jae: (theamericansgecko)
Jae ([personal profile] jae) wrote in [community profile] theamericans2014-03-12 07:45 pm
Entry tags:

Episode discussion post: "The Walk In"

Aired:
12 March 2014 in the U.S. and Canada
16 March 2014 in Israel
29 March 2014 in the UK

This is a discussion post for episode 203 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 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 two, episode three.)

Original promo trailers





Episode recaps

From the Washington Post
From Vulture
From Hitfix
From the AV Club
From the Huffington Post
From IGN
From Collider
From Television Without Pity
From Sound on Sight
From tv.com
From TV Ate My Wardrobe
From the Houston Chronicle
From spoilertv.com
From showratings.tv
From The Cloture Club

More to come once they're available!
soupytwist: Dude says NO to heterosexuality. (mmm... vice)

[personal profile] soupytwist 2014-03-13 09:22 pm (UTC)(link)
I feel kind of totally overwhelmed by that episode! Between the amazing scene of Philip FREAKING OUT at Paige and the wonderful, gut-wrenching montage set-piece at the end, I am done. I have lost the ability to can. OMG.

The montage at the end first -I love love love that it was so much about how their lives are so fundamentally conflicted, driving each other away and tying each other together all at the same time. THEY JUST ALL FEEL SO MUCH AAAHHHH. In, like, the most tragic way. and I didn't know the song until I saw it mentioned in comments, but it was perfect.

I don't think Paige's new friend is KGB but I do think that there's probably going to be SOMETHING there. Like, maybe the friend - as an outside entity - is better able to tell Paige what about her family life is REALLY WEIRD and what isn't. I also liked that Paige on the bus is a TERRIBLE liar!

I was so happy the link to "aunt Helen" worked so well! I was totally impressed. Paige is obviously not finished snooping yet though and oh my god I don't know if I am going to survive it.

Flashbacks were awesome (Elizabeth is ROCKING that sixties fashion, helloooooooooo) and I am so pleased to see some of their earlier life, but I was kind of surprised that we saw NOTHING from back in the day that indicated Elizabeth was even vaguely doubtful about giving Jared the letter. I mean, having children would obviously be a pivotal moment in terms of her feelings about that, but as a good Soviet soldier I would have expected a bit more pushback from Elizabeth on that, I felt?

Also, yo, Elizabeth, your colleagues are planning for their children's future in the event of their death, you share a very dangerous profession, IT MIGHT BE A GOOD IDEA TO THINK ABOUT THAT ISSUE BEFORE YOU SEE SAID COLLEAGUES BRUTALLY MURDERED. Also, Philip, if that "my dad died when I was six" thing is as biographical as it really seemed like it was, you KNOW parents can die before their children. It happens. PLAN FOR THESE THINGS.

This was the first episode where I kind of wondered if maybe Nina was getting feelings for Stan, but then her little smile made me go straight back to nope, she hates his guts. She fakes it REALLY WELL though. Damn. Also, I wonder how much report Oleg saw and whether it's telling him anything he isn't supposed to know.

I really liked that even though Stan could realise that married guys don't do their own laundry, he still completely didn't take Sandra seriously. And that complimenting her appearance was not enough to stop that being clearly a dick move. Sandra trying to explain why that comment hurt her, and then basically giving it up, made me sad. Sandra, honey. :(

I will have to rewatch all the flashback scenes a billion times. The fundamental conflictedness in their conceiving children - that these are kids who were produced on demand, by people with very little in the way of consent, but who are hanging onto the last bits of consent they have... ouch. And I think that's what Philip's asking her if she's sure was about, and her pause after - a sort of acknowledgment that the whole situation is so complicated and confusing and frankly non-consensual at that point.
soupytwist: Dude says NO to heterosexuality. (mmm... vice)

Elizabeth's response to Jared's letter, and thoughts on Nina/Stan

[personal profile] soupytwist 2014-03-13 11:12 pm (UTC)(link)
Yeah, that is surprising, and no one else has brought it up yet. It could well be that Leanne was also ideologically very rooted and Elizabeth looked up to her for that, so she didn't feel like she could turn down a request that came from a place like that? But certainly it's a major violation of the rules (and rules that in this case have a damn good reason). It's weird that neither one of them acknowledges that at any point.

