Question of the week #3

[jae]

Which character from The Americans is, more than any other, the one who intrigues you most? Not necessarily the one you'd want to have a beer with/befriend/sleep with, but the one whose story you're most interested in, the one you find yourself thinking about even when the show isn't on? And why? You can expect spoilers for the entire first season in the comments.

(There's no expiration date on these questions, so if you're reading this post months later and feel like jumping in, please do.)

Comments

[jae]

Oh, I totally agree that Elizabeth had a harder time in the early years. Philip would have been totally in his element from day one, while Elizabeth would have been good at the work, but struggling with so many things. And given what we saw of their relationship in the pilot before things changed between them, her feelings for him seem to have ranged from tolerant to mildly hostile, which wouldn't have been much fun at all for all those years.

-J

[katiac]

Yes. And I would theorize they would've switched back and forth at intervals a lot (the tolerant to mildly hostile feelings) because she has to keep him at bay and let it be known that he's not getting any closer than she wants, but at the same time, they have to work together practically 24/7 and raise children together. If she pushes him away to the point they're both tense and unhappy, they can't work together effectively. So I think she was constantly striving to maintain that "just giving enough to make it workable" status, conflict coming in when he tried to nudge for something more.

[jae]

I'd never put it this way to myself, but I really like this interpretation!

-J

[katiac]

It's funny because all the snippets and flashbacks we're given paint such a varied picture. In Zhukov's office, she's clearly on edge, but not mean. In the hotel, they're a little smiley and friendly, she's not ready for sex, but clearly they're not angry at each other. They transition right to a civil conversation even after she rejects his advance. In Zhukov's flashbacks, it's clear they're not getting along. In the table conversation with Gregory, it's revealed Elizabeth came to him in tears when pregnant. Paige talks fondly about family games of round robin checkers. Even when you see them together in the pilot, there's a level of comfort in the way they interact that suggests things aren't always icy. He wouldn't come up and kiss her neck if a knife was pulled every time. With all those wildly different snippets, I can only assume things were rocky, but okay at times too.

[jae]

I'm with you on all of this. I think there are time periods when he's just too much for her to take, given all of her issues (and the period when she was pregnant with Paige was probably the worst of those), but she always fundamentally likes him. And she always, always values him as a colleague, because they are just dynamite together when it comes to the work, and have been right from the start. That's what Zhukov is referring to when he says it's a good match. When it comes to the work, it really really is. I'm sure he has pairs to watch over that don't deal with each other nearly as well.

-J

[katiac]

Yeah, I agree the pregnancy would've brought a lot of issues to a head. She can't get out of a baby. Even if she wasn't planning to run off before, a baby really seals the deal in a way where she can't have the fantasy in her head either. Sort of like Philip can no longer lie to himself and pretend everything is going to turn out fine for their family. In my head, the more the kids turned into real little people, the more obvious it became that going off to Russia wasn't a viable option and if anything happened to him and Elizabeth (quite likely) they were screwed.

But I don't think she hates Philip. I think she's not particularly attracted to him until much later, but respects him as a partner, a father. There would've been a lot of resentment at first, I think, for all the little things she couldn't control about her life in the US (the Elizabeth in my head is all about control) and since Philip was the only one other than Gregory that she didn't have to lie to, I think he would've been the target for some of those frustrations, particularly since some of them (living in the US, having sex, having kids), he didn't particularly mind--even liked--and she deeply didn't want.

I'm interested in the Philip/Zhukov angle, what made him choose Philip for his little darling Elizabeth...