing what she wanted despite them not liking it. Neither kid understood how important it was to him and what he meant by him. But that's finally what Paige did. And she did it after Philip made the same case for Henry. And hearing his speech to Stan.

That also leads to a little theory of mine. I've always been frustrated by lack of Philip backstory. I've also always noticed that when their real names are mentioned they almost always use the full version of her name and the shortened version of his name. With her it makes sense--she would be sensitive about who used a familiar form of her name. But Philip was almost always Mischa except when he got married and when he told his real name to Martha--but there he quickly deflated to "But everybody calls me Mischa."

I thought of it here because Father Andrei did the same thing which is bizarre. He had one scene using their real names and used full names for both. He doesn't know Philip better. So why Mischa?

My thought is that the whole thing with Philip--and this goes along with the irritating choice to not give us his story--is that he really has never been able to form his real self. Elizabeth clung to a version of herself that might have been too rigid and not completely true to who she was, but it was important to her.

Philip never became that fully formed person. It makes sense his name was shortened--it's only the name "everybody" would have called him as a child before he was formed fully. In the last scene Elizabeth imagines herself running a factory (just like the woman in the movie who Claudia said she might have ended up like!), she also mentioned wanting to be a doctor. But when she imagines fully-grown Russian Philip she's got nothing. There's no career that immediately springs to mind.

Even Philip in his speech to Stan says he's just a failed travel agent...only he isn't. Yeah, he isn't. He was working again, the travel agency wasn't an expression of his true self. He said he felt stuck and wanted to do something good. Working with Oleg seemed the thing he liked most.

So yeah, I think the idea was he'd never really gotten a chance to explore who he was outside of what he had to do--exactly the kind of thing the EST guy said. He was Mikhail only when he got married (a true expression of himself). With Martha maybe he wanted to stand up for himself but was still unsure.

Loved Elizabeth's final line, breaking the English barrier so they could speak Russian with each other at last. And of course "we'll get used to it" has been the story of their lives, the conversation echoing the one in the motel back in 1965.

Philip's speech was masterful (I was reminded of it because he seems to intentionally not set a date on how long he's been in the US.) Like all his best spy triumphs it's true...but also utterly careful. Stan give him the "You were my best friend" opening and he goes right in, painting himself as the wimp and the fool he's always subtly been compared to Stan. He even makes sure to give Elizabeth full credit for "figuring out" the Gorbachev plot that in fact Philip told her about--Elizabeth got the details from Claudia. But it was important that Philip not be so clever here. Especially after he hadn't dropped his mask yet and Stan yelled at him to STOP MOVING because he totally was angling to disarm Stan somehow.

And I love how before he starts it all he hangs his head as if in surrender but imo he's also thinking quickly. None of this means he's just lying to Stan here, but this is Philip's signature move as a spy. This is why he and Elizabeth are such a good team. She'd packed a gun. She's been using force all season, trying to force people to do things. But here it was the last of Philip's devoted sources who decided not to give him up. Like Martha didn't. A lot of people thought Kimmy was going to tell her father about Jim's last phone call but nope, she protected him too. It's Philip's dark superpower. One that he would never use on the kids.

I wonder if Paige realized at all what she was seeing there. I do think she has stopped believing the lies--when they reflexively claimed they never killed anybody I don't think she believed them any more than Stan did. But I wonder if watching Philip and watching Elizabeth watch him she realized that even if there was truth to what he was saying, he had a forked tongue.

So many Russians were separated from their children. Philip and Elizabeth, but also Igor from Oleg and Oleg from Sasha. Man, I grew to love love love Igor. His final flinging up of his arms in a gesture of helplessness/hopelessness was fantastic. It was like his shooting his pistol at his other son's funeral.

I guess that's why ultimately it was so right for this last conflict to be all about "fucking Russians" as Philip called. Stan kept saying he didn't care who their leader was, and even if of course he could understand that this should matter, it still made perfect sense as an FBI agent to not care about it in that moment. But it was great that the Russian characters really did care. It foreshadowed that they could actually have a purpose in the USSR that they believed in.

When Stan's telling Henry the truth you can plainly see his uniform with JENNINGS on the back. Ouch.

I also like how none of these relationships have been tested except for P&E. But warm feelings now don't give any indication how anyone's life might go or how they might deal with all this. Especially the kids.

Re: Sistermagpie's Thoughts on START

[shapinglight]

And I love how before he starts it all he hangs his head as if in surrender but imo he's also thinking quickly. None of this means he's just lying to Stan here, but this is Philip's signature move as a spy. This is why he and Elizabeth are such a good team. She'd packed a gun. She's been using force all season, trying to force people to do things. But here it was the last of Philip's devoted sources who decided not to give him up. Like Martha didn't. A lot of people thought Kimmy was going to tell her father about Jim's last phone call but nope, she protected him too. It's Philip's dark superpower. One that he would never use on the kids.