Yeah, exactly - there are possible reasons that I could buy for it, including Leanne being kind of Elizabeth's new-to-the-US "mentor", but not MENTIONING it seemed weird. Weird enough that I am wondering if that will be brought up, somehow.

I like your thoughts on Nina! I actually got more like quantumreality's impression below: I felt like at least some of her seeming satisfaction there is the satisfaction of having 'got one over' on Stan? But she's pretending so well that on reflection I think you have to be right, and there's at least a grain of truth in it somewhere, even if she's not sure how much.

(Edited for clarity about what was my opinion and what was other people's!)
Edited 2014-03-13 23:13 (UTC)
quantumreality: (americans1)

Re: Elizabeth's response to Jared's letter, and thoughts on Nina/Stan

[personal profile] quantumreality 2014-03-13 11:15 pm (UTC)(link)
Flashbacks were awesome (Elizabeth is ROCKING that sixties fashion, helloooooooooo) and I am so pleased to see some of their earlier life, but I was kind of surprised that we saw NOTHING from back in the day that indicated Elizabeth was even vaguely doubtful about giving Jared the letter.

Hmm - people do change in ~15 years, and to my understanding they had very little contact anyway; people grow apart during that time even if they're still cordial and friendly. Plus, after a wrenching event like that?

I think for all Elizabeth's ideology-first attitude, she has come to realize the more human dimension of living in the USA and that includes letting a kid believe what he thinks is the truth rather than just wrecking his life further what with the whole evil-empire thing going on at the time.
soupytwist: stephen fry peering round a wall (Default)

Re: Elizabeth's response to Jared's letter

[personal profile] soupytwist 2014-03-13 11:20 pm (UTC)(link)
I think for all Elizabeth's ideology-first attitude, she has come to realize the more human dimension of living in the USA and that includes letting a kid believe what he thinks is the truth rather than just wrecking his life further what with the whole evil-empire thing going on at the time.

I definitely buy her changing - and I even think there are plenty of reasons why younger Elizabeth might have immediately offered to do something so very, very, very against the rules, despite being a believer. But not mentioning that at all seemed bizarre!
soupytwist: Dude says NO to heterosexuality. (mmm... vice)

Re: Elizabeth's response to Jared's letter, and thoughts on Nina/Stan

[personal profile] soupytwist 2014-03-14 01:56 pm (UTC)(link)
Yeah, that makes sense - and she'd have to have something to build it upon for Stan to believe it, for one thing. He would definitely smell a rat if one day she obviously hated him and the next day she was getting in his pants.

I do think though that even their earlier connection is deeply, deeply dubious. (Not that I think you see it as anything other than that! This is me clarifying my thoughts, rather than thinking you see Nina/Stan as sweetness and light. :) ) But for me I think it boils down to "when she had to" being such a difficult thing to determine in that situation. Yeah, he didn't say "I want you to sleep with me or I will sell you out", but he didn't really have to. He had already sorta-of-but-in-a-way-he-could-deny-even-to-himself ordered her to use sex to get information. It wouldn't take even a particularly paranoid person to read that as a very clear sign pointing down a deeply unpleasant road.

And then, of course, Stan kills Vlad, and that adds a whole extra layer of messed up to the whole thing. For me, that final level, while fundamentally important, is also more a clarifer, a final straw, rather than completely seperate from all that other stuff. Not that Nina, like, thought Stan was repulsive or anything back in the beginning, but I think there's a definite argument about how much was real and how much was the situation and how much was people in said situation trying to convince themselves it was okay.

Re: Thoughts on Nina/Stan

[personal profile] soupytwist - 2014-03-14 20:41 (UTC) - Expand
sistermagpie: Classic magpie (Default)

Re: Response to soupytwist's thoughts

[personal profile] sistermagpie 2014-03-13 11:47 pm (UTC)(link)
This is what I'm hoping for. Because, you know, Paige needs that--there has been so much weirdness in that home lately that she needs someone who's able to help distinguish between weirdness and WEIRDNESS. And of course it's going to freak her parents out for good reason.

I am seriously so repulsed by the idea of this girl being KGB. It just makes everything seem kind of stupid. Like even if I assume that she's not really supposed to be Mary Sue Kiddie!Spy, that she's supposed to be an adult, it just seems to lower everyone's dignity. Plus planting a fake spy teenager right next to Paige doesn't seem to offer any more protection than her having fake spy parents!

