theamericans | Episode discussion post: "The Deal"

jae posting in

Aired:
26 March 2014 in the U.S. and Canada
30 March 2014 in Israel
12 April 2014 in the UK

This is a discussion post for episode 205 of The Americans, intended for viewers who are watching the show on the U.S./Canadian schedule. (Feel free to dive in to the discussion even if you're coming in late--and you should also feel free to start a new thread if it seems too daunting to read through what's already been posted first. If you're reading this at a point where you've already seen subsequent episodes, though, please take care to keep comments spoiler-free of anything that comes after season two, episode five.)

Original promo trailers

"Next On: The Deal" (Watch on YouTube)

"The Americans: Exclusive Scene from Episode 5" (Watch on YouTube)

Episode recaps

From Grantland
From The New York Times
From Time
From Vulture
From The Washington Post
From Rolling Stone
From The AV Club
From Hitfix
From the Huffington Post
From Collider
From Sound on Sight
From IGN
From Television Without Pity
From TV Ate My Wardrobe
From Geekbinge
From showratings.tv
From screenrant.com
From GAMbIT Magazine
From Crave Online
From spoilertv.com
From tv.com
From Unreality Primetime
From Newsmanone

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

jae

Like everybody else I, too, loved this one (it was soooo looong, too! I'm sure some people's PVRs cut off the end, but I suppose that can't be helped). Specifically, I loved:

• The scene between Philip and the Mossad agent when the Mossad agent was trying to get him talking was just so, so layered. He was clearly trying to flatter Philip with his position in the hierarchy of spies (hiding what you do makes you "pure bronze," but hiding who you are makes you "pure platinum"), but I think there was genuine admiration there, too. He was also casting about, trying to figure out what makes Philip tick (the icicles, etc.), and surprisingly, actually getting somewhere during a couple of moments. And of course at the same time he was trying to get under Philip's skin in many ways (needling him about his vicious wife, the line about "your name isn't your name, is it? is your face your face? are your children your children?"). And Philip was a consummate professional throughout, of course, but there were still little bits of him that sneaked out throughout (e.g. "I like the cold," which you can read on at least three levels I can think of), and that was so perfect.

• One question from that scene: Mossad agent to Philip: "You miss it. You really miss it. Unbelievable." True or false? My read is that he was actually telling the truth when he said he didn't remember the icicles, and that's what he was actually missing--having memories, not the specific things he'd be able to remember if he still could.

• Which leads me into that scene at the end, which was just so heartbreaking, but also so lovely that there could be that moment of comfort despite everything else that had happened. This was Philip's worst mission yet--worse than Grayson, even, which he hated hated hated--and he needed her, and she was there with all the right things, helping him to remember (because she of course wouldn't forget). "We used to have swordfights." :D

• My favourite scene, though (and one of my favourite scenes on the whole show to date), was the one between Philip and Anton in the car. He says almost nothing, and doesn't even show any major emotions on his face, but you can still see how the tragedy of it all is affecting him in the tiny little subtle expressions. It reminded me of the scene in "Gregory" where Gregory tells Philip about his relationship with Elizabeth, and all of Philip's reactions are so tiny and understated, but just so, so brilliant and heartbreaking.

• And let's not forget Anton, too, god. He really thought he would be safe when he ended up in the hands of Mossad. He started by bargaining ("let me work for you here, I'll put you on the Arpanet"), then breaking down and trying to appeal to Philip's humanity, followed by the accusations ("you're a monster"). The writing here was impeccable, as was the direction: it went on just long enough to be excruciating, and then one step further. And then him on the boat at the end, standing up to look out the window as the land disappeared. Man.

• The scene between "Jennifer" and Martha was wonderful on so many levels, as well as all the stuff that led up to it (the phone tapping, the "Columbia Record House" code). And then Jennifer said all the right things, pushed all the right buttons, and struggled with the difficult parts of it, but managed to get the job done. I wonder how she got away with not drinking all that much, though (presumably she wouldn't actually get drunk while working?). I just loved Jennifer's little mannerisms and key phrases--this last pair of episodes were really Elizabeth's chance to shine in terms of getting to play actual characters!

