Jay: Ho hum. Another episode of The Americans, another sigh of disappointment. This is getting to become a ritual weekly event.
This time we have Granny telling Elizabeth the truth about Phil and Irina. We have Stan and Amador’s colleagues getting blown to smithereens. We have Amador himself starting to suspect his former girlfriend…of something. And we have a West German loose cannon on the prowl until he, too, gets blown to smithereens.
What a lot of these moments have in common, or how they tie together, is not always clear. Why, for instance, did Granny feel it necessary to sabotage Elizabeth’s marriage? Was this her backhanded way of exacting revenge for the beating she received at Elizabeth’s hands: a ruined marriage for a bruised face? Or was there some larger strategic calculation at play? My first thought was that this could set up a situation in which Elizabeth sells out Phil to her bosses for his lack of commitment, as revenge for his infidelity. But by the end of the episode, their tension had mostly dissipated into familiar marital discord.
Nina’s conversation with Stan at the end, meanwhile, was certainly bizarre. What exactly is going on at the embassy? Is she really being promoted, or is Arkady moving her up to keep a closer eye on her? Something about that situation seemed funky.
Also, it was never explained why the West German hired hand would have a problem with following directions from the KGB. What’s it to him whether or not a scientist lives or dies? As with so many aspects of The Americans, this is left unexplained.
Also, I guess I’m supposed to care that Phil’s and Elizabeth’s marriage is falling apart, right? Well, I don’t.
Do you?
Sam: Not in the least! I could care less about whether the Phil-Elizabeth love meter is hot or cold this week. You covered many of the same thoughts I had. We’ve said it before, and it seems like we always have to come back to it: the marital problems story is a dead horse that has already been beaten to nothing (like Phil and Elizabeth looking in an “empty” bathroom after the explosion).
The absolutely bipolar nature of how Elizabeth interacts with Phil just feels so…contrived. They always talk about how their job is the one thing they can truly depend on, but honestly, it seems to me that their marriage — if they would both simply invest in it for real — is the only thing they really can depend on. They can’t be naive enough to think the KGB will trust them completely forever, right?
I know many reviews have given this show a positive rating because of exactly this angle of looking at their marriage even though they’re spies. But, seriously, how many episodes can you really drag this storyline out before it’s the same old crap over and over again? I feel like we passed that point a few episodes already.
Frankly, it’s almost as if the writers think we’re too dumb to follow along. They ended last week’s episode with a great scene in which Phil lies to Elizabeth’s face, leading us to wonder how long they’d go before Elizabeth learned the truth. Well, we barely made half an episode, before that promising intrigue got squashed by none other than the perpetually annoying Granny. I do not get it.
The depressing downward trajectory of this show makes me feel so fed up with it that I don’t even want to theorize how Stan and Nina getting a safe house might be Agent Gadd’s way of gaining leverage on Stan (by this, I mean I think the house is bugged). Nor do I even feel excited to point out that Phil turning on the radio in their kitchen to talk to Elizabeth about top secret KGB stuff is simply laughable. There’s no point.
This show sucks. Or are we supposed to wait until the end of the season to make such a declarative statement? Do we even care what might happen in the coming episodes? (I really don’t.)
Jay: I’m completely with you on the tired plot lines. And to add to this complaint, whatever happened to the news about Phil’s child? Was it real? The whole story with Irina just seemed a bit off: in this latest episode, it functioned only to piss off Phil and Elizabeth even more at each other. Speaking of that, if Phil was really that upset and remorseful about lying to his wife, shouldn’t he have at least mentioned the possibility of having a son? Or is it just assumed that that’s not true? (Then again, if he doesn’t know for sure, maybe there’s no point in upsetting the volatile Elizabeth.)
In some ways, this is the flip side of what you were saying. You’re frustrated that the show doesn’t even trust us to hold a plot in our heads for an entire episode (Phil’s infidelity with Irina) before blowing open that secret. Meanwhile, I’m complaining that they didn’t address Irina’s maybe-kid this episode, not because I disagree with your assessment but precisely because I just assume that, if they’re going to continue a storyline, it’ll happen immediately.
I like the idea of Agent Gadd bugging the safe house. I never thought of that, but if Stan were a good agent he would’ve. I’m also mildly curious about Amador’s decision to tail his colleague this last episode. Things could get interesting if he finds anything out.
Sam: I thought the developments with Amador this week were also interesting. Did I just not pay close enough attention previously or was this the first time we found out he and Martha used to date? His seemingly so normal character just took on a darker side that maybe is not so cool anymore. His tailing Martha could be either he thinks she’s hiding something after catching her in that file room or he’s simply stalking her because he still wants her. The show seems to want us to think it’s more of the former.
Back to your question/comment about Phil and Irina’s child though. I honestly didn’t believe the child was real when Irina brought him up and showed Phil that picture. Maybe I’m just an awful cynic who thought she was using that to try to steal Phil away from Elizabeth and get him to run off with her. Who knows.
One thing I noticed this week was that they had a lot more scenes with people sleeping together than they have had in previous episodes. Or at least, that’s what it seemed to me. It was almost as if they thought they’d get more viewers with that strategy.
Any closing thoughts? Is there any hope left for this series, honestly?
Jay: I noticed the same thing! A lot of sex in this one. Again, with The Americans this could be more a matter of randomness than anything else.
As to your final comment, that’s the golden question: is this show ever going to turn the corner? In my (limited) experience, TV shows and movies tend not to get better after being given repeated chances to do so. So my hopes are dim. What is your prognosis?
Sam: Honestly, I fear I have no other thoughts than that this show has been extremely disappointing from the get-go. Whatever excitement I had before the series began dissipated by the end of the first episode, and I haven’t rediscovered it at all. As you probably remember, I didn’t think Homeland was all that good of a show early on, but as the series developed, it was clear that — personal qualms with certain characters aside — it was tremendously well written and well acted. Now I can’t stop raving about the show, even if we have dissected each episode. I see and feel none of that with The Americans, and it has proven to be exceptionally shallow in its writing and storytelling.
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