But apart from that, what you're saying here about her being a real friend is just so much more useful dramatically I can't see why they'd want to make her a spy (even if I believed she was one). Has there even been any time when the show's actually pulled one of these bait and switches we're always on the lookout for, where someone seems like a regular person but it turns out they're in on it--not just a few scenes later but a whole episode later? Because the show generally isn't really doing that.

Which doesn't mean there couldn't be a first time. But if Kelli's a spy it actually takes *away* all the potential interesting stuff there, because Kelli's just another decoy who's going to lead Paige back to her parents like everyone else. She's already got two KGB agents doing that to her--her mom and dad. Giving her one more just repeats the same idea yet again.

A regular teenage girl, however, brings all sorts of possibilities. This is the person who's already drawing Paige out of her house and into a host of other things that have nothing to do with home. (Which again, is hardly helpful if she's supposed to be "on" her--she's just working against Philip and Elizabeth who want Paige safe at home.) Kelli the girl is a wildcard. Kelli the spy has a known agenda we've seen a dozen times already and is just a weak version of Philip and Elizabeth in terms of betrayal.

But I do think she genuinely enjoys having sex with him at the same time that it totally comes from a place that's all about the manipulation. And going through the motions on something like that can make it almost FEEL real sometimes, so she probably has to remind herself sometimes why she's doing this. But her job, Vlad, all that is still always at the forefront of her mind.

Mild spoiler for something I read about Vlad:

Okay, apparently I can't do spoiler text so I cut it out.

Yeah, that is surprising, and no one else has brought it up yet. It could well be that Leanne was also ideologically very rooted and Elizabeth looked up to her for that, so she didn't feel like she could turn down a request that came from a place like that? But certainly it's a major violation of the rules (and rules that in this case have a damn good reason). It's weird that neither one of them acknowledges that at any point.

And also in that case why the hell doesn't Philip say anything? He's obviously against her doing it in in general, and I can see how they might have already talked about it enough that they've come to an impasse on whether it's a good thing to do for Jared if they were in disagreement there. But when he tells her the police might still be in the house you'd think he'd also mention she was going against orders, like he does in Only You and...um...I forget the ep where she goes after Zhukov's killer. But that one.
Edited 2014-03-13 23:49 (UTC)
quantumreality: (Default)

Re: Response to soupytwist's thoughts

[personal profile] quantumreality 2014-03-14 03:24 am (UTC)(link)
If you want to spoilerize, you could use ROT13 ( http://www.rot13.com/ ) which shifts the text 13 letters so it looks like nonsense and anyone who doesn't want to be spoilerized can just not "decrypt" it.
maidenjedi: (Default)

Re: Leanne and Elizabeth

[personal profile] maidenjedi 2014-03-14 05:51 am (UTC)(link)
Leanne gives off a sense, to me, of someone who is very comfortable in her surroundings and the life she adopted, if she's a bit nostalgic for home. I think Elizabeth responds to the nostalgia, and is in awe of the confidence. Elizabeth clearly didn't have that, especially that early on. She had no idea what "Revolver" was - she has no sense for the culture or anything, and there's Leanne very much a part of the world they've been sent to as much as anything else. I think their friendship was also illicit, in the sense that they were supposed to work together, but not go deeper. Leanne hints about their past lives a little too strongly - in Philip, Elizabeth didn't tolerate that at all (until she fell for him, anyway). I find this whole thing very fascinating.
quantumreality: (nina)

[personal profile] quantumreality 2014-03-13 11:01 pm (UTC)(link)
This was the first episode where I kind of wondered if maybe Nina was getting feelings for Stan, but then her little smile made me go straight back to nope, she hates his guts. She fakes it REALLY WELL though. Damn. Also, I wonder how much report Oleg saw and whether it's telling him anything he isn't supposed to know.

Maybe it's just me, but when she was doing that typing? She had a kind of expression on her face that seemed to resemble the way she looked when she gave Vasili a BJ and then spat into her teacup as soon as he left the room. I wonder if she resents having to "service" Stan because he coerced her into spying for him to begin with and now she has to keep the whole thing going so Arkady can get his back-channel intelligence, plus he killed Vladimir and won't even admit it to her, while she has to coo over him for being the brave American defender of freedom when Dameran was a patsy anyway.