• Speaking of which, like others above, I also loved the conclusion of the Brad Mullins storyline, though I also appreciated that it took a backseat this episode after being centre stage last time. It was really interesting to me that Brad had deduced that he would never see Elizabeth's character for that mission (did she ever get a name?) again now that she had the files she needed on the other guy. I suspect the fact that she stopped him clued him in, and then she talked about her recovery being an ongoing process, and her age, at which point he saw the writing on the wall. Young and inexperienced, that one, but not dumb.

• I guess this isn't a specific moment, but Arkady was just generally so perfect in this episode. The humour was wonderful (the line about vodka and tobacco was great, and the "is President Reagan personally scaling the walls in his cowboy hat?" was even better), but it was great to see him in "valiant" mode, too ("I'll get Moscow to make a deal with these people if it costs me my career!") We see more of what makes him tick every week, and I'm just loving it.

Littler things:

• The marvelous use of Kenny Rogers' "The Gambler" in an episode called "The Deal," and first thing, i.e. before there's ever even any hint of either of the deals in the plot. Such a sharply written script (by Angelina Burnett, by the way, who got a solo writing credit on this one).

• Also beautifully written: the way that the Rezidentura side and the Directorate S side of the KGB were working in tandem this episode.

• Philip pegging the Mossad agent as an Israeli based on his accent because he sang Kenny Rogers' "The Gambler" in the scene with the police. There is nothing about that that's not awesome.

• I'd love to know at which point Mr. Mossad realized Philip was a KGB illegal, though. My read: he figured they were KGB during the fight, and when he heard them open their mouths to talk to the police, the rest registered (and he thought "oh, shit."). Thoughts?

• Also, the very realistic anti-Semitism in that scene ("is this what you Jews do, spy on your friends?")--followed by the little jabs later from Arkady back at the Rezidentura--is going to piss off some people, I'm sure, but I appreciated it because it would be an element in the relationship between any KGB agent and any Mossad agent at that point in time.

• It's hard to get a read on the new handler since she's had so little to do so far, but here's what we know about her: Kate, no Russian accent, young. It's unclear to what extent she was involved in the dealmaking, but she has to have at least been a go-between between the illegals side and the Rezidentura side of the KGB.

• I loved the little Paige scene, where she comes to her mother and says, basically: "this church thing isn't just me rebelling, this is me doing something for me." My read is that it didn't make Elizabeth less concerned at all (I'm sure the line about her "crazy life" only made Elizabeth feel worse), but Paige did manage to sense that Elizabeth was feeling like she failed them, and was trying to make it better by telling her she'd done nothing wrong.

• Nice to see Gaad get out of the office a bit! Even if the FBI's plot was ultimately foiled in what amounts to one of the worst possible ways. (Oleg is not a buffoon.)

• Mossad guy's ploy with the toilet was well executed, but not quiiiiiite good enough.

• The DOD trying to keep secrets from the FBI. Innnnnteresting.

• "I can get you onto the Arpanet. You don't have that in the Soviet Union!" Foreshadowing!

• Sandra doesn't have much to do yet this season, but it's not lost on me that the group she's fallen in with is est. Eek, Stan, EEK!

One last note: we've now come to the end of the episodes that the critics saw when they wrote their awesome reviews at the beginning of the season. Uncharted territory! Exciting. I trust them, though; I'm totally invested in the storyline as they've constructed it so far, and I can't imagine that changing.

-J

Edited Date: 2014-03-27 02:55 pm (UTC)

From:

quantumreality

EST! Wasn't that a flash in the pan cult in the late 1970s and early 1980s? Now I know why I got a bad vibe when I watched that scene this morning. :O

Also, LOL @ swordfights with icicles! I'd forgotten about that line.

• Speaking of which, like others above, I also loved the conclusion of the Brad Mullins storyline, though I also appreciated that it took a backseat this episode after being centre stage last time. It was really interesting to me that Brad had deduced that he would never see Elizabeth's character for that mission (did she ever get a name?) again now that she had the files she needed on the other guy. I suspect the fact that she stopped him clued him in, and then she talked about her recovery being an ongoing process, and her age, at which point he saw the writing on the wall. Young and inexperienced, that one, but not dumb.

