Agreed. I think this is the new show I’ve seen in quite some time.
You do realize that the FBI have helped to kill an innocent man.
This episode seemed to be setting things up for the future. They pretty much faxed to us what was going to happen. The only things which surprised me were Philip’s abduction and to a lesser extent the residents setting up at the end. But, we do have Elizabeth’s faith in her superiors shaken and Philip and Elizabeth losing trust. We see Gregory’s return.
I do think that the kids could have been handled better. While the sequence itself was good, it would have been interesting if they had called the FBI agents family door help when stranded. IIRC in the era before mobile phones, it was normal to have your relatives or family friends or neighbours number in an emergency.
But to balance things out, they helped the rezident, who recently had an American murdered, get a free plane ride.
The resident made it clear that he did not authorize the operation to kill the bald guy.
This is the reason I don’t watch any of the trailers for the next week episode, or even read the on-screen plot summaries. About halfway through the beat-down I figured it out that it had to be KGB, but I didn’t expect Granny’s face smashing.
This was a great episode to watch a second time, since there a lot of setup for the Rezident.
Do you think the guy who picked up the kids was evil or not? I think it was left ambiguous; he admitted to having problems in the past but then started to talk about religion. Was he trying to warn the kids about choosing a good lifestyle, or was he preparing them for their deaths?
I think this is the best written show on TV currently. It’s starting to remind me of The Wire with many interconnections that will eventually make sense.
CREEPY GUY: Do you believe in God?
IIRC, that was a question one of the Columbine shooters asked a student, right before he shot her. When he said it, my spidey sense went full-on.
I really liked how they told us to expect something unexpected, but not what, with these two items from when the FBI agent was talking to Nina:
- take pictures of anything, so long as it’s secret
- you won’t have to (take the camera out of the embassy)
So you knew it wasn’t going to be what you’d expect from a typical spy mission, but (at that point) had no idea what the angle would be.
I missed that. It seemed to me that he was obviously acting as a distraction to the FBI, luring them away from the actual meeting place. I think he was saddened by his death, but not unaware of the operation.
I’m utterly astonished that the wizened and world weary Russian rezident did not figure out that this young beautiful woman who was suddenly sleeping with him was the mole. It was as irritating as in it was in The Departed, where none of the gangsters thought the mole just might be the new guy that got “thrown out” of the police academy.
Absolutely agree. You do NOT use your agents that way and expect to retain them. They’ve just taken the loyalty you fought so hard to prove and shoved it in their faces. You can test your agents, run a scam to see if they will sell out, or other games, but when you abduct and torture and threaten their families like that, you kill their trust in you, the thing that makes them trustworthy. If you doubt the loyalty of your agents that badly, then follow them and surveil them, or pull them and send them home. But you cannot abuse them and then send them back to work as if nothing happened.
I was right there. I knew from the moment he was grabbed it had to be a Soviet trick to test their loyalty. Just from the premise of the show, but then also when Mr FBI doesn’t know anything about it, etc.
Yeah, I totally saw that coming. Young guy pulled over to give the teenage girl a ride? Then takes them out to the park to “feed the ducks”? Yeah, major creep alert. Then when he sent the brother for the beer, it was telegraphed what the boy was going to do. And I woulda done the same.
Actually, I quickly worked out they were going to plant the evidence on someone else to make a fake mole. I just didn’t clue in it was the Rezident until the teahouse scene.
I guess I understand why to pick him - it separates Nina from the sex relationship. Except that also destroys her strongest connection for information. But maybe it makes her last longer as a viable resource.
I don’t cry over the execution of the Rezident. He was a spy playing the same games against the Americans. Just look at the guy he had killed. Yes, he agreed to that guy’s murder. He put it off until they found out the FBI had changed the codes and thus knew about the meet. He knew the spy was unstable and ready to break. He okayed the hit, and ran decoy. He was innocent of the crime the Soviets punished him for, but that’s the game of spies.
Absolutely. First, he didn’t clue in when a 20 year old hot chick wants to give him a blow job out of the blue, and begins a sexual relationship. Then immediately there are mole issues. :dubious: Only a handful knew about the FBI code thing. Maybe he was too distracted to realize she overheard when the guy popped in on the office to tell him?
But when he pegs to the set up and didn’t immediately throw her under the bus? The look he gave her when being escorted away, he knew.
The kids raise alot of interesting questions. “Phillip” & “Elizabeth” obviously don’t have any living family; so what kind of provisions did they make for their children? If they both get killed does a KGB agent show up pretending to be an aunt or uncle long enough to sign the kids out’ve state custody and spirit them off to the Motherland? Or do they just end up wards of the state? What about a situtation like in this episode where they’re both “indisposed”, possibly for longer? What happens if they have a mission lasting several days?