I think Arkady does kind of respect her, but he's still keeping his eye on the long-term ball of having his finger on the pulse of all that isn't reported in the press, and to that extent has to pragmatically accept making Nina go googly-eyes at Stan.
Edited 2014-03-13 23:03 (UTC)
soupytwist: Dude says NO to heterosexuality. (mmm... vice)

Nina/Stan

[personal profile] soupytwist 2014-03-13 11:17 pm (UTC)(link)
I definitely got a lot closer to your impression of Nina/Stan most of the time, yeah - although I'm not sure how much is me thinking that if I were her, I would absolutely have a whole lot of resentment towards Stan! And whether or not she's enjoying the sex part on any level, she definitely wouldn't be doing that sort of cooing if she didn't have to, I think.

And actually, as far as Arkady is concerned I think landing a link to Stan is a major coup! Even if the actual actionable intelligence is limited, it's the sort of thing you can play to sound REALLY GOOD to your bosses back in Moscow...
maidenjedi: (Default)

[personal profile] maidenjedi 2014-03-14 05:47 am (UTC)(link)
Re: kids produced on demand. This episode made me wonder. Did the USSR have an official or even unofficial policy about women having children for the good of the Motherland, or was that just a Nazi thing back in the 30s? Because the way Leanne said that the Center would expect it, and just the way Elizabeth finally gives in, I wonder very much about what they would have expected to do back home.

Re: Sandra. YES.

Re: Elizabeth as good Soviet soldier in terms of the letter. I think in the end, burning it had something to do with that. But also, I think she craved Leanne's confidence, and would have promised her anything to preserve that feeling. I can see her keeping that to herself, too, and Philip having no real inkling of the depth of feeling Elizabeth had there. Like Gregory, in a way.

Re: The Center's policy on having kids

[personal profile] treonb 2014-03-17 01:48 am (UTC)(link)
Not exactly 'having kids for the motherland', but this can certainly be 'having spies for the motherland'. American kids would make the perfect spies. And imagine a few generations down the line, they'd pass every security clearance check thrown at them.

I'm not sure how this fits with Elizabeth's "never tell them" policy, though.
maidenjedi: (Default)

Re: The Center's policy on having kids

[personal profile] maidenjedi 2014-03-25 05:10 am (UTC)(link)
That's what I figured. I would still be interested to get an idea of what expectations of motherhood in the Soviet Union might have been, but no doubt they would be removed utterly from the Directorate S agenda and orders stemming from same. Thanks!
lovingboth: (Default)

What about Paige's life is 'really wierd'?

[personal profile] lovingboth 2014-03-14 10:57 am (UTC)(link)
Yes, her parents are Soviet spies, but the point of the programme is that she (and everyone else apart from their bosses) don't know that. Yet.

She lives in the suburbs and goes to the local school. Both her parents work. They're a bit square. They sometimes go out or away because of work. They don't tell their 'just teenage' daughter everything. This has lead her to think about their sex lives, ewww. They've had trouble in their relationship, but they're back together. They're friendly with the neighbours, but not in and out of each others houses all the time. Erm, isn't all this within 'normal'?

With the possible exception of 'Mum was away for a while recovering from something, and I couldn't visit her', 'we don't have an extended family' is it, isn't it? Is that really weird?

Stan's family has been wierder, with him away for a loong time. His wife knows that he was working undercover, but did the rest? Now he can come in and say he's got a medal for killing someone...

Going back to the first para and to my guess that Philip was responsible for denouncing his father... Prediction: this will be shown at the point when Paige will at least be considering denouncing at least one of her parents.
soupytwist: stephen fry peering round a wall (Default)

Re: What about Paige's life is 'really weird'?

[personal profile] soupytwist 2014-03-14 12:50 pm (UTC)(link)
Dammit, while I was typing a reply you did it better! :)
quantumreality: (paige)

Re: What about Paige's life is 'really weird'?

[personal profile] quantumreality 2014-03-15 02:21 am (UTC)(link)
I think that really kind of nails it. Especially the tendency to unexplained absences and sudden "urgent trips" that have a surface kind of validity, but add to the subtle sense of wrongness about what should be just a 9-5 Monday to Friday kind of job running a well-functioning travel agency.

Paige herself reflects that assumption when she says "my dad doesn't really do anything."
soupytwist: Dude says NO to heterosexuality. (mmm... vice)

Re: What about Paige's life is 'really wierd'?