Yep. I think Brad realized that once, from his perspective, the girl he was interested in had the stuff she needed to get something on her attacker, she wasn't going to stick around to be in a relationship.

And he has plenty of reason to believe it: her skittishness at physical intimacy, her insistence that she still needs "time" (for him, as far as he knows, it's a recent thing and not something that happened in the 1960s), etc.

A small comfort will be that at least he's unlikely to get in trouble, since P & E likely have no intention of making those papers public.

Edited Date: 2014-03-27 03:31 pm (UTC)

From:

jae

Not all that flash-in-the-pan, as I understand it, and a lot of the principles are still present in "The Forum." But yes. UGH.

My first thought after "man, poor Stan," is "so much for Sandra and Elizabeth ever being real friends!"

-J

From:

quantumreality

Ha! XD Oh god, if Elizabeth heard about what Sandra was into she'd probably go bug-eyed like O_O and then have a fit when she talked to Philip in private. :P

From:

jae

I'm not sure she'd make a distinction between that and Christianity or religious Judaism (it's all for weak people who can't handle reality, basically), but she'd certainly think less of Sandra for it.

-J

Re: est, Werner Erhard, etc.

From:

sistermagpie - Date: 2014-03-27 04:39 pm (UTC) - Expand

From:

apolla_savre

"True or false? My read is that he was actually telling the truth when he said he didn't remember the icicles, and that's what he was actually missing--having memories, not the specific things he'd be able to remember if he still could."

False. He couldn't give the agent any leverage over him. He was by himself, alone in an unsafe location, with the FBI/police hunting him.

"I don't remember" might have meant: right now I am not thinking of it, so no, I do not remember.

Not that he can't, but that he won't and therefore will not think of the memory, won't call it back, not there, not then, not with him.

Because he misses Russia. We all want the life we don't have - and he wants the simple life. He wants his family to be real, he wants his wife to be his wife, his children to be his children, for the biggest problem to be that he has to shovel out the walk.

He wouldn't look or respond to Baklanov for the same reason: the words impact him, but he can't let them do that.

What is EST? Why's it bad?

From:

jae

est by Werner Erhard. (You may deduce for yourself whether or not it's bad after reading about it. *g*)

-J

From:

apolla_savre

Well...that's freaky.

Stan! Your wife might be joining a cult!

Interesting that Peter Gabriel is listed as a noted participant

From:

From:

wendelah1 - Date: 2014-03-27 09:20 pm (UTC) - Expand

From:

alisonx

If I was Elizabeth right now I would be panicking and stressing about "why the hell does my daughter think she has a crazy life!??" If this was a soap I woulda expected a pregnancy confession or something. Hey, even Paris Hilton's lives The Simple Life. I really don't get why Paige thinks she leads a crazy life, perhaps a suspicious not-quite-right life, but not a crazy one.

From:

sistermagpie

I think Paige is a bit of a drama queen. I mean...she doesn't have a crazy life. Her parents have crazy lives, and her anxiety about it is real, but her actual life's been pretty stable. But then, these things are relative. Plus she's now hanging out with a girl in a much more contentious family situation so she's probably started seeing things through that lens.

From:

wendelah1

You see her as a drama queen? You don't think that seems a little harsh? She's what, 14 or 15 now? During the past year, her parents separated. We know she blamed her mother for that. Then with no warning, her mother went away. For a couple of months, her mother was just--gone. Because of the prior separation, Paige thought the reason Elizabeth left was that her mother was having an affair. Thanks to the KBG's careful planning, Paige thinks her mother was in Pennsylvania with "Aunt Helen." Although, since it was just a few hours away, I can't imagine what excuse Philip came up with for not going up to visit on the weekends.

Unavoidably, her dad must have been continuing his relationship with Martha while Elizabeth was gone, requiring more absences. He was still running other operations while she was gone, too. Now that she's back, her mother gets these urgent phone calls and has to leave at all times of the day or night--to do what, Paige must be wondering. Her mother is supposedly a travel agent!

What was it Paige said to the girl on the bus? "It just seems like there's always something going on. I'd just like to know what it is."

