Third (and final! I promise!) linkspam this week

[jae]

The official reviews of season two are starting to roll in from various U.S. publications: from the San Francisco Chronicle, from the Tampa Bay Times, from Indiewire, from the Los Angeles Daily News, from the San Jose Mercury-News, from Slant Magazine, and finally, from the Huffington Post (this one is really a negative review of season two of House of Cards, but there's a positive comparison with The Americans in the final bit).

The full Wall Street Journal Live at Bryant Park "How The Americans Recreates the Cold War" panel has been posted (30-min video).

An interview with Keri Russell (Elizabeth) from the LA Daily News (with some season two spoilers).

And an interview with Matthew Rhys (Philip) from the New York Daily News (also with some season two spoilers).

And an interview with Noah Emmerich (Stan) from Paste Magazine (also with some season two spoilers).

And an interview with Peg Schierholz and Lori Hicks from the Hair and Makeup Department, from the Washington Post.

A couple of things from Twitter: according to script supervisor Molly Nussbaum, The Americans made the very top of this coming week's "must list" in Entertainment Weekly. And it looks like actor Gillian Alexy is going to be back playing Anneliese toward the end of the season!

And the comm's own quantumreality with the third part of the essay on symmetries in The Americans.

The Americans is going to be the subject of canada.com's TV Chat critics' panel on Monday at 2pm eastern time.

The TV Ate My Wardrobe blog sent someone to cover the season one DVD/Blu-Ray launch event.

The Staten Island Advance on the use of a local location as a backdrop to an episode of The Americans.

And finally, here's a little clip of Keri Russell on Late Night With David Letterman (on channelling her inner Elizabeth when her apartment was broken into).

Comments

[sistermagpie]

Hee! That one was great. I guess I can maybe see where Elizabeth's "intrigue" about Philip's sex life is going to come from if Martha just can't stop singing about his skillz, even to his sister.

Oh, Martha.

AV Club also has a review up.

[georgley]

I can't even imagine how awkward that conversation will be but I am so looking forward to it!

I read the AV Club review this morning as well. I'm so excited!!

[sistermagpie]

I can't stop imagining how it would go. Because it's not like "Jennifer" seems like the kind of gal who'd be open to this. Is Martha just too happy to keep it in--she might be, since she can't talk to anyone else. Or does Elizabeth subtly prod her about some things because she's curious.

I just really love that the show's actually explicitly bringing it up, even. Because with a woman you know guys would be thrilled just that she's willing to do things, much less would take the initiative herself. But the idea that there's this nebbishy Clark guy who's secretly a superhero in bed is just hilarious.

I would love it if it got Philip and Elizabeth to even refer to their training in this area.

[georgley]

I can't even imagine! I would kind of love a really awkward scene where Philip has to ask Elizabeth to pretend to be Jennifer again.

I would love it if they discussed their training in that area. I'm so intrigued by how the show will deal with the honey traps this season.

[georgley]

Looks like we'll have to wait until episode 5 for this scene. They just released the episode description.

Episode 2.05 - The Deal
(Airs March 26, 10:00 pm e/p)

Philip and Elizabeth are finally assigned a new handler as Philip works to clean up the mess of the last operation and Elizabeth, in disguise as Clark's sister Jennifer, does her best to smooth things over with Martha. As Stan searches for a missing scientist, Oleg and Arkady continue to argue over how best to handle the situation on their side, leaving Nina once again caught between the FBI and KGB.

Written by Angelina Burnett; directed by Dan Attias.

[sistermagpie]

Ooh--that's interesting. I was picturing Philip having to ask Jennifer over for dinner with the two of them, but it's even sketchier if Jennifer has to basically go in as Clark's sister to help Martha "understand" him. And that would certainly give Martha reason to talk about their sex life. Which hopefully leads Elizabeth to ambush him with "So...what's this business Martha calls the Pearl Harbor?"

Also, poor Nina. They're giving her reason to feel torn.

[georgley]

I'm also super intrigued by the new handler!

[katiac]

I know! I'm so excited to read this episode description! And how awful for poor Elizabeth to have to sit there and pretend not to care if Martha goes into details about the sex--sort of a mirror on Philip forced to sit there while Gregory cruelly rubbed it in his face, though not intentional on Martha's part. That's so great that "Jennifer" is coming back!

[katiac]

AHH!!! I could not be more excited to read this! I love that "Jennifer" is having to get involved too. Has the potential for such great drama between P/E.

Wondering what the "mess of the last operation" is. Sounds like they have some great stuff planned from the spy end. That was the one they had to do without the support of the Centre, right?

TWO MORE DAYS!!!

[quantumreality]

Hmm! Interesting. It sounds like the writers aren't planning on a smooth double-agenthood for Nina, either. I wonder how she'll handle things this season, with her job as assistant head of Directorate S + feeding Stan true and/or false info.

[katiac]

God, that's just so AWFUL for Elizabeth to have to go through, and yet so perfect in that it brings it up in a way they just can't avoid confronting honestly. And also, it's kind of her turn to have to deal with the painful issues she doesn't really have any power to change--Philip got stuck in that role a lot last season, forced to accept her past affair, forced to accept that she reported on him, and sides of her that were difficult to take. I think it's really great that Elizabeth can be finally put in this position of having to buck up and deal with realities that are painful while not being tempted to cut and run.