I love this about Philip. So very inciteful. Thanks.

[quantumreality]

SO MUCH TO SAY AND I CANNOT EVEN BEGIN

*flails*

So many others here have said it all better than I can, so I'll just say that what really, really got me was Paige going back to the safe house and slugging back some vodka in that bare, lonely apartment.

She's basically nerving herself up to face the consequences of the first truly independent decision she's made in, what, three, four years?

And it's got to be a pretty scary thought, realizing she's now all alone in the world and with literally nothing to fall back on.

[treonb]

Was that the safehouse? I thought it was her apartment. That does give her more time to think things through.

Is Paige safe from the... Russians?

[beer_good_foamy]

Just a thought that struck me, and at a glance I can't see that anyone else has brought it up?

Paige's situation right now, unless I'm missing something, basically leaves her with three bad choices:
1. Stay undercover, live on the run, go straight to jail for treason if she's ever recognized.
2. Report to the FBI, act shocked that her parents are Russian agents, lie her ass off and hope they can't pin anything on her.
3. Come clean, testify about everything and hope for clemency.

In all three cases, the FBI looks like her biggest problem. But what about the KGB? As far as they're concerned, she's basically a defected agent. She Knows Stuff. P&E will probably tell them she's harmless and doesn't have any worthwhile information to trade to the FBI, but of course they're not exactly impartial. Would the KGB consider it a worthwhile risk to let someone with that information run around unobstrcuted?

Re: Is Paige safe from the... Russians?

[sistermagpie]

It seems like we've seen the KGB let agents go before. They know Paige is useless now as an agent, the FBI will totally be watching her, but she doesn't seem dangerous enough for them to risk trying to kill her under the FBI's nose, imo.

Question about the garage scene with Stan and the Jennings

[saraqael]

When Stan catches the Jennings in the garage, Philip appeals to their friendship, is very self-depreciating (saying that his whole shitty life, not Stan, was the real joke, etc.) and also essentially turns Henry over to Stan for safe keeping because Henry loves Stan so much.

I'm interested to hear everyone's thoughts on this: how much of what Philip said was the truth, and how much was he just using his spy training to play on Stan's emotions to bamboozle him so that they could all get out of there alive?

Re: Question about the garage scene with Stan and the Jennings

[jae]

In my view, this is very much an "embrace the power of and" sort of thing. The showrunners have said again and again that the lies the spy characters tell work because they always begin with a truth. In this case, almost everything Philip said was 100% true, and very little of it was outright lies. But was he trying to manipulate Stan? Absolutely.

-J

The two pop songs in the finale

[jae]

In the critical response to the finale, one of the things that has divided people is the use of music. And if you'd asked me on the night the finale aired, I would have told you that neither of the songs really worked for me. One of the things this show has always done well is choose songs that never quite penetrated the public consciousness to a great extent, so that lots of viewers had either never heard the songs before or hadn't heard them in many years. By going with songs that had either been used to classic, widely talked-about effect in other Big TV Moments (in the case of "Brothers in Arms") or were just so ubiquitous that you associate them more with being overplayed than with any particular emotion (in the case of "With or Without You"), the show broke that pattern, and it felt pretty jarring to me. (Also, it doesn't help that I don't like either song very much, but I admit that's just me.)

In the days since the finale, though, I haven't been able to get either of them out of my head. And while I'd have sworn at the time the finale aired that there would be no way those two songs would attach themselves emotionally to those show-moments in the way other songs used on the show always have for me, I have to admit that when that subconscious soundtrack is playing, I'm running those moments from the show through my head again, too. I still would have preferred different, less overtly popular songs, but I can't really claim they didn't do their job.

What does everyone else think?

-J

Re: The two pop songs in the finale

[sistermagpie]

I had a similar reaction to it--though I was humming the U2 song a lot. But then, I'm still constantly humming Don't Dream It's Over, another song I never particularly liked!

I would note that at least once before they did something similar and pulled it off. Phil Collins' In The Air Tonight is not only really well-known but is totally associated with the beginning of Miami Vice to the point that people thought it was really audacious to even use it. But it worked for me beautifully!

[(Anonymous)]

Did Paige
hook up with
some of the
Other Illegals
who appeared
during the season?
up

[(Anonymous)]

Did Paige
hook up with
some of the
Other Illegals
who appeared
during the season after
she got off the train?

[sistermagpie]

All the Illegals Paige had ever met were gone by then, and she was rejecting off the train so I'd say definitely no.

[andy73]

Besides, we've seen that her instinct is always to tell the truth anyway, like she did to Stan. She's not a great liar at all, and this would require coming up with a detailed alternate life to keep straight.

Good point! It’s probably she would tell the truth.