Children are remarkably adaptable. It wouldn't be ideal but if both of her parents were openly working a second job to make ends meet--because the travel business wasn't going well for example--that would be an easier situation for the children to cope with. That's why they came up with the story about Philip having to travel more out of town for work. But without a more rational explanation to fall back on, Paige is going to assume the worst thing that she can think of--that her mother is seeing someone else.

These things are relative. But having your parents separate and then having your mother gone for a couple of months and unavailable to you doesn't sound like a stable home life to me. She doesn't need to see her family situation though someone else's eyes to feel confused.

From:

wendelah1

Her parents are not the people she always believed they were, because they have been lying to her about everything her entire life. She is being told that lying will not be tolerated by her parents, who lie constantly, who make their living lying. Paige is smart and intuitive and things in her life just aren't adding up anymore. She's right! Everything about her life is a lie. She doesn't want to believe her parents are lying to her, but on some level she knows something is wrong--and it is!

Children want, children need to trust their parents. Paige is beginning to experience the stress and anxiety that accompanies cognitive dissonance--the discovery that your beliefs don't match up with reality. It's disconcerting and painful and it can make you feel like you're going crazy.

The saddest part about this is that Philip and Elizabeth love their children. They don't wish to cause them harm. But this is a form of emotional abuse. The fact that it's unintentional doesn't make it any less harmful to Paige.

From:

lovingboth

If I were Elizabeth, I would have hugged Paige.

From:

jae

I actually think Elizabeth is panicking and stressing about that. I mean, on some level she knows that Paige has a crazy life, because she's aware of a lot of levels of that that Paige herself isn't. But as we know from Elizabeth's line to Paige in "A Little Night Music" about her friendship Kelli ("But...you don't have a messed-up family!") that she thinks Paige should not be picking up on that. And the fact that she clearly is picking up on that would worry Elizabeth on multiple levels: on the level of the parent (what am I doing wrong that she's noticing this? how can I fix it?), but also on the level of the spy who needs to keep her cover from being blown (what does she know? how does she know it? what can we do about this?).

-J

From:

endeni

/"your name isn't your name, is it? is your face your face? are your children your children?"/ - OMG, that was the most powerful line of the episode!

/it went on just long enough to be excruciating, and then one step further/ - OMG, Anton saying saying please over and over was so excruciating...

From:

jae

That is the sort of thing that will haunt my dreams for a long time to come (as will Philip's face).

-J

Edited Date: 2014-03-28 12:13 pm (UTC)

From:

https://me.yahoo.com/a/2cl73ukouOPLb3eEcwaOru5o0Qo.lDJW#40de1

Just a question about the fact that the episode was this long - in the video I downloaded, there weren't any opening credits. I guess the version that aired on TV did have the opening credits, right? If so, where did act 1 begin?

-Emma

From:

jae

I think there actually may not have been! And no previouslies, either. But I do have the version that aired PVRed; I can double check it when I get home after work tonight if you'd like.

-J

From:

treonb

Wow.. I didn't even notice how long it was. My episode was 53 minutes, including previouslies, and opening/closing credits.

The first scene ends with the police car passing by Elizabeth (on the street) and Philip (behind the fence)

Forgot to mention: it also came with subtitles. Which was weird. I'd looked all over for them before starting to watch and couldn't find any, and there they were, waiting for me.

Edited Date: 2014-03-28 03:18 pm (UTC)

From:

lovingboth

The download from elsewhere on DW is 49m30s - that compares to 45m39s for s2e04 (inc 'previously..', and main titles, but no end credits).

It starts with Elizabeth banging on the door where Philip is hiding with Yossi. I noticed that there wasn't a 'previously..' I hadn't noticed it doesn't have any main credits either!

There is a glitch(?) where the bit where Arkady is listening to the radio new is repeated. My guess was that coincided with an ad break.

From:

quantumreality

That's a defective release, PS. The version you want has "previouslies" and starts out with P & E regrouping after the car got stolen right out from under them.

From:

quantumreality

There was an issue with the releases this week. Apparently a group that usually releases mkvs decided to just shove them into the mkv as-is. Eventually things got all sorted out though.