[sistermagpie]

What's also cool about it for me is that first she's going to be conflicted because she knows this is his job. It's not like the Gregory revelations. Yet she's going to still feel jealous having to hear it. Plus it opens up the uncomfortable area of sort of. ..non - appreciation of Phillip. I don't mean she's a villain or anything but she very rarely has somebody pointing out some of the great things she's got in this guy she doesn't really acknowledge. And I understand why she hasn't but this is a great way to unpack some of that. It's good for her because she can start opening up and asking for these things. But it's also good for him to sort of say that well, he's never really gotten creative because he was afraid of rejection for good reason. It's just the type of thing she wouldn't think about from his pov. But I feel like it gets into some important areas of self - worth and so on. Because I feel like she's established her perspective on her own honey traps while the attitude towards his has been kind of implied over tome, also by her.

It's really another fascinating way the show plays with (without simply flipping) the gender roles.

[katiac]

Right, no, I agree. It's not an exact mirror. Philip definitely has the excuse it's for work and it's not like he's ever lied to her about it. But it does hold that similarity that both are kind of in a position where they feel really crappy about what they're hearing, where they can't really say anything back, and where the other person has a reason for it that kind of invalidates any ability they have to jump on their case about it (with Philip--it's our job, with Elizabeth--our marriage is just for cover.) So it's not exactly the same, but it has enough of the same potential to touch on some of the same buttons, but from Elizabeth's side of things, and that sounds great to me.

It's good for her because she can start opening up and asking for these things. But it's also good for him to sort of say that well, he's never really gotten creative because he was afraid of rejection for good reason. It's just the type of thing she wouldn't think about from his pov. But I feel like it gets into some important areas of self - worth and so on. Because I feel like she's established her perspective on her own honey traps while the attitude towards his has been kind of implied over tome, also by her.

I LOVE that it could potentially cause Elizabeth to start recognizing all the great things in what she has in a way that she hasn't before because you're right... she seems to take things for granted until they're shoved in her face in a way she can't avoid. She didn't take the step to make things "real" until she was jealous of Irina. It wasn't until Sandra said she envied her and Philip that it occurred to her they might have something to envy. It was thinking back on Zhukov saying how great she and Philip were matched that made her find new awareness of the fact it was true. This could be another great point along the same theme.

And I would love to see that start to encourage more openness in their sex life. Like in my head canon, pre-pilot it was always like, missionary position and no affection from Elizabeth's end whatsoever. I imagine during the good points in season one, they probably ventured a little beyond that into some basic things that weren't too risky, but with sex being such a weighted topic and the relationship being hot/cold all the time, I don't see where they would've had the bravery, comfort level or time for it to get open or adventurous. That could be a great step to watch them take together.

Although, good grief, now that I'm imagining it, what on EARTH would Martha say to "Jennifer" that one would say to their sister-in-law?? I mean, even if she has no idea it's her fake-husband's real wife, does one really go out there and describe the nitty-gritty when you know you're talking about someone's brother?

[sistermagpie]

There really are some interesting parallels there. With Philip he thought he was just dealing with a guy he'd worked with for a long time, and then Gregory throws this affair at him to at least in part to hurt him. In Elizabeth's case she knows what she's going into, ostensibly, but it might be very different listening to it. She's probably had her own pov on Philip's honeytraps for years, and now sitting here listening to this woman talk about ways he's been good to her. She's talking about this guy that she loves and feels has been so good to her, and Elizabeth's got to be surprised at how that feelings. I mean, even though she knows that it's not real, I'll bet it's very uncomfortable listening to these stories of intimacy, which is closer to her and Gregory than she'd probably imagined. I mean, again, she knows it's not real and in so many ways it's nothing like Gregory, but she is being confronted with somebody who's suddenly a real person with a real relationship with Philip, and I think that's partly why she'd focus on things like that he's doing something sexually with her that he's not with Elizabeth.

It's possible that Martha isn't even that explicit, exactly. She may just say something about how he's better than other people, that he's shown her things about her body or whatever, that she feels like she can ask him for things or whatever, or that he's just made her feel ways she's never feel. That could lead to Elizabeth asking him, vaguely to start, what exactly he's doing with this woman. He'd probably just shrug it off at first--whatever she likes. But that would open up the subject for Elizabeth to ask what she likes and maybe realize that for all the time they've been together, Philip maybe knows Martha physically better than he knows Elizabeth--and then more disturbing, maybe that means Martha knows her body more than Elizabeth does in that way because there are ways that Martha's approached her relationship with Philip that Elizabeth never thought about and it actually got her something valuable that Elizabeth isn't sure she is.

So it's kind of flipped in a way--with Gregory Philip had to face that he was offering this to Elizabeth, but she couldn't accept it from him. She wanted it from Gregory. With Martha it might be more that Elizabeth realizes that she never asked for it, but he was offering it.