Yeah, he clearly knew about the hit, but it’s not clear if he actually authorized it himself or if his #2 did by cabeling Moscow behind his back. In either event he’s still a spy; espionage is a capital crime and his diplomatic cover was the only thing standing in the way of us seizing him (granted we probally would’ve exchanged him for one of our spies instead of executing him).
[QUOTE=Irishman]
…Yeah, I totally saw that coming. Young guy pulled over to give the teenage girl a ride? Then takes them out to the park to “feed the ducks”? Yeah, major creep alert. Then when he sent the brother for the beer, it was telegraphed what the boy was going to do. And I woulda done the same…
[/QUOTE]
Yep, it was pretty clear he was planning on killing the boy, and raping & killing the girl. Maybe he would’ve raped the boy too.
No, you don’t do that with persons who enjoy diplomatic immunity. Unless the Soviets chose to waive that immunity (which they could do, but would have no reason to), the worst we could do to the Rezident would be to declare him persona non grata and kick him out of the country. No exchange, no prolonged detention, no interrogation.
When was that? I might have him mixed up with someone else, but I thought that when the rezident was on his way to the meeting with the traitor, another guy told him that the codes had been changed again, and his reply was something like, “Then we have no choice,” and next thing we knew, the traitor was killed.
At any rate, he must have been in on the decision to kill that other spy’s wife, and ship her baby to Russia. And hundreds of other things before that.
And just by the way, the reason the whole setup was necessary was to keep him from killing the woman sleeping with him, which would have happened in a day or two even in this show, and would have happened the same day as the other assassination in the real world. He is not an innocent man.
I don’t know if “innocent” is the right word - this is treason we’re talking about. Had the countries been reversed the US would probably have killed her too. Maybe not right away, but treason still gets the death penalty in the US doesn’t it?
That’s the maximum penalty, but I think you have to go back to the Rosenbergs to see it carried out. I can’t believe the US would execute anyone for a few days of leaking pretty minor stuff, unless it was some kind of huge scandal. In this case, hardly anybody knew about it.
It was pretty obvious even without reading the summary. I mean, if it had been anyone but other russian agents, wouldn’t that mean the end of the show more or less? Far too soon for that to happen.
The Rosenbergs were convicted of espionage, not treason. Treason convictions are extremely rare in the US because of the whole “2 witness to the same overt act” rule.
How come you didn’t quote the part of my post where I acknowledged that his diplomat status was the only thing *preventing *us from arresting him? :rolleyes:
He is innocent of the crime he is (presumably) going to be executed for. He is not “innocent” as in pure or good. Nobody on this show is except possibly for the juveniles.
He did not order the killing of the mole. The last scene in the episode before this one has him angry with his deputy about going over his head to Moscow.
I just rewatched the episode. When the Rezident is ready to go to the meet, his deputy explains that the FBI changed the code, and if he goes to the meet he could lead the FBI right to him. To which the Rezident says, “Then we have no choice.”
He wanders around stares at the water, and wanders back. It seems he’s reflecting and being maudlin.
Later, he does get mad about the guy contacting Moscow without his approval. One could think that is about the call to kill the agent, but I think it’s about telling Moscow there is a mole. That is the message to Moscow. The death of the agent was a necessity that the Rezident understood at that moment.
A couple things. First, it seemed incredibly stupid for the FBI to change the codes on the same day that they were trying to tail the Rezident to see who he was going to meet. They had to know that changing the codes so quickly would have alerted the Russians to the fact that they had a mole. Couldn’t they have at least waited until after the meet? Why would they tip their hand like that so quickly? Unless the FBI is run by morons, which doesn’t otherwise seem to be the case. Anyone have a fanwank?
Second – was there any particular significance to the item of jewelry Elizabeth gave to Phillip to give to his contact? She (Elizabeth) had an expression on her face like she was parting with something important. Or was it just the fact that Phillip has asked her for something he could give to someone else?
Apart from my first question, which is really bugging me for some reason, I’m enjoying the show quite a bit. I can even forgive the idea that the Rezident doesn’t know he’s getting blown for information. When you’re the one getting blown, its hard to take a look at the situation obejctively.
Also, I find it interesting that I’m somehow simulataneously rooting for both Elizabeth and Phillip AND their FBI agent neighbor. That will add an interesting dynamic if and when a confrontation finally occurs.
I must disagree that the Resident is being portrayed inaccuratley. Its been established that he is a lonely, burnt out (and possibly ill) man.She shows him affections and he is putty in her hands. Judgement has routinely gone to hell oin real life in situations like this.