[personal profile] soupytwist 2014-03-14 12:49 pm (UTC)(link)
There is more than that though! Paige and Henry get left, often at no notice and in weird ways/places. They get left alone in the middle of the night. (This is one I think Paige is specifically aware of as maybe being Weird - that's why she was checking the bedroom door, seeing if they were in the house.) They have some really bizarrely strict house rules. They've had at least one time where Elizabeth is clearly really worried/panicked, but doesn't explain why and instead is all "we're going to a movie! ...oh wait, I need to leave you at a movie!" The Jennings don't just lack a family, but they lack any friends at all on top of that. (Unless you count the Beemans, and they're new.)

Any single one of those could easily have any number of explanations. It's the combo of all of them that equals Something Is Up. :)

And I really hope Philip didn't denounce his dad (but it's definitely possible). I don't think Paige is going to get as far as denouncing, though. At least not until the very end of the show, and that would be such a sad way to end!
quantumreality: (Default)

Re: What about Paige's life is 'really wierd'?

[personal profile] quantumreality 2014-03-15 02:28 am (UTC)(link)
Hmm, assuming Philip is 40ish in 1981/2, then he lost his father circa 1946 or 1947 - which is kind of in the right time frame for some paranoid idiot at the MVD to decide his father talked too much to British or American soldiers and whipped him off to the Gulag.

(Yes, this happened IRL - the sheer absurd insanity of Stalin's notions that any Soviet soldier who talked to an American or a Frenchman or a Brit, or was even in a German POW camp, was possibly unreliable and needed to be thrown into a labor camp back home. If I could do one thing that would preserve the state of affairs post-WW2 and yet ease a lot of people's suffering? I'd make Stalin have a heart attack or something in late May, 1945. His successors would almost certainly have refused to continue such an asinine policy.)

Philip's family

[personal profile] soupytwist - 2014-03-15 10:24 (UTC) - Expand
sistermagpie: Classic magpie (Default)

Re: What about Paige's life is 'really wierd'?

[personal profile] sistermagpie 2014-03-14 02:38 pm (UTC)(link)
I think it's a combination of a thousand things that only now as a teenager she's putting together as a pattern. Others have mentioned the fact that Paige seems to get that it's weird they're not allowed to bother their parents at odd times, like at night.

But I really liked how she summed it up to Kelli, saying, "It just seems like there's always something going on." That's a more vague thing that she's picking up on. She probably couldn't point to all the little bits of evidence that lead her to that conclusion, but it's exactly right. It's like...there's somebody who said "There are no secrets" like in a family. It was referring to something where, for instance, somebody found out that their parents weren't their parents (Mom had an affair and he was their father, for instance, or they were adopted) and once they find it out rather than being simply shocked there's a feeling of "Oh, THAT explains it." Like they'd picking up on little signals for years.

So for Paige, like she said, she just always has the feeling that there's something going on that her parents aren't telling her. Sure at their best they can casually say they're just late at work and if Paige called they'd have an excuse where they were. But just in the past few months she's seen her parents quite obviously preoccupied with something, distracted, upset, and yet there's absolutely nothing she can see to explain it. And when she tries to ask questions they're brilliant at deflecting them.

Like, Mom goes away for 2 months to take care of a distance relative and the kids can't even see her all that time? How do you give a really good explanation for that if the kid doesn't totally want to believe you? It's not even about having a relative you didn't know about--though that adds to it, but also Paige just getting the feeling that that's not why her mother went away. That's why she checked out the address. In the back of her mind she wonders if Aunt Helen exists because something about her parents' behavior has conditioned her to believe they might be completely lying.
jo_lasalle: (bunnies incognito)

[personal profile] jo_lasalle 2014-03-15 09:30 pm (UTC)(link)
but I was kind of surprised that we saw NOTHING from back in the day that indicated Elizabeth was even vaguely doubtful about giving Jared the letter.

I thought she was totally lying, actually, and I felt that Keri Russel was playing it that way too -- like, Leanne makes the request, and Elizabeth flips from 'friend and colleague chatting about stuff' to 'what is most appropriate in this situation from the point of view of a KGB agent'. Which is to say yes and deal with it appropriately if the situation ever arises.

I even thought that she'd probably report this to the higher-ups, the way she used to report on Philip, but I'll admit that's at odds with the letter still being there.